THE MINISTRY OF HIGHER AND

SECONDARY SPECIAL EDUCATION OF THE

REPUBLIC OF UZBEKISTAN

KARAKALPAK STATE OF UNIVERSITY NAMED

AFTER BERDAKH

D. Khadjieva, N. Satullaeva

Literary Theory
(Manual)
5120100 –Philology and language teaching

Nukus – 2020

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D. Khadjieva, N.Satullaeva /“Literary theory/ Manual for high
educational learners /Nukus, 2020/145p

“Literary theory”is a manual of theory and practice which can be used

alongside in theoretical and practical course of “Literary theory”. Its aim is to help
students acquire and use the knowledge and techniques necessary for the literary
analysis of a text, to obtain knowledge about theories of literature.The book is
divided into three parts, first one containing theories of literature and questions
checking the students’ comprehension, second part practical activities and
exercises on seminar topics and self –study works of the subject. Multiple choice
tests are in the third part of the manual.The book ends with a list of the authors,
whose works have been used for illustration.

“Литературоведения” - это учебное пособие по теории и практике,

которое может быть использовано наряду с теоретическим и практическим
курсом. Его цель- помочь студентам приобрести и использовать знания и
приёмы, необходимые для литературного анализа текста, получить знания по
литературоведения. Книга разделена на три части, первая из них содержит
лекции по теории литературы и вопросы, проверяющие понимание
учащимися, вторая часть - практические занятия и упражнения по
семинарским темам предмета и задании для самостоятельного выполнения
студентам. Тесты с множественным выбором приведены в третьей части
учебного пособия. Книга заканчивается списком авторов, чьи произведения
были использованы для иллюстрации.

Reviewers:
D.S.prof.M.Kudaybergenov
Ph.d.dots.N.Babaniyazova

Editor : D.S.prof. D.Teshaboyeva

The manual was discussed at the meeting of the scientific council

of Karakalpak State University and recommended to publication. (paper
№ 7. date: 27.05.2020)

Nukus - 2020
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 PREFACE

"Literary theory" is the body of ideas and methods we use in the practical reading
of literature. By literary theory we refer not to the meaning of a work of literature
but to the theories that reveal what literature can mean. Literary theory is a
description of the underlying principles, one might say the tools, by which we
attempt to understand literature. All literary interpretation draws on a basis in
theory but can serve as a justification for very different kinds of critical activity. It
is literary theory that formulates the relationship between author and work; literary
theory develops the significance of race, class, and gender for literary study, both
from the standpoint of the biography of the author and an analysis of their thematic
presence within texts. Literary theory offers varying approaches for understanding
the role of historical context in interpretation as well as the relevance of linguistic
and unconscious elements of the text. Literary theorists trace the history and
evolution of the different genres—narrative, dramatic, lyric—in addition to the
more recent emergence of the novel and the short story, while also investigating
the importance of formal elements of literary structure. Lastly, literary theory in
recent years has sought to explain the degree to which the text is more the product
of a culture than an individual author and in turn how those texts help to create the
culture

The present manual presents two modules of the subject “Literary theory” .The
first one is about general basics of literary theory. It comprises such topics as
subject, object and tasks of the subject ‘Literary theory”, the notion of art, kinds of
art, the place of literature among the other branches of art, prominent schools of
literary theory,specific features of literary work, theme and idea of fictional
work, form and content in literature.

Module 2 isdevoted to theoretical –conceptual importance of the subject literary

theory .it deals with such topics as plot and composition of work of art as well as
language characteristics of fictional work.

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The subject Literary theory is taught in the 1st and 7th semesters at the branches
Philology and teaching foreign languages (English) , and Foreign languages and
literature (English). Its aim is to help students acquire and use the knowledge and
techniques necessary for the literary analysis of a text , besides to obtain perfect
knowledge about theories of literature which is a great need in their future career
of being successful teachers , furthermore it is a great help for starting research
in the field of theories and critiques of literature

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 MODULE I GENERAL BASICS OF LITERARY THEORY
1-THEME

Literary theory is a subject about literature

Subject matter of Literary theory

Literary theory in a strict sense is the systematic study of the nature

of literature and of the methods for analyzing literature.However, literary
scholarship since the 19th century often includes—in addition to, or even instead
of literary theory in the strict sense—considerations of intellectual history, moral
philosophy, social prophecy, and other interdisciplinary themes which are of
relevance to the way humans interpret meaning.[1] Inhumanities in modern
academia, the latter style of scholarship is an outgrowth of critical theory and is
often called simply "theory." As a consequence, the word "theory" has become an
umbrella term for a variety of scholarly approaches to reading texts. Many of these
approaches are informed by various strands of Continental philosophy and
sociology.A literary critic is not someone who merely evaluates the worth or
quality of a piece of literature but, rather, is someone who argues on behalf of an
interpretation or understanding of the particular meaning(s) of literary texts. The
task of a literary critic is to explain and attempt to reach a critical understanding of
what literary texts mean in terms of their aesthetic, as well as social, political, and
cultural statements and suggestions. A literary critic does more than simply
discuss or evaluate the importance of a literary text; rather, a literary critic seeks to
reach a logical and reasonable understanding of not only what a text’s author
intends for it to mean but, also, what different cultures and ideologies render it
capable of meaning.

“Literary theory,” however, refers to a particular form of literary criticism in which

particular academic, scientific, or philosophical approaches are followed in a

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systematic fashion while analyzing literary texts. For example, a psychoanalytic
theorist might examine and interpret a literary text strictly through the theoretical
lens of psychoanalysis and psychology and, in turn, offer an interpretation or
reading of a text that focuses entirely on the psychological dimensions of it.
Traditional literary criticism tends not to focus on a particular aspect of (or
approach to) a literary text in quite the same manner that literary theory usually
does. Literary theory proposes particular, systematic approaches to literary texts
that impose a particular line of intellectual reasoning to it. For example, a
psychoanalytic literary theorist might take the psychological theories of Sigmund
Freud or Carl Jung and seek to reach a critical understanding of a novel such as
Ernest Hemingway’s For Whom the Bell Tolls. A literary theorist applying,
perhaps, Sigmund Freud’s notions of trauma to Hemingway’s novel might explore
the protagonist’s psychology, using Freud’s theoretical “tools,” and The Saylor
Foundation argue that the protagonist suffers from what Freud termed “shell
shock” and that the novel, then, can reasonably be argued to be a commentary
upon the effects of war on the psychology of individuals. Literary theorists often
adapt systems of knowledge developed largely outside the realm of literary studies
and impose them upon literary texts for the purpose of discovering or developing
new and unique understandings of those texts that a traditional literary critic might
not be intellectually equipped to recognize

The practice of literary theory became a profession in the 20th century, but it has
historical roots that run as far back as ancient Greece (Aristotle's Poetics is an
often cited early example), ancient India (Bharata Muni's NatyaShastra), ancient
Rome (Longinus's On the Sublime) and medieval Iraq (Al-Jahiz's al-Bayan wa-'l-
tabyin and al-Hayawan, and ibn al-Mu'tazz's Kitab al-Badi),[3] and
the aesthetictheories of philosophers from ancient philosophy through the 18th and
19th centuries are important influences on current literary study. The theory
and criticism of literature are, of course, also closely tied to the history of
literature.

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 The modern sense of "literary theory," however, dates only to approximately
the 1950s, when thestructuralistlinguistics of Ferdinand de Saussure began strongly
to influence English languageliterary criticism. The New Critics and various
European-influenced formalists (particularly the Russian Formalists) had described
some of their more abstract efforts as "theoretical" as well. But it was not until the
broad impact of structuralism began to be felt in the English-speaking academic
world that "literary theory" was thought of as a unified domain.

In the academic world of the United Kingdom and the United States, literary
theory was at its most popular from the late 1960s (when its influence was
beginning to spread outward from elite universities like Johns Hopkins, Yale,
and Cornell) through the 1980s (by which time it was taught nearly everywhere in
some form). During this span of time, literary theory was perceived as
academically cutting-edge, and most university literature departments sought to
teach and study theory and incorporate it into their curricula. Because of its
meteoric rise in popularity and the difficult language of its key texts, theory was
also often criticized as faddish or trendy obscurantism (and many academic satire
novels of the period, such as those by David Lodge, feature theory prominently).
Some scholars, both theoretical and anti-theoretical, refer to the 1970s and 1980s
debates on the academic merits of theory as "the theory wars."

By the early 1990s, the popularity of "theory" as a subject of interest by itself

was declining slightly (along with job openings for pure "theorists") even as the
texts of literary theory were incorporated into the study of almost all literature. As
of 2004, the controversy over the use of theory in literary studies has all but died
out, and discussions on the topic within literary and cultural studies tend now to be
considerably milder and less acrimonious (though the appearance of volumes such
as Theory's Empire: An Anthology of Dissent, editedby NathanParker with Andrew
Costigan, sought a resurgence of the controversy). Some scholars draw heavily on
theory in their work, while others only mention it in passing or not at all; but it is
an acknowledged, important part of the study of literature.

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The notion of literature

One of the fundamental questions of literary theory is "what is literature?" –

Although many contemporary theorists and literary scholars believe either that
"literature" cannot be defined or that it can refer to any use of language. Specific
theories are distinguished not only by their methods and conclusions, but even by
how they define a "text". For some scholars of literature, "texts" comprises little
more than "books belonging to the Western literary canon."A very brief history of
literature highlights the following events. Before 500 B.C., there was almost no
written literature. A few pieces of literature did exist on clay tablets or carved in
stone--clay and stone were the first mediums of the writing arts. But most literature
was still oral in those days: literature was part of an oral tradition. In fact,
storytelling was a profession in more civilized ancient countries, and storytellers
would make their living by memorizing great classics of myth, legend, and truth
from each other, then repeating them to enraptured audiences.

Papyrus, rough paper-like material made from reeds, came into more common use
after the fifth century B.C. in Europe and Africa, and similar materials came into
use about the same time in the Far East. The mediums of papyrus and paints and
inks made writing easier.

Some of the earliest classics of written literature began to appear from that period
of history, works such as the Old Testament of the Hebrew Bible, the works of
early Greek philosophers and playwrights, the Tao TeChing of Lao-tzu, and other
great works of art. From this rough papyrus or "paper," more refined and mass
produced versions were developed as the centuries progressed to medieval times.
Early through late medieval times saw monastaries (in the Western world),
universities (in the Islamic cultures of North Africa and the Middle East), and the
courts of kings and princes (in the Far East) collecting older writings from
wherever they could, collecting them in small libraries, and copying them by hand
to share with others. In 1408, for example, the YongleDadian--a copy of all

8
existing writings in China, was made by order of Chinese Emperor Yongle. It is
through the sometimes heroic but more often tedious"Literature" actually may be
defined as any piece of writing that can claim that it has--in some way--artistic
beauty. A grocery list (unless, possibly, done as part of a longer literary work) is
not literature. War and Peace by Tolstoy is. So are Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter,
significant parts of great religious works of art such as the Bible or the Hindu
Bhagavid Gita, Shakespeare's plays and poetry, and finely crafted nonfiction such
as Plato's Republic or Martin Luther King's "I Have A Dream" speech. Sometimes
it is not so much the subject matter that makes a piece of writing literature, as it is
the way in which the subject matter is handled. The grocery list mentioned above
could appear in a beautifully crafted humorous article or fiction story, in a finely
tuned poem, or even in a speech, thus giving even its simple grocery-list contents a
special beauty or meaning. Sometimes the subject matter does make a difference,
though: important subjects sometimes lead people to talk and write more
eloquently.

When people write or speak of such subjects as visions of the soul, the eternal
conflict between good and evil, great romance, or the tragedy of loving or of
warring, the subject matter itself may incline them to create written works of art
that can move everyone else deeply, even change people's lives. The principles and
methods of literary theory apply to non-fiction, popular fiction, film, historical
documents, law, advertising, etc., and in the related field of cultural studies. Some
scholars within cultural studies treat cultural events, like fashion or football riots,
as "texts" to be interpreted. By this measure, literary theory can be thought of as
the general theory of interpretation.

Since theorists of literature often draw on a very heterogeneous tradition

of Continental philosophy and the philosophy of language, any classification of
their approaches is only an approximation.

What is literary theory?

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"Literary theory," sometimes designated "critical theory," or "theory," and now
undergoing a transformation into "cultural theory" within the discipline of literary
studies, can be understood as the set of concepts and intellectual assumptions on
which rests the work of explaining or interpreting literary texts. Literary theory
refers to any principles derived from internal analysis of literary texts or from
knowledge external to the text that can be applied in multiple interpretive
situations. All critical practice regarding literature depends on an underlying
structure of ideas in at least two ways: theory provides a rationale for what
constitutes the subject matter of criticism—"the literary"—and the specific aims of
critical practice—the act of interpretation itself. For example, to speak of the
"unity" of Oedipus the King explicitly invokes Aristotle's theoretical statements on
poetics. To argue, as does Chinua Achebe, that Joseph Conrad’s The Heart of
Darkness fails to grant full humanity to the Africans it depicts is a perspective
informed by a postcolonial literary theory that presupposes a history of exploitation
and racism. Critics that explain the climactic drowning of Edna Pontellier in The
Awakening as a suicide generally call upon a supporting architecture of feminist
and gender theory. The structure of ideas that enables criticism of a literary work
may or may not be acknowledged by the critic, and the status of literary theory
within the academic discipline of literary studies continues to evolve.

Literary theory and the formal practice of literary interpretation runs a parallel but
less well known course with the history of philosophy and is evident in the
historical record at least as far back as Plato. The Cratylus contains a Plato's
meditation on the relationship of words and the things to which they refer. Plato’s
skepticism about signification, i.e., that words bear no etymological relationship to
their meanings but are arbitrarily "imposed," becomes a central concern in the
twentieth century to both "Structuralism" and "Poststructuralism." However, a
persistent belief in "reference," the notion that words and images refer to an
objective reality, has provided epistemological (that is, having to do with theories
of knowledge) support for theories of literary representation throughout most of
Western history. Until the nineteenth century, Art, in Shakespeare’s phrase, held "a
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mirror up to nature" and faithfully recorded an objectively real world independent
of the observer

QUESTIONS
1. What is subject matter of literary theory?
2. What does literary theory investigate?
3. What is the first book which discussed theories of literature?
4. What is literature?
5. What masterpieces of English literature have you read?
6. When first started theories of literature in modern sense?

2. LITERATURE IS A KIND OF ART

The notion of art

In earlier times the word art referred to any useful skill. Shoemaking,
metalworking, medicine, agriculture, and even warfare were all once classified as
arts. They were equated with what are today called the fine arts- painting, -
sculpture, music, architecture, literature, dance, and related fields. In that broader
sense art has been defined as a skill in making or doing, based on true and adequate
reasoning.
The concept of beaux-arts, a term that was coined in France during the 18th
century, is expressed in English as fine arts. But the French word beau (plural,
beaux) is usually translated as meaning "beautiful." This usage is the decisive clue
to the separation of the fine arts from the useful arts and technology in the 1700s.
The arts of the beautiful were separated from the arts of the useful because of
the belief that the fine arts had a special quality: they served to give pleasure to an
audience. The type of pleasure was called aesthetic, and it referred to the
satisfaction given to the individual or group solely from perceiving--seeing or
hearing--a work of art. The work could be a painting, a performance of music or

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drama, a well-designed building, or a piece of literature. The satisfaction could
come from a perceived beauty, truth, or goodness; but since the mid-18th century
the emphasis has been on beauty.
Aesthetics is the study, or science, of the beautiful. The word is derived
from the Greek aisthetikos, meaning "of sense perception." The term aesthetics
was coined by a German philosopher, Alexander Gottlieb Baumgarten in a two-
volume work on the subject. Written in Latin and titled 'AestheticaAcroamatica', it
was published from 1750 to 1758. This unfinished work, which established
aesthetics as a branch of philosophy, influenced some noted German philosophers-
-particularly Immanuel Kant. Kant retained Baumgarten's use of the term to apply
to the entire field of sensory knowledge, and his interpretation was adapted by the
German writers Johann Wolfgang von Goethe and Friedrich Schiller to present
their own studies of the subject. It was Kant's 'Critique of Aesthetic Judgment'--the
first part of his 'Critique of Judgment' (1790)--that proved to be the pivotal work on
the subject, not Baumgarten's earlier work. For Baumgarten, aesthetics had two
emphases. First, it was a study of the theory of beauty; second, it was a theory of
art. These two emphases, when drawn together in one science, served to
distinguish the fine arts from the other activities of humankind.
The earlier and more comprehensive understanding of art can be seen in the
Latin and Greek words that were used to describe it. The Latin word ars (plural,
artes) was applied to any skill or knowledge that was needed to produce
something. From it the English word art is derived, as is artificial, which means
something produced by a human being. The Greek word is even more revealing. It
is techne, the source for the term technology, which most people would never
confuse with art. By the 18th century and the age of enlightenment, however, we
begin to see a change of attitude: Art is described as "A pursuit or occupation in
which skill is directed toward the ratification of taste or production of what is
beautiful." Here for the first time we hear that art is associated with taste, and
beauty, (though skill is still there).

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In the 19th century Matthew Arnold stated that "We mean by art not merely an aim
to please, but also pure and faultless workmanship." Arnold, who was the foremost
establishment arbiter of taste in the later 19th c. was being a little defensive here.
He was reaffirming the importance of skill, while acknowledging that art should
also aim to please; that is, create something beautiful. The ideals of
art as stated by Arnold are examplified by the painting on the right. But why was
he being defensive about this well established idea that artists exhibit skill?
Because in the 19th century for the first time we have dissent from this idea,
expressed in the idea of the Avant Garde- the notion that the creative powers of the
individual artist are at the center of what art is. The artist was now seen as the
leading edge, the prophet of new cultural ideas-- and this meant that the artist had
begun to take more extensive liberties with established ideas of technique,
interpretation, and suitable subject matter. There was still a belief, as there had
been in the past, in the power of art to mold human minds. But now the artist
controlled his own visions and the artist was seen as a race apart - a prophet. The
artist's duty, according to the Avant Garde ethic, was to provide moral and spiritual
leadership and to show beauty and meaning for the dawning industrial age. That is,
he was to reinvent and expand the visual language to meet changing times. These
ideals led to the birth of Modernism in the later 19th century through such
movements as impressionism, expressionism, and Symbolism. Modernism is a
concept born in the industrial revolution. It was the expression of an urge to
embrace the new realities and materials of the industrial age, and was expressed
through literature, art, decorative arts and design. Underlying most of the
modernist movements have been earnest efforts at social engineering- utopianism
for the new industrial state that was taking shape. Yet inevitably, as we shall see,
there was also a counter-movement toward nostalgia and tradition, a resistance to
the accelerating rate of change. This has often been expressed in visual arts by a
taste for decorative detail, realism in painting, and a general preference for the

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elaborate. This was in contrast with the modernist tendency to simplify forms,
reduce decorative detail, and retreat from realism. The emphasis on form also
resulted in attention to the materials used, and the visual qualities they offer.
There are many different kinds of art. Some of the different kinds of art include
original art, modern paintings, and art from the Impressionist era. Art that is
original, by definition, is work that is one-of-a-kind and it can be any kind of art,
not just a painting as long as it was created by the real artist himself or herself.
Modern art is, by definition, art "of the present times." Finally, impressionist
artwork is work in which the artist paints the picture as if he or she has just
something very quickly. Art is one of the best ways to lose yourself in your
thoughts, either when creating it or when viewing it.
Different Kinds Of Art
Painting
One of the most common and familiar forms of art is painting. It is a form wherein
you apply different pigment types to a medium, particularly on canvas, paper, wall,
wood panel, and so on. Nonetheless, painting itself is a broad category which is
further classified into different sub-categories. Depending upon the materials used,
painting can be grouped into acrylic painting, watercolor painting, mural painting,
etc. Also, there are various subjects that are portrayed through painting, such as
nature, people, living beings, objects, events, places, and so on.
Sculpture
Monuments, statues, and carvings are not new to any one of us. All these fall under
the category of sculptural art. It is a 3-dimensional kind of artwork made from
different materials, like rock, wood, clay, plastic, stone, and others. In general,
there are two different ways of making sculptures: carving the sculpture from a
single piece and assembling different pieces to form one full sculpture. Similar to
painting, sculptures, too, are segregated into different types. These include free-
standing sculptures, light sculptures, sound sculptures, relief sculptures, and
jewelry.
Photography
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Photography is one such art form that most of us have been connected with since
years. Clicking snaps and pictures are a passion for some people which is reflected
through their willingness to take up this art form as a career. The best pictures are
clicked using different light patterns that are emitted or reflected from various
angles. Aerial photography, black and white photography, fashion photography,
glamour photography, portrait photography, wedding photography,
astrophotography, digital photography, fine art photography, nature photography,
and still life photography are some types of photography.
Digital Art
With the development in technology, art has also undergone several changes and
modifications. As such, digital art, or computer art, is a kind of modern art that is
mostly used in creating websites, video games, clip arts, and templates. The latest
buzzword in the field of digital art is animation, especially 3D animation. It is
extensively used in making films, TV commercials, and web advertising.
Movie Making

Though movie making, or film making, is one of the modern visual art types, it is a
broad category that includes several other art forms. Scriptwriting, music, lyrics,
dialogues, cinematography, and others are some forms that converge into movie
making. Further, by including audio and video into movie making, it offers the
audience a complete picture.

The place and pecularities of literature among the other kinds of art

Literature (from Latinlitterae (plural); letter) is the art of written work and can,
in some circumstances, refer exclusively to published sources. The word literature
literally means "things made from letters" and the pars pro toto term
"letters" is sometimes used to signify "literature," as in the figures of speech "arts
and letters" and "man of letters." Literature is commonly classified as having two
major forms—fiction and non-fiction—and two major techniques—poetry and
prose.

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Literature is the art-form of language, and words are its tools. As a painter uses
paint, as a musician uses musical instruments, as a sculptor uses stone-and-chisel,
so a writer uses words.

"Literature" actually may be defined as any piece of writing that can claim that
it has--in some way--artistic beauty.

A grocery list (unless, possibly, done as part of a longer literary work) is not
literature. War and Peace by Tolstoy is. So are Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter,
significant parts of great religious works of art such as the Bible or the Hindu
Bhagavid Gita, Shakespeare's plays and poetry, and finely crafted nonfiction such
as Plato's Republic or Martin Luther King's "I Have A Dream" speech.

