How should I incorporate critics into my essays?

The use of critics in your essays is one of the biggest step-ups from GCSE to A-Level, and is often what fazes students the most. In terms of actually finding criticism, you should make use of your school library and online databases such as JSTOR. You should have the themes of each text clear in your mind so that you can find quotations that will refer to them. You do not need to necessary quote critics, and a general outline of their stance and opinion should suffice, but having a few of their quotes handy is nevertheless bound to impress. Critics should always be put at the beginning of your paragraphs along with your topic sentence, or perhaps after it, thus using the critic to back up the topic sentence, and the rest of the paragraph to interact with that critic's opinion. You decide whether you agree with the critic or not. It is often recommended to have three critical references in each essay, one for each main body paragraph. When referring to the critics themselves, you should write down their full name when you first mention them and then use their last name only afterwards. E.g. "Fred Botting asserts that..."