essay as prose

Definition of Prose

What really knocks me out is a book that, when you’re all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it.

Common Examples of First Prose Lines in Well-Known Novels

Examples of famous lines of prose, types of prose, difference between prose and poetry, writing a prose poem, prose edda vs. poetic edda, examples of prose in literature, example 1: the grapes of wrath by john steinbeck.

A large drop of sun lingered on the horizon and then dripped over and was gone, and the sky was brilliant over the spot where it had gone, and a torn cloud, like a bloody rag, hung over the spot of its going. And dusk crept over the sky from the eastern horizon, and darkness crept over the land from the east.

Example 2: This Is Just to Say by William Carlos Williams

I have eaten the plums that were in the icebox and which you were probably saving for breakfast Forgive me they were delicious so sweet and so cold

Example 3: Harrison Bergeron by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.

The year was 2081, and everybody was finally equal. They weren’t only equal before God and the law. They were equal every which way. Nobody was smarter than anybody else. Nobody was better looking than anybody else. Nobody was stronger or quicker than anybody else. All this equality was due to the 211th, 212th, and 213th Amendments to the Constitution, and to the unceasing vigilance of agents of the United States Handicapper General.

Synonyms of Prose

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How to Write the AP Lit Prose Essay + Example

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What is the ap lit prose essay, how will ap scores affect my college chances.

AP Literature and Composition (AP Lit), not to be confused with AP English Language and Composition (AP Lang), teaches students how to develop the ability to critically read and analyze literary texts. These texts include poetry, prose, and drama. Analysis is an essential component of this course and critical for the educational development of all students when it comes to college preparation. In this course, you can expect to see an added difficulty of texts and concepts, similar to the material one would see in a college literature course.

While not as popular as AP Lang, over 380,136 students took the class in 2019. However, the course is significantly more challenging, with only 49.7% of students receiving a score of three or higher on the exam. A staggeringly low 6.2% of students received a five on the exam. 

The AP Lit exam is similar to the AP Lang exam in format, but covers different subject areas. The first section is multiple-choice questions based on five short passages. There are 55 questions to be answered in 1 hour. The passages will include at least two prose fiction passages and two poetry passages and will account for 45% of your total score. All possible answer choices can be found within the text, so you don’t need to come into the exam with prior knowledge of the passages to understand the work. 

The second section contains three free-response essays to be finished in under two hours. This section accounts for 55% of the final score and includes three essay questions: the poetry analysis essay, the prose analysis essay, and the thematic analysis essay. Typically, a five-paragraph format will suffice for this type of writing. These essays are scored holistically from one to six points.

Today we will take a look at the AP Lit prose essay and discuss tips and tricks to master this section of the exam. We will also provide an example of a well-written essay for review.  

The AP Lit prose essay is the second of the three essays included in the free-response section of the AP Lit exam, lasting around 40 minutes in total. A prose passage of approximately 500 to 700 words and a prompt will be given to guide your analytical essay. Worth about 18% of your total grade, the essay will be graded out of six points depending on the quality of your thesis (0-1 points), evidence and commentary (0-4 points), and sophistication (0-1 points). 

While this exam seems extremely overwhelming, considering there are a total of three free-response essays to complete, with proper time management and practiced skills, this essay is manageable and straightforward. In order to enhance the time management aspect of the test to the best of your ability, it is essential to understand the following six key concepts.

1. Have a Clear Understanding of the Prompt and the Passage

Since the prose essay is testing your ability to analyze literature and construct an evidence-based argument, the most important thing you can do is make sure you understand the passage. That being said, you only have about 40 minutes for the whole essay so you can’t spend too much time reading the passage. Allot yourself 5-7 minutes to read the prompt and the passage and then another 3-5 minutes to plan your response.

As you read through the prompt and text, highlight, circle, and markup anything that stands out to you. Specifically, try to find lines in the passage that could bolster your argument since you will need to include in-text citations from the passage in your essay. Even if you don’t know exactly what your argument might be, it’s still helpful to have a variety of quotes to use depending on what direction you take your essay, so take note of whatever strikes you as important. Taking the time to annotate as you read will save you a lot of time later on because you won’t need to reread the passage to find examples when you are in the middle of writing. 

Once you have a good grasp on the passage and a solid array of quotes to choose from, you should develop a rough outline of your essay. The prompt will provide 4-5 bullets that remind you of what to include in your essay, so you can use these to structure your outline. Start with a thesis, come up with 2-3 concrete claims to support your thesis, back up each claim with 1-2 pieces of evidence from the text, and write a brief explanation of how the evidence supports the claim.

2. Start with a Brief Introduction that Includes a Clear Thesis Statement

Having a strong thesis can help you stay focused and avoid tangents while writing. By deciding the relevant information you want to hit upon in your essay up front, you can prevent wasting precious time later on. Clear theses are also important for the reader because they direct their focus to your essential arguments. 

In other words, it’s important to make the introduction brief and compact so your thesis statement shines through. The introduction should include details from the passage, like the author and title, but don’t waste too much time with extraneous details. Get to the heart of your essay as quick as possible. 

3. Use Clear Examples to Support Your Argument 

One of the requirements AP Lit readers are looking for is your use of evidence. In order to satisfy this aspect of the rubric, you should make sure each body paragraph has at least 1-2 pieces of evidence, directly from the text, that relate to the claim that paragraph is making. Since the prose essay tests your ability to recognize and analyze literary elements and techniques, it’s often better to include smaller quotes. For example, when writing about the author’s use of imagery or diction you might pick out specific words and quote each word separately rather than quoting a large block of text. Smaller quotes clarify exactly what stood out to you so your reader can better understand what are you saying.

Including smaller quotes also allows you to include more evidence in your essay. Be careful though—having more quotes is not necessarily better! You will showcase your strength as a writer not by the number of quotes you manage to jam into a paragraph, but by the relevance of the quotes to your argument and explanation you provide.  If the details don’t connect, they are merely just strings of details.

4. Discussion is Crucial to Connect Your Evidence to Your Argument 

As the previous tip explained, citing phrases and words from the passage won’t get you anywhere if you don’t provide an explanation as to how your examples support the claim you are making. After each new piece of evidence is introduced, you should have a sentence or two that explains the significance of this quote to the piece as a whole.

This part of the paragraph is the “So what?” You’ve already stated the point you are trying to get across in the topic sentence and shared the examples from the text, so now show the reader why or how this quote demonstrates an effective use of a literary technique by the author. Sometimes students can get bogged down by the discussion and lose sight of the point they are trying to make. If this happens to you while writing, take a step back and ask yourself “Why did I include this quote? What does it contribute to the piece as a whole?” Write down your answer and you will be good to go. 

5. Write a Brief Conclusion

While the critical part of the essay is to provide a substantive, organized, and clear argument throughout the body paragraphs, a conclusion provides a satisfying ending to the essay and the last opportunity to drive home your argument. If you run out of time for a conclusion because of extra time spent in the preceding paragraphs, do not worry, as that is not fatal to your score. 

Without repeating your thesis statement word for word, find a way to return to the thesis statement by summing up your main points. This recap reinforces the arguments stated in the previous paragraphs, while all of the preceding paragraphs successfully proved the thesis statement.

6. Don’t Forget About Your Grammar

Though you will undoubtedly be pressed for time, it’s still important your essay is well-written with correct punctuating and spelling. Many students are able to write a strong thesis and include good evidence and commentary, but the final point on the rubric is for sophistication. This criteria is more holistic than the former ones which means you should have elevated thoughts and writing—no grammatical errors. While a lack of grammatical mistakes alone won’t earn you the sophistication point, it will leave the reader with a more favorable impression of you. 

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Here are Nine Must-have Tips and Tricks to Get a Good Score on the Prose Essay:

• Carefully read, review, and underline key instruction s in the prompt.
• Briefly outlin e what you want to cover in your essay.
• Be sure to have a clear thesis that includes the terms mentioned in the instructions, literary devices, tone, and meaning.
• Include the author’s name and title  in your introduction. Refer to characters by name.
• Quality over quantity when it comes to picking quotes! Better to have a smaller number of more detailed quotes than a large amount of vague ones.
• Fully explain how each piece of evidence supports your thesis .  
• Focus on the literary techniques in the passage and avoid summarizing the plot. 
• Use transitions to connect sentences and paragraphs.
• Keep your introduction and conclusion short, and don’t repeat your thesis verbatim in your conclusion.

Here is an example essay from 2020 that received a perfect 6:

[1] In this passage from a 1912 novel, the narrator wistfully details his childhood crush on a girl violinist. Through a motif of the allure of musical instruments, and abundant sensory details that summon a vivid image of the event of their meeting, the reader can infer that the narrator was utterly enraptured by his obsession in the moment, and upon later reflection cannot help but feel a combination of amusement and a resummoning of the moment’s passion. 

[2] The overwhelming abundance of hyper-specific sensory details reveals to the reader that meeting his crush must have been an intensely powerful experience to create such a vivid memory. The narrator can picture the “half-dim church”, can hear the “clear wail” of the girl’s violin, can see “her eyes almost closing”, can smell a “faint but distinct fragrance.” Clearly, this moment of discovery was very impactful on the boy, because even later he can remember the experience in minute detail. However, these details may also not be entirely faithful to the original experience; they all possess a somewhat mysterious quality that shows how the narrator may be employing hyperbole to accentuate the girl’s allure. The church is “half-dim”, the eyes “almost closing” – all the details are held within an ethereal state of halfway, which also serves to emphasize that this is all told through memory. The first paragraph also introduces the central conciet of music. The narrator was drawn to the “tones she called forth” from her violin and wanted desperately to play her “accompaniment.” This serves the double role of sensory imagery (with the added effect of music being a powerful aural image) and metaphor, as the accompaniment stands in for the narrator’s true desire to be coupled with his newfound crush. The musical juxtaposition between the “heaving tremor of the organ” and the “clear wail” of her violin serves to further accentuate how the narrator percieved the girl as above all other things, as high as an angel. Clearly, the memory of his meeting his crush is a powerful one that left an indelible impact on the narrator. 

