MLA Template



Firstname LastnameInstructor’s NameCourse Information, Literary DATE \@ "d MMMM yyyy" 27 February 2020Center Title, Do Not Bold or UnderlineThis guide is modeled on a similar guide created by Kirby Rideout of Collin County Community College. Mr. Rideout’s original guide has been revised by Matt Swain for GHS. This version is a template for formatting a literary paper in MLA style. The information in this paper is entirely about formatting and style, not about content. Readers of this paper will not find good examples of essay structure, they will find only good examples of MLA formatting and style.The paper has one-inch margins all around. The upper left corner of the first page has identifying information, ending with the date written in day, month, year format, using the written word for the month. Each page has a header with the student author’s last name and the current page number. The paper is double-spaced throughout, with no extra space between sections or paragraphs. The entire paper, including the heading and title, is in the same type and size of font. This template uses Times New Roman, 12-point font. Because it is easy to read, this font is appropriate for MLA. The body text is left aligned, not fully justified, which means there is a straight line down the left margin of text on the left side of the page, but a more jagged line on the right side of the page. The enter key has been hit only once at the end of each paragraph and each paragraph is first-line indented. This sample MLA paper is printed on both sides of the paper to save paper. That is possible because this sample has few errors for its purpose and will not require extensive, hand-written notes from an instructor. Student essays handed in for marking should be printed on only one side of a paper.Apart from the larger formatting and typesetting considerations, also consider the conventions of formal grammar, punctuation, and word choice / usage. The two main considerations here are (1) do not use contractions (words such as don’t, they’ll, we’re, can’t, didn’t, it’s, they’re, etc.), and (2) do not use second-person pronouns (you, your, yours, yourself). In the first case, rather than contractions such as don’t or it’s, simply use do not or it is. In the second case, rather than a sentence like “When you drive when tired, you endanger other people,” use “Tired drivers endanger other people.” The latter construction is also more concise.In MLA format, authors document proof in parenthetical citations, which are brief notes in parentheses at the end of sentences that contain proof. Parenthetical citations allow authors to mention page numbers of quotes or of scenes or incidents in a novel. Mentioning page numbers is necessary so the reader of an essay can find the quote or the scene/incident in the novel. For example, one of the passages in Hatchet that most clearly shows Brian’s use of metacognition is a paragraph that ends with the sentences “Hot little jets of hate worked into his thoughts, pushed once, moved back. If his mother hadn’t … forced the divorce, Brian wouldn’t be here now,” and then the next paragraph begins: “He shook his head. Had to stop that kind of thinking. The sun was still high and that meant that he still had some time before darkness to find berries” (57). Normally, a literary essay would continue to explain how Brian’s ability to think about his own thought process shows maturity and helps him get on track to survive, however, this MLA style guide is not a literary essay and its focus for the above example is to point out how the page number appeared in parentheses at the end of the sentence that contained the quote. The quote is from page 57, and the reader knows that because the number appears in parentheses at the end of the sentence that contains the quote. This is a form of in-text citation. Specifically, it is a parenthetical citation. Students will have to follow this practice when writing MLA-style literary papers. Notice that the period goes after the parentheses. If a passage is longer than four lines of text, it must be set in block-quote format. MLA requires a full one-inch indentation for a block quote, no quotation marks around it, and the parenthetical note at the end comes AFTER the end punctuation. In other words, there is no punctuation after the parenthetical citation. The next few sentences of this paragraph will be an example of the type of sentence that might transition into a quote, in this case a block quote. The early stages of the novel Hatchet are filled with scenes in which Brian responds to both past and present events with mostly emotional reactions that do little to solve the practical problems he faces. Brian remembers a happy outing riding bicycles with his friend Terry, when he sees his mother in a car with a man who is not Brian’s father:Short blond hair, the man had. Wearing some kind of white pullover tennis shirt.Brian saw this more and more, saw the Secret and saw more later, but the memory came in pieces, came in scenes like this—Terry smiling, Brian looking over his head to see the station wagon and his mother sitting with the man, the time and temperature clock, the front wheel of his bike, the short blond hair of the man, the white shirt of the man, the hot-hate slices of the memory were exact.* * *Brian opened his eyes and screamed.For seconds he did not know where he was, only that the crash was still happening and he was going to die, and he screamed until his breath was gone. (30)The block quote would be followed by commentary that analyzes why these two passages—the first dealing with Brian’s emotional reaction to his back story and the second dealing with Brian’s emotional reaction to the rising action of the novel—are placed right next to each other by the author, Gary Paulsen. Notice that the long quote was set off by an extra one-inch margin rather than quotations marks, and in this case, the period goes before the parenthetical citation. For this class, block quotations need not have the full one-inch indentation and can even be single spaced if students are confident that each word is EXACTLY as it was printed in the original sources. ................
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