The essay introduction provides a quick overview of where your argument is going. It should include your thesis statement and a summary of the essay’s structure. A typical structure for an introduction is to begin with a general statement about the text and author, using this to lead into your thesis statement.

What is it? Analysis of theme involves working the concept, thought, opinion or belief that the author expresses. It is very common (and helpful) to consider theme when analyzing another aspect of literature rather than on its own. The theme of a work is the main message, insight, or observation the writer offers.

Objectives

1. identify some of the literary elements used within a particular selection, including characterization, setting, plot, and theme.
2. practice analyzing how character, setting, plot, and theme affect one another.
3. develop evidence from a literary work to support a thesis statement.

Introduction introduces the main text to the readers. Literature Review critically evaluates the existing research on the selected research area and identifies the research gap.

As nouns the difference between introduction and definition is that introduction is the act or process of introducing while definition is (semantics) a statement of the meaning of a word or word group or a sign or symbol (dictionary definitions).

Critical Approaches to Literature. -examines language and literary conventions; plot, rhyme, meter, dialect, setting, point of view, etc. -focuses on aspects of everyday life in various cultures; using ideas of folklore, ritual, celebrations, traditions, etc.

Formalistic criticism examines plot, characterization, dialogue, point of view, setting, and style to show how these elements contribute to the theme or unity of the literary work. The meaning and value of a literary work resides in the text itself, independent of the author’s intent.

Sociological Criticism: This approach “examines literature in the cultural, economic and political context in which it is written or received,” exploring the relationships between the artist and society.

Three theoretical perspectives guide sociological thinking on social problems: functionalist theory, conflict theory, and symbolic interactionist theory. These perspectives look at the same social problems, but they do so in different ways.

Formalist Criticism — Focuses solely on a text, using the “elements” of literature and nothing else. The meaning resides in the text, not in the reader, and we need to analyze the text to discover the meaning. Biographical Criticism — Uses events from the author’s life to illuminate the text.

In literary theory, formalism refers to critical approaches that analyze, interpret, or evaluate the inherent features of a text. These features include not only grammar and syntax but also literary devices such as meter and tropes.

You don’t have to be a Marxist to do a Marxist analysis of literature. In literary theory, a Marxist interpretation reads the text as an expression of contemporary class struggle. Literature is not simply a matter of personal expression or taste. It somehow relates to the social and political conditions of the time.

A formalist critic examines the form of the work as a whole, the form of each individual part of the text (the individual scenes and chapters), the characters, the settings, the tone, the point of view, the diction, and all other elements of the text which join to make it a single text.

Literature. A literary text is a piece of writing, such as a book or poem, that has the purpose of telling a story or entertaining, as in a fictional novel. Its primary function as a text is usually aesthetic, but it may also contain political messages or beliefs.

Reading as a Formalist critic

1. Must first be a close or careful reader who examines all the elements of a text individually.
2. Questions how they come together to create a work of art.
3. Respects the autonomy of work.
4. Achieves understanding of it by looking inside it, not outside or beyond.
5. Allow the text to reveal itself.

The formalistic approach to literature examines a text by its “organic form” – its setting, theme, scene, narrative, image and symbol. It is often referred as “a scientific approach to literature,” because it advocates methodical and systematic readings of texts.

Formalism may be defined as a critical approach in which the text under discussion is considered primarily as a structure of words. That is, the main focus is on the arrangement of language, rather than on the implications of the words, or on the biographical and historical relevance of the work in question.

The psychological approach is a unique form of criticism in that it draws upon psychological theories in its interpretation of a text. Linking the psychological and literary worlds bring a kind of scientific aspect into literary criticism.