Your paper must have a well defined thesis.
The thesis of your paper should be clearly stated in the introduction to the essay.
The main thesis should be developed through specific supporting arguments.
The essay must include specific evidence to support the main arguments. This support may include quotations from established scholars or from particular plays, evidence from performance practices of the period you are studying or references to particularly literary or scholarly works.
The essay should be clearly organized around your main arguments.
You must acknowledge the source for every idea that is not your own and for every fact that is not common knowledge within the field.
See MLA Chapter 5 for the appropriate format.
The final paper must cite at least five secondary sources, at least one of which is not a book (i.e. an article in a journal or periodical). The textbook does not count as one of these five sources, nor does a play script. Such resources may be used in your research, but the final bibliography must list five additional sources. General histories, encyclopedias, etc. are good places to start, but find more specific sources for the final paper.
See MLA Chapter 4 for appropriate format.
Pay particular attention to:
Subject-verb agreement
Sentence structure (avoid fragments and run-on sentences)
Clearly indicate where quotations begin and end by using quotation marks or by using a block indentation for quotes longer than 4 lines. (See MLA 2.7.2)
The spell-check function in your word processing program is
a great way to catch many typing errors. However, this function
will not necessarily assist you when you have used the wrong word.
Proofread carefully and make sure you have not used a word that
sounds like the word you intended to use (ie they're instead of
their, it's instead of its).