What is textual evidence?
Textual evidence is evidence from a text (fiction or nonfiction) that you can use to illustrate your ideas and support your arguments. All textual evidence should:
- Support a specific point
- Be cited with a page number at the end of the sentence – He shouted “no more stone soup” (14).
- Be followed by an “connection” that explains the relationship of the evidence to your main point.
There are four types of textual evidence: referencing, summarizing, paraphrasing, and quoting. The types are listed from using general evidence (referencing) to very to specific evidence (quoting). The most common type of textual evidence is quoting. Read through the types below and decide which one best fits your need.
1. Referencing
Referencing is mentioning a particular event or action in the text. It’s useful when you want to point to point something out to support a point you’re tying to make but don’t feel a summary, paraphrase or direct quote is necessary. See the chart at the bottom of this page for examples.
2. Summarizing
Summarizing is putting someone else’s words into your own words. It’s useful when you want to point to a larger section of text but do not need the details of the original text. Summarizing literary fiction usually occurs in the introduction of a literary analysis essay. It is rarely used in the body of a literary analysis essay other than to provide some context when it is needed. Summaries should be written in your own words, include a page number, and be followed by a statement explaining its importance and connection to the topic sentence. See the examples at the bottom of the page.
3. Paraphrasing
Paraphrasing is also putting someone else’s words into your own words. It is useful when you need more detail than a summary but less than a direct quote. A paraphrase focuses concisely on a single main idea. Paraphrasing should be written in your own words, include a page number, and be followed by a statement explaining its importance and connection to the topic sentence. See the examples at the bottom of the page.
4. Quoting
Quotations illuminate your ideas and support your argument using the exact words from the original text. It’s useful when you want to capture the particular language an author uses. It is the most convincing evidence of the four types as they add credibility to the point you are trying to make.. As with all the textual evidence, make sure you explain how the quote is connected to your point — let the reader know the significance of the quotations you use.
There are three levels of direct quoting:
- Specific details—quoting words or phrases
- Brief quotes—quoting 1-3 sentences
- Lengthy quotes—quoting 4 or more sentences at one time (you will unlikely use this type of quoting in this course)
Specific Detail
Specific details uses words or phrases from the text to support your argument. Details should be short—a word or phrase–and they should be incorporated into your own sentences.
Jack was “bent double” with his “nose only a few inches from the humid earth” tracking the trail of the pig “dog-like…on all fours” (Golding 48)
Brief quotations
Brief quotations are fewer than three lines and should be carefully introduced and integrated into your writing. Put quotation marks around all briefly quoted material, as in this example:
On the wall of his room is a “large tinted photograph of his dead wife, who, if Masses willed and paid for out of her own estate could do it, was in Heaven” (99).
Lengthy quotations
Lengthy quotations (also called block quotes) are used when you want to quote more than three lines of text. Think carefully before using this type of quotation and make sure the entire section you want to quote directly supports your argument. Block quotes should be single-spaced and indented four spaces from the left margin, and should not use quote marks. Steinbeck writes:
When the servant come in bearing the message that Juana and Kino have arrived, the doctor sat up in his high bed. He had on his dressing gown of red watered silk that had come from Paris, a little tight over the chest now if it was buttoned. On his lap was a silver tray with a silver chocolate pot and a tiny cup of eggshell china, so delicate that it looked silly when he lifted it with his big hands (701).
Comparing Four Types of Textual Evidence
Referencing:
- This is clear when Meursault attends his mother’s funeral.
- This is clear when he flies over the sea.
Summarizing:
- When Meursault’s mother dies he claims that it was inevitable, explaining the absurdist idea that life has no meaning (33).
- He did not worry about falling as he flew over the sea (298).
Paraphrasing:
- Original: “that it was one of those things that was bound to happen sooner or later” (33).
Paraphrase: As an absurdist, Meursault doesn’t put meaning towards any object or being. Therefore, he doesn’t mourn over his mother’s death and acts indifferently towards his loss(33).
- Original: “Part of his flight was over the dark sea, but it didn’t frighten him because he knew he could not fall” (298).
Paraphrase: He wasn’t afraid of falling when he flew over the sea (298).
Quote:
- The novel begins with his mother’s death, but Meursault remarks, “that it was one of those things that was bound to happen sooner or later,” which conveys the absurd ideology (33).
- Morrison writes, “Part of his flight was over the dark sea, but it didn’t frighten him because he knew he could not fall” (298).
Quoting Evidence
There are two ways you can use quotes in your essay: (1) by integrating them into your own sentences (2) by using a standalone quote.
- Integrating quotes into your own sentences is useful when you only need to use a word or phrase to support your argument. If you need to quote a complete sentence or more, you should use a standalone quote.
- Standalone quotes are quotes that are longer than a word or phrase. They can be one or several sentences long.
Here are some golden rules about quoting:
- Select your quotes carefully. A quote should build upon or directly support a specific point in your argument.
- Never start a sentence with a direct quote. Always introduce a quote or integrate it into our own sentence. (See How to Use Direct Quotations chart on NEXT PAGE for help with this.)