Words have a definite meaning. That is the first point every writer must address
(though of course not every writer answers that question as I just have). In fact,
it’s become fashionable to say that language is arbitrary and definitions are, at best,
approximations. Indeed, many writers accept these tenets without even realizing
that they’ve accepted them and without any regard whatsoever for the fact that it’s
not actually possible to write clearly unless you know the meaning of the words
you’re using. If you don’t know the meaning of the words you’re using, your
writing will be unclear, and readers will not grasp your intent. Clarity is the
number one priority in all issues of writing style. It is certainly true that language
envolves, and that words develop new nuances and new meanings. This is natural
and it is good. This natural process does not, however, negate objectivity, but just
the opposite: the evolutionary process of language is gradual, so that at any given
period, the words you’re using do possess a definite meaning. If a word does not
possess a definite meaning, it’s a non-word (and there are examples of these:
“postmodernism” being one of them). What I’ve just described is the place from
which every writer must proceed: Words possess a definite meaning. That is the
beginning. This point is critical to note, because it’s the foundation upon which the
rest of all literary knowledge is built.

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 Art by definition is communication — communication between the artist and
the audience. If it’s not communicable, it’s not art. If in your literature you reject
the notion that language is definite, you will not only confuse and frustrate your
readers, but worse: you will confuse and frustrate yourself, because you won’t
know the meaning of the things you’re trying to communicate.

The relationship between literature and history is as old as the written word.
Early writings influenced the formation of society and how people viewed their
communities, if not their very reality. Literature continues to reflect history, as
history looks in the mirror that works of literature provide.

During the Harlem Renaissance, the works of Langston Hughes and Countee
Cullen gave African-American people a voice. The works of Gertrude Stein and
Willa Cather, among others, eliminated some of the gender stereotypes that were
prevalent at the time. John Steinbeck and F. Scott Fitzgerald were among the
authors whose writings pointed out the wide gulf between society's haves and
have-nots. Today, Martin Luther King Jr.'s "I Have a Dream" speech continues to
inspire many.

Read Shakespeare's works and you'll get a feel for the important political
issues of the day, as well as what people found amusing at that point in history.
The poets of antiquity wrote about subjects that are startlingly familiar today --
shedding light on the similarities between ancient history and our own. Of the
more than 600 characters in "War and Peace," a great many are historical figures of
the time. Literature provides the opportunity to learn about history in a way that is
approachable and accessible.

Questions
1.What is the relationship of literature with the kinds of art?

2. The place and pecularities of literature among the other kinds of art?

3. What is digital art?

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4.What is literature?

5. What is art?

6. What other branches of art are you interested in?

7.What is your opinion about modern branches of art?

3. SCHOOLS OF LITERARY THEORY

General considerations

There are many types of literary theory, which take different approaches to texts.
Even among those listed below, combine methods from more than one of these
approaches (for instance, the deconstructive approach of Paul de Man drew on a
long tradition of close reading pioneered by the New Critics, and de Man was
trained in the European hermeneutic tradition).

Broad schools of theory that have historically been important include historical
and biographical criticism, New Criticism, formalism, Russian formalism,
and structuralism, post-structuralism, , new historicism, deconstruction, reader-
response criticism, and psychoanalytic criticism.

The different interpretive and epistemological perspectives of different

schools of theory often arise from, and so give support to, different moral and
political commitments. For instance, the work of the New Critics often contained
an implicit moral dimension, and sometimes even a religious one: a New Critic
might read a poem by T. S. Eliot or Gerard Manley Hopkins for its degree of
honesty in expressing the torment and contradiction of a serious search for belief in
the modern world. Or a post-structuralist critic might simply avoid the issue by
understanding the religious meaning of a poem as an allegory of meaning, treating
the poem's references to "God" by discussing their referential nature rather than
18
what they refer to. A critic using Darwinian literary studies might use arguments
from the evolutionary psychology of religion.

Such a disagreement cannot be easily resolved, because it is inherent in the

radically different terms and goals (that is, the theories) of the critics. Their
theories of reading derive from vastly different intellectual traditions: the New
Critic bases his work on an East-Coast American scholarly and religious tradition,
while they derive his thought from a body of critical social and economic thought,
the post-structuralist's work emerges from twentieth-century Continental
philosophy of language, and the Darwinian from the modern evolutionary
synthesis. To expect such different approaches to have much in common would be
naïve; so calling them all "theories of literature" without acknowledging their
heterogeneity is itself a reduction of their differences.

In the late 1950s, Canadian literary critic Northrop Frye attempted to establish
an approach for reconciling historical criticism and New Criticism while
addressing concerns of early reader-response and numerous psychological and
social approaches. His approach, laid out in his Anatomy of Criticism, was
explicitly structuralist, relying on the assumption of an intertextual "order of
words" and universality of certain structural types. His approach held sway in
English literature programs for several decades but lost favor during the
ascendance of post-structuralism.

For some theories of literature (especially certain kinds of formalism), the

distinction between "literary" and other sorts of texts is of paramount importance.
Other schools (particularly post-structuralism in its various forms: new historicism,
deconstruction, some strains of feminism) have sought to break down distinctions
between the two and have applied the tools of textual interpretation to a wide range
of "texts", including film, non-fiction, historical writing, and even cultural events.

Bakhtin argued that the "utter inadequacy" of literary theory is evident when it is
forced to deal with the novel; while other genres are fairly stabilized, the novel is
still developing.
19
Another crucial distinction among the various theories of literary interpretation is
intentionality, the amount of weight given to the author's own opinions about and
intentions for a work. For most pre-20th century approaches, the author's intentions
are a guiding factor and an important determiner of the "correct" interpretation of
texts. The New Criticism was the first school to disavow the role of the author in
interpreting texts, preferring to focus on "the text itself" in a close reading. In fact,
as much contention as there is between formalism and later schools, they share the
tenet that the author's interpretation of a work is no more inherently meaningful
than any other.

Listed below are some of the most commonly identified schools of literary
theory, along with their major authors. In many cases, such as those of the historian
and philosopher Michel Foucault and the anthropologist Claude Lévi-Strauss, the
authors were not primarily literary critics, but their work has been broadly
influential in literary theory.

Traditional Literary Criticism

Academic literary criticism prior to the rise of "New Criticism" in the United
States tended to practice traditional literary history: tracking influence, establishing
the canon of major writers in the literary periods, and clarifying historical context
and allusions within the text. Literary biography was and still is an important
interpretive method in and out of the academy; versions of moral criticism, not
unlike the Leavis School in Britain, and aesthetic (e.g. genre studies) criticism
were also generally influential literary practices. Perhaps the key unifying feature
of traditional literary criticism was the consensus within the academy as to the
both the literary canon (that is, the books all educated persons should read) and the
aims and purposes of literature. What literature was, and why we read literature,
and what we read, were questions that subsequent movements in literary theory
were to raiseModernismNew Criticism – looks at literary works on the basis of
what is written, and not at the goals of the author or biographical issues W. K.
Wimsatt, F. R. Leavis, John Crowe Ransom, Cleanth Brooks, Robert Penn Warren

20
 Structuralism and Poststructuralism

Like the "New Criticism," "Structuralism" sought to bring to literary studies a set
of objective criteria for analysis and a new intellectual rigor. "Structuralism" can
be viewed as an extension of "Formalism" in that that both "Structuralism" and
"Formalism" devoted their attention to matters of literary form (i.e. structure)
rather than social or historical content; and that both bodies of thought were
intended to put the study of literature on a scientific, objective basis.
"Structuralism" relied initially on the ideas of the Swiss linguist, Ferdinand de
Saussure. Like Plato, Saussure regarded the signifier (words, marks, symbols) as
arbitrary and unrelated to the concept, the signified, to which it referred. Within the
way a particular society uses language and signs, meaning was constituted by a
system of "differences" between units of the language. Particular meanings were of
less interest than the underlying structures of signification that made meaning itself
possible, often expressed as an emphasis on "langue" rather than "parole."
"Structuralism" was to be a metalanguage, a language about languages, used to
decode actual languages, or systems of signification. The work of the "Formalist"
Roman Jakobson contributed to "Structuralist" thought, and the more prominent
Structuralists included Claude Levi-Strauss in anthropology, Tzvetan Todorov,
A.J. Greimas, Gerard Genette, and Barthes.

The philosopher Roland Barthes proved to be a key figure on the divide

between "Structuralism" and "Poststructuralism." "Poststructuralism" is less
unified as a theoretical movement than its precursor; indeed, the work of its
advocates known by the term "Deconstruction" calls into question the possibility
of the coherence of discourse, or the capacity for language to communicate.
"Deconstruction," Semiotic theory (a study of signs with close connections to
"Structuralism," "Reader response theory" in America ("Reception theory" in
Europe), and "Gender theory" informed by the psychoanalysts Jacques Lacan and
Julia Kristeva are areas of inquiry that can be located under the banner of
"Poststructuralism."
21
New Historicism and Cultural Materialism
"New Historicism," a term coined by Stephen Greenblatt, designates a body of
theoretical and interpretive practices that began largely with the study of early
modern literature in the United States. "New Historicism" in America had been
somewhat anticipated by the theorists of "Cultural Materialism" in Britain, which,
in the words of their leading advocate, Raymond Williams describes "the analysis
of all forms of signification, including quite centrally writing, within the actual
means and conditions of their production." Both "New Historicism" and "Cultural
Materialism" seek to understand literary texts historically and reject the
formalizing influence of previous literary studies, including "New Criticism,"
"Structuralism" and "Deconstruction," all of which in varying ways privilege the
literary text and place only secondary emphasis on historical and social context.
According to "New Historicism," the circulation of literary and non-literary texts
produces relations of social power within a culture. New Historicist thought differs
from traditional historicism in literary studies in several crucial ways. Rejecting
traditional historicism's premise of neutral inquiry, "New Historicism" accepts the
necessity of making historical value judgments. According to "New Historicism,"
we can only know the textual history of the past because it is "embedded," a key
term, in the textuality of the present and its concerns. Text and context are less
clearly distinct in New Historicist practice. Traditional separations of literary and
non-literary texts, "great" literature and popular literature, are also fundamentally
challenged. For the "New Historicist," all acts of expression are embedded in the
material conditions of a culture. Texts are examined with an eye for how they
reveal the economic and social realities, especially as they produce ideology and
represent power or subversion. Like much of the emergent European social history
of the 1980s, "New Historicism" takes particular interest in representations of
marginal/marginalized groups and non-normative behaviors—witchcraft, cross-
dressing, peasant revolts, and exorcisms—as exemplary of the need for power to
represent subversive alternatives, the Other, to legitimize itself.

22
Ethnic Studies and Postcolonial Criticism
"Ethnic Studies," sometimes referred to as "Minority Studies," has an obvious
historical relationship with "Postcolonial Criticism" in that Euro-American
imperialism and colonization in the last four centuries, whether external (empire)
or internal (slavery) has been directed at recognizable ethnic groups: African and
African-American, Chinese, the subaltern peoples of India, Irish, Latino, Native
American, and Philipino, among others. "Ethnic Studies" concerns itself generally
with art and literature produced by identifiable ethnic groups either marginalized or
in a subordinate position to a dominant culture. "Postcolonial Criticism"
investigates the relationships between colonizers and colonized in the period post-
colonization. Though the two fields are increasingly finding points of
intersection—the work of bell hooks, for example—and are both activist
intellectual enterprises, "Ethnic Studies and "Postcolonial Criticism" have
significant differences in their history and ideas.

"Ethnic Studies" has had a considerable impact on literary studies in the United
States and Britain. In W.E.B. Dubois, we find an early attempt to theorize the
position of African-Americans within dominant white culture through his concept
of "double consciousness," a dual identity including both "American" and "Negro."
Dubois and theorists after him seek an understanding of how that double
experience both creates identity and reveals itself in culture.

Gender Studies and Queer Theory

Gender theory came to the forefront of the theoretical scene first as feminist theory
but has subsequently come to include the investigation of all gender and sexual
categories and identities. Feminist gender theory followed slightly behind the
reemergence of political feminism in the United States and Western Europe during
the 1960s. Political feminism of the so-called "second wave" had as its emphasis
practical concerns with the rights of women in contemporary societies, women's
identity, and the representation of women in media and culture. These causes

23
converged with early literary feminist practice, characterized by Elaine Showalter
as "gynocriticism," which emphasized the study and canonical inclusion of works
by female authors as well as the depiction of women in male-authored canonical
texts.

Feminist gender theory is postmodern in that it challenges the paradigms and

intellectual premises of western thought, but also takes an activist stance by
proposing frequent interventions and alternative epistemological positions meant
to change the social order. In the context of postmodernism, gender theorists, led
by the work of Judith Butler, initially viewed the category of "gender" as a human
construct enacted by a vast repetition of social performance

Cultural Studies
Much of the intellectual legacy of "New Historicism" and "Cultural Materialism"
can now be felt in the "Cultural Studies" movement in departments of literature, a
movement not identifiable in terms of a single theoretical school, but one that
embraces a wide array of perspectives—media studies, social criticism,
anthropology, and literary theory—as they apply to the general study of culture.
"Cultural Studies" arose quite self-consciously in the 80s to provide a means of
analysis of the rapidly expanding global culture industry that includes
entertainment, advertising, publishing, television, film, computers and the Internet.
"Cultural Studies" brings scrutiny not only to these varied categories of culture,
and not only to the decreasing margins of difference between these realms of
expression, but just as importantly to the politics and ideology that make
contemporary culture possible. "Cultural Studies" became notorious in the 90s for
its emphasis on pop music icons and music video in place of canonical literature,
and extends the ideas of the Frankfurt School on the transition from a truly popular
culture to mass culture in late capitalist societies, emphasizing the significance of
the patterns of consumption of cultural artifacts. "Cultural Studies" has been
interdisciplinary, even antidisciplinary, from its inception; indeed, "Cultural
24
Studies" can be understood as a set of sometimes conflicting methods and
approaches applied to a questioning of current cultural categories. Stuart Hall,
Meaghan Morris, Tony Bennett and Simon During are some of the important
advocates of a "Cultural Studies" that seeks to displace the traditional model of
literary studies.

QUESTIONS

1. What schools of literary schools do you know?

2. Which school do you think was important in the development of literary
theory?
3. What is the first book which discussed theories of literature?
4. What is literature?
5. What masterpieces of English literature have you read?
6. When did first start theories of literature in modern sense?

4. THEME AND IDEA OF FICTIONAL WORK

The notion of fiction
Fiction writing is any kind of writing that is not factual. Fictional writing
most often takes the form of a story meant to convey an author's point of view or
simply to entertain. The result of this may be a short
story, novel, novella, screenplay, or drama, which are all types (though not the
only types) of fictional writing styles.Just as a painter uses color and line to create
a painting, an author uses the elements of fiction to create a story.

A fictional text (belles-lettres text), being one of the forms of literary

coitiiiiunication, has peculiar features which distinguish this text type from other
tonus of communication. The problem of fictional texts has received widespread
attention among linguists. The basic notions of fiction such as imagery, emotiveness,
implicitness, ambiguity, associative potential, creativity, semantic complexity were
discussed in the works by V.V. Vinogradov, B.A. Larin, G.O, Vinokur, R.O.
Jackobson and others.
A fictional text is regarded as one of the types of communication, that is literary
25
communication. This assumption raises the question: how to draw a clear line
ofdemarcation between literary and other types of communication. In other words, it
is necessary to define what features determine the specificity of the belles-lettres
text. l.R. Galperin indicates the following features of'this text-type:
1. genuine, not trite imagery achieved by means of stylistic devices;
2. the use of words in contextual, and very often in more than one dictionary
meaning;
3. the vocabulary which reflects to a greater or lesser degree the author’s personal
evaluation of things and phenomena;
4. a peculiar individual selection of vocabulary and syntax, a kind of lexical and
syntactical idiosyncrasy.
There were attempts to define the specificity of a fictional text in the pragmatic
perspective proceeding from the theory of speech acts based on the universal rules
of speech behavior . However, in the process of'literary communication these
rules, as has been proved by many researchers, are constantly violated. It refers to
the so called “surplus'" informal ion peculiar to fictional texts. This information
violates the principle of “brevity" in communication.
The elements of fiction

The elements of fiction are: character, plot, setting, theme, and style. Of
these five elements, character is the who, plot is the what, setting is
the where and when, and style is the how of a story.

A character is any person, personal, identity, or entity whose existence originates

from a fictional work or performance.

A plot, or storyline, is the rendering and ordering of the events and actions of a
story, particularly towards the achievement of some particular artistic or emotional
effect.

Setting is the time and location in which a story takes place.

Theme is the broad idea, message, or lesson of a story.

26
Style includes the multitude of choices fiction writers make, consciously or
subconsciously, as they create a story. They encompass the big-picture, strategic
choices such as point of view and narrator, but they also include the nitty-gritty,
tactical choices of grammar, punctuation, word usage, sentence and paragraph
length and structure, tone, the use of imagery, chapter selection, titles, and on and
on. In the process of writing a story, these choices meld to become the
writer's voice, his or her own unique style.

Characterization is one of the five elements of fiction, along with plot, setting,
theme, and writing style. A character is a participant in the story, and is usually a
person, but may be any persona, identity, or entity whose existence originates from
a fictional work or performance. Characters may be of several types:

Point-of-view character: the character by whom the story is viewed. The point-of-
view character may or may not also be the main character in the story.

Protagonist: the main character of a story

Antagonist: the character who stands in opposition to the protagonist

Minor character: a character that interacts with the protagonist. They help the story
move along.

Foil character: a (usually minor) character who has traits in aversion to the main
character

The plot, or storyline, is the rendering and ordering of the events and actions of a
story. Starting with the initiating event, then the rising action, climax, falling
action, and ending with the resolution.

On a micro level, plot consists of action and reaction, also referred to as stimulus
and response. On a macro level, plot has a beginning, a middle, and an ending. Plot
is often depicted as an arc with a zig-zag line to represent the rise and fall of
action. Freytag's Pyramid is also another way to represent action in a novel.

27
The climax of the novel consists of a single action-packed sentence in which the
conflict (problem) of the novel is resolved. This sentence comes towards the end of
the novel. The main part of the action should come before the climax.

Plot also has a mid-level structure: scene and sequel. A scene is a unit of drama—
where the action occurs. Then, after a transition of some sort, comes the sequel—
an emotional reaction and regrouping, an aftermath.

Setting is the locale and time of a story. The setting is often a real place, but may
be a fictitious city or country within our own world; a different planet; or an
alternate universe, which may or may not have similarities with our own universe.
Sometimes setting is referred to as milieu, to include a context (such as society)
beyond the immediate surroundings of the story. It is basically where and when the
story takes place.

Theme is what the author is trying to tell the reader. For example, the belief in the
ultimate good in people, or that things are not always what they seem. The moral
of the story, if you will. Though be warned there is not always a theme to every
story.Style includes the multitude of choices fiction writers make, consciously or
not, in the process of writing a story. It encompasses not only the big-picture,
strategic choices such as point of view and choice of narrator, but also tactical
choices of grammar, punctuation, word usage, sentence and paragraph length and
structure, tone, the use of imagery, chapter selection, titles, etc. In the process of
creating a story, these choices meld to become the writer's voice, his or her own
unique style.

For each piece of fiction, the author makes many choices, consciously or
subconsciously, which combine to form the writer's unique style. The components
of style are numerous, but include point of view, choice of narrator, fiction-writing
mode, person and tense, grammar, punctuation, word usage, sentence length and
structure, paragraph length and structure, tone, imagery, chapter usage, and title
selection.

28
 A writer's choice in the narrator is crucial for the way a work of fiction is
perceived by the reader. Most narrators present their story from one of the
following perspectives (called narrative modes): first-person, or third-person
limited or omniscient. Generally, a first-person narrator brings greater focus on the
feelings, opinions, and perceptions of a particular character in a story, and on how
the character views the world and the views of other characters. If the writer's
intention is to get inside the world of a character, then it is a good choice, although
a third-person limited narrator is an alternative that does not require the writer to
reveal all that a first-person character would know. By contrast, a third-person
omniscient narrator gives a panoramic view of the world of the story, looking into
many characters and into the broader background of a story. A third-person
omniscient narrator can tell feelings of every character. For stories in which the
context and the views of many characters are important, a third-person narrator is a
better choice. However, a third-person narrator does not need to be an omnipresent
guide, but instead may merely be the protagonist referring to himself in the third
person (also known as third person limited narrator).

A writer may choose to let several narrators tell the story from different
points of view. Then it is up to the reader to decide which narrator seems most
reliable for each part of the story. It may refer to the style of the writer in which
he/she expresses the paragraph written. See for instance the works of Louise
Erdrich. William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying is a prime example of the use of
multiple narrators. Faulkner employs stream of consciousness by narrating the
story from the first person view of multiple characters. Each chapter is devoted to
the voice of a single character after whom it is titled. Some writers employ an
alternate form of this style, in which multiple characters narrate the story at
once, or at least a single character narrates the actions of a group of characters
while never referring to a "me", and only to a "we" of the group. The technique of
narrating from the point of view of a group as opposed to an individual can create a
dissociative effect of observation, as if a Greek chorus, or personalize the story
further by providing the reader with the knowledge and experience of a party
29
involved in the story, without the unrelatable specifics of an individual personality
or character. Examples of first-person plural narration include Chuck
Palahniuk's Haunted and Jeffrey Eugenides' The Virgin Suicides.

In literary work, the narrator is the person who tells the story. Point of view
is the narrator's relationship to the story. In a story using first-person point of view,
the narrator is a character in the story. The reader sees everything through that
character's eyes. In a work with third-person limited point of view, the narrator is
outside the story and reveals the thoughts and feelings of only one character.

A narrator is, within any story (literary work, movie, play, verbal account,
etc.), the non-fictional or fictional, personal or impersonal entity who tells the story
to the audience. When the narrator is also a character within the story, he or she is
sometimes known as the first person or first-person narrator. The narrator is
constructed by the author and may be presented as distinct from, or the same as,
the author, depending upon the author's construction. The narrator is one of three
entities responsible for story-telling of any kind. The others are the author and
the audience (the latter called the "reader" when referring specifically to literature).

The author and the audience both inhabit the real world. It is the author's
function to create the universe, people, and events within the story. It is the
audience's function to understand and interpret the story. The narrator only
exists within the world of the story (and only there—although in non-fiction the
narrator and the author can share the same persona, since the real world and the
world of the story may be the same) and present it in a way the audience can
comprehend.

A narrator may tell the story from his or her own point of view (as a fictive
entity) or from the point of view of one of the characters in the story. The act or
process of telling the particulars of a story is referred to as narration. Along
with exposition, argumentation, anddescription, narration (broadly defined) is one
of four rhetorical modes of discourse. More narrowly defined, narration is
the fiction-writing mode whereby the narrator communicates directly to the reader.
30
 The concept of the unreliable narrator (as opposed to "author") became more
prominent with the rise of the novel in the 18th century. Until the late 19th
century, literary criticism as an academic exercise dealt solely
with poetry (including epic poems like the Iliad and Paradise Lost, and poetic
drama like Shakespeare). Most poems did not have a narrator distinct from the
author. But novels, with their immersive fictional worlds, created a problem,
especially when the narrator's views differed significantly[clarification needed] from those
of the author.

