Synopsis of Course Material VI: Writing for the AP Exam

Open Prompt

·         Introduction should begin with a broader statement which then is tied into the work you are analyzing.  The thesis should be stated very concisely, without giving away the entire argument

·         The body paragraphs’ introductory sentence should provide a “map” of your arguments.  The second paragraph should follow logically from the first, and so on

·         The conclusion reiterates your argument in different words, and may bring a slightly altered idea to the table.

·         Using quotes is a bonus

·         You must address how your evidence “affects the meaning of the work as a whole”.  That is NOT a suggestion

·         Don’t try to tackle too much in the essay: stick to a fairly simple argument, but cover all of the goals

·         Write in Plain Style: that is, use your own voice and don’t try to sound smarter than you are, because you’ll end up sounding dumber

Close Reading

·         “Annotate” both the prompt and the text/texts you are provided.  Make sure you have identified all the goals in the prompt.  Especially the MEANING OF THE WORK AS A WHOLE PART.  Otherwise, horrible things will happen.

·         Make sure you stick to one specific way of organizing your essay, especially when contrasting two pieces.  Generally, analyze each separate literary technique in a paragraph.

Multiple Choice

·         Don’t look at the options first: just look at the question and formulate an answer before seeing if it’s an option

·         The questions are set up to trick you…so be careful

IN ALL THREE, TIME MANAGEMENT!!!!!!!!

Synopsis of Course Material V: Through the Looking Glass (at Literature)

Through the Looking Glass: Peering at Literature

In the approach to analyzing literature, there are many different “lenses” through which you can look.  Critics have grouped themselves into many teams, all with very strong opinions on what you should consider when finding the meaning of the work.

·         New Criticism/Formalists: They believe that only the words on the page matter when analyzing a work.  Not the creator’s intentions and background, the time at which the work was created, or public response.  Just the words on the page.  DO NOT LOOK AWAY FROM THE WORDS ON THE PAGE.  For art, the piece has to be initially constructed with the intention of being art and with the intention of being aesthetically pleasing.

·         New Historicism: they say that the author needs to be taken into account, but the events going on outside the creator’s head.  They look at the life of the creator as it relates to the historical events and culture of the creator’s time.

·         Feminism: in short, they ask the gender questions.  What is the relationship between men and women in this work?  How are women represented?  If the author of this work was the opposite gender, would it have been taken seriously?

·         Marxism: They’re a lot like New Historicism critics, but they look specifically at economic issues of the time, and view things in a very “power to the masses” Communist sort of way (well, they’re called Marxist critics, for goodness sakes). 

·         Post Colonialism: they agree with Feminists, Historicism critics, and the Marxists, but they have a theory of their own.  They look at imperialism and colonization, demonization, hegemony, alienation, exoticism, subalterns, mimicry, appropriation, and stereotyping and how that shapes the work.  Basically, how is one cultural group presented in the work, either by that group or by an outside observer.  Post Colonialism critics take a look at how cultures blend.

·         Psychoanalytic: tries to psychoanalyze the creator, and what caused them to create the work they did.  They also look at the reaction of the audience to the piece.  Psychoanalytic critics stemmed from Freud, so often view things through the lens of his ideas.  One idea considered was the idea of the Id, the Ego, and the Super ego: that people are constantly engaging in an internal struggle to balance the ideals of society with their desires. 

·         Archetypal/Mythological: they look to similarities between and references to mythology, and archetypal plots or characters.

·         Reader Response: they believe that meaning is only assigned by the viewer.  It only exists when there is an interaction between work and audience; therefore, it is totally individualized. 

·         Literary Darwinism: they believe that all art is a by-product of culture, which comes from genetic traits that cause human behavior. 

·         Structuralism and Post Structuralism: they came up with the idea that you have to look at a text while considering the cultural structure of the audience.  They’re a bunch of “super important French philosophers” (Holmes). 

Synopsis of Course Material IV: Tragedy, Comedy, and Other Extremes

Tragedy, Comedy, and Other Extremes

Tragedy: Hamlet, Death of a Salesman

                *Tragedy has had some varying definitions throughout history.  The hands-on test of tragedy is: is almost everyone or everyone in the work absolutely miserable throughout most or all of the story?  If the answer is yes, it’s probably a tragedy.  But here are some technical thoughts anyway…

·         Aristotle had the earliest opinion.  He thought that tragedy should involve catharsis: emotional cleansing because of that “so glad it’s not me” feeling.  In Greek tragedy, some error of the tragic hero causes his fall from a high place to a low place.

