(3) It is a good idea to begin writing as soon as possible. To their great discomfort, writers of theses often find that notebooks full of reading notes are not readily transformed into coherent prose in a short time.(Read the last sentence again: its aptness may be all too evident during the month of March.)
(4) Every time you read material that might be germane to your thesis, enter full bibliographical data in your notes. When you copy down material that you may wish to quote, note precise page numbers.
(5) The outer limit of the thesis is 20,000 words (approximately 60-80 pages).A lower limit may be understood to be roughly 15,000 words. Many students find that, perhaps because of the awe in which they hold the Senior Thesis, once they begin writing they become carried away. Most readers of theses tend to find that longer does not usually mean better. Thus there is another reason for beginning your actual writing early.
(6) While an adviser may be relied upon for help in improving the presentation overall, or in identifying broad or recurrent problems of writing or composition, the adviser's function is not that of a line-by-line copy editor. Please remember that additional guidance on writing can and should be obtained at The Writing Center, 108 Notestein Hall (258-2797).
(7) For all technical matters (format, citations, electronic citations) refer to the MLA Handbook or the Chicago Manual of Style. If you do not possess a copy of these manuals, by all means acquire at least one of them.
(8) The question of acknowledgement of your sources is dealt with in a section of the University publication Rights, Rules, Responsibilities. You should be closely familiar with all of its provisions.
(9) The title-page of your thesis must bear the title of the thesis, your name and class, the name of your adviser(s), the date on which the thesis is due, and the following inscription:
Submitted to the Department of Comparative Literature in partial fulfillment of requirements for the A.B. degree in Princeton University.
(10) The final page of the thesis must include your signature and the following text: This paper represents my own work in accordance with University regulations, followed by your signature.
(11) You must submit, on or before the deadline date, three copies of the thesis, signed at the end of the final chapter. Two copies must be hard bound; one of these will be kept in the departmental archive, and the other returned to you. The third copy must be unbound. This will be sent, according to University policy, to the Princeton University Archives in the Seeley G. Mudd Library to be microfilmed as an archival copy, and will not be returned. If you are writing a creative thesis, you will be required to submit an additional bound copy for the Creative Writing Program's library.
It is the policy of the University Library that all researchers will have access to senior theses on deposit in Mudd Library. In extraordinary circumstances, a student may petition the Dean of the College in writing to restrict access to a thesis for a specified period of time. The policy of the University Library is that fair-use copying, as defined by the copyright law, should be allowed for all senior theses on deposit in Mudd Library.
(12) Any independent work received after the deadline will be subject to a grade reduction of 3 points per day on a scale of 100 (approximately one step on the letter-grade scale, e.g. from B+ to B).Petitions for extensions for medical reasons must include letters from a doctor or dean and be received by the Director of Undergraduate Studies at least seven days prior to the deadline in question. As independent work must be paced over the course of the entire academic year, petitions for extensions will normally not be deemed admissible in the final week before a deadline. The reasons for these rules are simple:(1) lateness is unfair to other students who, perhaps at the risk of a less-than-perfect job, hand their work in on time, and (2) extensions ultimately handicap the individuals involved since they hamper preparations for comprehensives and final examinations.
(13) You should remember that theses are submitted to the Comparative Literature Department and not simply to your individual thesis adviser. The adviser is only one of the people who will grade the thesis; the final evaluation of your work will be the product of deliberations among your adviser, a second reader, and in some instances, a third reader. While the fact that your adviser has read a draft of your thesis is not a guarantee of its acceptability to the Department, it is normally true that if you work closely with your adviser throughout the year and satisfy her requirements, you should have no trouble in having your thesis accepted by the Department.
