Response to Literature:
Character Analysis
Mrs. Kelly Brown
What can you tell me about this character?
What character traits would you say he has?
How do you know he has those traits?
Insert photo of Superman
How do we get started?
1. You need to pick the easiest character from the story to
analyze
2. You need to brainstorm about their character traits
3. You need to pick three traits that you feel you could
easily support with events from the story
4. You need to find the events in the story and look for
quotes from that event that helps to describe what the
character does to show this trait
5. You need to use commentary (your own opinions) to
explain why you think this event and the correlating
quotes prove each trait
Let’s see what that looks like:
Let’s say you choose Superman- he is the main character and we
know a lot about him
You think about all of the good he does for society and you decide
that his actions show that he is: brave, compassionate, motivated,
super strength, conflicted by his double life, and cautious.
You feel like you could best support: brave, compassionate, and
motivated.
You find an event where he shows bravery. Let’s say he saves people
from a train collision. You want to find a description during that
event that describes how he put himself in danger to save others.
This would be and event and a quote that would show bravery.
Finally, you would use commentary to explain why this event and
quote prove that he is brave. What might that sound like?
What goes in paragraph one?
-Hook (you start every essay with an interesting
opening)
-Title
_Author
-Genre
-Two sentence summary
-Three Character Traits (thesis statement)
Paragraph 2-4
 -State the trait (brave)
 -Say it in another way (Superman puts himself in
danger and risks his life to save others)
 -Event to prove the trait (Superman saved the people
from a terrible train collision)
 - Quote from the story to help further explain what the
character is doing/thinking during the even that would
strengthen your argument for the character trait
 -Two sentences of Commentary to explain why the
event you chose proves that he is brave
Paragraph 5
 -Make a final statement about the character
(Superman is the type of character that inspires me to
ask myself what I think I could do to help make
society better.)
-Restate the three character traits
-Final Commentary: link to society (If more people
were willing to take a more self-less position in our
society and serve others, our world would be a safer
and more welcoming place.)