Perspective, interpretive knowledge, focalization and structure are the

narrator's characterisa viewpoint character is Dr. Watson from theSherlock
Holmes stories. Almost all of the Sherlock Holmes collection is from his point of
view.

Wholeness of literary text

The structural-semantic categories,which actually serve as "steps of cognizing"

the nature of the text, its organizational units and its functioning,
include the category of text wholeness—the category reflecting the
primary properties of the text.

In modern linguistics the wholeness of the text, the close inter-

connection of its constituents has got the na me of text coherence
(fro m Latin "cohaerens"—sticking together, well-knit). It is also
metaphorically conveyed by the molecular-physics term — cohesion,
attraction of particles to each other, tendency to remain united.
The text wholeness, the organic hitching of its parts is inherent both to
separate spans of the text and to the entire speech production. Separate
spans into which the text is fractioned are joined together preserving
the unity, totality of the literary work, ensuring consecutiveness
(continuum) of the related events, facts, actions.

31
Between the described events there must be, as it is known, so me
succession, some connection, which, it is true, is not always expressed
by the verbal system of language means — by conjunctions, by
conjunctional phrases, participial phrases etc. Moreover, this very
syste m was worked out according to the connections, observed inside
a sentence, i.e. its parts and between its clauses, in particular betwee n
principal and subordinate clauses.

However, analysing texts, we see that its separate parts sometimes

placed at a considerable distance from each other, turn out to be
connected in a greater or less degree, while the means of connection
do not always coincide with traditional ones.

For designating textual forms of connection it is expedient to use the

term cohesion, which has recently ca me into linguistic
use.Consequently cohesion denotes special kinds of connection, ensu-
ring continuum, i.e. logical consistency, interdependence of separate
communications, facts, actions etc.

The means of cohesion in the text can be classified according to

different traits. Besides traditionally grafphic means, performing the
text-forming function, they can be divided into logical, associative,
image-forming, composition-structural, stylistic and rhythm-creating.
The traditionally gra mmatic means embrace all conjunctions and
conjunctional words of the type: as, since, therefore, that's why,
because, however, in this connection, both... and, as well as, all
deiktic means, participial phrases. All these means are called
traditionally grammatic means because they are already described as
means of connection between separate sentences and clauses. But in
the text they serve as means of connection between much larger spans
— syntactical wholes, paragraphs, chapters. Such forms of cohesion

32
also include the following means of enumeration: in the first place, in
the second place, graphic means a) b), c), or means disme mbering
parts of the utterance by figures 1)' 2), 3), etc. Such adverbs as: soon,
a few days (weeks, years) later, when etc, being temporal parameters
of co mmunication, hitch together separate events, imparting
authenticity to the m. The same function is performed by the following
words: not far fro m, opposite, behind, under, above, next to, in the
distance, close by, past, etc., which are spatial parametres o f
communication. The enumerated means of cohesion are considered
logical, because they fit the logic-philosophic concepts —the concepts
of consistency, te mporal, spatial, cause-and-effect relations. These
means are easily recognized and therefore don't detain the reader's
attention. It is just in logical means of cohesion that we observe the
intersection of gra mmatic and textual forms of connection. Connecting
separate spans of the text into one aggregate whole, into a speech
production, the gra mmatic means acquire the status, of textual means,
i.e. acquire the status of cohesion.

Naturally in this process the connective means don't lose their syste m
properties co mpletely. That's why we can say that in logic connectives
we observe simultaneous realization of two functions: gra mmatic and
text-forming.

The basis of the next kind of cohesion — associative — is formed b y

other peculiarities of text structure such as: retrospection,
connotation, subjective-evaluating modality. The verbal signals of
associative cohesion are such introductory phrases as: suddenly it
occured to him, that re minded him of... etc. Associative cohesion is
often elusive. However it sometimes determines the connection bet-
ween the described phenomena, the connection which is very impor-
tant for understanding the content-conceptual information of a literary
33
work. It is necessary to point out that associations in literary works do
not appear accidentally (spontaneously). They appear as a result o f
imaginative-creativc process, in which remote notions, which are not
connected by logical means of cohesion acquire quite clear
connections.

Associative means of cohesion are typical mainly of imaginative

literature. It requires some creative reexa mination of connections
between phenomena. Here we can cite the following words b y
Wordsworth: "To find affinities in objects in which no brotherhood
exists for passive minds". It means that it is not easy to find similarit y
in objects without straining one's mind.

The co mpositional-structural forms of cohesion include first of all

such forms which break consistency and logical organization of the
communication by all kinds of digressions, insertions, te mporal pr
spatial descriptions of pheno mena, events, actions, not immediately
connected with the main theme (plot) of narration. Such violations,
interrupting the main line of narration, so metimes constitute the
second plan of co mmunication. The compositional-structural forms of
hitching remind of the assemblage of cine ma sequences into co mplete
films, when some recollections, "second plans" burst into the
consistently connected stills.

In every case of co mpositional-structural cohesion we can mentally

imagine words and expressions which could logically connect the
disunited pieces of narration, for instance: "digressing from the the me
of the account", "passing over to the second line in the narration",
'that reminds me of...", "a parallel case", "simultaneously with this",
"at the same time", "in the other place", "we can detect similarity of
the events"... etc.

34
The notion of “theme”

Theme is what the author is trying to tell the reader. For example, the belief in
the ultimate good in people, or that things are not always what they seem. The
moral of the story, if you will. Though be warned there is not always a theme to
every story.Style includes the multitude of choices fiction writers make,
consciously or not, in the process of writing a story. It encompasses not only the
big-picture, strategic choices such as point of view and choice of narrator, but also
tactical choices of grammar, punctuation, word usage, sentence and paragraph
length and structure, tone, the use of imagery, chapter selection, titles, etc. In the
process of creating a story, these choices meld to become the writer's voice, his or
her own unique style.

By the "theme" we mean the sense nucleus of the text, the condensed
and generalized contents of the text. The quotation itself from a
theoretical treatise 1 on this subject runs as follows: "By the the me of
the whole text or a micro-text we consider the sense nucleus
understood as a generalized concentrate of the entire contents of the
text".

The subthemes are revealed in separate chapters, paragraphs and

complex syntactical wholes constituting a speech production. Betwee n
the the me of the entire speech production and its subthemes there
exists an indirect connection. The theme of the entire speech
production is by no means a mere arithmetic sum of particular
subthe mes. That is most distinctly seen in the genre of imaginative
literature. The main idea of a literary work, as it is well known, is not
stated by the writer immediately, but it is brought to the reader
through a syste m of images, through concrete pictures of human life,
coloured by his subjective attitude to it.

35
Nature descriptions, portraits of people, stories about separate events
in the life of personages, or about their sufferings and experiences
serve as separate subthemes of chapters, parts and syntactical wholes.
Of course, the aggregate sum of subthe mes is not equal to the ideo-
thematic contents of the whole literary work, but it is only aimed at its
revelation and serves as a means of its realization.

The concepts of a theme and introtextual connections as well as the

focus of a speech production constitute the main linguistic para meters
belonging to the category of the wholeness of the text. The wholeness
of the text, as it has been remarked, is not only a structura l
pheno menon, it manifests itself simultaneously in structural, sense and
communicative wholeness, which correlate among themselves as form,
contents and function

QUESTIONS

1.What’s fiction writing?

2. What does style include?

3.Who is the author of “In the Characters”

4. What’s the function of a first-person narrator
5. . What’s internal conflict?
6. What’s the characterization?
7. What’s the direct characterization?
8.What’s the indirect characterization?
9.What’s the setting?
10.What’s the tone of a story?
11.What’s the theme of a story?

12.What’s the message of a story

36
 5.FORM AND CONTENT IN LITERATURE

General considerations

In literature the form refers to the style and structure of a literary work whereas
the content refers to the plot , characters, settings and themes.
Have you ever thought of literature as a great big happy family? It might seem like
a strange image, but it is quite effective for describing the relationships between
form, genre, and meaning. In this lesson, we're going to meet some of the members
of the literary family tree and see how they function in the literary world.

First, let's define some terms. The form of a piece of writing is simply its structure,
how it is constructed and organized. Literary forms are like the roots of the literary
family tree. Genres, in turn, are like the branches of the family tree. A genre is a
specific style or category of writing. Genres make use of the various literary forms
as foundations from which to stretch out in many directions of expression. Forms
and genres join with content to create the meaning of a piece of
writing. Meaning is basically the writer's message to the reader. Writers choose
various forms and genres to help them express their meaning. For instance, a poem
about the tragedy of the Civil War would send a very different message than a
nonfiction history book.

The key difference between form and content in literature is that the content is
what a text says while the form is the way of arrangement of the content.

Form and content are two very important aspects of a text. It is not possible to
disconnect the two and look at them as completely different components due to
their inherent relation. In literature, the form refers to the style and structure of a
literary work whereas the content refers to the plot, characters, setting, and themes.

What is Form in Literature? The form is the way of arrangement of the content
of a text. Basically, it explains how the text presents the information. In a literary

37
work, the form can refer to the style, structure or tone of a work. There are
different forms in literature; for example, novels, novellas, short stories, and
poems.

These forms also have sub-forms; for instance, a poem can take different forms
such as narrative, ballad, epic, elegy or sonnet. Division of a novel into chapters,
the division of a play into various acts and scenes are also examples of the form in
literature.

What is Content in Literature?

Content is basically what a text says. It explains what’s the text is about. In other
words, it’s the information the text presents. In a literary piece of work, the content
refers to the message, story, theme, setting and/or characters.For example, if you
are looking at a novel, the content refers to the plot, characters, theme, and setting
of that novel. Similarly, if you are looking at a poem, it expresses the ideas of the
poem. Further, there are different forms in use to present the content. For example,
a poem can take the form of a sonnet, free verse, limerick, haiku, etc.

In some works, the content may decide the form of the work. However, some
writers also let the form of the work influence the content. Form and content are
dependent on each other. To fully appreciate a work of literature, they cannot be
separated from each other. The content basically refers to what a text says while
the form refers to how it is said. In other words, the form explains the arrangement
or structure of the information while content refers to the information presented in
the text. In a work of literature, form may include style and structure while content
may include characters, themes, and settings

Major Literary FormsNow let's meet some of the members of the literary family
tree. We'll begin at the roots with the four major literary forms: nonfiction prose,
fiction prose, poetry, and drama.

38
Nonfiction prose is literature that is written in ordinary, non-metrical language
and communicates facts or opinions about reality. Every time you read a science
textbook or a how-to article, you are reading nonfiction prose. Nonfiction
meanings are usually pretty straightforward because the writer's primary purpose is
to convey information or persuade readers.

Fiction prose is also written in ordinary, non-metrical language, but it is the

product of the writer's imagination. You've probably been reading novels and short
stories for years; if so, you already know a lot about fiction prose. The meaning of
fictional works can stretch all the way from obscure and difficult to clear and
direct.

Poetry, on the other hand, uses metrical language with lots of rhythm and rhyme to
create word pictures. Poetry employs all kinds of word play, figurative language,
and imagery to send its messages, which are often rather obscure and need to be
dug out with some effort on the part of the reader.

Drama combines elements of prose and poetry into plays that are usually intended
to be performed on stage. Drama joins monologues and dialogues by characters
with stage directions and occasionally narrative sections that explain the action.
Like poetry, drama can feature hidden meanings and messages that take some work
to decipher.

These four literary forms are like the roots of the literary family tree, and they
branch off into many different genres. We can't meet all these genres within the
scope of this lesson, but we'll look at a few of the most common for each literary
form.

39
 MODULE 2. THEORETICAL- CONCEPTUAL IMPORTANCE OF THE
SUBJECT LITERARY THEORY

LITERARY GENRES

A literary genre is a category of literary composition. Genres may be determined

by literary technique, tone, content, or even (as in the case of fiction) length. Genre
should not be confused with age category, by which literature may be classified as
either adult, young-adult, or children's. They also must not be confused with
format, such as graphic novel or picture book. The distinctions between genres and
categories are flexible and loosely defined, often with subgroups.

Genresare often divided into sub-genres. Literature, for instance, is divided

into three basic kinds of literature, the classic genres of the Ancient Greece, poetry,
drama, and prose. Poetry may then be subdivided into epic, lyric, and dramatic.
Subdivisions of drama include foremost comedy and tragedy, while e.g. comedy
itself has sub-genres, including farce, comedy of manners, burlesque, and satire.
Dramatic poetry for instance, might include comedy, tragedy, melodrama, and
mixtures like tragicomedy. This parsing into sub-genres can continue: comedy has
its own sub-genres, including, for example, comedy of manners, sentimental
comedy, burlesque comedy, and satirical comedy. Also the mixtures, such as
tragicomedy, have sub-genres, for example, hardboiled fiction characterized by the
tragicomic cynical narrator's self-talk.

Genres of literature are important to learn about. The two main categories
separating the different genres of literature are fiction and nonfiction. There are
several genres of literature that fall under the nonfiction category. Nonfiction sits
in direct opposition to fiction. Examples from both the fiction and nonfiction
genres of literature are explained in detail below. This detailed genres of literature
list is a great resource to share with any scholars.

40
Types of Nonfiction:

Narrative Nonfiction is information based on fact that is presented in a format

which tells a story.

Essays are a short literary composition that reflects the author’s outlook or point. A
short literary composition on a particular theme or subject, usually in prose and
generally analytic, speculative, or interpretative.

A Biography is a written account of another person’s life.

An Autobiography gives the history of a person’s life, written or told by that

person. Often written in Narrative form of their person’s life.

Speech is the faculty or power of speaking; oral communication; ability to express

one’s thoughts and emotions by speech, sounds, and gesture. Generally delivered
in the form of an address or discourse.

Finally there is the general genre of Nonfiction. This is Informational text dealing
with an actual, real-life subject. This genre of literature offers opinions or
conjectures on facts and reality. This includes biographies, history, essays, speech,
and narrative non fiction. Nonfiction opposes fiction and is distinguished from
those fiction genres of literature like poetry and drama which is the next section we
will discuss.

Genres of Fiction:

Drama is the genre of literature that’s subject for compositions is dramatic art in
the way it is represented. This genre is stories composed in verse or prose, usually
for theatrical performance, where conflicts and emotion are expressed through
dialogue and action.

41
Poetry is verse and rhythmic writing with imagery that evokes an emotional
response from the reader. The art of poetry is rhythmical in composition, written or
spoken. This genre of literature is for exciting pleasure by beautiful, imaginative,
or elevated thoughts.

Fantasy is the forming of mental images with strange or other worldly settings or
characters; fiction which invites suspension of reality.

Humor is the faculty of perceiving what is amusing or comical. Fiction full of fun,
fancy, and excitement which meant to entertain. This genre of literature can
actually be seen and contained within all genres.

A Fable is a story about supernatural or extraordinary people Usually in the form

of narration that demonstrates a useful truth. In Fables, animals often speak as
humans that are legendary and supernatural tales.

Fairy Tales or wonder tales are a kind of folktale or fable. Sometimes the stories
are about fairies or other magical creatures, usually for children.

Science Fiction is a story based on impact of potential science, either actual or

imagined. Science fiction is one of the genres of literature that is set in the future or
on other planets.

Short Story is fiction of such briefness that is not able to support any subplots.

Realistic Fiction is a story that can actually happen and is true to real life.

Folkloreare songs, stories, myths, and proverbs of a person of “folk” that was
handed down by word of mouth. Folklore is a genre of literature that is widely
held, but false and based on unsubstantiated beliefs.

Historical Fiction is a story with fictional characters and events in a historical

setting.

42
Horror is an overwhelming and painful feeling caused by literature that is
frightfully shocking, terrifying, or revolting. Fiction in which events evoke a
feeling of dread in both the characters and the reader.

A Tall Tale is a humorous story with blatant exaggerations, swaggering heroes

who do the impossible with an here of nonchalance.

Legend is a story that sometimes of a national or folk hero. Legend is based on

fact but also includes imaginative material.

Mystery is a genre of fiction that deals with the solution of a crime or the
unraveling of secrets. Anything that is kept secret or remains unexplained or
unknown.

Mythology is a type of legend or traditional narrative. This is often based in part

on historical events, that reveals human behavior and natural phenomena by its
symbolism; often pertaining to the actions of the gods. A body of myths, as that of
a particular people or that relating to a particular person.

Fiction in Verse is full-length novels with plot, subplots, themes, with major and
minor characters. Fiction of verse is one of the genres of literature in which the
narrative is usually presented in blank verse form.

The genre of Fiction can be defined as narrative literary works whose content is
produced by the imagination and is not necessarily based on fact. In fiction
something is feigned, invented, or imagined; a made-up story.

Drama is the specific mode of fictionrepresented in performance. The term comes

from a Greek word meaning "action" (Classical Greek: δρᾶμα, drama), which is
derived from the verb meaning "to do" or "to act" (Classical Greek: δράω, draō).
The enactment of drama in theatre, performed by actors on a stage before an
audience, presupposes collaborative modes of production and a collective form of
reception. The structure of dramatic texts, unlike other forms of literature, is
43
directly influenced by this collaborative production and collective reception. The
early moderntragedyHamlet (1601) by Shakespeare and the classical Athenian
tragedy Oedipus the King (c. 429 BCE) by Sophocles are among the masterpieces
of the art of drama. A modern example is Long Day's Journey into Night by
Eugene O’Neill (1956).

The two masks associated with drama represent the traditional generic
division between comedy and tragedy. They are symbols of the ancient
GreekMuses, Thalia and Melpomene. Thalia was the Muse of comedy (the
laughing face), while Melpomene was the Muse of tragedy (the weeping face).
Considered as a genre of poetry in general, the dramatic mode has been contrasted
with the epic and the lyrical modes ever since Aristotle's Poetics (c. 335 BCE)—
the earliest work of dramatic theory. The use of "drama" in the narrow sense to
designate a specific type of play dates from the 19th century. Drama in this sense
refers to a play that is neither a comedy nor a tragedy—for example,
Zola'sThérèseRaquin (1873) or Chekhov'sIvanov (1887). It is this narrow sense
that the film and television industry and film studies adopted to describe "drama"
as a genre within their respective media.[6] "Radio drama" has been used in both
senses—originally transmitted in a live performance, it has also been used to
describe the more high-brow and serious end of the dramatic output of radio.

Drama is often combined with music and dance: the drama in opera is generally
sung throughout; musicals generally include both spoken dialogue and songs; and
some forms of drama have incidental music or musical accompaniment
underscoring the dialogue (melodrama and Japanese Nō, for example). In certain
periods of history (the ancient Roman and modern Romantic) some dramas have
been written to be read rather than performed. In improvisation, the drama does not
pre-exist the moment of performance; performers devise a dramatic script
spontaneously before an audience.

44
A short story is a brief work of literature, usually written in narrativeprose.
Emerging from earlier oral storytelling traditions in the 17th century, the short
story has grown to encompass a body of work so diverse as to defy easy
characterization. At its most prototypical the short story features a small cast of
named characters, and focuses on a self-contained incident with the intent of
evoking a "single effect" or mood. In so doing, short stories make use of plot,
resonance, and other dynamic components to a far greater degree than is typical of
an anecdote, yet to a far lesser degree than a novel. While the short story is largely
distinct from the novel, authors of both generally draw from a common pool of
literary techniques.

The present English (and Spanish) word derives from the Italiannovella for
"new", "news", or "short story of something new", itself from the Latinnovella, a
singular noun use of the neuter plural of novellus, diminutive of novus, meaning

"new".[10] Most European languages have preserved the term "romance" (as in
French, Russian, Croatian, Romanian, Swedish and Norwegian "roman"; German
"Roman"; Portuguese "romance" and Italian "romanzo") for extended narratives.
The first "romances" had been verse epics in the Romance language of southern
France. Novel(la)s as those Geoffrey Chaucer presented in his The Canterbury
Tales appeared in verse much later. A number of famous 19th-century fictional
narratives such as Lord Byron'sDon Juan (1824) and Alexander Pushkin's
YevgeniyOnegin (1833) competed with the moderne prose novels of their time and
employed verse. It is hence problematic to call prose a decisive criterion. Prose
did, however, become the standard of the modern novel – thanks to a number of
advantages it had over verse once the question of the carrier medium was solved.

The word "tragedy" appears to have been used to describe different

phenomena at different times. It derives from Classical Greekτραγῳδία, contracted
from trag(o)-aoidiā = "goatsong", which comes from tragos = "he-goat" and
aeidein = "to sing" (cf."ode"). Scholars suspect this may be traced to a time when a

45
goat was either the prize in a competition of choral dancing or was that around
which a chorus danced prior to the animal's ritualsacrifice.[15] In another view on
the etymology, Athenaeus of Naucratis (2nd–3rd century CE) says that the original
form of the word was trygodia from trygos (grape harvest) and ode (song), because
those events were first introduced during grape harvest.

The philosopher Aristotle said in his work Poetics that tragedy is

characterized by seriousness and dignity and involving a great person who
experiences a reversal of fortune (Peripeteia). Aristotle's definition can include a
change of fortune from bad to good as in the Eumenides, but he says that the
change from good to bad as in Oedipus Rex is preferable because this effects pity
and fear within the spectators. Tragedy results in a catharsis (emotional cleansing)
or healing for the audience through their experience of these emotions in response
to the suffering of the characters in the drama. According to Aristotle, "the
structure of the best tragedy should be not simple but complex and one that
represents incidents arousing fear and pity—for that is peculiar to this form of art."
This reversal of fortune must be caused by the tragic hero's hamartia, which is
often mistranslated as a character flaw, but is more correctly translated as a
mistake (since the original Greek etymology traces back to hamartanein, a sporting
term that refers to an archer or spear-thrower missing his target).[44] According to
Aristotle, "The change to bad fortune which he undergoes is not due to any moral
defect or flaw, but a mistake of some kind."[45] The reversal is the inevitable but
unforeseen result of some action taken by the hero. It is also a misconception that
this reversal can be brought about by a higher power (e.g. the law, the gods, fate, or
society), but if a character’s downfall is brought about by an external cause,
Aristotle describes this as a misadventure and not a tragedy. In Poetics, Aristotle
gave the following definition in ancient Greek of the word "tragedy" (τραγωδία)

Tragedy is an imitation of an action that is admirable, complete (composed

of an introduction, a middle part and an ending), and possesses magnitude; in
language made pleasurable, each of its species separated in different parts;
46
performed by actors, not through narration; effecting through pity and fear the
purification of such emotions.

Common usage of tragedy refers to any story with a sad ending, whereas to be an
Aristotelian tragedy the story must fit the set of requirements as laid out by
Poetics. By this definition social drama cannot be tragic because the hero in it is a
victim of circumstance and incidents which depend upon the society in which he
lives and not upon the inner compulsions — psychological or religious — which
determine his progress towards self-knowledge and death.[47] Exactly what
constitutes a "tragedy", however, is a frequently debated matter.

