Writing your own essay

This guide shows one method for developing those preparation essays using the texts, archive material, historical research and critical readings brought together by the Bram Stoker Estate. Your teachers will help you apply that knowledge to the demands and technique of your examination.

Different courses, different questions. Classroom research assignments, honors courses and AP Literature can make different demands. Some classroom tasks concern one novel; others require comparison or analysis of a supplied passage. AP Question 3 asks for an argument about one selected work. Use Chapter C’s course information and official AP materials alongside your teacher’s advice.

Choose a practice question or one set by your teacher. The seven stages below – five to build the argument, then two to write and revise – suggest a method, not a compulsory formula. Your teacher or college may suggest another. You may return to earlier stages when drafting changes your understanding.

The example essays show the first five decisions before presenting the finished essay. Read the preparation alongside the essay to see how the question, evidence and provisional conclusion shape the finished argument. Then use the full seven-stage approach to develop and revise your own response.

Define the task, test the evidence and settle on an argument and structure before you begin the draft.

Work out what the question asks you to decide. Define each important term through the text, identify what its wording actually asserts and establish the task’s requirements. Distinguish an assumption in the question from a tempting initial reading of your own.

Worked example: “Mina Harker is both traditional and modern.” Traditional can refer to marriage, duty, service and male protection; modern to paid work, technical competence and independent judgement. “Both” proposes coexistence, not an equal balance. Ask how those qualities work together, where they conflict and what the novel’s treatment of them enables you to conclude.

Gather relevant passages from across the novel. For each, record the chapter, who speaks or writes, a short exact quotation, and the point it supports or complicates. A quotation becomes evidence when you explain what it helps establish. Include the strongest passage against the answer you first prefer, as well as evidence in its favour.

Keep a brief note of passages you considered and set aside, with your reasons: a passage may answer a different question, record one character’s view rather than establish a fact, or repeat a point that stronger evidence supports. Select for relevance and range; there is no fixed number of passages every essay must use.

Worked example: “useful to Jonathan” (Chapter 5) connects technical skills with service; “it is no part for a woman” (Chapter 18) exposes a limit on participation. “Unclean, unclean!” (Chapter 21) could support a different argument about coercion, purity and conventional expectations. Set it aside here to maintain the chosen focus on work and authority, not because it is inherently irrelevant to traditional femininity.

Investigate relevant context and alternative interpretations where they sharpen the argument. There is no fixed quota of critics or historical facts. Keep a source only when you can explain what it strengthens, qualifies or challenges. A class research assignment may set additional requirements; follow those instructions.

For example, the New Woman debate can clarify Mina’s useful work and the limits placed on it. Charlotte’s public work, the Whitman letters and Stoker’s friendships can be investigated through the Estate’s sources, while keeping documented facts distinct from claims of fictional influence.

Set out the strongest evidence for your initial reading, evidence that complicates it, and the consideration that shapes your final judgement. Write a provisional thesis answering the prompt. A counter-argument is useful when it genuinely tests the reading; you do not need to force every task into equal “for” and “against” halves.

A defensible thesis makes a claim that needs explanation. “Mina uses modern technology” identifies a fact. An argument might explain how the group’s dependence on her records exposes the weakness of the authority that excludes her.

Write an argument outline, sometimes called its “spine”: your provisional thesis followed by the main points of your paragraphs in their intended order. Explain how each claim develops, qualifies or challenges the previous one. The reader should be able to follow why the argument moves from one point to the next.

For each paragraph, select the key quotation or precise detail, note the method you will analyse, and explain how the paragraph advances your answer. Place an alternative interpretation where it most effectively tests your reasoning. Keep the plan flexible if the drafting exposes a gap.

Three useful options follow. They are choices, not rules: choose the one that best develops the conclusion your evidence supports.

Main point: Modern competence develops within conventional usefulness.

Key quotation: “useful to Jonathan” (Chapter 5); “dates are everything” (Chapter 17)

What to analyse: Contrast the declared beneficiary with the authority that organising the documents gives her.

Main point: Male praise recognises ability while retaining a gendered hierarchy.

Key quotation: “man’s brain”; “woman’s heart” (Chapter 18)

What to analyse: Read the divided terms of praise beside the subsequent decision to exclude her.

Turn your plan into connected prose, then check whether the finished essay delivers the answer your evidence supports.

Drafting and revision can send you back to the evidence or change your conclusion. This guide’s sequence is a suggested working method. The IES guidance on modelling, practice and reflection supports making writing decisions visible, without prescribing these exact seven steps.

Keep a short revision note: what was the original claim, what evidence challenged it, and how did the new version answer the question more accurately? This makes the preparation reusable without treating the finished essay as a script to reproduce.

The method draws on IES guidance on modelling, practice and reflection. It is not a requirement imposed by an examination board.

A striking opening and an earned final turn are writing choices, not separate AP scoring requirements. A clear, well-supported interpretation matters more than a decorative hook or surprise ending.

AP Question 3 ordinarily develops an argument about one selected work. The comparison guides and Wilde essay below remain useful for teacher-set comparative assignments, wider reading and understanding literary choices. They are not models of the AP Question 3 format.

For an AP preparation using one novel, use the old-and-new worked plan. For a comparative class assignment, use the pairing guides and follow your teacher’s requirements.

Use context in an argument. Context and themes shows how historical and literary evidence can explain a passage, with a worked paragraph and a comparative prompt. Charlotte Stoker and Mina: an evidence-led comparison addresses the connection between women’s public work and the novel, and distinguishes a useful comparison from proof that Charlotte inspired Mina. Printable student worksheet · Separate teacher commentary.

Going further with the belonging example. Stoker’s life and queer readings sets out what the documents show about Stoker’s friendships with Walt Whitman, Henry Irving and Oscar Wilde, and what they cannot show. Read it alongside the difference and belonging example. A queer reading of the novel can be illuminating without proving anything about Stoker’s own life.

Nine researched example essays, each with a question, five stages of argument-building and a finished essay. Use steps 6 and 7 to write and revise your own work. The questions are classroom preparation tasks drawn or adapted from the existing guide; they are not nine official AP prompts. The separate teaching notes explain the task’s scope and how to use it.

If you think you’ve developed a convincing argument, send us your essay. We welcome contributions from teachers, students and enthusiasts alike. Your ideas could help readers and Bram’s family deepen our understanding of his life and Dracula, while supporting future students. We’ll credit the author of every essay we publish – so your fifteen minutes of fame might last a little longer.

Next: F – Practising and revising · Previous: D – Context and themes · Back to US-system study

Did this approach help you develop your own argument? Tell us what worked and what needs explaining more clearly.