Quick Reference

For reference, here’s a short passage from The Fellowship of the Ring, the first book of The Lord of the Rings.

“It’s a dangerous business, Frodo, going out of your door,” [Bilbo] used to say. “You step into the Road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there is no knowing where you might be swept off to.”

Summary

Using your own words to give a condensed overview of a text.

J. R. R. Tolkein’s book The Lord of the Rings is a story about how two short, hairy people save the world by throwing a ring into a volcano.

Paraphrase

Using your own words to explain a specific detail or point from the text.

As Bilbo told Frodo, once you start traveling, it’s sometimes hard to stop (Tolkein).

Quotation

Including a small piece of the text exactly as it appears in the original.

Bilbo told Frodo that leaving home was “a dangerous business.” He observed that once you do, “if you don’t keep your feet, there is no knowing where you might be swept off to” (Tolkein).

Show quoted material

Citation:

Giving credit to the source of an idea. Whenever you use an idea or words from an outside source, your paragraph needs to tell your readers where that came from.

Show citations