The word "comedy" is derived from the Classical Greekκωμῳδίαkōmōidía,

which is a compound either of κῶμοςkômos (revel) or κώμηkṓmē (village) and
ᾠδήōidḗ (singing); it is possible that κῶμος itself is derived from κώμη, and
originally meant a village revel. The adjective "comic" (Greek κωμικόςkōmikós),
which strictly means that which relates to comedy is, in modern usage, generally
confined to the sense of "laughter-provoking". Of this, the word came into modern
usage through the Latin comoedia and Italian commedia and has, over time, passed
through various shades of meaning.

Greeks and Romans confined the word "comedy" to descriptions of stage-

plays with happy endings. In the Middle Ages, the term expanded to include
narrative poems with happy endings and a lighter tone. In this senseDante used the
term in the title of his poem, La Commedia. As time progressed, the word came
more and more to be associated with any sort of performance intended to cause
laughter. During the Middle Ages, the term "comedy" became synonymous with
satire, and later humour in general, after Aristotle's Poetics was translated into
Arabic in the medieval Islamic world, where it was elaborated upon by Arabic
writers and Islamic philosophers, such as Abu Bischr, his pupil Al-Farabi,
Avicenna, and Averroes. Due to cultural differences, they disassociated comedy
from Greek dramatic representation and instead identified it with Arabic poetic
47
themes and forms, such as hija (satirical poetry). They viewed comedy as simply
the "art of reprehension", and made no reference to light and cheerful events, or
troublous beginnings and happy endings, associated with classical Greek comedy.
After the Latin translations of the 12th century, the term "comedy" thus gained a
more general semantic meaning in medieval literature. In the late 20th century,
emerged among scholars the tendency to pragmatically prefer the term laughter to
comprehensively refer to the whole gamut of the comic, to avoid the classification
in ambiguous and problematically defined genres and fields like humour,
grotesque, irony, and "Comedy", in its Elizabethan usage, had a very different
meaning from modern comedy. A Shakespearean comedy is one that has a happy
ending, usually involving marriages between the unmarried characters, and a tone
and style that is more light-hearted than Shakespeare's other plays.The phenomena
connected with laughter and that which provokes it have been carefully
investigated by psychologists. They agreed dominant characteristics are
incongruity or contrast in the object and shock or emotional seizure on the part of
the subject. It has also been held that the feeling of superiority is an essential
factor: thusThomas Hobbes speaks of laughter as a "sudden glory". Modern
investigators have paid much attention to the origin both of laughter and of
smiling, as well as the development of the "play instinct" and its emotional
expression.

Comedy may be divided into multiple genres based on the source of humor, the
method of delivery, and the context in which it is delivered: for instance, standup
comedy, improvisation, slapstick. The different forms often overlap, and most
comedy can fit into multiple genres. Some of the sub-genres of comedy are farce,
comedy of manners, burlesque, and satire.

Folklore is the traditional art, literature, knowledge, and practice that is

disseminated largely through oral communication and behavioral example. Every
group with a sense of its own identity shares, as a central part of that identity, folk
traditions–the things that people traditionally believe (planting practices, family
48
traditions, and other elements of worldview), do (dance, make music, sew
clothing), know (how to build an irrigation dam, how to nurse an ailment, how to
prepare barbecue), make (architecture, art, craft), and say (personal experience
stories, riddles, song lyrics). As these examples indicate, in most instances there is
no hard-and-fast separation of these categories, whether in everyday life or in
folklorists’ work.
The word "folklore" names an enormous and deeply significant dimension of
culture. Considering how large and complex this subject is, it is no wonder that
folklorists define and describe folklore in so many different ways. Try asking
dance historians for a definition of "dance," for instance, or anthropologists for a
definition of "culture." No one definition will suffice–nor should it.
In part, this is also because particular folklorists emphasize particular parts or
characteristics of the world of folklore as a result of their own work, their own
interests, or the particular audience they’re trying to reach. And for folklorists, as
for the members of any group who share a strong interest, disagreeing with one
another is part of the work–and the enjoyment–of the field, and is one of the best
ways to learn.
Folklore is a body of traditional belief, custom, and expression, handed down
largely by word of mouth and circulating chiefly outside of commercial and
academic means of communication and instruction. Every group bound together by
common interests and purposes, whether educated or uneducated, rural or urban,
possesses a body of traditions which may be called its folklore. Into these
traditions enter many elements, individual, popular, and even "literary," but all are
absorbed and assimilated through repetition and variation into a pattern which has
value and continuity for the group as a whole.
Dan Ben-Amos defines …folklore is artistic communication in small groups
in his work Toward a Definition of Folklore in Context. Dell Hymes claims that
folklore study is” the study of communicative behavior with an esthetic,
expressive, or stylistic dimension.”

49
 Jan Brunvand states that folklore comprises the unrecorded traditions of a
people; it includes both the form and content of these traditions and their style or
technique of communication from person to person.
Folklore is the traditional, unofficial, non-institutional part of culture. It
encompasses all knowledge, understandings, values, attitudes, assumptions,
feelings, and beliefs transmitted in traditional forms by word of mouth or by
customary examples writes Edward D. Ives. Joe Scott.
No song, no performance, no act of creation can be properly understood apart
from the culture or subculture in which it is found and of which it is a part; nor
should any "work of art" be looked on as a thing in itself apart from the continuum
of creation-consumption. Such a definition gives Barre Toelken in his work “The
Dynamics of Folklore”. Tradition [means] not some static, immutable force from
the past, but those pre-existing culture-specific materials and options that bear
upon the performer more heavily than do his or her own personal tastes and talents.
We recognize in the use of tradition that such matters as content and style have
been for the most part passed on but not invented by the performer.
Dynamic recognizes, on the other hand, that in the processing of these contents and
styles in performance, the artist’s own unique talents of inventivenesswithin the
tradition are highly valued and are expected to operate strongly. Time and space
dimensions remind us that the resulting variations may spread geographically with
great rapidity (as jokes do) as well as down through time (good luck beliefs).
Folklore is made up of informal expressions passed around long enough to have
become recurrent in form and context, but changeable in performance.
…modern American folklorists do not limit their attention to the rural, quaint, or
"backward" elements of the culture. Rather, they will study and discuss any
expressive phenomena–urban or rural–that seem to act like other previously
recognized folk traditions. This has led to the development of a field of inquiry
with few formal boundaries, one with lots of feel but little definition, one both
engaging and frustrating . Surely no other discipline is more concerned with
linking us to the cultural heritage from the past than is folklore; no other discipline
50
is more concerned with revealing the interrelationships of different cultural
expressions than is folklore; and no other discipline is so concerned …with
discovering what it is to be human. It is this attempt to discover the basis of our
common humanity, the imperatives of our human existence that puts folklore study
at the very center of humanistic study.
"Folklore," though coined as recently as 1846, is the old word, the parental
concept to the adjective "folk." Customarily folklorists refer to the host of
published definitions, add their own, and then get on with their work, leaving the
impression that definitions of folklore are as numberless as insects. But all the
definitions bring into dynamic association the ideas of individual creativity and
collective order.
Folklife is the sung parodies of the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" and the
variety of ways there are to skin a muskrat, preserve string beans, or join two
pieces of wood. Folklife is the society welcoming new members at bris and
christening, and keeping the dead incorporated on All Saints Day. It is the marking
of the Jewish New Year at Rosh Hashanah and the Turkic New Year at Nauruz
Folklife is community life and values, artfully expressed in myriad forms and
interactions. Universal, diverse, and enduring, it enriches the nation and makes us a
commonwealth of cultures.

QUESTIONS

1. What is literary genre?

2. How can Genres be determined?
3. How can we differentiate janre from caregory?
4. What is sub-janres?
5. What is the main categories separating the different genres of literature?
6. How can you differentiate fiction from non fiction?
7. What are the types of non- fiction and fiction?
8. What is the difference between novella and short story?
9. What is typical features of drama?
10. What does folklore present in your country?

51
 PLOT AND COMPOSITION

Plot structure

Most novels and stories have plots. Every plot is an arrangement of meaningful
events. The plot has four structural components:
• Exposition
• Complication
• Climax
• Denouement
Plot" is the basic structure, skeleton, or direction of a story. It is who did what
to whom, when, and why. The difference between just an event and a plot is
that an event is, simply, a description of something that has happened. But a
plot is a description of how a person goes through change

This change, this pattern, has been described in a number of ways. Here are some:

person problem Solution

hero/heroine(s) villain(s) goal

good person(s) bad person(s) resolution
main character the obstacles end

Someone or some group of people that are basically good or trustworthy have to be
at the center of the story, they must have problems of some kind, and they must try
to reach a goal or end to their problems, or create a successful change. They don't
always win--some of the best tragedies show people losing--but they must try with
all their heart.It may help to imagine the plot of a story as a character battling to
climb over a mountain of trouble in his or her way:

52
The "rising action" is the events leading to reaching the goal (or forever failing to
reach the goal). The "falling action" is the end of the story--what happens after the
denouement, as a result of it. Stories usually are composed mostly--perhaps 90-
99%--of rising action. The falling action or denouement is simply there to provide
what Aristotle in his famous booklet "Poetics"--a description of how tragedy and
comedy are written--describes as relief and happiness (or tears of grief), which is
the audience's final release of emotion at the end. Some modern stories even do
entirely without a denouement: they simply end right at the moment the goal is
achieved.

Exposition

The exposition introduces all of the main characters in the story. It shows
how they relate to one another, what their goals and motivations are, and the kind
of person they are. The audience may have questions about any of these things,
which get settled, but if they do have them they are specific and well-focused
questions. Most importantly, in the exposition, the audience gets to know the main
character (protagonist), and the protagonist gets to know his or her main goal and
what is at stake if he or she fails to attain this goal. This phase ends, and the next
begins, with the introduction of conflict. A certain kind of exposition introduces
into the narrative additional information about the personages outside the
immediate connection with the depicted events: some information about the things
that preceded the depicted events, that took place between these events and, finally,

53
that followed these events. In this respect the exposition can give substantial
material for understanding the ideological essence, conceptual information of the
text.
The author may give no exposition at the beginning, but hold it up until the
initial conflict takes place as an explanation for the latter (retarded exposition); he
can place it at the end (reverse exposition) etc. —all that depends on how he
understands life in its development and how he wants to depict it.

Rising action (Initial collision)

Rising action is the second phase in Freytag's five-phase structure. It starts with the
death of the characters or a conflict. "Conflict" in Freytag's discussion must not be
confused with "conflict" in Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch's critical apparatus
plots into types, e.g., man vs. society. The difference is that an entire story can be
discussed according to Quiller-Couch's mode of analysis, while Freytag is talking
about the second act in a five-act play, at a time when all of the major characters
have been introduced, their motives and allegiances have been made clear (at least
for the most part), and they now begin to struggle against one another. Generally,
in this phase the protagonist understands his or her goal and begins to work toward
it. Smaller problems thwart his initial success, and in this phase his progress is
directed primarily against these secondary obstacles. This phase shows us how he
overcomes these obstacles.
In some scientific literature this part is called as important component that
forms the framework of the plot is the initial collision. The initial collision
represents an event that starts action and causes subsequent development of events.
The exposition doesn't engender action, it only creates a background for it,
but the initial collision engenders action, thanks to it events begin concrete
unfolding.
The initial collision ensures transition to the next stage—development of
action. The author shows the course of events and their development which ensures
from the main "jerk", from the initial collision. The development of events leads,
54
finally, to the moment of great tension, to the decisive clash of interests, to the top-
most point — to the climax.

Culmination

The point of culmination is the turning point of the story, where the main
character makes the single big decision that defines the outcome of the story and
who he is as a person. The dramatic phase that Freytag called the "climax" is the
third of the five phases and occupies the middle of the story. Thus "the climax"
may refer to the point of climax or to the third phase of the drama.

The beginning of this phase is marked by the protagonist finally having cleared
away the preliminary barriers and being ready to engage with the adversary.
Usually, entering this phase, both the protagonist and the antagonist have a plan to
win against the other. Now for the first time we see them going against one another
in direct, or nearly direct, conflict.

This struggle results with neither character completely winning, nor losing, against
the other. Usually, each character's plan is partially successful, and partially foiled
by his adversary. What is unique about this central struggle between the two
characters is that the protagonist makes a decision which shows us his moral
quality, and ultimately determines his fate. In a tragedy, the protagonist here makes
a "bad" decision, a miscalculation that demonstrates his tragic flaw.

The culmination often contains much of the action in a story, for example, a
defining battle.

Falling action

Freytag called this phase "falling action" in the sense that the loose ends are being
tied up. However, it is often the time of greatest overall tension, because it is the
phase in which everything goes most wrong. In this phase, the villain has the upper
hand. It seems that evil will triumph. The protagonist has never been further from
55
accomplishing the goal. For Freytag, this is true both in tragedies and comedies,
because both of these types of play classically show good winning over evil. The
question is which side the protagonist has put himself on, and this may not be
immediately clear to the audience.

Denouement

As a rule the culmination is followed by a denouement, i.e. the situation that is

taking people shape as a result of the development of the entire preceding
action.The Resolution: All mystery is solved. In this stage all patterns of events
accomplish artistic or emotional effect.
All basic elements of plot construction – exposition, initial collision, development
of action (story), culmination, denouement, can be given in the most various forms.
Sometimes separate links of the plot chain can be omitted. Many short stories
begin immediately from the initial collision and contain no exposition. The reader
himself conjectures it. The majority of E.Hemingway's stories can serve as
examples.
A work of narrative prose that has all traditional elements including the end
has a closed plot structure. This type of writing was most broadly cultivated by
such American short story writers as W. Irving, E. Рое, N. Hawthorn, Bret Hart, H.
James, O. Henry and others.
A literary work in which the action is represented without an obvious
culmination, which does not contain all the above mentioned elements understood
in their conventional sense is said to have an open plot structure.
Plot structure (whether it is open or closed) entirely depends on the content
of the text. The text (a short story, for example) which gives the sequence of
events, the dynamic development of action usually has a closed structure, forming
an ascending line from the exposition on to the climax and down to the
denouement. "Wild Flowers" by E.Caldwell may serve as an illustration. The text
which describes the drama of a character's inner world-, (the so called
"psychological or character" story) has an open plot structure. In such texts the
56
traditional components of the plot are not easily discernible and the action is less
dynamic. Little if anything happens in such stories. The plot, as such, is practically
eventless, but it is only a surface layer and behind it we find the drama of a
character's inner world. Many of E.Hemingway's stories-are of this type ("Cat in
the Rain", "In Another Country").
So the plot structure of the text is not a formal factor. It is undoubtedly
meaningful, being closely connected with the character of information in the text.
The Resolution: All mystery is solved. In this stage all patterns of events
accomplish artistic or emotional effect.

Plot devices

This is how a plot is organized. But it must also have well developed characters
and good descriptions to make it enjoyable and meaningful to read. As with other
literary terms, these have come about gradually as descriptions of common
narrative structures. Conflict was first described in ancient Greek literature as
the agon, or central contest in tragedy.[3] According to Aristotle, in order to hold
the interest, the hero must have a single conflict. The agon, or act of conflict,
involves the protagonist (the "first fighter") and the antagonist (a more recent
term), corresponding to the hero and villain. The outcome of the contest cannot be
known in advance, and according to later critics such asPlutarch, the hero's
struggle should be ennobling.

Even in contemporary, non-dramatic literature, critics have observed that the

agon is the central unit of the plot. The easier it is for the protagonist to triumph,
the less value there is in the drama. In internal and external conflict alike, the
antagonist must act upon the protagonist and must seem at first to overmatch him
or her. For example, in William Faulkner's The Bear, nature might be the
antagonist. Even though it is an abstraction, natural creatures and the scenery
oppose and resist the protagonist. In the same story, the young boy's doubts about
himself provide an internal conflict, and they seem to overwhelm him.

57
Similarly, when godlike characters enter (e.g. Superman), correspondingly great
villains have to be created, or natural weaknesses have to be invented, to allow the
narrative to have drama. Alternatively, scenarios could be devised in which the
character's godlike powers are constrained by some sort of code, or their respective
antagonist.

Conflict may be internal or external—that is, it may occur within a character's

mind or between a character and exterior forces. Conflict is most visible between
two or more characters, usually a protagonist and an antagonist/enemy/villain, but
can occur in many different forms.

The basic types of conflict in fiction have been commonly codified as "man
against man", "man against nature", "man against self." In each case, "man" is the
universal and refers to women as well.

Ayn Rand, for instance, argued that "man against nature" is not a conflict because
nature has no free will and thus can make no choices.[7] Sometimes a fourth basic
conflict is described, "man against society",[8][9] Some of the other types of conflict
referenced include "man against machine" (The Terminator, Brave New World),
"man against fate" (Slaughterhouse Five), "man against the supernatural" (The
Shining) and "man against god" (A Canticle for Liebowitz).

Narrative structure is generally described as the structural framework that

underlies the order and manner in which a narrative is presented to a reader,
listener, or viewer. The narrative text structures are the plot and the setting.

Generally, the narrative structure of any work (be it film, play, or novel) can be
divided into three sections, which is referred to as the three-act structure: setup,
conflict, resolution. The setup (act one) is where all of the main characters and
their basic situation are introduced, and contains the primary level of
characterization (exploring the character's backgrounds and personalities).
A problem is also introduced, which is what drives the story forward.

58
The second act, the conflict, is the bulk of the story, and begins when the inciting
incident (or catalyst) sets things into motion. This is the part of the story where the
characters go through major changes in their lives as a result of what is happening;
this can be referred to as the character arc, or character development.

The third act, or resolution, is when the problem in the story boils over, forcing the
characters to confront it, allowing all elements of the story to come together and
inevitably leading to the ending.

An example is the 1973 film The Exorcist: The first act of the film is when the
main characters are introduced and their lives are explored: Father Karras (Jason
Miller) is introduced as a Catholic priest who is losing his faith. In act two, a girl
named Regan (Linda Blair) becomes possessed by a demonic entity (the problem),
and Karras' character arc is being forced to accept that there is no rational or
scientific explanation for the phenomenon except that she actually is possessed by
a demon, which ties in directly with the theme of him losing his faith. The third act
of the film is the actual exorcism, which is what the entire story has been leading
to.

Theorists describing a text's narrative structure might refer to structural elements

such as an introduction, in which the story's founding characters and circumstances
are described; a chorus, which uses the voice of an onlooker to describe the events
or indicate the proper emotional response to be happy or sad to what has just
happened; or a coda, which falls at the end of a narrative and makes concluding
remarks. First described in ancient times by Greek philosophers (such
as Aristotle and Plato), the notion of narrative structure saw renewed popularity as
a critical concept in the mid-to-late-20th century, when structuralist literary
theorists including Roland Barthes,Vladimir Propp, Joseph Campbell and Northrop
Frye attempted to argue that all human narratives have certain universal, deep
structural elements in common. This argument fell out of fashion when advocates
of poststructuralism such as Michel Foucault and Jacques Derridaasserted that such
universally shared deep structures were logically impossible.

59
A non-linear narrative is one that does not proceed in a straight-line, step-by-step
fashion, such as where an author creates a story's ending before the middle is
finished. Linear is the opposite, when narrative runs smoothly in a straight line,
when it is not broken up.

Flashback movies are often confused with true non-linear narratives.

Although they appear to open (very briefly) with the ending, flashback movies
almost immediately jump back to the very beginning of the story to proceed
linearly from there and usually proceed past the supposed "ending" shown at the
beginning of the movie. A narrative can have one or more plot-lines, that is, events
can centre around one or more groups of characters. In Dickens’ Bleak House for
instance, there is the plot line which centers around Lady Dedlock and the
discovery of her guilty past and there is the plot line which centres around Esther
Summerson and her growth to maturity. At certain points these two plot lines
merge, as it is discovered that Esther is Lady Dedlock’s illegitimate daughter (see
also plot-lines in drama). Single plot novels are comparatively rare, most novels
develop multiple plots. These multiple plot lines are not necessarily all of the same
importance, there can be a main plot-line and one or more subplot lines. Such
subplots can serve as a contrast to the main plot when, for instance, there is the
same constellation of events in a higher and a lower social sphere Some narratives
are very tightly plotted , everything happens for a reason or a purpose and one
event is the consequence of another. Quest-stories or fairy tales are usually tightly
plotted (see the example in Jahn 2002: D7.2). When each plot-line is brought to a
satisfactory ending one also talks of a closed structure (for example the death or
marriage of the protagonist or the final defeat of an evil force). This is often the
case in Victorian novels where there is frequently an entire chapter at the end,
tying up all the loose ends of the plot and giving a short glimpse of the characters'
future (see for example George Eliot, Middlemarch or Charles Dickens, Hard
Times). A literary work in which the action is represented without an obvious
culmination, which does not contain all the above mentioned elements understood
in their conventional sense is said to have an open plot structure.
60
 Plot structure (whether it is open or closed) entirely depends on the content
of the text. The text (a short story, for example) which gives the sequence of
events, the dynamic development of action usually has a closed structure, forming
an ascending line from the exposition on to the climax and down to the
denouement. "Wild Flowers" by E.Caldwell may serve as an illustration. The text
which describes the drama of a character's inner world-, (the so called
"psychological or character" story) has an open plot structure. In such texts the
traditional components of the plot are not easily discernible and the action is less
dynamic. Little if anything happens in such stories. The plot, as such, is practically
eventless, but it is only a surface layer and behind it we find the drama of a
character's inner world. Many of E.Hemingway's stories-are of this type ("Cat in
the Rain", "In Another Country").
So the plot structure of the text is not a formal factor. It is undoubtedly
meaningful, being closely connected with the character of information in the text.

QUESTIONS
1. What is narration?
2.What is description?
3.What is dialogue?
4.What is interior monologue?
5.What is digression?
6.What’s a composition?
7.What’s an exposition?
8.What’s climax
9.What’s complication?

10.What’s denoument?

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 8. LANGUAGE CHARACTERISTICS OF FICTION

Belles –lettres style

Literally, belles-lettres is a French phrase meaning "beautiful" or "fine" writing. In

this sense, therefore, it includes all literary works — especially fiction, poetry,
drama, or essays — valued for their aesthetic qualities and originality of style and
tone. The term thus can be used to refer to literature generally. The Nuttall
Encyclopedia, for example, described belles-lettres as the "department of literature
which implies literary culture and belongs to the domain of art, whatever the
subject may be or the special form; it includes poetry, the drama, fiction, and
criticism," while the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition describes it as "the
more artistic and imaginative forms of literature, as poetry or romance, as opposed
to more pedestrian and exact studies."

The belles- lettres style is a generic term for three substyles in which the
main principles and the most general properties of the style are materialized. These
three substyles are:

1.The language of poetry, or simple verse. 2.Emotive prose or the language of

fiction. 3.The language of drama.