[3] Upon reflecting on this memory and the period of obsession that followed, the narrator cannot help but feel amused at the lengths to which his younger self would go; this is communicated to the reader with some playful irony and bemused yet earnest tone. The narrator claims to have made his “first and last attempts at poetry” in devotion to his crush, and jokes that he did not know to be “ashamed” at the quality of his poetry. This playful tone pokes fun at his childhood self for being an inexperienced poet, yet also acknowledges the very real passion that the poetry stemmed from. The narrator goes on to mention his “successful” endeavor to conceal his crush from his friends and the girl; this holds an ironic tone because the narrator immediately admits that his attempts to hide it were ill-fated and all parties were very aware of his feelings. The narrator also recalls his younger self jumping to hyperbolic extremes when imagining what he would do if betrayed by his love, calling her a “heartless jade” to ironically play along with the memory. Despite all this irony, the narrator does also truly comprehend the depths of his past self’s infatuation and finds it moving. The narrator begins the second paragraph with a sentence that moves urgently, emphasizing the myriad ways the boy was obsessed. He also remarks, somewhat wistfully, that the experience of having this crush “moved [him] to a degree which now [he] can hardly think of as possible.” Clearly, upon reflection the narrator feels a combination of amusement at the silliness of his former self and wistful respect for the emotion that the crush stirred within him. 

[4] In this passage, the narrator has a multifaceted emotional response while remembering an experience that was very impactful on him. The meaning of the work is that when we look back on our memories (especially those of intense passion), added perspective can modify or augment how those experiences make us feel

More essay examples, score sheets, and commentaries can be found at College Board .

While AP Scores help to boost your weighted GPA, or give you the option to get college credit, AP Scores don’t have a strong effect on your admissions chances . However, colleges can still see your self-reported scores, so you might not want to automatically send scores to colleges if they are lower than a 3. That being said, admissions officers care far more about your grade in an AP class than your score on the exam.

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What Is Prose In Writing? Find A Definition And Examples

As a creative writing teacher, a common question I get asked is “what is prose?” The term prose simply refers to spoken or written language. In the context of writing books, it describes a style of written words, distinct from poetry, numbers and metrics.

One of the biggest tasks many writers face is improving their ability to write prose. This guide offers the quickest and easiest solutions.

Below, we take a look at the different styles of writing prose, examples of each one, and advice from expert writers on getting better.

You can jump to the section you’re most interested in below:

Choose A Chapter

What is prose writing an easy definition, what are the main styles of prose, orwellian prose: the clear pane of glass, florid prose: the stained glass window, can you use a hybrid approach, examples of different styles of prose, 13 tips to help you write clear prose, learn more about writing prose, frequently asked questions (faq), join an online writing community.

So what is prose ?

It’s spoken or written language that does not rhyme or contain numbers. How we think, speak and write would be described as prose. When we write prose, we often apply a grammatical structure.

How Are Prose And Poetry Different?

Prose and poetry are different because poetry applies a rhythmic structure whereas prose follows a more standard mode of written language that follows natural speech patterns—an example being this very article you’re reading now.

Prose and poetry are therefore considered opposites.

What Is Purple Prose In Writing?

Purple prose is when a writer uses too many fancy words or describes things in a flowery, exaggerated way. It’s like adding too much frosting on a cupcake; it might look pretty, but it’s too much and can make it hard to enjoy.

There are a few main styles of writing prose. They are:

• Clear, concise prose, referred to as ‘Orwellian’, or the ‘clear pane of glass’, and;
• Florid, literary prose, referred to as the ‘stained glass window’.
• A hybrid of the two, which is an approach I favour. 

First, we’ll have a look at each, before looking at some examples.

If you’ve ever heard the phrase “good prose is like a window pane” and wanted to know the meaning behind it, here it is.

George Orwell in his essay, Politics and the English Language , set out what he thinks good prose writing ought to consist of, all the while attacking the British political system for the destruction of good writing practices.

Orwell was very much against the over-complication of language, which at the time (1946), was the direction politics was taking, and unfortunately still takes today.

Orwell believed prose should be like looking through a clear pane of glass at the story unfolding on the other side. It should be clear to understand. The writing should be invisible, drawing as little attention to itself as possible. The reader shouldn’t have to stop to re-read a sentence due to poor construction or stumble over a word used in the wrong way.

Words should be chosen because of their meaning, and to make them clearer, images or idioms, such as metaphors and similes, should be conjured. He encouraged the use of ‘newly invented metaphors’ which “assists thought by evoking a visual image”. Orwell encouraged writers to use the fewest and shortest words that will express the meaning you want.

“ Let the meaning choose the word.” 

If you can’t explain something in short, simple terms, you don’t understand it, was his argument. 

A change in the language used by politicians provoked Orwell to write his essay. Pretentious diction, as he called it—words such as phenomenon, element, objective, eliminate and liquidate—is used to dress up simple statements. He blamed politics for this, and how politicians adopt hollow words and phrases, mechanically repeating them over and over until they become meaningless.

I’m sure we can all agree we’re fed up of hearing such phrases. Orwell used ‘stand shoulder to shoulder’ as an example, and more recently we’ve seen Theresa May butcher the phrase ‘strong and stable’. These phrases are vague and bland and do not evoke any imagery, and if you’re a writer, they’re things you ought to avoid, Orwell argued.

Orwell’s Six Rules For Achieving Clear Prose

Orwell provided six rules to remember when writing prose. In following them, he argued, you could achieve clear prose that could be understood and enjoyed by all readers:

• Never use a metaphor, simile or other figure of speech which you are used to seeing in print;
• Never use a long word where a short one will do;
• If it is possible to cut out a word, always cut it out;
• Never use the passive [voice] where you can use the active;
• Never use a foreign phrase, a scientific word, or jargon word if you can think of an everyday English equivalent;
• Break any of these rules sooner than say anything outright barbarous.

So in summary, Orwellian prose is writing which is short, simple and understandable. And if you’re looking for a simple and effective method of how to write good prose, this is it.

They’re great guidelines to test out with short stories. With that type of narrative writing you need to make every word count, so they’re a great way to get used to them. It’s also a more preferred prose form among many literary agents, publishers , and editors.  

A Video Explainer On Orwellian Prose

If you’d like a more visual explainer on writing Orwellian prose, check out this brilliant video from bestselling author, Brandon Sanderson.

When we explore answers to the question, what is prose writing, one approach we inevitably turn to is the stained glass window—the antithesis to Orwell’s clear pane method.

With a stained glass window approach, you can still see the story on the other side, but the stained glass is colouring it in interesting ways. Language and structure are therefore florid and more creative. And it also tends to lean more heavily on the side of descriptive writing.

It’s used more in literary fiction and requires a mastery of language to pull off well. Brandon Sanderson refers to it as the artist’s style of prose, whereas Orwellian prose he regards as the craftsman’s style.

Above we mentioned the phrase ‘purple prose’. This is an attempt at creating a stained glass window, but the description and structure are poor , rendering the prose incomprehensible.

A blend of the clear pane and stained pane can work well. JRR Tolkien often adopted this, particularly with his descriptions, and other writers, Sanderson and David Gemmell to name but two, like to start chapters in a florid way before transitioning into the clear pane. Sometimes it can depend on the scene.

In fight scenes , for example, simple language is best adopted so the reader’s flow isn’t disrupted. When describing places, people or settings colourful language works well to liven up what would otherwise be quite mundane passages.

My personal preference is toward Orwellian prose writing. Writing should be clear and accessible to all. As writers, that’s what we want—to have our stories read and enjoyed by as many people as possible.

Having spent years working as a lawyer I know it’s not the case, and Orwell’s fears back in 1946 continue to materialise. In the end, I regarded my role as a lawyer as more of a translator of legal jargon. Writing shouldn’t be this way.

So we’ve taken a look at the different styles of prose writing. Now let’s take a look at some examples to better illustrate the different approaches. 

Examples Of A Clear Prose Style

One of my favourite writers of clear prose is Ernest Hemingway. His stories are immersive and gripping because they’re simple to follow. A clear pane of glass approach if ever there was one. 

Here’s an extract from Old Man And The Sea:

“He was happy feeling the gentle pulling and then he felt something hard and unbelievably heavy. It was the weight of the fish and he let the line slip down, down, down, unrolling off the first of the two reserve coils. As it went down, slipping lightly through the old man’s fingers, he still could feel the great weight, though the pressure of his thumb and finger were almost imperceptible.”

You can see here how clear the language is. “Imperceptible” may be the most difficult word used, but it almost doesn’t matter because what has come before it is so clear and vivid, we can picture the scene in our minds. 

Examples Of Flowery Prose

On the other side of the coin, we have flowery prose. One of my favourite writers of florid prose is JRR Tolkien. Some people find The Lord Of The Rings quite challenging to read when they first begin, and I was one of them, and it’s down to Tolkien’s unqiue voice. But once you grow accustomed to it, there’s something quite enchanting about it.

