Defining your topics - First and foremost, a
topic sentence is a piece of analysis, NOT summary. Think of
it in a similar manner to how you thought of your thesis; in other words,
an original interpretation based upon the textual evidence of your source.
The first of the following examples illustrates a statement of fact,
rather than an argumentative topic sentence.
Weak Topic Sentence:
"Book Five of Paradise Lost
concentrates on the conversation between Adam
and the archangel Raphael.”
Strong Topic Sentence:
"Throughout Book Five, Milton utilizes
images of gardening and nourishment to
convey man's maturing relationship to
the divine."
Relationship of topics to thesis -
Your topic statements should each provide a solid area of analysis by
which your thesis is true. They should, however, be more specific than a
mere restatement of part of it.
Thesis: "In Journey
Through the Twelve Forests, David
Haberman apprehends the Ban-Yatra pilgrimage
as a realization of the god Krishna's
omnipresence, through separate realizations of
the journey's cyclical nature, the externalization
of the divine, and the relationship between
asceticism and pleasure."
Topic Sentence for
Second Paragraph: "Throughout the
narrative, the physical relationship of the
pilgrim to the natural landscape of
Braj, as well as worshipped images of
Krishna and other deities, reflects the
presence of Krishna as an interactive
externality, rather than the occupant of
an inaccessible sphere."
