SAMPLE ANNOTATED TEXTS
The prose passage below is from Willa Cather’s novel My Antonia. The poem is John Donne’s The
Broken Heart. These samples are meant to give you an idea of what an annotated text looks like. As you
study each one, you may find other literary elements that you would have marked or made note of. If so, it
shows you are thinking critically. Good for you!!
Try writing an essay for each of the texts below using the insights in the annotations.
Use this generic prompt to guide you: What is the narrator’s/speaker’s attitude
toward the setting/situation?