So to illustrate this style, here’s an extract from The Lord of The Rings (Book One):

So far in this guide on how to write prose, we’ve looked at the different approaches. Now we’re looking at the practical side of things—how we actually write great prose. Here are a few writing tips to help you achieve a clear style :

• Resist the temptation to get fancy . We all do it. Only the other day I was going through a story of mine with a friend. I’d written the phrase “after thrice repeating the words,” and he pulled me up on it, and rightly so. “Why not just say ‘after the third time’?” he asked. Simpler, more effective.
• Make good use of nouns and verbs, and refrain from indulging in adjectives and adverb s. Check out my 7 nifty editing tips which look at the impact too many adjectives and adverbs can have on your writing.
• Show don’t tell . This has cropped up a few times on the blog over the past few weeks, and for good reason. Telling the reader how a character feels is boring! Show it! 
• Behead the passive voice . Seek to use active verbs. But this can be harder than it looks. Check out my full guide to passive voice here.
• Use effective dialogue. You can find dialogue writing examples here 
• Try poetry and flash fiction . These facets of the craft will teach you the importance of each and every word. You’ll learn the power a single word can have, how it can provoke images, emotions or memories in the reader’s mind.
• Try using deliberate line breaks . Not only does this break up the wall of text to make it easier on the eye for the reader, it can help you emphasise key points as well as a structural device to build tension and suspense.
• Varying line lengths and sentence structure . This is a good one to help you build rhythm to your writing. Go back through your written prose and see how long each sentence is. If your sentences have similar strcutures, it can help to mix them up. Shorter sentences can help build suspense, longer sentences are useful for explanations and description. Keep this in mind as you go back through and edit, breaking up longer sentences into shorter ones or joining others together.  
• Cut out extraneous words. Remove unnecessary words that balloon sentences. Let’s look at some prose writing examples:

He quickly crossed to the opposite side of the road.

He crossed the road.

Remember Orwell’s rule: if you can cut out a word, do it. When it comes to writing clear prose, less is more . That’s a good guideline to remember.

• Be specific and concrete . Seek to conjure vivid images and avoid vague phrases. Orwell provides a wonderful example from the book Ecclesiastes of how specificity can create vivid images:

“… The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong, neither yet the bread to the wise, nor yet the riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to men of skill …”

• Pay attention to sentence structure, a.k.a. syntax. Sentences of a similar structure disrupt the flow and creates an awful rhythm. Short sentences increase the pace as well as tension, are effective at hitting home points, or signalling a change in tone. A short sentence I’d say is one less than half a line. Be warned: do not overuse them. A short sentence packs a punch, and you don’t want to bludgeon your reader. For an example of short sentences used well, check out Anna Smith Spark’s debut novel The Court of Broken Knives . Then come the medium-length sentences—one to two lines—which keeps the pace at a steady level. Anything over two lines and I’d say that’s a pretty long sentence. Long sentences are useful for pieces of description, slowing the pace or reducing tension. You can even be clever and use them to throw the reader off-guard. Watch out for your use of commas too and keep an eye on syllables. Read your work aloud to reveal these problems.
• Trust your reader . At some stage, we’ve all been guilty of holding the reader’s hand. Seek to create intrigue by withholding details.
• Avoid clichés and be mindful of tropes . It cheapens your writing and gives the reader the impression of laziness.
• What am I trying to say?
• What words will express it?
• What image or idiom (a group of words that establish a meaning that a single word cannot) will make it clearer?
• Is the image/idiom fresh enough to have an effect?
• Could I put it more shortly?
• Have I said anything that is avoidably ugly?

I’ve included a few other materials for you to further your reading.

Check out this English literature writing guide by the University of Edinburgh

If you’d like to study creative writing , check out this writing course offered by the University of East Anglia. If you’d like more resources like this, you can also check out my online writing classes .

To learn more about using the 5 senses in writing , which is a vital part of prose, check out this guide.

For some of the best tips around on writing a book for the first time , head here. You can find lots of brilliant advice for first time authors. 

A great way to improve your prose is by writing short stories . Head here for a complete guide

Learn about sensory language examples here which can immensely improve your prose.

And head here for advice on when to rewrite your story .

And for more on character development and how to write a plot , head here.

Prose relates to ordinary everyday speech, so it’s arguably easier to write than poetry. However, many writers fall into the trap of writing ‘purple prose’, which is easy to write but not very good to read.

Prose carries with it no formal or set structure. It does, however, apply the general principles of grammar. It often reflects common or conversational speech.

Prose means the ordinary, everyday language that’s spoken or written. It is often distinguished from poetry due to its lack of a rhythmic structure.

In writing, prose relates to any form of written work in which the general rules of grammar and structure are followed. This is distinct from poetry, which follows a more rhythmic structure.

In the context of writing, prose refers to words assembled in a way that we wouldn’t otherwise describe as poetry or non-rthymic.

Written in prose simply means that a piece of text has been written down in a non-rhythmic way.

There are two main types of prose style—George Orwell’s the clear pane of glass, and on the opposite end of the spectrum, the stained glass window. Orwell believed in clear and simple, plain language. The stained glass window, on the other hand, opts for a more florid style.

Thank you for reading this guide on how to write prose. Hopefully, this post has shed light on the mysteries of prose and how you can achieve that clear, readable style.

If you’d like more help with your writing or would like to connect with like-minded writers, why not join my online writing community. There are hundreds of us all sharing advice, tips, calls for submissions, and helping each other out with our stories.  We congregate on Facebook and Discord. To join, just click below. 

If you need any more help with your prose writing, get in contact .

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richiebilling

About author, related posts, the best and most interesting words to describe a book, the best words to describe teachers, the best and most unique words that start with 'e' to describe someone, 14 comments.

Reblogged this on Richie Billing and commented:

For my 50th post I thought I’d take a look back at the past 5 or so months at what I’ve thrown out into the world for your enjoyment. I was going to share the most popular post to date, but instead I’ve decided to share my personal favourite—the one that’s helped me the most in researching and writing it. So here it is, my guide to writing Orwellian prose.

Thank you to everyone who’s so far subscribed to this blog. It means a hell of a lot. In the months to come I’ll be looking to giveaway more free content and of course keep the articles coming. Here’s to the next 50!

Guess I”m more George Orwel than John Milton … 🙂 Just one thing (from a Jesuit-trained Old Xav with penchant for Latin grammar) The Passive voice gets a lot of ‘bad press’ which IMHO is often undeserved. You use an Active verb when you’re doing somehing. But you still need a Passive verb when someone is DOInG SOMETHING to you! Also: it’s almost impossible to write a grammatical French sentence without using a Reflexive verb. The Reflexive (s’asseoir, ‘to sit’ OR se plaire, ‘to please’) is a variation on Passive. They also use what in English grammar is called the subjunctive Mood, particularly in speech and even when Grammar insists that an Active verb is required … you can’t trust the French! LOL

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What is Prose? Definition, Examples of Prose

Home » The Writer’s Dictionary » What is Prose? Definition, Examples of Prose

Definition of prose: Prose is often defined as straightforward rather than poetic writing.

What is Prose?

When identifying a piece of writing as prose, the piece should be written in a typical, straightforward manner. It will follow grammatical structures rather than a meter or verse pattern.

Examples of Prose in Writing

Erik Larson’s The Devil in the White City , is a work of nonfiction that utilizes prose when describing the effect the fair had on the local hospitals:

• “With so many people packed among the steam engines, giant rotating wheels, horse-drawn fire trucks, and rocketing bobsleds, the fair’s ambulances superintended by a doctor named Gentles were constantly delivering bruised, bloody, and overheated visitors to the exposition hospital.”

Mark Haddon also writes using prose in his novel The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time when his teenaged protagonist finds his neighbor’s murdered dog:

• “It was 7 minutes after midnight. The dog was lying on the grass in the middle of the lawn in front of Mrs. Shears’s house. Its eyes were closed. It looked as if it was running on its side, the way dogs run when they think they are chasing a cat in a dream. But the dog was not running or asleep. The dog was dead.”

Different Types of Prose

While prose can be broadly defined as straightforward writing that resembles everyday spoken word, there are categories that prose can be broken into: nonfiction, fictional, heroic, and poetry.

Nonfictional prose writings are pieces that are written that contain mostly facts but may contain pieces of fictional information for literary purposes. Many memoirs can be described as nonfictional prose because the writers often include fictional information to make their life stories more interesting for the readers.

Fictional prose is writing that is entirely made up by the authors such as in short stories or in novels. These are pieces such as J. K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series or Gone Girl by Gillian Flynn.

Heroic prose pieces are written or oral stories that follow the traditional structure used by oral expressionists such as Homer’s The Illiad and The Odyssey . Both of these pieces include such structures as an invocation to the Muses or epithets that are used in oral storytelling.

Prose in poetry refers to works that include large amounts of poetic devices such as imagery, alliteration, and rhythm but are still written in a straightforward manner rather than in verse form.

The Function of Prose

Prose is used when the writer wants to tell a story in a straightforward manner. It should be used when the writer wants their writing to resemble everyday speech.

Examples of Prose in Literature

Here are some examples of prose in literature:

Nonfictional prose can be found in Zora Neale Hurston’s autobiography Dust Tracks on a Road because the piece is told in a straightforward manner:

• “I was born in a Negro town. I do not mean by that the black back-side of an average town. Eatonville, Florida, is, and was at the time of my birth, a pure Negro town—charter, mayor, council, town marshal and all.”

