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 The title of your paper should reflect your thesis or focus and should be more than just the title of the work you are exploring.Titles should be written in conventional type with only the first letters of important words capitalized. Quotation marks, underlining, and large or unusual fonts are inappropriate.
 

 Use the present tense as a base for writing or talking about literature. The text exists here and now, regardless of when it was written or when you read it.
 

 When you first refer to a writer, give his or her full name; in subsequent references, use only the writer's last name. Never refer to any writer only by his or her first name; to do so insults and trivializes the writer and the text.
 

 When quoting prose, incorporate the words into your sentence so that the whole reads smoothly and is grammatically correct. Make minor adjustments by breaking up the quotation with your own words, using brackets to enclose any words or phrases that you have inserted into the quote. Or use several short quotes (one word or phrase) in place of the full-length quotation. Place the Latin word sic in brackets directly after an error in a quotation to signify that the error appears in the original source. Put periods and commas inside quotation marks (except in a citation when you are using MLA parenthetical documentation), colons and semicolons outside quotation marks, and question marks and exclamation points inside quotation marks, unless they apply to the whole sentence.

 If the prose quotation is longer than 4 typewritten lines, set it off from your own writing by indenting ten spaces from the left. Note that the quote remains double-spaced, that no quotation marks are used, and that the right margin is unchanged. 

When quoting poetry, if the quotation is 3 lines or less, incorporate it into your sentence. 

If the poetry quotation is longer than 3 lines, set it off from your own writing by indenting ten spaces from the left margin. 

 Three spaced periods (. . .) form an ellipsis, a device that demonstrates your decision to delete words from a quotation without changing the meaning of the original. Use a fourth period if a full sentence or more is deleted within the quotation. An ellipsis should not be used at the beginning of a quote or at the end.
 

 Document quotations from the text you are analyzing, as well as any other sources that you quote or paraphrase. Ask what style of documentation your instructor prefers. Common citation styles include MLA, APA, Chicago, and GPO.

 In MLA format, a list of all cited sources, entitled "Works Cited," must accompany the paper. If you do not quote directly from a source or paraphrase it, but want to show additional texts you explored, add a "Works Consulted" section. If you want to refer the reader to useful texts which you did not necessarily consult, add a "Bibliography."

 **This guide represents selected methods used in writing about literature. Consult your instructor for her or his preferred style.