Each of these substyles has certain common features, typical of the general
belles lettres style, which make up the foundation of the style, by which the
particular style is made recognizable and can therefore be singled out. Each of
them also enjoys some individuality. This is revealed in definite futures typical
only of one or another substyle. This correlation of the general and the particular in
each variant of the belles lettres style had manifested itself differently at different
stages in its historical development. The common features of the subsyles may be
summed up as follows. First of all comes the common function, which may
broadly be called “aesthetico-cognitive”. This is a double function, which aims at
the cognitive process, which secures the gradual unfolding of the idea to the reader
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and at the same time calls forth a feeling of pleasure, a pleasure, which is derived
from the form in which the content is wrought. Since the belles- lettres style has a
cognitive function as well as an aesthetic one, it follows that it has something in
common with scientific style. The purpose of science as a branch of human activity
is to disclose by research the inner substance of things and phenomena of objective
reality and find out the laws regulating them, thus enabling man to predict, control
and direct the further development in order to improve the material and social life
of mankind. The style of scientific prose is therefore mainly characterized by an
arrangement of language means which will bring proofs to clinch a theory. The
selection of the language means must therefore meet this principle requirement.
The purpose of the belles lettres style is not to prove but only to suggest a possible
interpretation of the phenomena of life by forcing the reader to see the viewpoint
of the writer. This is the cognitive function of the belles-lettres style. From all this
it follows, therefore, That the belles- lettres style must select a system of language
means which will secure the effect sought, which is an aesthetico- cognitive effect.

The belles lettres style rests on certain indispensable linguistic features which are:

1. Genuine, not trite imagery, achieved by purely linguistic devices.

2. The use of words in contextual and very often in more than one dictionary
meaning, or at least greatly influenced by the lexical environment.
3. A vocabulary which will reflect to a greater or lesser degree the author’s
personal evaluation of things or phenomena.
4. A peculiar individual selection of vocabulary and syntax, a kind of lexical
and syntactical idiosyncrasy.
5. The introduction of the typical futures of colloquial language to a full
degree, (in plays or a lesser one in emotive prose) or a slight degree, if any
(in poems).

The belles lettres style is individual in a sense. This is one of its most distinctive
properties

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Fiction writing is any kind of writing that is not factual. Fictional writing most
often takes the form of a story meant to convey an author's point of view or simply
to entertain. The result of this may be a short story, novel, novella, screenplay,
or drama, which are all types (though not the only types) of fictional writing
styles.Just as a painter uses color and line to create a painting, an author uses the
elements of fiction to create a story

Literal and figurative language

Literal and figurative language is a distinction within some fields of language

analysis. Literal language refers to words that do not deviate from their defined
meaning. Non-literal or figurative language refers to words, and groups of words,
that exaggerate or alter the usual meanings of the component words. A literal
usage is the "normal" meanings of the words. It maintains a consistent meaning
regardless of the context, with "the intended meaning corresponding exactly to the
meaning" of the individual words. Figurative use of language is the use of words or
phrases in a manner where the literal meaning of the words is not true or does not
make sense, but "implies a non-literal meaning which does make sense or that
could be true". Epigram and paradox. Epigrams and paradoxes as stylistic devices
are used for creating generalised images. «Paradox is based on contrast, being a
statement contradictory to what is accepted as a self-evident or proverbial truth.
Paradox can be considered a figure of speech with certain reservations, since the
aesthetic principle, that underlies it, i.e. contrast has divers linguistic
manifestations».

Epigram is «a stylistic device akin to a proverb, the only difference being that
epigrams are coined by individuals whose names we know, while proverbs are the
coinage of the people. In other words, we are always aware of the parentage of an
epigram and therefore, when using one, we usually make a reference to its author».

Epigrams and paradoxes as stylistic devices are usually used in the Present
Indefinite Tense which makes them abstract.
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One of the most characteristic and essential features of epigrams and paradoxes is
their shortness and conciseness. They are achieved by the syntactical pattern of an
epigram or paradox. The syntax of these stylistic devices is laconic and clear –
cut.A simile is a figure of speech in which one thing is explicitly compared to
another using the words "like" or "as" to show how they are similar.[8]

Example: "His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry.../And the beard on
his chin was as white as the snow." - Clement Clark Moore.

A metaphor is figure of speech in which two "essentially unlike things" are shown
to have a type of resemblance or create a new image. The similarities between the
objects being compared may be implied rather than directly stated.

Example: "Fog comes on little cat feet" - Robert Frost

An extended metaphor is metaphor that is continued over multiple sentences.

Example: Suzie is a beautiful young flowering girl. Her cheeks are flush with the
spring of life. She has the fragrance of youth about her.

Onomatopoeia is a word designed to be an imitation of a sound. Example: “Bark!

Bark!” went the dog as he chased the car that vroomed past.

Personification is the attribution of a personal nature or character to inanimate

objects or abstract notions,[15] especially as a rhetorical figure.Example: "Because I
could not stop for Death,/He kindly stopped for me;/The carriage held but just
ourselves/And Immortality." - Emily Dickinson. Dickinson portrays death as a
carriage driver.[15]

An oxymoron is a figure of speech in which a pair of opposite or contradictory

[16]
terms is used together for emphasis. Examples: Organized chaos, Same
difference

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A paradox is a statement or proposition which is self-contradictory, unreasonable
or illogical. Example: This statement is a lie.

Hyperbole is a figure of speech which uses an extravagant or exaggerated

statement to express strong feelings. Example: They had been walking so long that
John thought he might drink the entire lake when they came upon it.

Allusion is a reference to a famous character or event. Example: Like Hercules, he

is so strong.

An idiom is an expression consisting of a combination of words that have a

figurative meaning.Example: You should keep your eye out for him.To keep an
eye out for someone means to watch out for it.

A pun is an expression intended for a humorous or rhetorical effect by exploiting

different meanings of words.Example: I wondered why the ball was getting bigger.
Then it hit me."Then it hit me." has two different meanings:The person figured out
why the ball was getting bigger.

The notion of imagery

Imagery, in a literary text, occurs when an author uses an object that is not
really there, in order to create a comparison between one that is, usually evoking a
more meaningful visual experience for the reader. It is useful as it allows an author
to add depth and understanding to his work, like a sculptor adding layer and layer
to his statue, building it up into a beautiful work of art.

By the loosest definition, stock characters have been around ever since the
tragedy of Aeschylus, Sophocles, and Euripides, being based upon the traits
of mythological characters. Although mythological characters are not
representations of real people, they are a group that would have been recognizable
to ancient audiences, and even back then, tended to fall into well-established group

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types. For example,Hephaestus, Hermes, and Prometheus represented the fool
character as "jesters to the gods."

In a stricter definition, stock characters originated in the theater. For example,

the Greek Old Comedy of Aristophanes typically employed three stock characters:
the alazon, the boastful imposter; his ironic opponent, the eiron; and the buffoon,
known as the bomolochos. Furthermore, the furnishing of these prototypes of Old
Comedy with accents, costumes, or props illustrated the desire of the playwright to
have the audience readily recognize and relate with the character quickly. The
servants wore short-sleeved cassock; parasites carried a short truncheon; rural
deities, shepherds, and peasants held a crook; heralds and ambassadors had
the caduceus; kings held a sceptre, heroes a club, and old men carried a crooked
staff.

As Aristotle explored theories on the pursuit of happiness, he discussed the virtues

of people surrounding him and, perhaps unintentionally, was the first person to
study characters.

His Book V of Nicomachean Ethics, after an outline of positive characteristics

(e.g., "liberality," "noble-mindedness," "wit") encouraged in humans, sketched
some characters based on their possession or lack of these characteristics.
Examples include the "rich man of vulgar profusion," the "vainglorious," the
"great-souled man," the “choleric,” the “good tempered man,” the “officious,” the
“contentious,” the “self-detractor,” and the “buffoon."

In his Rhetoric, Aristotle explored how “young men, old men, men in their prime,
well-born men, rich men, men of power, men of good fortune” varied emotionally.
Although Aristotle’s work closely resembles what came to be known as the
Character, Ethics and Rhetoric contained “disquisitions,” not Characters.

The study of the Character, as it is now known, was conceived by Aristotle’s

student Theophrastus. In The Characters (c. 319 BC), Theophrastus introduced the
“character sketch,” which became the core of “the Character as a genre.” It
67
included 30 character types. Each type is said to be an illustration of an individual
who represents a group, characterized by his most prominent trait.

“An image”, writes A.E. Derbyshire, “is a use of language which relates or
substitutes a given word or expression to or for an analogue in some grammatical
way, and which in so doing endows that word or expression with different lexical
information from that which it has in its set”. An image, in this sense, is merely a
linguistic device for providing contextual information.

In spite of being rather complicated, there is a grain of truth in this definition of

an image, for an image does give additional (contextual) information. This
information is based on association aroused by a peculiar use of a word or
expression. An interesting insight into the essence of imagery is given by Z.
Paperny: “Poetical image”, he writes, “is not a frozen picture, but movement, not a
static reproduction but the developing idea of an artist”.
He calls the image a “double unit”, thus pointing to the twofold application of
the word, word-combination or even whole sentence.
Galperin I.R. defines “imagery as a use of languagemedia which will create a
sensory perception of an abstract notion by arousing certain associations
(sometimes very remote) between the general and the particular, the abstract and
the concrete, the conventional and the factual”.
It is hardly possible to under-estimate the significance of imagery in the belles-
lettres style of language. The image, as a purely linguistic notion, is something that
must be decoded by the reader. So are the subtle inner relations between the parts
of the utterance and between the utterances themselves. An image can be decoded
through a fine analysis of the meanings of the given word or word-combination. In
decoding a given image, the dictionary meanings, the contextual meanings, the
emotional colouring and, last but not least, the associations which are awakened by
the image should all be called into play.
The easier the images are decoded, the more intelligible the poetic utterance

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becomes to the reader. If the image is difficult to decode, then it follows that either
the idea is not quite clear to the poet himself or the acquired experience of the
reader is not sufficient to grasp the vague or remote associations hidden in the
given image.
Images from a linguistic point of view are mostly built on metaphor,
metonymy and simile. These are direct semantic ways of coining images. Images
may be divided into three categories: two concrete ( visual, aural) and one abstract
( relational).

Categories of imagery.

Visual images are the easiest of perception, inasmuch as they are readily caught
by what is called the mental eye. In other words “ visual images” are shaped
through concrete pictures of objects, the impression of which is present in our
mind. Thus in:
While their long lashes darken ’d gloss
Seem’d stealing o’er thy brilliant cheek
Like raven’s plumagesmooth’d on snow.
(Byron , p. 100)
The simile has called up a visual image, that of raven’s plumage smooth’d on
snow.
Onomatopoeia will build an aural image in our mind, that is it will make us
hear the actual sounds of nature or things.
Adieu, ye joys of La Valette!
Adieu, Siracco, sun, and sweet!
Adieu, thou palace rarely entered!
Adieu, ye mansions where – I’ve ventured!
Adieu, ye cursed streets of stairs!
(How surely he who monntsthe swears!).

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 A relational image is one that shows the relation between objects through
another kind of relation and the two kinds of relation will secure a more exact
realization of the inner connections between things or phenomena.
My voice, though but humble, was raised for thy right;
My vote, as a freeman’s still voted thee free;
This hand, though but feeble, would arm in thy fight,

Such notions as “my voice”, “my vote”, “this hand” all create relational
images, inasmuch as they aim at showing the relations between the constituents of
metonymies.

Imagery in an literary text ,occurs when an author uses an object that really there in
order to create a comparison between one evoking a more meaningful visual
experience for the reader Forms of imagery (with examples)

Auditory imagery represents a sound.The bells chimed two o'clock and Daniel got
ready for school. Jacob heard the call of the loon as the moonlight cast itself upon
the ocean.

Kinesthetic imagery represents movement as in Wordsworth's poem Daffodils:

"tossing their heads in sprightly dance"

Gustatory imagery represents a taste.The sweet marinara sauce makes up for the
bland sea-shell pasta that Jeffrey served. Tumbling through the ocean water after
being overtaken by the monstrous wave, Mark unintentionally took a gulp of the
briny, bitter "Character" means the development of people in a story who are:

1. identifiable2. interesting

"Identifiable" means that a reader can either identify with the characters
because they seem like him or her, or the reader has experienced other people like
them. In short, the characters must be believable in an immediate and personal
way.

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 Romeo and Juliet from Shakespeare are, for example, very identifiable, very
believable: at some age or time in one's life, many people can identify with one of
the two lovers, and most people have watched others who act like Romeo and
Juliet. Usually a story people enjoy will have at least one main character--a hero or
heroine--whom the readers can directly identify with: someone who makes others
say, "That person is like me," or "I can imagine myself being in that person's
shoes." "Interesting" means that the characters must not only be identifiable--
believable--but also more interesting than the normal run of people in life. Either
the characters must be unusual people, or they must be normal people living
unusual lives. They must also be attractive in a certain way. Their attractiveness
must be "normal" in important ways, but usually there is a slight flaw--physically,
psychologically, or both--that makes the character a little different in an even more
interesting way.

Some famous unusual characters in literary history are the great figures of
any major religion (remember that true stories can be written as good literature,
too); mythic figures such as Thor, Venus, and Coyote; and book heroes, heroines,
and villains such as Tom Jones, Heidi, Darth Vadar, Nancy Drew, and Harry
Potter. However, even when unusual people are heroes, heroines, or villains in
literature, much of their appeal is how much they are, in some basic ways, like
ourselves or people we know. This appeal to readers' own personalities or the
personalities of people near them usually is the central attraction of a good
character.

The same attraction exists for the other kind of literary character: a normal
person living an unusual life. There are many examples of such characters--in fact,
much of the best literature may be about characters with whom most readers can
closely identify. Tiny Tim and his family in A Christmas Carol are one example;
so is Anne Frank or Agatha Christie's bumbling but loveable and intelligent
detective, Poirot. These all are characters with whom large numbers of readers can
identify because the characters are so much like average readers that readers can
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put themselves in the characters' shoes and ask themselves, "How would I respond
to what this character must go through?"

In fact, it is said that there is at least one good book lying within each person-
-if he or she only knew how to write it. If this is true, it is because all of us
experience the deep joys and beauties of life, and great sorrows and losses, too. It
is readers' own experiences that help them identifywith normal characters in
literature who are going through unusually good and/or bad times. We imagine
ourselves in their shoes, and we imagine ourselves acting like they would in trying,
difficult times.

The structure of poems

Poetry (from the Greekpoiesis — ποίησις — with a broad meaning of a

"making", seen also in such terms as "hemopoiesis"; more narrowly, the making of
poetry) is a form of literary art which uses aesthetic and rhythmic qualities of
language—such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre—to evoke
meanings in addition to, or in place of, the prosaic ostensible meaning.

Poetry has a long history, dating back to the SumerianEpic of Gilgamesh.

Early poems evolved from folk songs such as the Chinese Shijing, or from a need
to retell oral epics, as with the SanskritVedas, ZoroastrianGathas, and the Homeric
epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey. Ancient attempts to define poetry, such as
Aristotle's Poetics, focused on the uses of speech in rhetoric, drama, song and
comedy. Later attempts concentrated on features such as repetition, verse form and
rhyme, and emphasized the aesthetics which distinguish poetry from more
objectively-informative, prosaic forms of writing. From the mid-20th century,
poetry has sometimes been more generally regarded as a fundamental creative act
employing language.

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 Poetry uses forms and conventions to suggest differential interpretation to
words, or to evoke emotive responses. Devices such as assonance, alliteration,
onomatopoeia and rhythm are sometimes used to achieve musical or incantatory
effects. The use of ambiguity, symbolism, irony and other stylistic elements of
poetic diction often leaves a poem open to multiple interpretations. Similarly,
metaphor, simile and metonymy create a resonance between otherwise disparate
images—a layering of meanings, forming connections previously not perceived.
Kindred forms of resonance may exist, between individual verses, in their patterns
of rhyme or rhythm.

Some poetry types are specific to particular cultures and genres and respond
to characteristics of the language in which the poet writes. Readers accustomed to
identifying poetry with Dante, Goethe, Mickiewicz and Rumi may think of it as
written in lines based on rhyme and regular meter; there are, however, traditions,
such as Biblical poetry, that use other means to create rhythm and euphony. Much
modern poetry reflects a critique of poetic tradition, playing with and testing,
among other things, the principle of euphony itself, sometimes altogether forgoing
rhyme or set rhythm.[6][7] In today's increasingly globalized world, poets often
adapt forms, styles and techniques from diverse cultures and languages.

Poetry meter - stressed syllables and the iambic foot

Meter measures lines of poetry based on stressed and unstressed syllables. I'll
explain. When we speak, we put the stress on a certain part of each word. For
example, take the words "apple" and "fantastic."

When we say the word "apple," we stress the first syllable, the "ap" part. We say
"AP-ple," how not "ap-PLE."

When we say the word "fantastic," we stress the second syllable. We say, "fan-TAS-
tic," not "FAN-tas-tic" or "fan-tas-TIC."

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 In poetry, a unit of stressed and unstressed syllables is called a foot. For example,
look at this line from Shakespeare: "No longer mourn for me when I am dead."
The rhythm is, "bah-BAH bah-BAH bah-BAH bah-BAH bah-BAH. We read it like
this: "no LON-ger MOURN for ME when I am DEAD." The type of foot
Shakespeare used here is called an iamb. An iamb or an iambic foot has the rhythm
bah-BAH. An unstressed syllable, then a stressed one. The iamb is the most
common kind of foot in English poetry.Here are three examples of words that have
an iambic rhythm (bah-BAH). above (we say, "a-BOVE")support (we say, "sup-
PORT")hurray (we say, "hur-RAY").Here's a sentence written in iambic meter:
"His noisy snoring woke the neighbors' dog." Bah-BAH bah-BAH bah-BAH bah-
BAH bah-BAH.

Poetry meter - other types of foot:

The trochee or trochaic foot. This is the opposite of an iamb -- the rhythm is BAH-
bah, like the words "apple," and "father."

The anapest or anapestic foot. This sounds like bah-bah-BAH, like the words
"underneath" and "seventeen."

The dactyl or dactylic foot. This is the opposite of an anapest -- the rhythm is BAH-
bah-bah," like the the words "elephant" and "stepmother."

Poetry meter - counting the feet

When we think about the meter of poem, in addition to looking at the kind of foot,
we count the number of feet in each line.

If there's one foot per line, it's monometer. Poetry written in monometer is very rare.

If there are are two feet per line, it's called dimeter. Here's a sentence in trochaic
dimeter: "Eat your dinner." BAH-bah (1) BAH-bah (2).

Three feet per line = trimeter. Here's a sentence in iambic trimeter: "I eat the bread
and cheese." Bah-BAH (1) bah-BAH (2) bah-BAH (3).

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Four feet per line = tetrameter. Here's a sentence in trochaic tetrameter: "Father
ordered extra pizza." BAH-bah (1) BAh-bah (2) BAH-bah (3) BAh-bah (4).

Five feet per line = pentameter. Here's a sentence in iambic pentameter: "I'll toast
the bread and melt a piece of cheese." Bah-BAH (1) bah-BAH (2) bah-BAH (3)
bah-BAH (4) bah-BAH (5).

Six feet per line = hexameter or Alexandrine. A sentence in iambic hexameter: "I'll
toast the bread and melt a piece of cheese, okay?" Bah-BAH (1) bah-BAH (2) bah-
BAH (3) bah-BAH (4) bah-BAH (5) bah-BAH (6).

Seven feet per line = heptameter. You get the idea...

Poetry meter - meter and rhythmWhen you read metered poetry, such as a sonnet
in iambic pentameter, you may notice that the meter is sometimes sounds uneven or
is hard to hear. Meter is just a form of measurement. The real rhythm of a poem is
more complicated than that:

None of us talk like robots. We give certain words and sounds more emphasis than
others in a sentence, depending on a number of factors including the meaning of the
words and our own personal speaking style. So not all of the stressed syllables have
the same amount of stress, etc.

We pause at the ends of ideas or the ends of sentences, even if these occur partway
through a poetic line. So this creates a rhythmically variation. When the sentence
ends or has a natural pause in the middle of a line of poetry, that's called a caesura.

Poets vary meter or make exceptions in order to create desired rhythmic effects.All
of these elements combine to give each poem a unique music.

The individual style of a writer

The individual style of an author is frequently identified with the general, generic
term 'style'. The individual style of an author is only one of the applications of the
general term 'style'.
What we here call individual style, therefore, is a unique combination of language
units, expressive means and stylistic devices peculiar to a given writer, which
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makes that writer's works or even utterances easily recognizable. Hence, individual
style may be likened to a proper name. It has nominal character. Individual style is
based on a thorough knowledge of the contemporary language and also of earlier
periods in its development. Selection, or deliberate choice of language are the main
distinctive features of individual style.
The treatment of the selected elements brings up the problem of the norm-
standard. The norm is regarded by some-linguists as "a regulator which controls a
set of variants. There are many versions of the notion of style according to the
different purposes of stylistic analysis. «The style of any period is the result of a
variety of complex and shifting pressures and influences. Books reflect our
experience, but our experience is also shaped by the books». That is why there is
the constant interaction between life and literature, life and literary style of any
writer as we could see from our analysis in the previous part of our paper.
Individual style study is determined as the style of the author. «It looks for
correlations between the creative concepts of the author and the language of his
work». It’s also a subject of literary stylistics research, a branch of the theory of
literature, which studies linguistic features of literary trends, genres and individual
style.
So we could underline three main influences that pressure on the individual
writer’s style:
1) Writer’s personality, his philosophy and own way of thinking and feeling that
determines his mode of expression;
2) The occasion on which he is writing, the particular purpose;
3) The influence of the age in which he lives.
In other words, a writer’s style is «his individual and creative choice of the
resources of the language». So there are many definitions of style.
According to R.Chapman, «a good style of writing has three qualities, which may
be described as accuracy, ease and grace» According to G.L.Buffon, «in reality the
style is the man himself».