Fictional prose is used in John Kennedy Toole’s only novel A Confederacy of Dunces :

• “ Ignatius himself was dressed comfortably and sensibly. The hunting cap prevented head colds. The voluminous tweed trousers were durable and permitted unusually free locomotion.”

Dramatic prose can be found in William Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. Shakespeare often uses prose in this play when servants talk to show their lack of education and has higher-class characters talk in verse form. Here a servant speaks:

• “Now I’ll tell you without asking: my master is the great rich Capulet; and if you be not of the house of Montagues, I pray, come and crush a cup of wine. Rest you merry!”

Define prose: Prose is writing that resembles everyday speech. It is straightforward, ordinary language rather than following a meter or rhythmic pattern like poetry.

Final example of prose:

Ayn Rand’s novella Anthem is written using the ordinary language found in prose:

• “It is a sin to write this. It is a sin to think words no others think and to put them down upon a paper no others are to see. It is base and evil.”

• Literary Terms
• When & How to Write a Prose
• Definition & Examples

How to Write Prose

There’s just one rule for writing prose: don’t write verse by mistake. If you grew up in the modern world, chances are you’ve been writing prose since the day you started stringing sentences together on a page. So all you have to do now is keep it up!

• In general, prose does not have line breaks; rather, it has complete sentences with periods or other punctuation marks.
• There’s another very important kind of line break that makes your prose easier to understand: paragraph breaks. Paragraphs break up your writing into manageable chunks that the reader can digest one at a time as they read. This is especially important in essays , where each paragraph contains a single “step” in the argument. Without paragraph breaks, prose becomes pretty ugly: just a huge block of words without any breaks or structure at all!

When to Use Prose

Unless you’re writing poetry, you’re writing prose. (Remember that prose has a negative definition.) As we saw in §2, essays use prose. This is mainly just a convention – it’s what readers are used to, so it’s what writers use. In the modern world, we generally find prose easier to read, so readers prefer to have essays written that way. The same thing is true for stories – we have an easier time following the story when it’s written in prose simply because it’s what we’re accustomed to.

So you can use prose pretty much anywhere – poetry is the only kind of writing that frequently uses verse, meaning prose covers everything else . And even poetry, as we’ve seen, can be written in prose. So when should you use prose? The answer is: all over the place.

List of Terms

• Alliteration
• Amplification
• Anachronism
• Anthropomorphism
• Antonomasia
• APA Citation
• Aposiopesis
• Autobiography
• Bildungsroman
• Characterization
• Circumlocution
• Cliffhanger
• Comic Relief
• Connotation
• Deus ex machina
• Deuteragonist
• Doppelganger
• Double Entendre
• Dramatic irony
• Equivocation
• Extended Metaphor
• Figures of Speech
• Flash-forward
• Foreshadowing
• Intertextuality
• Juxtaposition
• Literary Device
• Malapropism
• Onomatopoeia
• Parallelism
• Pathetic Fallacy
• Personification
• Point of View
• Polysyndeton
• Protagonist
• Red Herring
• Rhetorical Device
• Rhetorical Question
• Science Fiction
• Self-Fulfilling Prophecy
• Synesthesia
• Turning Point
• Understatement
• Urban Legend
• Verisimilitude
• Essay Guide
• Cite This Website

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Your chance of acceptance, your chancing factors, extracurriculars, writing a prose essay.

I've got an assignment to write a prose essay, but I'm not exactly sure what that means. Can any of you help me understand the definition of a prose essay and maybe some tips on how to write one?

A prose essay is a type of essay written in prose, which is a natural, flowing form of language, as opposed to verse or poetry. Essentially, when you're asked to write a prose essay, you're being asked to write an essay in complete sentences, organized into paragraphs, that clearly communicates your thoughts and ideas.

To write a prose essay, follow these steps:

1. Understand the prompt: Read the essay prompt or question carefully and make sure you fully comprehend what is being asked of you. Ask your teacher if you're unclear about what the point of the question is.

2. Brainstorm and outline: Jot down your thoughts and ideas related to the prompt and begin organizing them into a logical structure. Create an outline to serve as the framework for your essay, with a clear introduction, body, and conclusion.

3. Introduction: Start with an engaging opening line that grabs the reader's attention and introduces the topic. Provide some background information and outline the main points you plan to cover in the essay.

4. Body paragraphs: Each paragraph should focus on a single main point that supports your overall argument. Use evidence, examples, and analysis to back up your claims and explain how they connect to the essay's central theme.

5. Transitions: Smoothly transition between paragraphs and ideas with appropriate phrases and sentences. This will help improve the readability and flow of your essay.

6. Conclusion: Summarize the most important points made in the body paragraphs and restate the thesis or main argument. Offer some insight or thoughts about the implications of your analysis.

7. Edit and revise: Carefully review your essay for clarity, coherence, grammar, and spelling errors—even small typos may give your reader the impression that you don't care all that much about what you're writing about. Make necessary changes to improve readability and ensure that your essay effectively addresses the prompt. Reading your essay out loud can sometimes be a good way of identifying snag points.

Finally, remember to keep your language clear and concise, while still using a variety of sentence structures and vocabulary to make your essay more engaging. Good luck with your prose essay assignment!

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Prose: Understanding, Examples & Writing Tips

What is prose.

• Prose classifications
• Examples of prose
• How to write prose
• Tips for writing effective prose

Ever wondered what makes a piece of writing engaging, readable, and relatable? A lot of it has to do with its structure and form. One such form of writing is prose. In this blog, we'll unravel the definition of prose, its various classifications, examples, and even some handy tips for writing effective prose. So, let's jump right in!

At its simplest, the definition of prose refers to any form of writing that doesn't have a strict metrical structure. Unlike poetry, which often relies on rhythm and rhyme, prose follows the natural patterns of everyday speech. Now, let's explore some key characteristics and types of prose.

The Characteristics of Prose

Prose is a versatile form of writing with several distinct characteristics:

• Ordinary Language: Prose uses everyday language, the kind you use when chatting with friends or writing an email. It's easy to understand, without any fancy or poetic elements.
• Structured Sentences: Sentences in prose follow grammatical rules and have a clear beginning, middle, and end. This structure makes prose easy to read and comprehend.
• No Rhyme or Rhythm: Unlike poetry, prose doesn’t have to rhyme or follow a specific rhythm. It flows naturally, just like spoken language.

Types of Prose

Prose can take on many forms, depending on its purpose. Here are a few you may recognize:

• Narrative Prose: This type of prose tells a story. It's what you'll find in novels, short stories, and biographies.
• Nonfiction Prose: This form of prose shares real-life experiences, facts, or ideas. Think newspaper articles, essays, and textbooks.
• Dramatic Prose: Dramatic prose is used in plays and scripts. It's written to be performed, rather than read silently.

Now that we've covered the definition of prose and its types, you're well on your way to understanding this versatile form of writing. Next, we'll look at some examples of prose to solidify your understanding. But we'll save that for our next section. Stay tuned!

Prose Classifications

Having grasped the basic definition of prose, let's move on to the various ways prose can be classified. Understanding these classifications can help you better appreciate the depth and diversity of prose in literature.

Literary Prose

Literary prose is a term often used to describe works of fiction and certain types of creative nonfiction. This classification includes:

• Novels: Long works of fiction with complex plots, subplots, and well-developed characters.
• Short Stories: Brief works of fiction, typically focusing on a single event or character.
• Essays: Short pieces of nonfiction that explore a particular topic from the author's perspective.

Functional Prose

Functional prose refers to writing that serves a practical purpose. This includes:

• Instruction Manuals: Guides that provide step-by-step instructions on how to use a product or perform a task.
• Reports: Formal documents that relay information or results in a structured format.
• Business Letters: Professional correspondence often used in the corporate world.

Conversational Prose

Conversational prose emulates the style and tone of everyday speech. Some examples include:

• Dialogues: Conversations between characters in novels, short stories, or plays.
• Personal Letters: Informal written communication between friends, family, or acquaintances.
• Blog Posts: Informal articles written in a conversational tone, such as this one!

With these classifications in mind, you'll start to see the breadth of prose in everyday life—from the books on your shelf to the instruction manual for your coffee maker. But how do these different types of prose come to life? Let's delve deeper into some examples in our next section. Stay tuned!

Examples of Prose

Now that you've got a solid understanding of the different types of prose, let's dive into some examples. This should help cement your understanding and give you a more tangible sense of what the definition of prose really entails.

Examples of Literary Prose

When it comes to literary prose, one can't help but think of classic novels. Take, for example, Jane Austen's "Pride and Prejudice." In this novel, Austen's prose is elegant, witty, and deeply revealing of her characters' inner lives. Another example is "To Kill a Mockingbird" by Harper Lee, where the prose is simple yet powerful, and carries a heavy emotional impact.

Examples of Functional Prose

An example of functional prose could be the instruction manual included with your microwave. It's direct, clear, and serves a practical purpose—helping you figure out how to heat up your leftovers! Another example is a business report, such as a quarterly earnings report for a company, which provides structured and factual information about the company's financial performance.

Examples of Conversational Prose

In conversation, we use prose all the time without even realizing it. Think about the last text message you sent—it's likely a great example of conversational prose. Or consider the dialogue in your favorite sitcom. The characters' conversations are examples of prose that are designed to sound natural and spontaneous.

Hopefully, these examples have brought the definition of prose to life for you. Now, onto the fun part: how to write your own prose.