- Always provide a context for your quote before you use it. When using quotes in essays about nonfiction, be sure to tell the reader who wrote it (author’s name), where it’s from (source title) and what it’s about. Similarly, for essays about fiction be sure to tell the reader where in the story quote comes from and what it’s about. Do not refer to page number or chapters (“on page 16” or “in chapter five”). Instead, refer to a time or place in the actual story (“When John arrives at the store” or “When they are sitting at home waiting for the storm”).
Which quoting method should you use?
Each has some advantages and disadvantages. The integrated quote disrupts the flow of your argument less than a standalone quote because it’s woven into your own writing. Standalone quotes, however, allow you to support complex arguments and ideas because they are longer and contain more information. An expert writer determines which method best supports the argument in each specific instance. An expert writer is also aware that the selection of quotes must be judicious. Quoting too much can distract the reader with unnecessary information. Quoting too little is likely to leave the reader unconvinced.
Integrated Quote Examples
Essays About Fiction
Jack was “bent double” with his “nose only a few inches from the humid earth” tracking the trail of the pig “dog-like…on all fours” (Golding 48)
Odysseus arrogantly provokes the Cyclops when he yells, “if ever mortal man inquire how you were put to shame and blinded, tell him Odysseus, raider of cities, took your eye” (9.502-05).
Essays About Nonfiction
According to Holiday, the effects of a rumor can be “devastating to the point where some students stay home sick from school and even contemplate suicide” (89).
Holiday argues that the rumors can be “devastating” and even cause some teens to “stay home sick from school and even contemplate suicide” (89)
Standalone Quote Examples
Essays About Fiction
Steinbeck writes:
When the servant come in bearing the message that Juana and Kino have arrived, the doctor sat up in his high bed. He had on his dressing gown of red watered silk that had come from Paris, a little tight over the chest now if it was buttoned. On his lap was a silver tray with a silver chocolate pot and a tiny cup of eggshell china, so delicate that it looked silly when he lifted it with his big hands (701).
This can been seen where Odysseus gloats, “Cyclops, if ever mortal man inquire how you were put to shame and blinded, tell him Odysseus, raider of cities, took your eye: Laertes’ son, whose home’s on Ithaca!” (9.502-05).
Essays About Nonfiction
In How Rumors Kill, Harvard researcher Jill Holiday reveals how one simple rumor among a few friends can spread in just a few weeks throughout an entire high school: “The affect of spreading rumors can have a significant impact in a high school environment. In just a few weeks, a harmless rumor can grow to the point where almost everyone in that community is involved” (89).
Advanced Quoting
Adding Words to a Quotation
If you need to add words to a quotation in order to explain who or what the quotation refers to, you must use brackets to distinguish your addition from the original source, as shown in the following example:
“He [the doctor] had on his dressing gown of red watered silk that had come from Paris, a little tight over the chest now if it was buttoned.”
Brackets are used here because there is no way of knowing who “he” is unless you add that information. Brackets are also used to change the grammatical structure of a quotation so that it fits into your sentence, as in this example:
He holds the tea cup “with the tips of thumb and forefinger and spread[s] the other three fingers wide to get them out of the way.”
Brackets are used here to add the “s” to the verb “spread” in order to change it to present tense (it was originally past tense) so that it stays consistent with “holds” which is also present tense. Remember that you write about literature in the present tense, as if the story is still going on.
Deleting Words from a Quotation
You must use ellipsis (…) if you omit any words from the original quote. Ellipsis can be used at the beginning, in the middle, or at the end of the quotation, depending on where the missing words were originally. Ellipsis is formed by either three periods with a space between each period.
Original text: “Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy, wealthy and wise.”
- Quote with omission from beginning: This behavior “…makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.”
- Quote with omission from middle: This maxim claims that “Early to bed…makes a man healthy, wealthy, and wise.”
- Quote with omission from end: He said, “Early to bed and early to rise makes a man healthy . . . .”
Punctuating Direct Quotations
You will be able to punctuate quoted materials accurately if you observe the following conventions used in writing about literature.
- When the quoted material is part of your own sentence, place periods and commas inside the quotation marks.
When Kino and Juana return to their village, they walk “side by side.” - When the quoted material is part of your own sentence, but you need to include a parenthetical reference to page or line numbers, place the periods and commas after the reference.
When Kino and Juana return to their village, they walk “side by side” (41). - When the quoted material is part of your own sentence, punctuation marks other than periods and commas, such as question marks and exclamation points, are placed outside the quotation marks, unless they are part of the quoted material.
Not part of original text: Why does Steinbeck write that Kino and Juana walked “side by side”?
Part of original text: The doctor shows his greed and prejudice when he asks his servant “Has he any money?” The question mark is placed inside the quotation marks because it appears in the original. - When the original material you are quoting already has quotations marks (for instance, dialog from a short story), you must use single quotation marks within the regular quotation marks.
The servant is ashamed, and “opened the gate just wide enough to pass the paper back. ‘The doctor has gone out,’ he said.”
Source: “Advanced Quoting” was adopted from http://www.mtabe.k12.vt.us/middleschool/aurora/languagearts/textualevidence.html