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That is why the essence of style is multi-topic and its peculiarities and components
are carefully explored by the separate scientific branch – stylistics.
Creative prose or fiction (lat. fictum, "created") is a branch of literature which
deals, in part or in whole, with temporally contra factual events (events that are not
true at the time of writing). In contrast to this is non-fiction, which deals
exclusively in factual events (e.g.: biographies, histories). So as the most important
feature of prose fiction is its style, it is necessary to highlight and clarify the term
“style” and its peculiarities.
Style is depth, deviations, choice, context style restricted linguistic variation, and
style is the man himself. According to Galperin the term ‘style’ refers to the
following spheres:
1) The aesthetic function of language. It may be seen in works of art-poetry,
imaginative prose, fiction, but works of science, technical instruction or business
correspondence have no aesthetic value.
2) Synonymous ways of rendering one and the same idea. The possibility of choice
of using different words in similar situations is connected with the question of style
as if the form changes, the contents changes too and the style may be different.
3) Expressive means in language. They are employed mainly in the following
spheres – poetry, fiction, colloquial speech, speeches but not in scientific articles,
business letters and others.
4) Emotional coloring in language. Very many types of texts are highly emotional
– declaration of love, funeral oration, poems (verses), but a great number of texts is
unemotional or non-emphatic (rules in textbooks).
5) A system of special devices called stylistic devices. The style is formed with the
help of characteristic features peculiar to it. Many texts demonstrate various
stylistic features: She wears ‘fashion’ = what she wears is fashionable or is just the
fashion metonymy.
6) The individual manner of an author in making use the individual style of
speaking, writing must be investigated with the help of common rules and
generalization.
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The writer’s Choice of words
The word-stock of any given language can be roughly divided into three uneven
groups, differing from each other by the sphere of its possible use. «The biggest
division is made up of neutral words, possessing no stylistic connotation and
suitable for any communicative, situation, two smaller ones are literary and
colloquial strata respectively.
Literacy words serve to satisfy communicative demands of official, scientific,
poetic messages, while the colloquial ones are employed in non-official everyday
communication. «Though there is no immediate correlation between the written
and the oral forms of speech on the one hand, and the literary and colloquial words,
on the other, yet, for the most part, the first ones are mainly observed in the written
form, as most literary messages appear in writing. And vice versa: though there are
many examples of colloquialisms in writing (informal letters, diaries, certain
passages of memoirs, etc.), their usage is associated with the oral form of
communication».
Consequently, taking for analysis printed materials we shall find literary words in
authorial speech, descriptions, considerations, while colloquialisms will be
observed in the types of discourse, simulating (copying) everyday oral
communication-i.e., in the dialogue (or interior monologue) of a prose work.
When we classify some speech (text) fragment as literary or colloquial it does not
mean that all the words constituting it have a corresponding stylistic meaning.
More than that: words with a pronounced stylistic connotation are few in any type
of discourse, the overwhelming majority of its lexis being neutral.
As the famous philologist L.V. Shcherba once said: «A stylistically coloured word
is like a drop of paint added to a glass of pure water and colouring the whole of it».
Each of the two named groups of words, possessing a stylistic meaning, is not
homogeneous as to the quality of the meaning, frequency of use, sphere of
application, or the number and character of potential users. This is why each one is
further divided into the general, i. e. known to and used by most native speakers in
generalized literary (formal) or colloquial (informal) communication, and special
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bulks. The latter ones, in their turn, are subdivided into subgroups, each one
serving a rather narrow, specified communicative purpose. So, there are at least
two major subgroups essential for creative prose among special literary words.
They are:
1. Archaisms, i. e. words,
- a) denoting historical phenomena which are no more in use (such as "yeoman",
"vassal", falconet"). These are historical words.
- b) used in poetry in the XVII-XIX cc. (such as "steed" for "horse"; "quoth" for
"said"; "woe" for "sorrow"). These are poetic words.
- c) in the course of language history ousted by newer syn onymic words (such as
"whereof = of which; "to deem" = to think; "repast" - meal; "nay" = no) or forms
("maketh" = makes; "thou wilt" = you will; "brethren" = brothers). These are
called archaic words (archaic forms) proper.
Literary words are used in official papers and documents, in scientific
communication, in high poetry, in authorial speech of creative prose.
2. Colloquial words, on the contrary, mark the message as informal, non-official,
conversational. Apart from general colloquial words such special subgroups may
be mentioned:
- a) Slang forms the biggest one. «Slang words are highly emotive and expressive -
'and as such, lose their originality rather fast and are replaced by newer formations.
This tendency to synonymic expansion results in long chains of synonyms of
various degrees of expressiveness, denoting one and the same concept». So, the
idea of a "pretty girl" is worded by more than one hundred ways in slang.
- B) Jargonisms stand close to slang, «also being substandard, expressive and
emotive, but, unlike slang they are used by limited groups of people, united either
professionally (in this case we deal with professional jargonisrns, or
professionalisms, or socially (here we deal with jargonisms proper)». Their major
function thus was to be cryptic, secretive. So it seems appropriate to use the
indicated terms as synonyms. These lexical groups give the text strong
expressiveness.
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- С) Vulgarisms are coarse words with a strong emotive meaning, mostly
derogatory, normally avoided in polite conversation. «One of the best-known
American editors and critics Maxwell Perkins, working witn tne serialized 1929
magazine edition of Hemingway's novel A. Farewell to Arms found that the
publishers deleted close to a dozen words which they considered vulgar for their
publication. Preparing the hardcover edition Perkins allowed half of them back
("son of a bitch", "whore", "whorehound," etc.)»[24]. Consequently, in
contemporary West European and American prose all words, formerly considered
vulgar for public use (including the four-letter words), and are even approved by
the existing moral and ethical standards of society and censorship.
Thus, the denotation meaning is the major semantic and stylistic
characteristic of the word. The words in context may acquire additional lexical
meanings not fixed in dictionaries. «What is known in linguistics as “transferred
meaning” is particularly the interrelation between two types of lexical meaning:
dictionary and contextual».
The mechanism is simple: «When the deviation from the acknowledged meaning is
carried to a degree that it causes an unexpected turn in the recognised logical
meanings, we register a stylistic device».
The following lexical stylistic devices (LSD) can be pointed out:
1. Epigram and paradox. Epigrams and paradoxes as stylistic devices are used for
creating generalised images. «Paradox is based on contrast, being a statement
contradictory to what is accepted as a self-evident or proverbial truth. Paradox can
be considered a figure of speech with certain reservations, since the aesthetic
principle, that underlies it, i.e. contrast has divers linguistic manifestations».
Epigram is «a stylistic device akin to a proverb, the only difference being that
epigrams are coined by individuals whose names we know, while proverbs are the
coinage of the people. In other words, we are always aware of the parentage of an
epigram and therefore, when using one, we usually make a reference to its author».
Epigrams and paradoxes as stylistic devices are usually used in the Present
Indefinite Tense which makes them abstract.
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One of the most characteristic and essential features of epigrams and paradoxes is
their shortness and conciseness. They are achieved by the syntactical pattern of an
epigram or paradox. The syntax of these stylistic devices is laconic and clear – cut.
Irony and pun. «Irony is a stylistic device in which the contextual evaluative
meaning of a word is directly opposite to its dictionary meaning» Like many other
stylistic devices, irony does not exist outside the context.
«Pun (paronomasia, a play on words) is a figure of speech emerging as an effect
created by words similar or identical in their sound form and contrastive or
incompatible in meaning».
Pun is based on the effect of deceived expectation, because unpredictability in it is
expressed either in the appearance of the elements of the text unusual for the reader
or in the unexpected reaction of the addressee of the dialogue.
Simile is the intensification of someone feature of the concept in question is
realized in a device. «To use a simile is to characterize one object by bringing it
into contact with another object belonging to an entirely different class of things».
Oscar Wilde was one of the Victorian aesthetes he tried to make the writings that
should be beautiful in its color and cadence. His extraordinary personality and wit
have so dominated the imaginations of most biographers and critics that their
estimates of his work have too often consisted of sympathetic tributes to a writer
whose literary production was little more than a faint reflection of his brilliant talk
or the manifestation of “lawlessness”. Indeed, «Wilde’s remark that he had put his
genius into his life and only his talent into his art has provided support to those
who regard his life as the primary object of interest»
The basis of the moral conflict and aesthetic values which was very close to Oscar
Wilde and his heroes still influences on our present and future. The author’s speech
was full of paradoxical judgments which are well known in our days:
«Conscience and cowardice are really the same things. Conscience is the trade
name of the firm. That is all»;
«Being natural is simply a pose, and the most irritating pose»;
«Life is far too important a thing to talk seriously about it» and many others.
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With the perfect sense of the theatre, Oscar Wilde took his characters from high
society; he set his elegant marionettes in motion with such mastery that his
comedies can be regarded as the wittiest that have been written in a very long time.

Tradition and newness

S. Eliot’s ‘Tradition and Individual Talent’ is one of the critical essay in which
Eliot has described with concept of tradition, individual talent, emotion and poetry
as well as his concept of depersonalized art. In the opening of the essay, Eliot’s
defines tradition, which is the literary history. He says that each and every nation
has it’s individual genius who create literature. So many such individual writers
produce a big bulk of writing which is tradition.
In other words, tradition is the matter of past that is even related to present because
it is in the process of formation. Eliot gives an example of English literature
produced from the Anglo Saxon period up to the present day. It is like a wall where
there are so many bricks working commonly. Eliot also says that when a writer
comes to write at present. He should be aware of the tradition. To learn the
tradition he should have a great labor but he should not imitate it. Learning the
tradition is also called historical sense that is necessary to the present writer,
because tradition as the past influences.

Eliot even says that the new writer writing at present becomes the part of
tradition so he has to learn the tradition but not imitate it. No writers and writings
have value in isolation, the writer and his writing would not be evaluated with the
writers of the past, he should be compared and contrasted with the tradition, it is
possible to examine his individual talent. If the new writer has imitated the
tradition, blindly such slavish imitation should be discouraged because it has not
individual talent. Individual talent is the novelty or newness. If the present writer
has brought something novelty in his writing, it is called individual talent such
novelty should be encourage because it suggests the genius of the writer.

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 Eliot has also given his personal idea about the depersonalization of art,
which is also called impersonal poetry. He says that emotions and feelings are
related to poetry but they should be expressed indirectly and objectively. In other
words, Eliot says that emotions of the poet are expressed in poetry but the poet
should in personify them. His concept is against the concept of words being
involved in poetry. Instead, the poet should not be identified as the direct speaker
in poetry but he should indirectly speak through the characters or other objects,
which is called objective correlative. So Eliot says Poetry is not the turning loose
of emotion but escape from emotion. It is not the expression of personality but
escape from it.

QUESTIONS

1. What is individual style?

2.What are the structures of literary speech?

3. What is the interdependence of literary language with national language and
colloquial ?
4.What is speech?
5.What is the difference between traditions and newness ?
6. What does Kinesthetic imagery represent?
7.What does Gustatory imagery represent?
8.This critical stance "uses various and even contradictory theories in critiquing a
piece of literature." ?
9.How many categories may images be divided into?
10.What is imagery?
11.What does identifiable mean?
12.How does Galperin I.R. define imagery?

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 PRACTICAL PART
Topic 1 Introduction to literary theory
Activity 1

WHAT IS A GOOD BOOK?

In an interview, Ernest Hemingway, the author of The Old Man and the Sea, The
Sun AlsoRises, and other novels and short stories, once said, ”All good books are
alike in that they aretruer than if they had really happened and after you are
finished reading one you will feelthat all that happened to you and afterwards it all
belongs to you; the good and the bad, theecstasy, the remorse, and sorrow, the
people and the places and how the weather was.” Onthe lines provided, answer the
following questions.
1. Define ecstasy.
__________________________________________________________
2. Define remorse.
__________________________________________________________
3. Paraphrase Hemingway’s quote.
______________________________________________
4. Do you agree or disagree with the quote? Why?
________________________________
5. Select a novel you have read and—on another sheet of paper—explain how
Hemingway’squote is appropriate or inappropriate regarding that book.
6. Now that you know what Hemingway feels is a “good book,” what do you feel
is a “goodbook”? Write your answer on another sheet of paper.

Activity 2

In this Venn diagram students should complete this diagram and compare and
contrast the stories(or novels ,short stories) etc which they have read.

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Example ;

An Introduction to Shakespeare’s Hamlet

William Shakespeare’s 1602 play Hamlet is arguably the single most
“theorized” literary text in the English language. Hamlet’s aesthetic,
psychological, political, philosophical,and literary depth and richness has made the
play not only among the most frequently performed, adapted, revised, and studied
85
texts in English literature but also among th most widely taught, debated, and
researched literary texts in the world. Several hundred scholarly books and
thousands of scholarly articles have been published about Hamlet over the last
hundred years alone, with new articles and scholarly books appearing every year
on the topic of Shakespeare’s most famous and controversial play. The play’s
richness and ambiguity—as well as its revolutionary style and characterizations—
allows for a plethora of different interpretations to be reasonably applied to it,
hence the reason the literary theorist Harold Bloom refers to Hamlet as a “poem
unlimited.” Nearly every form of literary theory that we will study in this course—
from psychoanalysis and new historicism to feminist theory and queer theory—can
be readily applied to Hamlet in order to develop a deeper critical understanding of
the play. In this course, our readings about different literary theories will be
supported not only with brief essays that seek to provide students with a general
overview of the theories at hand, but also with interpretations of Hamlet through
the perspective of the literary theories we study. The purpose of this exercise is for
you to be able to not only see the theories we study be put into practical use, but
also to be able to recognize the different ways a single text can be interpreted using
different literary theories. That is not to suggest that a definitive critical or
theoretical reading of Hamlet will be offered in this course. Instead, Hamlet will
be used as a springboard through which we will be able to recognize how different
literary theories can be applied to a literary text in order to explore newdimensions
of interpretation.

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 Topic 2 Literature is a kind of art

Activity 1 Discuss the questions with your partner:

1. How interested are you in art?

2. What kind of art do you like – paintings, sculpture, ceramics, etc.?
3. What do you think of contemporary art / installation art / abstract art?
4. Do you have any artistic talents?
5. How often do you go to art galleries? What was the last art gallery you went
to? What did you think of it?
6. What’s the best exhibition you have ever been to?
7. Who’s your favourite artist? (What do you feel when you see one of his/ her
artworks?)
8. How would the world be different without artists?
9. Do colours affect how you feel? your mood?
10. What are the most famous paintings in the world?

87
Activity2 Complete the mind map.

Complete your mind map with the words below:

landscape, acrylics, lifelike, soft, bright, oils, impressionism, cold, still life,
midground, background, photography, crayons, cubism, architecture, watercolours,
chalk, a portrait, abstract, layers, foreground, transparent, installation, dreamlike,
outstanding.

Ty
pes
of
art
Paintings
genres
Adjectives

ART Styles of
Parts of paintings
paintings

C Materials
ol
o
ur
s

Activity 3 Look at the paintings. Match the names and the paintings. Match the
with artists.

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Starry Night A Salvador Dali

Self-Portrait Without Beard B Rembrandt van Rijn

The Last Supper C Michelangelo

Girl With A Pearl Earring D Edvard Munch

The Scream E Pablo Picasso

The Night Watch F Vincent van Gogh

Mona Lisa G Vincent van Gogh

Guernica H Leonardo da Vinci

The Persistence Of Memory I Johannes Vermeer

The Creation Of Adam J Leonardo da Vinci

Activity 4 Watch the video and check

https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=2&v=UFrqngK_iKw

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 Topic 3 The imagery is the main feature

Activity 1

Imagery is creating vivid (strong) mental pictures through using words that appeal
to the senses and emotions.

 Rewrite each sentence using imagery to expand on the idea presented.

EXAMPLES 1. I was afraid.

The fear came over me like a dark cloud.

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2.My clothes were ruined.

The dark green paint crept like a snake slowly down my leg and ruined my brand
new blue jeans.

1. Her hair was

nice.______________________________________________________________

2. The ocean was

wavy._____________________________________________________________

3. I am
angry._____________________________________________________________

4. I fell in love with

him/her.____________________________________________________________
____________

5. My house is a
dump._____________________________________________________________

6. My friend’s voice is
annoying.__________________________________________________________

7. My homework is
hard.______________________________________________________________

8. The sky is
beautiful.___________________________________________________________

9. The painting is
colorful.___________________________________________________________

10.The couch is
comfortable.________________________________________________________
___________________

Once you have completed the sentences above write a poem in which you use imagery. If you like you
can use a sentence above as inspiration or you may freewrite. Use at least three examples of imagery and
UNDERLINE THEM. Turn this sheet and the poem in at the end of class.
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 Topic 4. Plot structure

Activity 1

Read this text about attentively and complete the lines.

The Breakaway

As far as Justin knew, there was only one way out of his neighborhood: basketball.
So he ran with the ball like the hounds were chasing him. He could drop any of the
older guys at the court in a blaze of crossovers, fadeaways, and finger rolls, and the
younger guys didn’t stand a chance. Justin saw his way out and he ran for it. But
the world has a funny way of changing right when you think you’ve got things
figured out, and that’s just what happened to Justin.

One day when Justin was shooting around at the local court, some guys from
another block ran up and asked to play. The big one in the middle said that he had
heard that Justin was the best and he wanted to see if it was true. Justin said, “Nah,
Man, I’m just shooting around with my cousin, I ain’t trying to get all sweaty right
now.” But the big guy was insistent, and Justin’s cousin was bugging, “C’mon,
Justin, drop this guy.” So Justin figured that he’d just do what everyone wanted
and play.

Justin was running all over the big guy and making his shots while he did it. But
just as the outcome of the game seemed certain, the big guy shoved Justin as he
went for a lay up. Justin went flying in just such a way that he managed to tear up
his right knee. The doctor said Justin might never play again, and if he did play, he
wouldn’t play the same. Justin was devastated.

The first six weeks, Justin just laid in bed with his leg in a long cast feeling like a
broomstick. He watched three reruns of The Simpsons every day and ate potato
chips until the bag was empty, and then he’d dig the salt and grease out of the
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corner with his index finger. Justin blew up like a balloon as watched his once
bright future fadeway. Right when he reached the bottom of the pit of despair,
Justin’s sister, Kiki came home from the university

She came in the house like a whirl of sunshine, bringing exciting tales of a far
away land called college. Justin was amazed and intrigued by the dorm room
dramas and campus craziness that Kiki told, but he could hardly believe any of it.
It was as if she were telling him about some fantasy land high above the clouds.
Justin gazed off dreamily as she spoke.

“Justin!” She interrupted his day dream. “Let me see your progress report.”
Justin was ashamed. His grades had really slumped since his injury. “Oh no, this
won’t do, J,” she said. “We’re going to have to get these up.” Well, Justin was a
pretty stubborn guy, but his older sister had a way of getting him to do things that
nobody else could. So, while she was home on break, they studied together, and
they talked, and they worked, and Justin felt better than he ever had before.

After spending those weeks with his sister, Justin realized that he didn’t want to
feel bad for himself any more, and he didn’t want to quit. Basketball used to be his
thing, and he was good at it, but now there was only school, so he had to get good
at that. Justin passed through all his classes like a half-court trap. By the time he
got to senior year in high school, his GPA was hovering in the slam-dunk position.
The last thing that Justin had to do to get into the college of his choice was score
well on the ACT. Well wouldn’t you know it? Using the study skills Justin had
acquired from his sister, Justin scored a 24 on the ACT. That’s not the highest
score a person can get, but it was high enough for Justin. Now he had his
academic game together.

Though the recruiters never came to Justin’s door, every university that he applied
to accepted him; and when the fall came, Justin had his choice in colleges. Though
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he’d miss his family, Justin decided to enroll in the sunniest university in Hawaii,
and nobody could say that Justin made a bad choice.

“The Breakaway” -

1. Author’s Purpose: entertain inform

persuade
Why did the author write this?

2. Genre: ____________________________ Subgenre:

______________________________
Ex: Nonfiction, fiction, or folklore Ex: Autobiography, science fiction, fable, informational writing,
etc.

3. Narrator’s Point of View:

______________________________________________________
1st-person, 2nd-person, 3rd-person objective, 3rd-person limited, or 3rd-person omniscient

4 & 5. Summarize the text:

Five key events from beginning, middle, & end.

6. Exposition

A.
Setting:____________________________________________________________
___________
When and where does the story take place?

B. Conflict:
__________________________________________________________________
_
Describe the conflict in the story.

7. Rising Action: List some events that occur before the climax.

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 1.
________________________________________________________________
_________

2.
________________________________________________________________
___________

3.
__________________________________________________________________
_______

Climax:
The turning point

Falling Action: List some events that occur after the climax.

1.
________________________________________________________________
_________

2.
________________________________________________________________
_________

Resolution:
When the conflict is solved

Every story has a plot, or a sequence of events. There are five parts to a good plot

Beginning—the story begins and characters are introduced

Rising Action—something happens to make the story more interesting; the

characters have a problem

Climax—the most suspenseful part of the story; the characters must finally face
their problems and make decisions
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Falling Action—the character has made a decision about how to handle the
problem, and now the story is coming to a close

End—the story concludes as the action comes to an end

Activity 2 Read the following version of “The Tortoise and the Hare.” Then, list
the events of the story on the plot diagram below.

A speedy hare bragged about how fast he could run. He challenged Tortoise to a
race, and all of the animals in the forest gathered to watch. When the race started,
Hare ran very quickly down the road, while Tortoise plodded along slowly. Hare
yelled back to him, “You will never win this race! You are too slow!” Then, Hare
decided he had time to rest, and he fell asleep. Tortoise continued to move along
slowly, and while Hare slept, he passed Hare and headed toward the finish line.
The other animals cheered loudly for Tortoise as he got closer. When their cheers
woke Hare up, he could see that Tortoise was almost at the finish line. He tried to
catch up to Tortoise, but it was too late. Tortoise won the race. All of the animals
cheered, and Hare no longer bragged about how fast he could run. He had learned a
lesson: Slow and steady wins the race.

Topic 5 Fiction writing

Activity1 This is a very simple activity to help students better understand

elements of fiction.Students will define terms related to the elements of fiction

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(setting, plot, rising action, etc.), create an example, and then illustrate the
examples.

Illustrate the Terms – Elements of a Story

Directions: write the definition of the term in the box below and draw an example.
Color your pictures for bonus points.

Setting: Plot:

Conflict: Rising action:

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Climax: First Person Narration:

Dialogue: The third person narration

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 Topic 6 Belles Letter Style(Literal and figurative ,publicistic style)

Activity 1 Poetry Quiz

Read the following examples of figurative language. Identify the poetic device
being used. Write the letter of your answer on the line to the right.

1. The streets were strange and still, / Through the doors of the open churches
The organs were moaning shrill.

a. simile b. metaphor c. hyperbole d. personification _________

2. Chicago is a city that is fierce as a dog with tongue lapping for action.

a. enjambment b. metaphor c. simile d. onomatopoeia ________

3. She soothed her secret sorrow.

a. hyperbole b. alliteration c. metaphor d. simile ________

4. Silver bells!... How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle in the icy air of night.

a. simile b. hyperbole c. onomatopoeia d. alliteration _________

5. He answered her he knew not what: / Like shaft from bow at random shot,

a. simile b. personification c. repetition d. metaphor _________

6. Chant in a wail / that never halts, / pace a circle and pay tribute / with a song.

a. rhyme b. simile c. personification d. hyperbole _________

7. Vague pageants woven on a web of dream!

And we, pushing and fighting in the turbid stream / Of modern life

a. simile b. metaphor c. understatement d. hyperbole _________

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 8. He would contemplate the distance / With a look of pensive meaning, As of
ducks that die in ill tempests.

a. simile b. metaphor c. personification d. onomatopoeia __________

9. And I will return, my love, / even if it were a million miles.

a. personification b. onomatopoeia c. hyperbole d. simile _________

10. Women under the gas lamps luring the farm boys.

a. onomatopoeia b. hyperbole c. personification d. alliteration _________

Topic 7. The structure of poems

Activity 1

Reading Poetry

The world is too much with us; late and soon,

Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:

Little we see in Nature that is ours;

We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!