How to Write Prose

Writing prose isn't about fancy words or complex sentences. It's about clarity, rhythm, and meaning. If you've been wondering how to apply the definition of prose to your own writing, here are some steps to get you started.

Choose Your Purpose

First, decide why you're writing. Are you trying to entertain readers with a gripping story? Convey information in a clear and concise way? Or engage in a casual conversation? Your purpose will help shape the style and tone of your prose.

Plan Your Message

Next, consider your message. What do you want your readers to understand, feel or do after reading your prose? Keep this message in mind as you're writing—it will guide your choice of words and sentence structures.

Write with Clarity

When you write prose, strive for clarity. Use simple, everyday words. Make your sentences short and to the point. And remember, it's not about how complicated you can make the sentence, but how easily your reader can understand it.

Revise and Refine

Finally, always take the time to revise and refine your prose. Look for ways to make your writing more clear, concise, and engaging. Remember, the more you practice, the better you'll get at writing prose.

Now, you're ready to take your understanding of the definition of prose and put it into practice. But before you do, let's look at a few tips to make your prose even more effective.

Tips for Writing Effective Prose

Now that you've got a handle on the definition of prose and how to write it, let's delve a little deeper. Here are a few tips that can help make your writing more engaging and effective.

Use Active Voice

Active voice makes your writing more direct and engaging. So, instead of writing "The cake was eaten by the dog," write "The dog ate the cake." It's a simple change, but it can make a big difference in how your writing is received.

Keep Sentences and Paragraphs Short

Long sentences and paragraphs can be hard to follow. So, try to keep your sentences short and sweet. And break up your paragraphs into smaller chunks. This makes your writing easier to read and understand.

Choose the Right Word

Every word matters when you're writing prose. So, choose your words carefully. Use words that are precise and clear. And avoid jargon or overly complicated terms. Remember, your goal is to communicate, not to confuse.

Add Variety to Your Sentence Structures

Varied sentence structures can make your writing more interesting. So, don't be afraid to mix things up. Use short sentences. Use long sentences. Use sentences that start with "And" or "But." The key is to keep your reader engaged and interested.

By applying these tips, you'll be able to write prose that is clear, engaging, and effective. And remember, the best way to improve your prose is to write, write, and write some more. So, what are you waiting for? Get out there and start writing!

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Any writer looking to master the art of storytelling will want to learn the literary devices in prose. Fiction and nonfiction writers rely on these devices to bring their stories to life, impact their readers, and uncover the core truths of life. You can, too, with mastery over the different literary devices! 

If you’re not familiar with the common literary devices, start with this article for definitions and examples. You may also benefit from brushing up on the six elements of fiction , as most prose stories have them. Combined with the following literary devices in fiction and nonfiction, these framing elements can help you write a powerful story.

10 Important Literary Devices in Prose

We’ve included examples and explanations for each of these devices, pulling from both contemporary and classical literature. Whether you’re a writer, a student, or a literary connoisseur, familiarize yourself with the important literary devices in prose.

1. Parallelism (Parallel Plots)

Parallelism refers to the plotting of events that are similarly constructed but altogether separate.

Are you familiar with the phrase “history often repeats itself”? If so, then you’re already familiar with parallelism. Parallelism refers to the plotting of events that are similarly constructed but altogether separate. Sometimes these parallels develop on accident, but they are powerful tools for highlighting important events and themes.

A surprising example of parallelism comes in the form of the Harry Potter series. As an infant, Harry is almost killed by Voldemort but is protected by his mother’s love. Eighteen years later, Harry must die in order to defeat Voldemort, thus shouldering the burden of love himself.

What does this parallelism do for the story? Certainly, that’s open to interpretation. Perhaps it draws attention to the incompleteness of love without action: to defeat Voldemort (who personifies hatred), Harry can’t just be loved, he has to act on love—by sacrificing his own life, no less.

This is unrelated to grammatical parallelism , a different literary device.

2. Foil Characters

A foil refers to any two characters who are “opposites” of each other.

A foil refers to any two characters who are “opposites” of each other. These oppositions are often conceptual in nature: one character may be even-keeled and mild, like Benvolio in Romeo & Juliet, while another character may be quick-tempered and pugnacious, like Tybalt.

What do foil characters accomplish? In Romeo & Juliet , Benvolio and Tybalt are basically Romeo’s devil and angel. Benvolio discourages Romeo from fighting, as it would surely end in his own death and separation from Juliet, whereas Tybalt encourages fighting out of family loyalty.

Of course, foils can also be the protagonist and antagonist, especially if they are character opposites. A reader would be hard-pressed to find similarities between Harry Potter and Voldemort (except for their shared soul). If you can think of other embodiments of good versus evil, they are most assuredly foils as well.

Foil characters help establish important themes and binaries in your work.

Foil characters help establish important themes and binaries in your work. Because Shakespeare wrote Benvolio and Tybalt as foils, one of the themes in Romeo & Juliet is that of retribution: is it better to fight for honor or turn the other cheek for love?

When considering foil characters in your writing, consider which themes/morals you want to turn your attention towards. If you want to write about the theme of chaos versus order, and your protagonist is chaotic, you might want a foil character who’s orderly. If you want to write about this theme but it’s not central to the story, perhaps have two side characters represent chaos versus order.

Learn more about foil characters here:

What is a Foil Character? Exploring Contrast in Character Development

You’ll often hear that “diction” is just a fancy term for “word choice.” While this is true, it’s also reductive, and it doesn’t capture the full importance of select words in your story. Diction is one of the most important literary devices in prose, as every prose writer will use it.

Diction is best demonstrated through analyzing a passage of prose, so to see diction in action, let’s take apart the closing paragraphs of The Great Gatsby . 

Take a look at the highlighted words, as well as the opposition between different highlights. F. Scott Fitzgerald juxtaposes many different emotions in this short, poignant passage, resulting in an ambivalent yet powerful musing on the passage of time. By focusing the diction of this passage on emotions both hopeful and hopeless, Fitzgerald masterfully closes one of the most important American novels.

For a further analysis of diction, as well as some great examples, check out our article expanding upon word choice in writing !

The mood of a story or passage refers to the overall emotional tone it invokes.

The mood of a story or passage refers to the overall emotional tone it invokes. When writers craft a mood in their work, they’re heightening the experience of their story by putting you in the characters’ shoes. Since mood requires using the right words throughout a scene, mood can be considered an extended form of diction.

The writer cultivates mood by making consistent language choices throughout a passage.

The writer cultivates mood by making consistent language choices throughout a passage of the story. Take, for example, the cliché “it was a dark and stormy night.” That phrase wasn’t clichéd when it was first written; in fact, it did a great job of opening Edward Bulwer-Lytton’s novel Paul Clifford . The narrator’s dark, bleak description of the weather brings the reader into the bleary, tumultuous life of its protagonist, building a mood in both setting and story.

Or, consider this excerpt from Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë:

Charlotte is quick to build the mood, keying in on Jane’s sombre beginnings before juxtaposing it against the ironic perfection of her siblings. Jane’s world is clear from the beginning: a cloudy house amidst a sunny street.

Learn more about this device at our article on mood in literature.

What is Mood in Literature? Creating Mood in Writing

5. Foreshadowing

A foreshadow refers to any time the writer hints towards later events in the story.

Foreshadowing is a powerful literary device in fiction, drawing readers ever-closer to the story’s climax. A foreshadow refers to any time the writer hints towards later events in the story, often underscoring the story’s suspense and conflict.

Sometimes foreshadowing is obvious, and sometimes you don’t notice it until rereading the story.

Sometimes foreshadowing is obvious, and sometimes you don’t notice it until rereading the story. For example, the foreshadowing in Harry Potter makes it fairly obvious that Harry will have to die. Once the idea of horcruxes, or “split souls,” was introduced in the books, it was only a matter of time before readers connected these horcruxes to the psychic connection Harry shared with Voldemort. His mission—to die and be reincarnated—becomes fairly obvious as the heptalogy comes to a close.

However, sometimes foreshadowing is much more discreet. In Jane Eyre , for example, it’s clear that many of the people in Jane’s life are keeping secrets from her. Rochester doesn’t let anyone know about his previous marriage but it gets alluded to several times, and St. John is reluctant to admit that he does not actually love Jane, foreshadowing Jane’s return to Rochester. All of this combines to reinforce Jane’s uncertain place in the world and the journey she must take to settle down.

6. In Media Res

In Media Res refers to writing a story starting from the middle

From the Latin “In the middle of things,” In Media Res is one of the literary devices in prose chiefly concerned with plot. In Media Res refers to writing a story starting from the middle; by throwing the reader into the center of events, the reader’s interest piques, and the storytelling bounces between flashback and present day.

Both fiction and nonfiction writers can use In Media Res, provided it makes sense to do so. For example, Margaret Atwood’s A Handmaid’s Tale begins in the middle of a dystopian society. Atwood leads us through the society’s establishment and the narrator’s capture, but all of this is in flashback, because the focus is on navigating the narrator’s escape from this evil world.

In Media Res applies well here, because the reader feels the full intensity of this dystopia from its start. Writers who are writing stories in either alternate worlds or very private worlds may benefit from this literary device in fiction, as it helps keep the reader interested and attentive.

7. Dramatic Irony

Dramatic irony occurs when the audience understands more about the situation than the story’s characters do.

Dramatic irony is a literary device in prose in which the audience understands more about the situation than the story’s characters do. This is an especially important literary device in fiction, as it often motivates the reader to keep reading.

We often see dramatic irony in stories which involve multiple points-of-view.

