Should you give background information on a quote?

[BakerDad12]

Hey guys. Should you give background information before analysing a quote. I've given an example of the same analysis with and without background information.


1.  To illustrate, when Danforth discovers a potential uprising against the court, he vows to “hang ten thousand that dare rise against the court.” Miller purposefully evokes gruesome imagery, combined with Danforth’s callously hyperbolic tone, to characterise him as riddled with cruelty as an impact of his infatuation with power.

2. To illustrate, the gruesome imagery, combined with Danforth's callously hyperbolic tone as he vows to "hang ten thousand that dare rise against the court", characterises him as riddled with cruelty as an impact of his infatuation with power.

[s110820]

Hey guys. Should you give background information before analysing a quote. I've given an example of the same analysis with and without background information.


1.  To illustrate, when Danforth discovers a potential uprising against the court, he vows to “hang ten thousand that dare rise against the court.” Miller purposefully evokes gruesome imagery, combined with Danforth’s callously hyperbolic tone, to characterise him as riddled with cruelty as an impact of his infatuation with power.

2. To illustrate, the gruesome imagery, combined with Danforth's callously hyperbolic tone as he vows to "hang ten thousand that dare rise against the court", characterises him as riddled with cruelty as an impact of his infatuation with power.

Hi BakerDad12,

I'm a QCE student so my syllabus method of writing analytical essays may be slightly different to yours, but from what I can understand, before you analyse a quote, you should always give some context (background information). Again, I'm not sure what the HSC English Advanced syllabus mentions in terms of context, but there are two reasons why you should always give some context:

A) Some of your readers (exam markers included) may not be familar with your text. Meaning, that if you were to not contextualise your quotes, then they would have to consult the text or Google who knows how many times just to understand what you're going on about. Yes, I know it sounds a little bit harsh but I ultimately learnt this the hard way.

B) From what I've seen after proofreading, editing and annotating more than a dozen English essays in the past year, a quote that is just left "hanging" never ends up being analysed - it's just left there to fill up some empty space. For me, personally, the contextualisation of a quote is the first step in analysis: not only does it provide some additional background to your readers, but it also sets up and maintains an effective foundation for the rest of your essay.

Again, for me personally, and usually the QCE students, this is the process that I use when writing analytical essays:

ANALYSIS: These questions should be answered in any individual quotation analysis (but they are not all individual sentences)

• What is the context?
• What is the quotation?
• What are the connotations/aesthetic features?
• So what do the connotations/aesthetic features ask us to compare and/or remind us of and/or make us feel?
•   So what are we invited to think or feel about the character and/or concept?
• So how do audiences' attitudes/beliefs/values/cultural assumptions shape our perceptions (this might be modern (contemporaneous) and of the time (the era that the text was written in/set in), separately or together)
• So how does all of this prove your thesis?

Hopefully, this helps

Have a great week and kind regards,

Darcy Dillon.

[BakerDad12]

Hi, thanks so much for the in-depth response! Do you think the example I provided above aligns with your method?

[rirerire]

Personally I've been told the opposite from my teachers (hsc student here)- always assume your marker knows what you're talking about and never ever retell the story. Retelling the story takes up precious time that you could be using evaluating your quote eg what effect it has on the audience, how it links to the author's context.

Instead what I've noticed as I've read through some exemplar essays  from the 2019 hsc exam is exactly what you've done in your second analysis.
you've probably already read through this but look at the 20/20 essay sample in the following link: https://atarnotes.com/hsc-english-essay/
plot is never explained, it's straight into analysis however the quote is always integrated in the same context as the original text.
EG:
Integration example from the essay: As "Newspeak" was designed to "diminish the range of thought"
actual quote from the book: "Newspeak was designed not to extend
but to DIMINISH the range of thought"

[Justin_L]

Another HSC student here, I would actually disagree and say that contextualising your quotes is helpful in many cases. Personally, I think that where in the novel the quote occurs is particularly important to signpost as characters change over time, as well as the fact the marker may not be familiar with that particular quote so giving a few words of context is always safer.

For example, in 1984 Winston says "Sanity is not statistical" early on in Mr Charrington's shop, yet changes his view later on in the novel when he convinces himself that "Sanity is statistical" after his torture in the Ministry of Love. Without context, this can get confusing for a marker who might not have been familiar with those exact quotes.

This is just my opinion though, and both s110820 and rirerire also have excellent points for and against contextualisation.

[rirerire]

Another HSC student here, I would actually disagree and say that contextualising your quotes is helpful in many cases. Personally, I think that where in the novel the quote occurs is particularly important to signpost as characters change over time, as well as the fact the marker may not be familiar with that particular quote so giving a few words of context is always safer.

For example, in 1984 Winston says "Sanity is not statistical" early on in Mr Charrington's shop, yet changes his view later on in the novel when he convinces himself that "Sanity is statistical" after his torture in the Ministry of Love. Without context, this can get confusing for a marker who might not have been familiar with those exact quotes.

This is just my opinion though, and both s110820 and rirerire also have excellent points for and against contextualisation.

good point!! I actually agree with that, especially since characters are constantly developing throughout a text...
just keep it very succinct and if possible use textual evidence to describe the context.

I used a very similar quote/analysis in my trials however the critique was that there was no quote to back up the 'his torture in the Ministry of Love', so try to see if you can replace "discovers a potential uprising against the court" from option 1 with the quote from the play.

[angewina_naguen]

Hey, BakerDad12!

To add to all the great points raised above, I sit somewhere in the middle. Many students fall into the trap of providing more accounts on a text’s context and giving excessive amounts of background information, rather than analysing the text itself. Context is important to all levels of English but it is not a substitute for techniques and quotes. Too much background information will result in you potentially retelling the text more than analysing it to respond to and engage with the question. Basically, think of it as a way to enhance your arguments, not to be your arguments. If you provide context or background information, it should always forward your analysis and contribute to your overall argument 

Angelina