This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon;

The winds that will be howling at all hours,

And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;

For this, for every thing, we are out of tune;

It moves us not. Great God! I’d rather be

A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;

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So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,

Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;

Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;

Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.

William Wordsworth, 1807

1. What is the rhyme scheme of the poem?

___________________________________

2. What is the poem about? This poem was written over two hundred years ago. Do
you think it has any relevance for us today? Why or why not?

__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________

Reading On The Move Poetry: Rhyme, Repetition, and Rhythm

Rhyme is the repetition of similar sounds in two or more words. In poetry these
words are usually at the end of a line and help create a certain rhythm. Example:
tree, me, see, be, flee all rhyme because they end with the same sound.

Worksheet 2 Match the rhyming words below. The first one is done for you.

1.squeak shuttle

2.pray Stray

3.sharpen Hour

4.phone boat

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5. empower Peak

6. helpful Stone

7. strange Open

8. motion Range

9. puddle Cupful

10. note lotion

Topic 8 Literary genres

Activity 1 Read the descriptions of the texts. Look for details that reveal the
genre. Write the genre and subgenre on the lines and write a sentence
explaining your answer

1. The Hard Way Out by Terry Vaughn In this novel, Brian is struggling. After
losing both of his parents in a tragic car accident, Brian is living at his Aunt's
house and sharing a room with his cousin. Basketball is his only escape. But after
getting benched for low progress report grades, Brian's world shatters. Does he
have it in him to improve his grades? Will Brian come to peace with his emotions?
Can anyone help him?

Genre: ___________________________________
Subgenre:_________________________________

Explain your answer

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2. Newton's Law by Morton Mallon After a life of studying the nano-transportation
sciences, Professor Melton stumbles upon a major breakthrough. On April 20th,
2042, Melton discovers a way to transport particles at light-speed across fixed
distances. Now he can teleport from one location to another. But Professor Melton
soon discovers that there is no such thing as a free lunch. He learns that the body
ages relative to the distance travelled, not just the time. This means that a
teleporting body ages very rapidly. Can Melton solve this problem before his time
is up?

Genre: ___________________________________
Subgenre:_________________________________

Explain your answer

3. Intermediate Math Problems for Students by M. Colwell This workbook

explains how to perform basic mathematical operations, like double-digit addition,
subtraction, multiplication, and division. It also explains fractions and decimals.

Genre: ___________________________________
Subgenre:_________________________________

Explain your answer

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4. "If a Tree Falls" adapted by Stan Tanner This is the very short story of a buck.
The buck was admiring his horns in the water's reflection and feeling bad about his
skinny legs. Then a hunter tries to kill him. As the buck tries to escape, his big
horns get stuck in some tree branches, but his skinny legs manage to pull him free.
The moral is that what is truly valuable is often unappreciated.

Genre: ___________________________________
Subgenre:_________________________________

Explain your answer

5. The Tinfoil Key by Rob Burnside When young Ian Bradley accidently switches
suitcases with an intergalactic space explorer, he ends up going on the trip of a
lifetime. Now that he's left holding the bag, Ian must deliver it to the light
scientists on Gamma Outpost 9 in time. Every life form in the galaxy is
unknowingly depending on the success of Ian's efforts.

Genre___________________________________
Subgenre:_________________________________

Explain your answer

6. Seeing More, Being More by Fletch Carpenter "Dr." Fletch gives readers a dose
of hard medicine. He believes that most people cause their own problems. Fletch
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teaches readers to solve problems such as bullying, insecurity, and relationship
troubles. He does this with a three-step strategy: letting go of ego, seeing the "real"
reality, and finding a role. Some readers find Carpenter's ideas to be refreshing.
Others find them to be offensive

Genre___________________________________
Subgenre:_________________________________

Explain your answer

7. Bronze Star by Irwin Keene World War II has been hard for Mama Conner.
While her husband and three sons have been away at war, Mama Conner has had
to fend for herself. She keeps the house together, raises money, and provides for
Baby Maple. The mood in town suddenly darkens when her neighbor Betsy loses
one of her loved ones in battle. At Mama Conner's ladies club, several upstanding
ladies of the town are on edge. They heard a garbled news report announcing that a
man from their town was lost in battle. But the man's name went unheard and the
women are left to speculate. This novel ends in a surprising twist.

Genre___________________________________
Subgenre:_________________________________

Explain your answer

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8. "Rapunzel" adapted by Craig Hooper Once upon a time a young girl named
Rapunzel was running an errand for her mother. An evil witch kidnaps Rapunzel
and imprisons her in the tower of a castle. After years in the tower, Rapunzel grew
long, beautiful hair. Having seen nobody but the evil witch her whole life,
Rapunzel is very lonely. One day a prince wanders by and climbs up her hair. The
witch doesn't like this and action ensues. Eventually the prince and Rapunzel live
happily every after.

Genre___________________________________
Subgenre:_________________________________

Explain your answer

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 Some useful techniques

Two-part diary

A two-part diary is a pedagogical technique that develops written speech. It allows

students to explore the text, express their understanding of what they read in
writing, linking it to their personal experience.

Goals:

-Motivate students to the topic

-improves writing skill

Description of the method:

-We offer students a prepared text to read.

-After making sure that everyone has read the text (novel comedy etc), students
divide the notebook sheet into two parts with a vertical line

- Next, we offer students write down quotes on the left (ideas, thoughts) of the
author that they liked (or did not like, puzzled).

- On the right, the student writes a comment to the author's quote (thesis), i.e.
justifies their choice and understanding of what they read.

- At the end of this part of the task, we invite students (voluntarily) to read out
quotes (once a time) and their comments on them. In the course of familiarization,
other students can ask questions or offer your own version of a comment on a
particular quote.

- Then students can work in pairs (in threes, small groups), discuss what they heard
and note what they liked in their partners work.

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Example

Mind mapping

A mind map is a diagram used to visually organize information. A mind map is

hierarchical and shows relationships among pieces of the whole. It is often created
around a single concept, drawn as an image in the center of a blank page, to which
associated representations of ideas such as images, words and parts of words are
added. Major ideas are connected directly to the central concept, and other ideas
branch out from those major ideas. Also we can use mind mapping in describing
our books which we have read.

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109
 Tasks for Self-study

TWO CHARACTERS IN CONFLICT

Often the most intriguing parts of any literary work are the conflicts presented by
the author, when one character is pitted against another. These conflicts provide
interesting reading andsomething to think about long after you have finished
reading the literary work. On the lines provided, answer the questions using works
you have read either as class assignments or individualized readings. When you
have completed your answers, share your ideas with your classmates.
1. Name a literary work that features two individuals in conflict with each other.
Include the work’s author and the genre.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
________________________________________________________________
2. Describe the conflict.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
3. How did the two characters attempt to resolve the conflict?
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
________________________________________
4. To what extent were these characters successful in resolving the conflict?
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
5. If they were unsuccessful, what, in your opinion, contributed to their not being
able tosettle their differences?
__________________________________________________________________

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__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
6. If you had been the literary work’s author, how, if at all, would you have made
the outcome of this conflict different?
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________

ONE VERSUS THE CROWD

An author will sometimes present one character who has a problem with those
around him or her. Often these conflicts deal with philosophical differences. At
times, they may even turn into physical encounters. The character who is not in
agreement with the society’s rules and regulations because of a basic and
seemingly important difference (religious, familial,and nationalistic differences
come to mind) will make the reader think carefully about the world inside (and
outside) the text. After all, one of literature’s purposes is to make us think.
Conflicts do exactly that.Write your responses on the lines provided. When you
have finished, discuss your responses with your classmates.
1. Name a literary work that presents a conflict between an individual and his or
her society.Include the work’s author and the genre.
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
2. Describe the conflict.
__________________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
3. How, if at all, did the character attempt to resolve the conflict with society?
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________

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4. Did the society make an attempt to resolve the difference(s)?
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
5. To what extent was the character successful in resolving the conflict with
society?
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
6. What contributed to the conflict’s resolution?
__________________________________________________________________
____________________________________________
7. What contributed to the conflict’s not being
resolved?___________________________________________________________

WORKING WITH QUOTES

On many standardized English tests, you will be asked to connect a quote with a
work (ortwo) of literature. Today you will be asked to prepare to perform such a
task.First, select one of these quotes (or the one your teacher assigns to you) and
paraphrase the quote on the lines provided. Then, on another sheet of paper, tell
whether you agree or disagree with the quote. Select two literary works in which
the quote applies, give the title,author, and genre of each work. Finally, specifically
show how the quote applies to the literary works by using concrete examples from
the text. These examples can include specific quotes, characters’ actions, conflicts,
or any other literary techniques. Use another sheet of paper if needed. When you
have completed your writing, discuss your answers with your classmates.
“All that we do is done with an eye to something else.” —ARISTOTLE
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________

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“Man has gone long enough, or even too long, without being man enough to face
the simple truth that the trouble with man is Man.” —JAMES THURBER
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
“Men can starve from a lack of self-realization as much as they can from a lack of
bread.” RICHARD WRIGHT
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
“Our failings sometimes bind us to one another as closely as could virtue itself.”
VAUVENARGUES
__________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________
“The firmest friendships have been formed in mutual adversity, as iron is most
strongly united by the fiercest flame.” —CHARLES CALEB COLTON
__________________________________________________________________

THREE CHARACTERS
Here are character descriptions from three different literary works. Each character
is described using effective diction (word choice) and syntax (word and sentence
placement). First, look up any new vocabulary words found in the three
descriptions. Then circle the words that contribute to a greater understanding of
each character. Lastly, on another sheet of paper, describe a character, real or
fictional, using the techniques employed by Hemingway, Schaefer, or Dickens.
Discuss your thoughts with your classmates.
For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway
“The young man, who was tall and thin, with sun-streaked fair hair, and a wind-
and-sunburnedface, who wore the sun-faded flannel shirt, a pair of peasant’s
trousers and ropesoledshoes, leaned over, put his arm through one of his leather
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pack straps and swung the heavy pack against his back. His shirt was still wet from
where the pack had rested.”
Shane by Jack Schaefer
“He was clean-shaven and his face was lean and hard and burned from high
forehead to firm, tapering chin. His eyes seemed hooded in the shadow of the hat’s
brim. He came closer, and I could see that this was because the brows were drawn
in a frown of fixed and habitual alertness. Beneath them the eyes were endlessly
searching from side and forward, checking off every item in view, missing nothing.
As I noticed this, a sudden chill, I couldn’t have told why, struck through me there
in the warm and open sun.”
A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
“Oh! but he was a tight-fisted hand at the grindstone, Scrooge! A squeezing,
wrenching, grasping, scraping, clutching, covetous old sinner. Hard and sharp as
flint, from which no steel had ever struck out generous fire, secret, and self-
contained, and solitary as an oyster. The cold within him froze his old features,
nipped his pointed nose, shriveled his cheek, stiffened his gait, made his eyes red,
his thin lips blue, and spoke out shrewdly in his grating voice. A frosty rime was
on his head and on his eyebrows, and his wiry chin. He carried his own low
temperature always about with him; he iced his office in the dog days; and didn’t
throw it one degree at Christmas.”

DRAW THE DESCRIPTIONS

Here is an interesting way to “see” what authors want us to “see.” First, look up
any word whose definition you do not know. Then, on a plain sheet of paper, draw
a picture of each character as described by the author. Discuss your drawings with
your classmates.
Slake’s Limbo by Felice Holman
“To begin with, Slake was small. Anyone could beat him for any reason or non-
reason,and did, when they could catch him. But he was wiry and wily, too, and he
could often outrun,tack, back-track, double-back, and finally dodge unseen into the
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subway, hiding, if possible, in some nook of the station to save the fare, or riding,
if necessary, till things cooled off and the world above became habitable again.
That’s just to begin with.”

The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne

“The young woman was tall, with a figure of perfect elegance on a large scale. She
had dark and abundant hair; so glossy that it threw off the sunshine with a gleam,
and a face which, besides being beautiful from regularity of feature and richness of
complexion, had the impressiveness belonging to a marked brow and deep black
eyes. She was ladylike, too, after the manner of feminine gentility of those days;
characterized by a certain state and dignity, rather than by the delicate, evanescent,
and indescribable grace, (over) which is now recognized as its indication.”

FOR OPENERS (PART ONE)

Here are the openings of three well-known novels. On the lines beneath each
opening excerpt, write what you think is the author’s intended purpose. Is the
author establishing character? setting? conflict? Be prepared to explain your
opinions. If you need additional space, use the back of this sheet.
Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson
“I will begin the story of my adventure with a certain morning early in the month
of June, the year of grace 1751, when I took the key for the last time out of the
door of my father’s house. The sun began to shine upon the summit of the hills as I
went down the door; and by the time I had come as far as the manse, the blackbirds
were whistling in the garden lilacs, and the mist that hung around the valley in the
time of the dawn was beginning to arise and die away.”
The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
“A throng of bearded men, in sad-colored garments and gray, steeple-crowned
hats, intermixed with women, some wearing hoods, and others bareheaded, was
assembled in front of a wooden edifice, the door of which was heavily timbered
with oak and studded with iron spikes.”
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Bless the Beasts and Children by Glendon Swarthout
“In that place the wind prevailed. There was always sound. The throat of the
canyon was hoarse with wind. It heaved through pines and passed and was
collected by the cliffs. There was a phenomenon of pines in such a place. When the
wind died in box canyon and in its wake the air was still and taut, the trees were
not. The passing trembled in them, a sough of loss. They grieved. They seemed to
mourn a memory of wind.”

FOR OPENERS (PART TWO)

Here are the openings of three well-known novels. On the lines beneath each
excerpt, write what you think is the author’s intended purpose. Is the author
establishing character? setting? conflict? Be prepared to explain your opinions. If
you need additional space, use the back of this sheet.
The Crystal Cave by Mary Stewart
“I am an old man now, but then I was already past my prime when Arthur was
crowned King. The years since then seem to me now more dim and faded than the
earlier years, as if my life were a growing tree which burst to flower and leaf with
him, and now has nothing more to do than yellow to the grave.”
Dracula by Bram Stoker
“Jonathan Harker’s Journal (kept in shorthand) 3rd May. Bistritz—left Munich at
8:35 P.M., on 1st May, arriving in Vienna early next morning; should have arrived
at 6:46, but train was an hour late. Buda-Pesth seems a wonderful place, from the
glimpse which I got of it from the train and the little I could walk through the
streets. I feared to go very far from the station, as we arrived late and would start as
near the correct time as possible.”
The Yearling by Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings
“A column of smoke rose thin and straight from the cabin chimney. The smoke
was blue where it left the red of clay. It trailed into the blue of the April sky and
was no longer blue butgray. The boy Jody watched it, speculating. The fire on the

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kitchen hearth was dying down.His mother was hanging up pots and pans after the
noon dinner. The day was Friday.”

PARAPHRASING POWER

The paragraph below, excerpted from Ray Bradbury’s novel Fahrenheit 451,
contains fine examples of diction (word choice), syntax (placement of words and
sentences), and imagery (images perceived by our five senses). Using these literary
devices, this award-winning author certainly knows how to create vivid pictures
for his readers.Today you are asked to paraphrase (put into your own words) six
sentences from the excerpt. On the lines below, using your own words, write your
own version of each numbered sentence. Compare your ideas with those of your
classmates. “(1) The autumn leaves blew over the moonlit pavement in such a way
as to make the girl who was moving there seem fixed to a sliding walk, letting the
motion of the wind and the leaves carry her forward. (2) Her head was half bent to
watch her shoes stir the circling leaves. (3) Her face was slender and milk-white,
and in it was a kind of gentle hunger that touched over everything with tireless
curiosity. (4) It was a look, almost, of pale surprise; the dark eyes were so fixed to
the world that no move escaped them. (5) Her dress was white and it whispered.
(6) He thought he almost heard the motion of her hands as she walked, and the
infinitely small sound now, the white stir of her face turning when she discovered
she was a moment away from a man who stood in the middle of the pavement
waiting.”

“FUNERAL BLUES”
Read W. H. Auden’s “Funeral Blues,” which has been distributed by your teacher.
Then, on a separate piece of paper, answer these questions by referring to the
poem.
1. Give a metaphor found in the poem.

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2. Why is your answer to question 1 a metaphor?
3. Is the poem told in the first- or third-person point of view?
4. Give an example of consonance.
5. Give an example of alliteration.
6. What is the tone of the poem? (Adjectives or nouns should be given here.)
7. Give illustrative examples for question 6’s answer.
8. Give an example of repetition.
9. What is the reason for the repetition?
10. What is the poem’s setting?
11. What is the rhyme scheme?
12. Select a symbol and give its literal and figurative purposes.
13. How does imagery contribute to the sense and purpose of the poem?
14. Cite four examples of words whose sounds contribute to the poem’s meaning.

THE DESERT ISLAND

It is time to ship off to that desert island, the place of quiet, comfort, and solitude.
However, this desert island is a bit different from the others. It has running water,
electricity, a beautiful air-conditioned house, and some other modern-day
comforts. You and your family will have the entire island to yourselves for the next
two months. Swimming, water skiing, and jet skiing are just some of the activites
you will be able to enjoy. Sounds like fun?Yet, there is a bit of a catch here. You
are only allowed to take one of everything with you: one CD, one book, one
photograph. . . . So now is the time to do some thinking about what you will pack
for the trip. What you pack will tell you much about yourself. On a separate piece
of paper, write the answers to the statements below. If you choose
to do so, share your answers with your classmates.
1. The CD I would take to the island is because . . .
2. The book I would have with me is because . . .
3. The photograph I would carry along is because . . .
4. The section of the newspaper I would have delivered every day is because . . .
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5. The television show I would watch is because . . .
6. The magazine I would have is because . . .
7. The board game we would play is because . . .
8. The activity I do when I am home that I would miss the most is because . . .
9. The activity I do when I am home that I would miss the least is because . . .
10. The videotape I would have with me is because . . .
11. One of my favorite memories from home that I would often think about is
because . . .
12. What I would probably miss most about my home is because . . .

TOWNS
Read the song lyrics distributed by your teacher. The subject matter of each song is
a town. After reading the lyrics to each song, answer the following questions.
1. Each town has its problems. (A) What is a major problem with Springsteen’s
town?
(B) What is a major problem with Allentown?
2. Cite examples of man vs. man conflicts in Springsteen’s song.
3. Cite examples of man vs. nature in “Allentown.”
4. How does history repeat itself in Springsteen’s song?
5. Point out examples of cynicism in “Allentown.”
6. How are the two songs similar?
7. How are the two songs different?
8. What images characterize Springsteen’s town?
9. What images characterize Allentown?

SENSING WHAT IS GOING ON

Good writers make good use of their five senses. They allow the reader to see,
hear, taste,touch, and smell the people, places, and things in their literary works.
So, when you arereading about the beach, you can hear the waves, see the
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swimmers, smell the ocean’s salt, taste the fried foods, and touch the sand. This is
done, of course, through fine word choice,sentence structure, description, and
imagery.Select two of the following five scenarios. Then, on the lines, provide
specific words and sensory details that you as the author would use to help your
reader visualize the setting.Give at least two details per sense. For example, rather
than simply stating “two people talking,” write “a humorous conversation between
Uncle Rich and Aunt Terry.” Discuss your answers with your classmates.
SETTING:_________________________________________________________
_________
Taste:
__________________________________________________________________
__
Touch:
__________________________________________________________________
__
See:
__________________________________________________________________
____
Smell:
__________________________________________________________________
__
Hear:______________________________________________________________
________
A relative’s house
A sporting event
A crowded department store
A rock concert
A sleepover at a friend’s house
SETTING:
__________________________________________________________________
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Taste:
__________________________________________________________________
__
Touch:
__________________________________________________________________
__
See:
__________________________________________________________________
____
Smell:
__________________________________________________________________
__
Hear:______________________________________________________________
________

THE AUTHOR’S MESSAGE

Often, your English teacher will ask you to comment on the message that a novel,
play, short story, poem, or some other literary work conveys. Read the list of
genres below, and think of a familiar literary title for each one. Write the title on
the line provided (for example, To Kill a Mockingbird). Then explain what
message(s) is/are conveyed by the work. Discuss your ideas with your classmates.