We often see dramatic irony in stories which involve multiple points-of-view. For example, the audience knows that Juliet is still alive, but when Romeo discovers her seemingly dead body, he kills himself in grief. How ironic, then, for Juliet to wake up to her lover’s passing, only to kill herself in equal grief. By using dramatic irony in the story, Shakespeare points towards the haphazardness of young love.

8. Vignette

A vignette is a passage of prose that’s primarily descriptive, rather than plot-driven.

A vignette (vin-yet) refers to a passage of prose that’s primarily descriptive, rather than plot-driven. Vignettes throw the reader into the scene and emotion, often building the mood of the story and developing the character’s lens. They are largely poetic passages with little plot advancement, but the flourishes of a well-written vignette can highlight your writing style and the story’s emotions.

The story snippets we’ve included are striking examples of vignettes. They don’t advance the plot, but they push the reader into the story’s mood. Additionally, the prose style itself is emotive and poetic, examining the nuances of life’s existential questions.

9. Flashback

A flashback refers to any interruption in the story where the narration goes back in time.

A flashback refers to any interruption in the story where the narration goes back in time. The reader may need information from previous events in order to understand the present-day story, and flashbacks drop the reader into the scene itself.

Flashbacks are often used in stories that begin In Media Res, such as The Handmaid’s Tale. While the main plot of the story focuses on the narrator’s struggles against Gilead, this narration frequently alternates with explanations for how Gilead established itself. The reader gets to see the bombing of Congress, the forced immigration of POC, and the environmental/fertility crisis which gives context for Gilead’s fearmongering. We also experience the narrator’s separation from her daughter and husband, supplying readers with the story’s highly emotive world.

10. Soliloquy

A soliloquy is a long speech with no audience in the story.

Soliloquy comes from the Latin for self (sol) and talking (loquy), and self-talking describes a soliloquy perfectly. A soliloquy is a long speech with no audience in the story. Soliloquies are synonymous with monologues, though a soliloquy is usually a brief passage in a chapter, and often much more poetic.

Shakespeare’s plays abound with soliloquies. Here’s an example, pulled from Scene II Act II of Romeo and Juliet .

But soft, what light through yonder window breaks? It is the East, and Juliet is the sun. Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon, Who is already sick and pale with grief That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.

Romeo isn’t talking to anyone in particular, but no matter: his soliloquy is rife with emotion and metaphor, and one can’t help but blush when he expresses how his love for Juliet makes her like the sun to him.

As a literary device in prose, soliloquy offers insight into the characters’ emotions. Soliloquy doesn’t have to be in dialogue, it can also take the form of private thoughts, but a soliloquy must be an extended conversation with oneself that exposes the character’s own feelings and ideas.

Write Powerful Literary Devices in Prose with Writers.com

The literary devices in Jane Eyre , Romeo & Juliet, and The Great Gatsby help make these stories masterful works of fiction. By using these literary building blocks, your story will sparkle, too. Take a look at our upcoming courses in fiction and nonfiction , and take the next step in writing the great American novel. Happy writing!

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What Is Prose?

Glossary of Grammatical and Rhetorical Terms

• An Introduction to Punctuation
• Ph.D., Rhetoric and English, University of Georgia
• M.A., Modern English and American Literature, University of Leicester
• B.A., English, State University of New York

Prose is ordinary writing (both fiction and nonfiction ) as distinguished from verse. Most essays , compositions , reports , articles , research papers , short stories, and journal entries are types of prose writings.

In his book The Establishment of Modern English Prose (1998), Ian Robinson observed that the term prose is "surprisingly hard to define. . . . We shall return to the sense there may be in the old joke that prose is not verse."

In 1906, English philologist Henry Cecil Wyld suggested that the "best prose is never entirely remote in form from the best corresponding conversational style of the period" ( The Historical Study of the Mother Tongue ).

From the Latin, "forward" + "turn"

Observations

"I wish our clever young poets would remember my homely definitions of prose and poetry: that is, prose = words in their best order; poetry = the best words in the best order." (Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Table Talk , July 12, 1827)

Philosophy Teacher: All that is not prose is verse; and all that is not verse is prose. M. Jourdain: What? When I say: "Nicole, bring me my slippers, and give me my night-cap," is that prose? Philosophy Teacher: Yes, sir. M. Jourdain: Good heavens! For more than 40 years I have been speaking prose without knowing it. (Molière, Le Bourgeois Gentilhomme , 1671)

"For me, a page of good prose is where one hears the rain and the noise of battle. It has the power to give grief or universality that lends it a youthful beauty." (John Cheever, on accepting the National Medal for Literature, 1982)

" Prose is when all the lines except the last go on to the end. Poetry is when some of them fall short of it." (Jeremy Bentham, quoted by M. St. J. Packe in The Life of John Stuart Mill , 1954)

"You campaign in poetry. You govern in prose ." (Governor Mario Cuomo, New Republic , April 8, 1985)

Transparency in Prose

"[O]ne can write nothing readable unless one constantly struggles to efface one's own personality. Good prose is like a window pane." (George Orwell, "Why I Write," 1946) "Our ideal prose , like our ideal typography, is transparent: if a reader doesn't notice it, if it provides a transparent window to the meaning, then the prose stylist has succeeded. But if your ideal prose is purely transparent, such transparency will be, by definition, hard to describe. You can't hit what you can't see. And what is transparent to you is often opaque to someone else. Such an ideal makes for a difficult pedagogy." (Richard Lanham, Analyzing Prose , 2nd ed. Continuum, 2003)

" Prose is the ordinary form of spoken or written language: it fulfills innumerable functions, and it can attain many different kinds of excellence. A well-argued legal judgment, a lucid scientific paper, a readily grasped set of technical instructions all represent triumphs of prose after their fashion. And quantity tells. Inspired prose may be as rare as great poetry--though I am inclined to doubt even that; but good prose is unquestionably far more common than good poetry. It is something you can come across every day: in a letter, in a newspaper, almost anywhere." (John Gross, Introduction to The New Oxford Book of English Prose . Oxford Univ. Press, 1998)

A Method of Prose Study

"Here is a method of prose study which I myself found the best critical practice I have ever had. A brilliant and courageous teacher whose lessons I enjoyed when I was a sixth-former trained me to study prose and verse critically not by setting down my comments but almost entirely by writing imitations of the style . Mere feeble imitation of the exact arrangement of words was not accepted; I had to produce passages that could be mistaken for the work of the author, that copied all the characteristics of the style but treated of some different subject. In order to do this at all it is necessary to make a very minute study of the style; I still think it was the best teaching I ever had. It has the added merit of giving an improved command of the English language and a greater variation in our own style." (Marjorie Boulton, The Anatomy of Prose . Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1954)

Pronunciation: PROZ

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What is Prose?

Prose is ordinary language that follows regular grammatical conventions and does not contain a formal metrical structure. This definition of prose is an example of prose writing, as is most human conversation, textbooks, lectures, novels, short stories, fairy tales, newspaper articles, and essays.

Prose can be either fiction or non-fiction. It can be “poetic,” meaning that it has rhythmic structure and contains figurative language. Sermons, political speeches, and modernist writing are good examples of poetic fiction.

How Do you Identify Prose in Writing?

Distinguishing prose from poetry is usually just a matter of recognizing the basic conventions of prose writing: paragraphs and sentences that have proper grammar and mechanics. Poetry, on the other hand, contains lines and stanzas. And while there may be a cadence or rhythm to prose, it contains neither a regular meter nor a deliberate rhyme scheme.

Only one form of writing falls in a gray area, and that is the so-called “prose poem.” As the name suggests, prose poems contain a formal metrical structure but are written out like prose, in sentence and paragraph form.

Examples of Prose

Prose Example 1.  The Hunger Games,  by Suzanne Collins, is a prose novel.

Prose Example 2. “Cinderella” is a prose fairy tale.

Prose Example 3. “The Yellow Wallpaper” is a prose story by Charlotte Gilman Perkins.

Prose Example 4. “The State of the Union Address” is a prose speech delivered early in the year by the sitting president of the United States.

Prose Example 5. “The Declaration of Independence” is a prose document signed by prominent American colonists who wished no longer to be under British rule.

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• How to write a literary analysis essay | A step-by-step guide

How to Write a Literary Analysis Essay | A Step-by-Step Guide

Published on January 30, 2020 by Jack Caulfield . Revised on August 14, 2023.

Literary analysis means closely studying a text, interpreting its meanings, and exploring why the author made certain choices. It can be applied to novels, short stories, plays, poems, or any other form of literary writing.

A literary analysis essay is not a rhetorical analysis , nor is it just a summary of the plot or a book review. Instead, it is a type of argumentative essay where you need to analyze elements such as the language, perspective, and structure of the text, and explain how the author uses literary devices to create effects and convey ideas.

Before beginning a literary analysis essay, it’s essential to carefully read the text and c ome up with a thesis statement to keep your essay focused. As you write, follow the standard structure of an academic essay :

• An introduction that tells the reader what your essay will focus on.
• A main body, divided into paragraphs , that builds an argument using evidence from the text.
• A conclusion that clearly states the main point that you have shown with your analysis.

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Table of contents

Step 1: reading the text and identifying literary devices, step 2: coming up with a thesis, step 3: writing a title and introduction, step 4: writing the body of the essay, step 5: writing a conclusion, other interesting articles.

The first step is to carefully read the text(s) and take initial notes. As you read, pay attention to the things that are most intriguing, surprising, or even confusing in the writing—these are things you can dig into in your analysis.

