Analysing aesthetic features

and stylistic devices

A guide for Year 11 English
Ipswich Grammar School
You learned how to analyse in
a previous lesson…
Today you’re going to learn
about a special type of
analysis…
To do this, you’ll still need to
introduce evidence and use an
analytical verb!
There is a criterion that exists on every assessment task in General
English that refers to either analysis or use of AFs/SDs.

Analysis of the effects of aesthetic features and

stylistic devices in the texts
It’s even mentioned on the EAMG!

• Examine a writer’s stylistic or aesthetic choices

• Provide an interpretation of these stylistic or
aesthetic choices

Note: EAMGs are subject to change

 What are aesthetic features
and stylistic devices?

Afs and SDs prompt emotional

or critical responses.
 What are aesthetic features and stylistic
devices?
We might be positioned to criticise Romeo, hate Tybalt,
condemn Friar Lawrence… to judge the social structure
that oppressed Juliet… to feel frustrated by the deaths of
the protagonists…

These are all emotional and critical responses.

Examples of aesthetic features
This is not an exhaustive list!
• Imagery
• Symbolism
• Metaphor
• Simile
• Alliteration
• Irony
• Antithesis
• Allusion
• Puns (word play)
• Questions
 Examples of stylistic devices
• Text structure, e.g. Romeo and Juliet’s
speech forming a perfect sonnet when
they first meet
• Character foils, e.g. two contrasting
characters such as Mercutio and Benvolio,
Nurse and Lady Capulet or Juliet and
Rosaline
• The use of soliloquies
• Approaches to characterisation, e.g. a
character’s distinctive diction like
Mercutio’s crazy rants
• Narrative viewpoint
Metaphor
Simile
Simile
How do we analyse aesthetic features and
stylistic devices?

You have to credit the playwright, Shakespeare.

You should mention him and his

aesthetic/stylistic choices at least ONCE in your
essay.
Important notice!
• Most quotations don’t actually feature these devices 
• Only really special quotations have aesthetic or stylistic qualities
• Aim to memorise a handful of AF/SD quotations so you can show off
in your analysis
• This PPT has a range of AF/SD quotations that are relevant for your
upcoming exam
Basic analysis looks like this:

This highlights…
This reveals…
This demonstrates…
This suggests…
 Analysis of aesthetic and stylistic choices
looks like this:
Shakespeare’s use of
metaphor highlights…
Shakespeare’s use of simile
reveals…
Shakespeare’s conscious
vocabulary choice
demonstrates…
The imagery employed by
Shakespeare suggests…
 Analysis of aesthetic and stylistic choices
looks like this:
Shakespeare’s use of
metaphor highlights…
Shakespeare’s use of simile
reveals…
Shakespeare’s conscious
vocabulary choice
demonstrates…
The imagery employed by
Shakespeare suggests…
 Exemplar passage
Capulet shows some reservations about
Juliet marrying young, and tells Paris, “Let
two more summers wither in their pride.
Ere we may think her ripe to be a bride”.
Here, Shakespeare employs imagery of
seasons and blossoming trees to highlight
Juliet’s purpose in the patriarchal society
of Verona. Women were expected to bear
children, in the same way trees bear fruit.
By making this comparison, audiences are
positioned to understand Juliet’s value to
her father and Paris revolves around
bearing children and reproducing.
 Analyse the aesthetic choice
At the beginning of the Balcony
Scene in Act 2, Romeo catches
sight of Juliet and states, “But
soft! What light through yonder
window breaks? It is the East,
and Juliet is the sun” (78).
Shakespeare’s use of _________
reveals…
 Exemplar passage
At the beginning of the Balcony Scene in
Act 2, Romeo catches sight of Juliet and
states, “But soft! What light through
yonder window breaks? It is the East,
and Juliet is the sun” (78). Shakespeare’s
use of metaphor compares Juliet to the
sun, which suggests that Romeo views
her as bringing warmth and illumination
to his otherwise dark and dim life. The
fact that Romeo compares her to the
sun also implies that Juliet symbolises
the start of a new day, a new beginning
and a new hope for what his future may
hold.
 Introduce and analyse the aesthetic choice

“I have no joy in this contract.

It is too rash, too unadvised,
too sudden, too like the
lightning” (86). Here,
Shakespeare uses a _______
to compare...
 Introduce and analyse the aesthetic choice

“These violent delights have

violent ends and in their
triumph die, like fire and
powder, which, as they kiss,
consume” (132)
 Introduce and analyse the aesthetic choice

“Death lies on her like an untimely

frost upon the sweetest flower of
all the field” (236)
 Introduce and analyse the aesthetic choice

“Death is my son-in-law. Death is

my heir” (238)
 Introduce and analyse the aesthetic choice

“Come, I’ll dispose of thee among

a sisterhood of holy nuns” (272)
 Introduce and analyse the aesthetic choice

“Thou desperate pilot, now at

once run on the dashing rocks thy
seasick, weary bark” (268)
 Introduce and analyse the aesthetic choice

“Thy Juliet is alive […] there art

thou happy […] Tybalt would kill
thee, but thou slew’st Tybalt –
there art thou happy. The law that
threatened death becomes thy
friend and turns it to exile – there
art thou happy” (176)