(1) Novel title:

______________________________________________________________
Message(s):
________________________________________________________________
(2) Play
title:_______________________________________________________________
_

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Message(s):
________________________________________________________________
(3) Short Story title:
__________________________________________________________
Message(s):
________________________________________________________________
(4) Poem title:
______________________________________________________________
Message(s):
________________________________________________________________
(5) Song title:
______________________________________________________________
Message(s):
________________________________________________________________
(6) Movie title:
______________________________________________________________
Message(s):
________________________________________________________________
(7) Television Program title/episode:
____________________________________________
Message(s):
________________________________________________________________
(8) Newspaper Article title:
____________________________________________________
Message(s):
________________________________________________________________

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 A PURPOSE TO EVERY WORD AND EVERY SENTENCE

Make no mistake about it—authors select their words carefully and form sentences
that have
a specific purpose. So when you read, digest each word and sentence (and
paragraph and chapter that follows) to help you form pictures and opinions about
the characters, settings, and themes in the work.
On a separate sheet of paper, in a single sentence, tell the purpose behind each
paragraph below. Write the purpose in a single sentence. After you have written
that sentence, support your opinion of the author’s purpose with at least three
specific examples from that paragraph. Share your answers with your classmates.
“A pigeon swept across her window, and she marveled at its liquid movements in
the air waves. She placed her dreams on the back of the bird and fantasized that it
would glide forever in the transparent silver circles until it ascended to the center
of the universe and was swallowed up.” (From the short story “Kiswana Browne”
by Gloria Naylor)
“When Lida Mae was born the ninth of nine children, she had a 90% possibility to
do and be anything she would choose. She had a good brain and disposition, good
health and body, excellent looks and big legs to come in the future! She was going
to be neat, petite, and all reet! As they say!” (From “Sin Leaves Scars” by J.
California Cooper) “In the 1950s many of the parishioners, seized by the national
urge toward the suburbs, moved to newly integrated towns outside the city, leaving
the streets around New Africa to fill with bottle and papers and loungers. The big
church stood suddenly isolated. It had not been abandoned—on Sundays the front
steps overflowed with members who had driven in—but there was a tentative
feeling in the atmosphere of those Sunday mornings, as if through the middle of
social change, the future of New Africa had become unclear.” (From “New Africa”
by Andrea Lee)

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 WHAT HAVE WE LEARNED?
If authors create characters to teach us more about ourselves and the world around
us, what have we learned through the various literary characters we have met in
our readings? Today you will have the chance to show what traits some literary
characters exemplify.
Select three literary characters. For each, select any six character traits from the
following lists of positive and negative personal traits. Then give an example of
how the character displays each trait. Remember, you will have six examples for
each character. Write your answers on a separate sheet of paper.
Positive Traits
beautiful
charitable
classy
concerned
famous
generous
handsome
hardworking
honest
humorous
intelligent
kind
lovable
optimistic
persevering
realistic
talented
thoughtful

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 IN OTHER WORDS

Several literary works and their authors are listed below. Select any ten. For each,
invent another title in other words. Thus, Seize the Day could be Carpe Diem, and
Invisible Man could be Undetectable Homo Sapien. Write your ten “in other
words” titles on another sheet of paper.Then see if your classmates can guess the
correct real title. Have fun!
Author Real Title
1. Albert Camus The Stranger
2. Kate Chopin The Awakening
3. Irene Hunt Across Five Aprils
4. Sharon Creech Walk Two Moons
5. Gary Paulsen Hatchet
6. Elie Wiesel Night
7. Harper Lee To Kill a Mockingbird
8. Paul Zindel The Pigman
9. William Shakespeare The Merchant of Venice
10. Anne Frank The Diary of a Young Girl
11. S. E. Hinton The Outsiders
12. J. D. Salinger Catcher in the Rye
13. Jack London The Call of the Wild
14. John Steinbeck The Pearl
15. Robert Newton Peck A Day No Pigs Would Die
16. Robert Louis Stevenson Treasure Island
17. Joseph Heller Catch-22
18. Ernest Hemingway The Sun Also Rises
19. Bernard Malamud The Assistant
20. Amy Tan The Joy Luck Club
21. Alice Walker The Color Purple

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 Glossary

Hermeneutical Another term for "rules of interpretation."

principles

Literary criticism "The act of studying, analyzing, interpreting, evaluating, and

enjoying a work of art."

Theoretical The type of criticism that formulates the theories, principles,

and tenets of the nature and value of art.

Practical/applied The type of criticism that applies the theories and tenets of
literary criticism to a particular work.

Absolutist This critical stance "posits that there is only one theory or set
of principles a critic may use when evaluating a literary work."

Relativistic This critical stance "uses various and even contradictory

theories in critiquing a piece of literature."

Socially This term refers to the fact that "how we arrive at meaning in
constructed fiction is in part determined by our past experiences.
Consciously or unconsciously, we have developed a mindset
or framework concerning our expectations when reading a
novel, short story, poem, or any other type of literature."

True True or False. According to Bressler, there is no such thing as

an innocent reading of a text.

Worldview This framework consists of our basic assumptions or

presuppositions. Bressler uses it when he makes the point that
"[h]ow we as readers construct meaning through or with a text
depends on the mental framework each of us developed and
continues to develop concerning the nature of reality."

Transactional Louise Rosenblatt uses this term to refer to the fact that "the
relationship between the reader and the text is not linear....it is
a process or event that takes place at a particular time and
place in which the text and the reader condition each other."

Ontological status This term refers to the fact that a work of literature exists in
and of itself.

Metatheory This term refers to that "one overarching literary theory that
encompasses all possible interpretations of a text suggested by
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 its readers." Bressler states that such a thing can't exist because
"no literary theory can account for all the various factors
included in everyone's conceptual framework...."

Theoretical / "Each literary theory establishes its own ____________ basis

Method and then proceeds to develop its own ___________ whereby
readers can apply this theory to an actual text."

Extrinsic If the chief function of literature is to teach, its value may be

called this.

Intrinsic If the chief function of literature is to entertain, its value may

be called this.

Literary theory Because our reactions to any text have theoretical bases, it
logically follows that all readers must have one of these,
whether they know it or not.

Epistemology This philosophical term refers to ways of knowing, or how we

know what we know.

Savoir / Knowing a text is psychologically, as well as intellectually,

Connaitre complex. These two French words refer to ways of knowing:
______________ analytical knowing; ______________
intimate experiential knowing

Dialogic Russian theorist Mikhail Bakhtin used this term to describe the
heteroglossia phenomenon of many different voices or conversations going
on in the text of any novel.

Intertextuality Our response to any text is conditioned or even constructed by

the fact that we've read lots of other texts - so we have
preconceived notions of how a text is going to work.

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 TESTS
1. What does auditory imagery represent?
a. Auditory imagery represents a sound
b. Auditory imagery represents movement
c. Auditory imagery represents a taste
d. Auditory imagery represents dream
2. What does Kinesthetic imagery represent?
a.Kinesthetic imagery represents a sound
b Kinesthetic imagery represents movement
c.Kinesthetic imagery represents a taste
d.Kinesthetic imagery represents dream
3.What does Gustatory imagery represent?
a. Gustatory imagery represents a sound
b Gustatory imagery represents movement
c. Gustatory imagery represents a taste
d. Gustatory imagery represents dream
4.This critical stance "uses various and even contradictory theories in critiquing a
piece of literature."
a. Metatheory

b. Practical/applied

c. Literary criticism

d. Hermeneutical principles

5. What is narration?
a.dynamic, it gives a continuous account of events
b.Static, and it is a verbal portraiture of an object, person or scene.
c renders the thoughts and feelings of a character.
d.The interrelation between different components of a literary text
6.What is description?
a.dynamic, it gives a continuous account of events

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b.Static, and it is a verbal portraiture of an object, person or scene.
c renders the thoughts and feelings of a character.
d.The interrelation between different components of a literary text
7.What is dialogue?
a. renders the thoughts and feelings of a character.
b.The interrelation between different components of a literary text
c.the characters are better portrayed, it also brings the action nearer to the reader,
makes it seem more swift and more intense
d.consists of an insertion of material that has no immediate relation to the theme or
action. It may be lyrical, philosophical or critical.
8.What is interior monologue?
a. renders the thoughts and feelings of a character.
b.The interrelation between different components of a literary text
c.the characters are better portrayed, it also brings the action nearer to the reader,
makes it seem more swift and more intense
d.consists of an insertion of material that has no immediate relation to the theme or
action. It may be lyrical, philosophical or critical.
9.What is digression?
a. renders the thoughts and feelings of a character.
b.The interrelation between different components of a literary text
c.the characters are better portrayed, it also brings the action nearer to the reader,
makes it seem more swift and more intense
d.consists of an insertion of material that has no immediate relation to the theme or
action. It may be lyrical, philosophical or critical.
10.What’s a composition?
a. renders the thoughts and feelings of a character.
b.The interrelation between different components of a literary text
c.the characters are better portrayed, it also brings the action nearer to the reader,
makes it seem more swift and more intense

129
d.consists of an insertion of material that has no immediate relation to the theme or
action. It may be lyrical, philosophical or critical.
11.What’s an exposition?

a.Contains a short presentation of time, place and characters of the story

b. A separate incident helping to unfold the action, and might involve thoughts and
feelings as well.
c.The decisive moment on which the fate of the characters and the final action
depend. It is the point at which the forces in the conflict reach the highest intensity.
d.It means "the untying of a knot" which is precisely what happens in this phase.
Not all stories have a denouement. Some stories end right after the climax, leaving
it up to the reader to judge what will be the outcome of the conflict.
12.What’s climax?

a.Contains a short presentation of time, place and characters of the story

b. A separate incident helping to unfold the action, and might involve thoughts and
feelings as well.
c.The decisive moment on which the fate of the characters and the final action
depend. It is the point at which the forces in the conflict reach the highest intensity.
d.It means "the untying of a knot" which is precisely what happens in this phase.
Not all stories have a denouement. Some stories end right after the climax, leaving
it up to the reader to judge what will be the outcome of the conflict.

13.What’s complication?

a.Contains a short presentation of time, place and characters of the story

b. A separate incident helping to unfold the action, and might involve thoughts and
feelings as well.
c.The decisive moment on which the fate of the characters and the final action
depend. It is the point at which the forces in the conflict reach the highest intensity.
d.It means "the untying of a knot" which is precisely what happens in this phase.
Not all stories have a denouement. Some stories end right after the climax, leaving
it up to the reader to judge what will be the outcome of the conflict.
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14.What’s denoument?

a.Contains a short presentation of time, place and characters of the story

b. A separate incident helping to unfold the action, and might involve thoughts and
feelings as well.
c.The decisive moment on which the fate of the characters and the final action
depend. It is the point at which the forces in the conflict reach the highest intensity.
d.It means "the untying of a knot" which is precisely what happens in this phase.
Not all stories have a denouement. Some stories end right after the climax, leaving
it up to the reader to judge what will be the outcome of the conflict.

15.What’s flat characters?

a.usually one-sided, constructed round a single trait;

b.if they are complex and develop or change in the course of the story

c.It may be external, i. e. between human beings or between man and the
environment

d.When the author describes the character

16.What’s round characters?

a.usually one-sided, constructed round a single trait;

b.if they are complex and develop or change in the course of the story

c.It may be external, i. e. between human beings or between man and the
environment

d.When the author describes the character

17.What’s the external conflict?

a. It takes place in the mind, here the character is torn between opposing features of
his personality.
b.It may between human beings or between man and the environment (individual
against nature, individual against the established order/values in the society)
c.The description of the different aspects (physical, moral, social) of a character

131
d.When the author describes the character himself, or makes another do it
18. What’s internal conflict?
a. It takes place in the mind, here the character is torn between opposing features of
his personality.
b.It may between human beings or between man and the environment (individual
against nature, individual against the established order/values in the society)
c.The description of the different aspects (physical, moral, social) of a character
d.When the author describes the character himself, or makes another do it
19. What’s the characterization?
a. It takes place in the mind, here the character is torn between opposing features of
his personality.
b.It may between human beings or between man and the environment (individual
against nature, individual against the established order/values in the society)
c.The description of the different aspects (physical, moral, social) of a character
d.When the author describes the character himself, or makes another do it
20. What’s the direct characterization?
a. It takes place in the mind, here the character is torn between opposing features of
his personality.
b.It may between human beings or between man and the environment (individual
against nature, individual against the established order/values in the society)
c.The description of the different aspects (physical, moral, social) of a character
d.When the author describes the character himself, or makes another do it
21.What’s the indirect characterization?
a.When the author shows the character in action, and lets the reader judge for
himself
b.It takes place in the mind, here the character is torn between opposing features of
his personality.
c.It may between human beings or between man and the environment (individual
against nature, individual against the established order/values in the society)
d.The description of the different aspects (physical, moral, social) of a character
132
22.What’s the setting?
a.Whatever leads us to enter the author's attitude to his subject matter
b.The particular time and physical location of the story form
c.Like unifying general idea about life that the entire story reveals
d.The most important generalization the author expresses
23.What’s the tone of a story?
a.Whatever leads us to enter the author's attitude to his subject matter
b.The particular time and physical location of the story form
c.Like unifying general idea about life that the entire story reveals
d.The most important generalization the author expresses
24.What’s the theme of a story?
a.Whatever leads us to enter the author's attitude to his subject matter
b.The particular time and physical location of the story form
c.Like unifying general idea about life that the entire story reveals
d.The most important generalization the author expresses
25.What’s the message of a story?
a.Whatever leads us to enter the author's attitude to his subject matter
b.The particular time and physical location of the story form
c.Like unifying general idea about life that the entire story reveals
d.The most important generalization the author expresses
26.What are the substyles of belles lettres style?
a.The language of poetry
b.Emotive prose, or the language of fiction
c.The language of the drama
d.All the answers are right
27.What’s the main linguistic features of belles letres style?
a.Genuine, not trite, imagery, achieved by linguistic devices.
b.The use of words in contextual and very often in more than one dictionary
meanings.

133
 c.A vocabulary which will reflect to a greater or lesser degree the author’s
personal evaluation of things or phenomena.
d.All the answers are right
28.What’s the main linguistic features of scientific prose style?
a.The logical sequence of utterances (a developed system of connectives)
b.The use of terms specific to each given branch of science
c.The use of quotations and references
d.All the answers are right
29.Who is the author of “In the Characters”
a. Aristotle
b. Theophrastus
c.Menander
d. Plautus
30.What’s the function of a first-person narrator
a. a first-person narrator brings greater focus on the feelings, opinions, and
perceptions of a particular character in a story, and on how the character views the
world and the views of other characters.
b. first-person narrator gives a panoramic view of the world of the story, looking
into many characters and into the broader background of a story.

c.first-person narrator can tell feelings of every character.

d.narrator does not need to be an omnipresent guide, but instead may merely be the
protagonist referring to himself in the third person

31.What’s a third-person omniscient narrator?

a. a third-person omniscient narrator brings greater focus on the feelings, opinions,
and perceptions of a particular character in a story, and on how the character views
the world and the views of other characters.
b. a third-person omniscient narrator gives a panoramic view of the world of the
story, looking into many characters and into the broader background of a story.

c.a third-person omniscient narrator can tell feelings of every character.

134
d. a third-person omniscient narrator does not need to be an omnipresent guide, but
instead may merely be the protagonist referring to himself in the third person

32. What’s a plot device?

a.A contrived or arbitrary plot device may annoy or confuse the reader,
b. causes a loss of the suspension of disbelief
c.a well-crafted plot device, or one that emerges naturally from the setting or
characters of the story, may be entirely accepted, or may even be unnoticed by the
audience.
d. is an object or character in a story whose only purpose is to advance the plot of
the story, or alternatively to overcome some difficulty in the plot.
33.What’s a literary theory?
a. Literary theory in a strict sense is the systematic study of the nature
of literature and of the methods for analyzing literature
b.Literary theory can be defined as a system of coordinated, interrelated and
interconditioned language means
c.Literary theory is a relatively stable system at the given stage in the development
of the literary language
d.Literary theory is a historical category
34.Where do begin historical roots of literary theory?
a. in Old English,
b. in Germany v century
c.ancient Greece (Aristotle's Poetics is an often cited early example), ancient India
(Bharata Muni's Natya Shastra), ancient Rome (Longinus's On the Sublime) and
medieval Iraq
d.All the answers are right
35.What does the principles and methods of literary theory apply?
a.The principles and methods of literary theory apply to non-fiction, popular
fiction, film, historical documents, law, advertising, etc., and in the related field
of cultural studies

135
b.The principles and methods of literary theory in a strict sense is the systematic
study of the nature of literature and of the methods for analyzing literature
c. The principles and methods of literary theory gives a panoramic view of the
world of the story, looking into many characters and into the broader background
of a story
d.The principles and methods of literary theory a system of coordinated,
interrelated and interconditioned language means
applies
36. What schools of literary theory do you know?
a.Aestheticism Cognitive Cultural Studies
b.Darwinian literary studies FormalismModernism
c. New CriticismPostmodernism
d.PsychoanalysisStructuralism and semiotics
37.What’s the fabliau?
a.The fabliau is defined as a short narrative in (usually octosyllabic) verse, between
300 and 400 lines long, its content often comic or satiric
b.The particular time and physical location of the story form
c.Like unifying general idea about life that the entire story reveals
d.The most important generalization the author expresses
38. What’s a non-linear narrative?
a. when narrative runs smoothly in a straight line, when it is not broken up.
b. is one that does not proceed in a straight-line, step-by-step fashion, such as
where an author creates a story's ending before the middle is finished

c.when a narrator can tell feelings of every character.

d. when a narrator does not need to be an omnipresent guide, but instead may
merely be the protagonist referring to himself in the third person

39. What’s a linear narrative structures?

a. when narrative runs smoothly in a straight line, when it is not broken up.

136
b. is one that does not proceed in a straight-line, step-by-step fashion, such as
where an author creates a story's ending before the middle is finished

c.when a narrator can tell feelings of every character.

d. when a narrator does not need to be an omnipresent guide, but instead may
merely be the protagonist referring to himself in the third person

40.What’s fiction writing?

a. fiction writing is any kind of writing that is not factual.

b. Fictional writing most often takes the form of a story meant to convey an
author's point of view or simply to entertain
c. fiction writing includes the multitude of choices fiction writers make,
consciously or subconsciously, as they create a story.
d. fiction writing encompass the big-picture, strategic choices such as point of
view and narrator
41. What does style include?
a. Style includes the multitude of choices fiction writers make, consciously or not,
in the process of writing a story
b.It encompasses not only the big-picture, strategic choices such as point of view
and choice of narrator, but also tactical choices of grammar, punctuation, word
usage, sentence and paragraph length and structure
c.tone, the use of imagery, chapter selection, titles, etc. In the process of creating a
story, these choices meld to become the writer's voice, his or her own unique style.
d. All the answers are right
42. What’s the main linguistic features of belles letres style?
a.Genuine, not trite, imagery, achieved by linguistic devices.
b.The use of words in contextual and very often in more than one dictionary
meanings.
c.A vocabulary which will reflect to a greater or lesser degree the author’s
personal evaluation of things or phenomena.
d.All the answers are right
137
43.What’s the main linguistic features of scientific prose style?
a.The logical sequence of utterances (a developed system of connectives)
b.The use of terms specific to each given branch of science
c.The use of quotations and references
d.All the answers are right
44.Who is the author of “In the Characters”
a. Aristotle
b. Theophrastus
c.Menander
d. Plautus
45.What’s the function of a first-person narrator
a. a first-person narrator brings greater focus on the feelings, opinions, and
perceptions of a particular character in a story, and on how the character views the
world and the views of other characters.
b. first-person narrator gives a panoramic view of the world of the story, looking
into many characters and into the broader background of a story.

c.first-person narrator can tell feelings of every character.

d.narrator does not need to be an omnipresent guide, but instead may merely be the
protagonist referring to himself in the third person

46. What schools of literary theory do you know?

a.Aestheticism Cognitive Cultural Studies
b.Darwinian literary studies FormalismModernism
c. New CriticismPostmodernism
d.PsychoanalysisStructuralism and semiotics
47.What’s climax?

a.Contains a short presentation of time, place and characters of the story

b. A separate incident helping to unfold the action, and might involve thoughts and
feelings as well.

138
c.The decisive moment on which the fate of the characters and the final action
depend. It is the point at which the forces in the conflict reach the highest intensity.
d.It means "the untying of a knot" which is precisely what happens in this phase.
Not all stories have a denouement. Some stories end right after the climax, leaving
it up to the reader to judge what will be the outcome of the conflict.

48.What’s complication?

a.Contains a short presentation of time, place and characters of the story

b. A separate incident helping to unfold the action, and might involve thoughts and
feelings as well.
c.The decisive moment on which the fate of the characters and the final action
depend. It is the point at which the forces in the conflict reach the highest intensity.
d.It means "the untying of a knot" which is precisely what happens in this phase.
Not all stories have a denouement. Some stories end right after the climax, leaving
it up to the reader to judge what will be the outcome of the conflict.

49.What’s denoument?

a.Contains a short presentation of time, place and characters of the story

b. A separate incident helping to unfold the action, and might involve thoughts and
feelings as well.
c.The decisive moment on which the fate of the characters and the final action
depend. It is the point at which the forces in the conflict reach the highest intensity.
d.It means "the untying of a knot" which is precisely what happens in this phase.
Not all stories have a denouement. Some stories end right after the climax, leaving
it up to the reader to judge what will be the outcome of the conflict.

50.What’s flat characters?

a.usually one-sided, constructed round a single trait;

b.if they are complex and develop or change in the course of the story

c.It may be external, i. e. between human beings or between man and the
environment
139
d.When the author describes the character

140
 References

1. Culler, Jonathan. Literary Theory: A Very Short Introduction. Oxford:

Oxford University Press, 1997.
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 CONTENTS

Preface…………………………………………………………………………. 3
MODULE I General basics of literary theory……………………………

1.Literary theory is a subject about literature…………………………….

Subject matter of Literary theory……………………………………………… 5

The notion of literature………………………………………………………… 8

What is literary theory? ………………………………………………………... 9

2.Literature as a kind of art………………………………………………….

The notion of art……………………………………………………………….. 11
Kinds of art …………………….. ……………………………………………. 14
The place and pecularities of literature among the other kinds of art……….. 15
3.Schools of literary theory…………………………………………………

General considerations……………………………………………………… 18
Traditional Literary Criticism………………………………………………….. 20
Structuralism and Poststructuralism …………………………………………. 21
New Historicism and Cultural Materialism……………………………………. 22
Ethnic Studies and Postcolonial Criticism…………………………… 23
Gender Studies and Queer Theory………………………………………… 23
Cultural Studies………………………………………………………………. 24
4.Theme and idea of fictional work
The notion of fiction …………………………………………………………… 25
The elements of fiction ………………………………………………………… 26
A writer’s choice of narrator………………………………………………….. 29

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Wholeness of literary text………………………………………………………. 32
The notion of”theme”……………………………………………… 35

5.Form and content in literature

General considerations…………………………………………………………. 37
What is Form in Literature?................................................................................. 37
What is content in literature……………………………………………………. 38
Major forms…………………………………………………………………….. 38

MODULE 2. Theoretical- conceptual importance of the subject literary

theory

6.Literary Genres …………………………………………………………….. 40

Types of non – fiction ………………………………………………………… 41
Genres of fiction……………………………………………………………….. 41
Folklore is traditional art………………………………………………………. 48

7.Plot and Composition

Plot structure…………………………………………………………………... 52
Exposition………………………………………………………………………. 53

Initial collision………………………………………………………………….. 54

Culmination…………………………………………………………………….. 55

Deneument……………………………………………………………………… 56

Plot devices……………………………………………………………………... 56

Narrative structures…………………………………………………………….. 58
8.Language characteristics of fiction
Belles –lettres style …………………………………………………………….. 62
Literal and figurative language…………………………………………………. 64
The notion of imagery…………………………………………………………. 66

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Categories of imagery…………………………………………………… 69
Structure of poems …………………………………………………………….. 72
The writer’s Choice of words ………………………………………………….. 78
Tradition and newness ………………………………………………… 82
PRACTICAL PART
Topic 1 Introduction to literary theory…………………………………………. 84

87
Topic 2 Literature is a kind of art……………………………………………….

Topic 3 The imagery is the main feature……………………………………….. 90

Topic 4 Plot Structure…………………………………………………………... 92
Topic 5 Fiction writing…………………………………………………………. 96
Topic 6 Belles Letter Style (Literal and figurative ,publicistic 99
style)……………………………………………………………………………
Topic 7 The structure of poems………………………………………………. 100
Topic 8 Literary genres………………………………………………………... 102
Some useful techniques………………………………………………………… 107
Tasks for Self-study……………………………………………………………. 110
Glossary……………………………………………………………………….. 126
Tests………………………………………………………………………….. 128
References……………………………………………………………………. 141

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