Your goal in literary analysis is not simply to explain the events described in the text, but to analyze the writing itself and discuss how the text works on a deeper level. Primarily, you’re looking out for literary devices —textual elements that writers use to convey meaning and create effects. If you’re comparing and contrasting multiple texts, you can also look for connections between different texts.

To get started with your analysis, there are several key areas that you can focus on. As you analyze each aspect of the text, try to think about how they all relate to each other. You can use highlights or notes to keep track of important passages and quotes.

Language choices

Consider what style of language the author uses. Are the sentences short and simple or more complex and poetic?

What word choices stand out as interesting or unusual? Are words used figuratively to mean something other than their literal definition? Figurative language includes things like metaphor (e.g. “her eyes were oceans”) and simile (e.g. “her eyes were like oceans”).

Also keep an eye out for imagery in the text—recurring images that create a certain atmosphere or symbolize something important. Remember that language is used in literary texts to say more than it means on the surface.

Narrative voice

Ask yourself:

• Who is telling the story?
• How are they telling it?

Is it a first-person narrator (“I”) who is personally involved in the story, or a third-person narrator who tells us about the characters from a distance?

Consider the narrator’s perspective . Is the narrator omniscient (where they know everything about all the characters and events), or do they only have partial knowledge? Are they an unreliable narrator who we are not supposed to take at face value? Authors often hint that their narrator might be giving us a distorted or dishonest version of events.

The tone of the text is also worth considering. Is the story intended to be comic, tragic, or something else? Are usually serious topics treated as funny, or vice versa ? Is the story realistic or fantastical (or somewhere in between)?

Consider how the text is structured, and how the structure relates to the story being told.

• Novels are often divided into chapters and parts.
• Poems are divided into lines, stanzas, and sometime cantos.
• Plays are divided into scenes and acts.

Think about why the author chose to divide the different parts of the text in the way they did.

There are also less formal structural elements to take into account. Does the story unfold in chronological order, or does it jump back and forth in time? Does it begin in medias res —in the middle of the action? Does the plot advance towards a clearly defined climax?

With poetry, consider how the rhyme and meter shape your understanding of the text and your impression of the tone. Try reading the poem aloud to get a sense of this.

In a play, you might consider how relationships between characters are built up through different scenes, and how the setting relates to the action. Watch out for  dramatic irony , where the audience knows some detail that the characters don’t, creating a double meaning in their words, thoughts, or actions.

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Your thesis in a literary analysis essay is the point you want to make about the text. It’s the core argument that gives your essay direction and prevents it from just being a collection of random observations about a text.

If you’re given a prompt for your essay, your thesis must answer or relate to the prompt. For example:

Essay question example

Is Franz Kafka’s “Before the Law” a religious parable?

Your thesis statement should be an answer to this question—not a simple yes or no, but a statement of why this is or isn’t the case:

Thesis statement example

Franz Kafka’s “Before the Law” is not a religious parable, but a story about bureaucratic alienation.

Sometimes you’ll be given freedom to choose your own topic; in this case, you’ll have to come up with an original thesis. Consider what stood out to you in the text; ask yourself questions about the elements that interested you, and consider how you might answer them.

Your thesis should be something arguable—that is, something that you think is true about the text, but which is not a simple matter of fact. It must be complex enough to develop through evidence and arguments across the course of your essay.

Say you’re analyzing the novel Frankenstein . You could start by asking yourself:

Your initial answer might be a surface-level description:

The character Frankenstein is portrayed negatively in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein .

However, this statement is too simple to be an interesting thesis. After reading the text and analyzing its narrative voice and structure, you can develop the answer into a more nuanced and arguable thesis statement:

Mary Shelley uses shifting narrative perspectives to portray Frankenstein in an increasingly negative light as the novel goes on. While he initially appears to be a naive but sympathetic idealist, after the creature’s narrative Frankenstein begins to resemble—even in his own telling—the thoughtlessly cruel figure the creature represents him as.

Remember that you can revise your thesis statement throughout the writing process , so it doesn’t need to be perfectly formulated at this stage. The aim is to keep you focused as you analyze the text.

Finding textual evidence

To support your thesis statement, your essay will build an argument using textual evidence —specific parts of the text that demonstrate your point. This evidence is quoted and analyzed throughout your essay to explain your argument to the reader.

It can be useful to comb through the text in search of relevant quotations before you start writing. You might not end up using everything you find, and you may have to return to the text for more evidence as you write, but collecting textual evidence from the beginning will help you to structure your arguments and assess whether they’re convincing.

To start your literary analysis paper, you’ll need two things: a good title, and an introduction.

Your title should clearly indicate what your analysis will focus on. It usually contains the name of the author and text(s) you’re analyzing. Keep it as concise and engaging as possible.

A common approach to the title is to use a relevant quote from the text, followed by a colon and then the rest of your title.

If you struggle to come up with a good title at first, don’t worry—this will be easier once you’ve begun writing the essay and have a better sense of your arguments.

“Fearful symmetry” : The violence of creation in William Blake’s “The Tyger”

The introduction

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. You might refer to a commonly held idea about the text and show how your thesis will contradict it, or zoom in on a particular device you intend to focus on.

Then you can end with a brief indication of what’s coming up in the main body of the essay. This is called signposting. It will be more elaborate in longer essays, but in a short five-paragraph essay structure, it shouldn’t be more than one sentence.

Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein is often read as a crude cautionary tale about the dangers of scientific advancement unrestrained by ethical considerations. In this reading, protagonist Victor Frankenstein is a stable representation of the callous ambition of modern science throughout the novel. This essay, however, argues that far from providing a stable image of the character, Shelley uses shifting narrative perspectives to portray Frankenstein in an increasingly negative light as the novel goes on. While he initially appears to be a naive but sympathetic idealist, after the creature’s narrative Frankenstein begins to resemble—even in his own telling—the thoughtlessly cruel figure the creature represents him as. This essay begins by exploring the positive portrayal of Frankenstein in the first volume, then moves on to the creature’s perception of him, and finally discusses the third volume’s narrative shift toward viewing Frankenstein as the creature views him.

Some students prefer to write the introduction later in the process, and it’s not a bad idea. After all, you’ll have a clearer idea of the overall shape of your arguments once you’ve begun writing them!

If you do write the introduction first, you should still return to it later to make sure it lines up with what you ended up writing, and edit as necessary.

The body of your essay is everything between the introduction and conclusion. It contains your arguments and the textual evidence that supports them.

Paragraph structure

A typical structure for a high school literary analysis essay consists of five paragraphs : the three paragraphs of the body, plus the introduction and conclusion.

Each paragraph in the main body should focus on one topic. In the five-paragraph model, try to divide your argument into three main areas of analysis, all linked to your thesis. Don’t try to include everything you can think of to say about the text—only analysis that drives your argument.

In longer essays, the same principle applies on a broader scale. For example, you might have two or three sections in your main body, each with multiple paragraphs. Within these sections, you still want to begin new paragraphs at logical moments—a turn in the argument or the introduction of a new idea.

Robert’s first encounter with Gil-Martin suggests something of his sinister power. Robert feels “a sort of invisible power that drew me towards him.” He identifies the moment of their meeting as “the beginning of a series of adventures which has puzzled myself, and will puzzle the world when I am no more in it” (p. 89). Gil-Martin’s “invisible power” seems to be at work even at this distance from the moment described; before continuing the story, Robert feels compelled to anticipate at length what readers will make of his narrative after his approaching death. With this interjection, Hogg emphasizes the fatal influence Gil-Martin exercises from his first appearance.

Topic sentences

To keep your points focused, it’s important to use a topic sentence at the beginning of each paragraph.

A good topic sentence allows a reader to see at a glance what the paragraph is about. It can introduce a new line of argument and connect or contrast it with the previous paragraph. Transition words like “however” or “moreover” are useful for creating smooth transitions:

… The story’s focus, therefore, is not upon the divine revelation that may be waiting beyond the door, but upon the mundane process of aging undergone by the man as he waits.

Nevertheless, the “radiance” that appears to stream from the door is typically treated as religious symbolism.

This topic sentence signals that the paragraph will address the question of religious symbolism, while the linking word “nevertheless” points out a contrast with the previous paragraph’s conclusion.

Using textual evidence

A key part of literary analysis is backing up your arguments with relevant evidence from the text. This involves introducing quotes from the text and explaining their significance to your point.

It’s important to contextualize quotes and explain why you’re using them; they should be properly introduced and analyzed, not treated as self-explanatory:

It isn’t always necessary to use a quote. Quoting is useful when you’re discussing the author’s language, but sometimes you’ll have to refer to plot points or structural elements that can’t be captured in a short quote.

In these cases, it’s more appropriate to paraphrase or summarize parts of the text—that is, to describe the relevant part in your own words:

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The conclusion of your analysis shouldn’t introduce any new quotations or arguments. Instead, it’s about wrapping up the essay. Here, you summarize your key points and try to emphasize their significance to the reader.

A good way to approach this is to briefly summarize your key arguments, and then stress the conclusion they’ve led you to, highlighting the new perspective your thesis provides on the text as a whole:

If you want to know more about AI tools , college essays , or fallacies make sure to check out some of our other articles with explanations and examples or go directly to our tools!

