Last name 1
Name
My name
Course
Date
[Example of Title] “When you live a long way out you make your own fun”: Irony in “55
Miles to the Gas Pump” and “A Rose for Emily”
[Example of introduction leading to thesis—introducing terms to establish the
relationship between the texts]
Traditional plotlines contain a systematic formula beginning with exposition and
leading to resolution. As A. L. Bader writes, “Nothing Happens in Modern Short Stories”
and this is what we find in E. Annie Proulx’s “55 Miles to the Gas Pump” and William
Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily.” In these two stories, the resolution is anything but; both
protagonists are dead and the narrator seems to abandon the story and the reader.
[Body of the essay, how to introduce a block quote]
The two stories leave the reader with many unanswered questions. The stories
play with the reader’s expectations of what resolution means. Proulx writes,
Mrs. Croom on the roof with a saw cutting a hole into the attic where she
has not been for twelve years thanks to old Croom’s padlocks and
warnings, whets to her desire, and the sweat flies as she exchanges the saw
Last name 2
for a chisel and hammer until a ragged slab of peak is free and she can see
inside (568).
Proulx writes, “When you live a long way out you make your own fun” (568), showing
that the narrator is outside of the story, offering a critique.
[Use ellipses when excerpting] “When you live a long way out . . . fun”
[Citing lines in poetry]
The speaker states, “Life means Blue / Yet power forms base and chain” (page), showing
the idea that everything is meaningless.
“Life means Blue / . . . / The Road rips sleep and feet” (page),
Last name 3
Works Cited
[Example of format for a novel]
Last name, first. Title. Place: Publisher, year. Print.
[Example of work contained in an anthology]
Proulx, E. Annie. “55 Miles to the Gas Pump.” The Bedford Introduction to Literature.
10th ed. Ed. Michael Meyer. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2013. 578-579. Print.
[When using more than one work from an anthology, used in Papers 1 and 2]
Faulkner, William. “A Rose for Emily.” Meyer 99-105.
Meyer, Michael, ed. The Bedford Introduction to Literature. 10th ed. Boston: Bedford/St.
Martin’s, 2013. Print.
Proulx, E. Annie. “55 Miles to the Gas Pump.” Meyer 578-579.
[Handouts]
cummings, e e. “she being Brand.” The Bedford Introduction to Literature. 8th ed. Ed.
Michael Meyer. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2008. 834-835. Print.
Hughes, Langston. “Formula.” The Bedford Introduction to Literature. 9th ed. Ed.
Michael Meyer. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011. 1142-1143. Print.
Hughes, Langston. “Song for a Dark Girl.” The Bedford Introduction to Literature.
9th ed. Ed. Michael Meyer. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2011. 1144. Print.
Hughes, Langston. “The Weary Blues.” The Bedford Introduction to Literature. 8th ed.
Ed. Michael Meyer. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2008. 1170-1171. Print.
Last name 4
Jarman, Mark. “Ground Swell.” The Bedford Introduction to Literature. 7th ed. Ed.
Michael Meyer. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2005. 808-809. Print.
Wayman, Tom. “Did I Miss Anything?” The Bedford Introduction to Literature. 8th ed.
Ed. Michael Meyer. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2008. 1258-1259. Print.
[Proof]
Auburn, David. Proof. The Bedford Introduction to Literature. 7th ed. Ed. Michael
Meyer. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2005. 1969-2017. Print.
[Song]
Mirah. “The Garden.” Advisory Committee. K. Records, 2002. CD.
[Film]
Big Fish. Dir. Tim Burton. Perf. Ewan McGregor, Albert Finney, Billy Crudup, and
Jessica Lange. Columbia, 2003. DVD.
[Website]
Aldiss, Brian. “Super-Toys Last All Summer Long.” Wired 5.01. (1997): n. page. Web.
16 Sept. 2010.
Last name 5
Quotation Marks
Italics
Novels
Short Stories
Collection, Anthology
Poems
Collection, Anthology
Movies
Songs
Albums
Articles/Essays
Journals/ Newspapers/ Magazines
Episode
TV series
Paintings
Plays