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By tracing the depiction of Frankenstein through the novel’s three volumes, I have demonstrated how the narrative structure shifts our perception of the character. While the Frankenstein of the first volume is depicted as having innocent intentions, the second and third volumes—first in the creature’s accusatory voice, and then in his own voice—increasingly undermine him, causing him to appear alternately ridiculous and vindictive. Far from the one-dimensional villain he is often taken to be, the character of Frankenstein is compelling because of the dynamic narrative frame in which he is placed. In this frame, Frankenstein’s narrative self-presentation responds to the images of him we see from others’ perspectives. This conclusion sheds new light on the novel, foregrounding Shelley’s unique layering of narrative perspectives and its importance for the depiction of character.

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Definition of prose

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intransitive verb

Definition of pro se  (Entry 4 of 4)

Examples of prose in a Sentence

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'prose.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

Noun, Adjective, and Verb

Middle English, from Anglo-French, from Latin prosa , from feminine of prorsus, prosus , straightforward, being in prose, contraction of proversus , past participle of provertere to turn forward, from pro- forward + vertere to turn — more at pro- , worth

Adjective or adverb

14th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1a

14th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1

15th century, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Adjective Or Adverb

1861, in the meaning defined above

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“Prose.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary , Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/prose. Accessed 29 Jun. 2024.

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essay , an analytic , interpretative, or critical literary composition usually much shorter and less systematic and formal than a dissertation or thesis and usually dealing with its subject from a limited and often personal point of view.

Some early treatises—such as those of Cicero on the pleasantness of old age or on the art of “divination,” Seneca on anger or clemency , and Plutarch on the passing of oracles—presage to a certain degree the form and tone of the essay, but not until the late 16th century was the flexible and deliberately nonchalant and versatile form of the essay perfected by the French writer Michel de Montaigne . Choosing the name essai to emphasize that his compositions were attempts or endeavours, a groping toward the expression of his personal thoughts and experiences, Montaigne used the essay as a means of self-discovery. His Essais , published in their final form in 1588, are still considered among the finest of their kind. Later writers who most nearly recall the charm of Montaigne include, in England, Robert Burton , though his whimsicality is more erudite , Sir Thomas Browne , and Laurence Sterne , and in France, with more self-consciousness and pose, André Gide and Jean Cocteau .

At the beginning of the 17th century, social manners, the cultivation of politeness, and the training of an accomplished gentleman became the theme of many essayists. This theme was first exploited by the Italian Baldassare Castiglione in his Il libro del cortegiano (1528; The Book of the Courtier ). The influence of the essay and of genres allied to it, such as maxims, portraits, and sketches, proved second to none in molding the behavior of the cultured classes, first in Italy, then in France, and, through French influence, in most of Europe in the 17th century. Among those who pursued this theme was the 17th-century Spanish Jesuit Baltasar Gracián in his essays on the art of worldly wisdom.

Keener political awareness in the 18th century, the age of Enlightenment , made the essay an all-important vehicle for the criticism of society and religion. Because of its flexibility, its brevity , and its potential both for ambiguity and for allusions to current events and conditions, it was an ideal tool for philosophical reformers. The Federalist Papers in America and the tracts of the French Revolutionaries are among the countless examples of attempts during this period to improve the human condition through the essay.

The genre also became the favoured tool of traditionalists of the 18th and 19th centuries, such as Edmund Burke and Samuel Taylor Coleridge , who looked to the short, provocative essay as the most potent means of educating the masses. Essays such as Paul Elmer More’s long series of Shelburne Essays (published between 1904 and 1935), T.S. Eliot ’s After Strange Gods (1934) and Notes Towards the Definition of Culture (1948), and others that attempted to reinterpret and redefine culture , established the genre as the most fitting to express the genteel tradition at odds with the democracy of the new world.

Whereas in several countries the essay became the chosen vehicle of literary and social criticism, in other countries the genre became semipolitical, earnestly nationalistic, and often polemical, playful, or bitter. Essayists such as Robert Louis Stevenson and Willa Cather wrote with grace on several lighter subjects, and many writers—including Virginia Woolf , Edmund Wilson , and Charles du Bos —mastered the essay as a form of literary criticism .

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June 28, 2024 · 2 Comments

Reflecting on the Reading: The 2024 Prose Prompt Review

AP Classroom & AP Scoring · Prose Analysis Lessons & Resources

The only other time I scored for the AP Lit prose question was the infamous Zenobia question of 2018 (taken from Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Blithedale Romance ). Although many students misinterpreted the nature of that relationship, I remember really loving the Zenobia prompt. This year, I enjoyed reading for the prose question once again.

This year’s prose excerpt was taken from Mavis Gallant’s short story “One Morning in June” and asked students to analyze Mike’s experience painting abroad in Paris.

Here is the PDF of all questions in the test version I scored. This reflection is on Question 2.

What students did well:

As a whole, students felt confident making a statement on Mike’s experience in Paris, calling it unexpected or uncomfortable. Many took it a step further, contrasting Mike’s parents’ decision to send him abroad to his indecision and apathy once there, establishing not only a thesis but a great line of reasoning.

Commentary and Evidence

I was impressed with students’ integration of evidence from the text. Gallant’s excerpt is witty and rife with literary elements that students could use for quotations. “It was rather like exposing someone to a case of measles and watching for spots to break out,” was a quote used in more than half of the essays I scored. Because the excerpt’s plot is easy to understand, most students offered at least some commentary on Mike’s behavior in Paris, often discussing his state of uncertainty and lack of motivation in studying abroad.

Sophistication

I found myself giving the sophistication point most often for vivid and persuasive writing or for those who connected the excerpt to a broader context. I especially liked those who discussed how Mike’s American attitude, one designed around earning a living, conflicted with the more laissez-faire attitude of his art teacher, Mr. Chitterley.

Where students can improve:

As stated by many other educators, the use of the word “complex” in the prompt often throws AP Lit students. The word is designed to open students up to many different interpretations of the text, but instead, many simply call the work “complex” in their thesis. A student who only echoes or restates the prompt will not earn the thesis, although many did eventually take a stance or comment on Mike’s experience later in the essay.

Students can improve by stating a clear and interpretative thesis in the introduction, followed by a clear line of reasoning. Getting this done in the intro ensures not only a thesis point but higher points in Row B of the rubric.

I was excited to read students’ responses on this text especially, since Mike is in a state of life that so many of them are about to enter. Mike is unsure what he should do. If he follows his passions, will he still earn enough to make a living? And is this even his passion or simply a skill that his parents chose for him to pursue? Ironically, because this issue is so similar to students’ lives and choices, many essays moved away from commentary and straight into judgment. To label Mike as a lazy loser doesn’t provide a deep insight into the text. Instead, students begin relying on their own experiences rather than evidence from the text to support their argument.

Another thing students could do better, as I see in every year, is to focus on the “why does this matter?” of the text. Simply pointing out that the text uses figurative language and imagery doesn’t earn 3 or 4 points—you need to connect those to the reader’s experience or interpretation of the text. Lower-scoring essays often worked in a loop that I remember from AP Lit essays before the 2019 rubric change. This loop goes:

1) Identify a literary term. 2) Point out where to find literary term (optional: You can also define literary term). 3) Restate that this proves there was a literary term.

This is literary element name-dropping, not analysis.

I’d recommend that students reread their essay before concluding it, if time permits. Several students identified something new in the essay and pivoted their argument. However, this can derail an established line of reasoning or move they away from previous arguments.

Teaching points/extensions for the classroom:

• Assert – What does this mean?
• Prove – How do you know?
• Explain – Why does this matter?

If a paragraph falls short I can usually point out that they asserted and proved something but never explained why it mattered. Or, they jumped right into why something matters without establishing an argument (A) or proving with evidence (P). I have a one page handout and bookmark with this information for free in my TpT store for anyone interested.

When teaching literary terms, be sure to emphasize the function of literary terms in an AP Lit essay. I tell students that lit terms are the sprinkles on a donut, but the good part of the donut is made up of argument and evidence.

I can’t emphasize this enough: study excerpts . The CED instructs to teach short fiction but then steers us towards short stories. Students also need practice in excerpts of prose where the character is not introduced to us. Practice dropping students into texts and watching them figure it out. This, hands down, is the best prep for a Q2 question, in my opinion.

Texts that I’d suggest for excerpt practice include:

• The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway, Homegoing by Yaa Gyasi, “Flowers for Algernon” by Daniel Keyes, and There There by Tommy Orange.
• FRQs from AP Classroom. My favorite is “Hitting Trees With Sticks” by Jane Rogers in Unit 1.
• FRQs from past exams. I like The Blithedale Romance (18), Fasting, Feasting (08), and The Crossing (99)

I have a unit on excerpt practice and strategies on TpT and it’s one of my favorites to teach! Here is the link for anyone interested .

Spend time looking at past exams and prompts. Practice breaking down a prompt in addition to writing on-demand essays.

Discuss what is meant by complexity and how to construct a complex argument. Here is a blog post I wrote on the topic with lots of free lesson ideas!

AP Lit Questions 1 & 3 Reflections

For reader reflections on Question 1 (the poetry prompt) and Question 3 (the open question) check out these posts by Emily Wessel, Susan Barber, and Brian Hannon.

Question 1 – “On Summer”

Question 3 – Indecision

Reader Interactions

June 28, 2024 at 3:06 pm

FYI- It looks as though you mistakenly inserted the 2023 AP Lit test instead of this year’s.

On a separate note, thank you for sharing this insightful feedback. You are one of my favorite AP-Lit mentors, and I appreciate the hard work and support you provide us as a community.

Best, Janey

June 29, 2024 at 11:45 am

Thanks for letting me know! I was on a road trip when I posted it but it should be fixed now!

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