·         Medieval tragedy also has a tragic male hero who falls, but he falls because it is the will of the Judeo-Christian God, not any fault of his own

·         Renaissance Tragedy was very influenced by Greek Tragedy, and was often called Humanist tragedy.  In France, they took the idea of unity to an extreme: the play had to take place in one specific place within 24 hours without any sub-plots.  English tragedies, like Shakespeare’s, were less limited in this way.  They usually had a secret murder (generally of a good kind by a worse one), and a discovery of the crime when the ghost of the deceased comes back (usually appearing to his son).  Then, both murderer and avenger try to kill each other—taking out others in the process—and the play ends in a bloodbath where everyone, including the avenger, dies.  However, English tragedies defied Aristotle’s rules because they mixed in some comedy and sympathetic villains, and Aristotle and the French thought that the audience shouldn’t get any relief from relentless horrifying bloodshed.  English Humanists thought that the play should take place in five acts, and that the relentless horrifying bloodshed should be shown offstage.

·         Modern tragedy has become much less defined.  We still have a tragic hero, but they usually suffer because of society or their environment, not a small error or the intervention of a divinity.  Modern tragedy is often influenced by Nietzsche, who believed that when the tragic hero falls, he is returning to a Dionysian (creative) state, and that this is a positive thing because our world today is too Apollonian (ordered and structured).  Others, like Miller, believe that the common man should be the new tragic hero, a common man who is willing to do anything to maintain his dignity in an oppressive society.  Miller argues tragedy arises when men retaliate to what they see as an affront to their image.  He thinks that tragedy should be a battle of a man to “secure his place in the world”, and that there must be the possibility that he can succeed.

·         Tragedy is rational, with a tragic hero and a serious atmosphere.  It usually induces catharsis, and focuses on the psychological aspects of the characters and questions of the soul.

Comedy: Oscar Wilde, Much Ado About Nothing

·         In comedy, characters face challenges like in tragedy, but in the end, they end in a high place (having—usually—conformed and relied on unrealistic means to achieve their success)

·         When comedy is funny it must: make you think not just feel; be mechanical; be human; there must be a set of expectations for society which the audience is familiar with; the situation can’t conform to the societal expectations; and it must be ultimately harmless

·         One could argue the above must be present in order for something to be funny.  Others say that you need to find the “unexpected, intellectual connections between ideas” (Schopenhauer), but that it can’t be taken too seriously.

·         Others say that a joke has to insult something to be funny.  Most agree that societal norms must be violated and that the joke must remind us of humanity. 

·         But all this analyzing begs the question: is the joke still funny if we have to explain it?  Why do we have to analyze laughter, which seems to be the absence of caring why?

·         Low Comedy: has little intellectual appeal

·         High Comedy: comedy that makes you think, and appeals to the intellect

·         Burlesque: ridiculously exaggerated comedy

·         Farce: highly improbably, slapstick, and exaggerated

·         Lampoon: satire that attacks an entire person or group

·         Parody: makes fun of another work

·         Satire: mocks society

·         Slapstick: chaotic physical comedy

·         Travesty: makes fun of something very serious 

·         Comedy of Ideas: characters engage in witty verbal wars about politics, religion, sex, marriage, and in doing so satirize various institutions

·         Comedy of Manners: love comedy among the upper classes, with witty verbal wars

·         Farce: full of improbable coincidences, bad timing, and mistaken identities.  Characters have often lost their identity, and are generally separated twins, born into the wrong class, or unable to marry because of money problems

·         Low Comedy: dirty jokes and sex with lots of slapstick humor

·         Comedy is full of spontaneity and improbability, ultimately making fun of the silliness of the human being.  There is usually a lack of communication between characters.

Irony: in irony, a character falls from a high place, and starts to recover.  Then they fall right back down and end like tragedy.  Irony emphasizes pointlessness.  This character either really screwed up or has really bad luck.

Absurdism: The American Dream, Waiting for Godot

·         A literary form so illogical that it tends to produce genuine confusion along with laughter.  It conveys bewilderment.  A famous absurdist is Edward Albee, who wrote the American Dream

·         Characters have disjointed conversations where they don’t really seem to be listening to one another.  The dialogue is often filled with non-sequiturs.  This forces the audience to consider the possibility of breaking the conventions of our society.  This is basically the concept of this type of literature.  It tests our version of reality and encourages us to break the status quo.   

Synopsis of Course Material III: Eras of Literature

Classical Antiquity: Oedipus, the Odyssey, Aristotle; essentially, Ancient Greek and Roman Tragedy. 

·         Iambic trimester and lyric style

·         uses elevated language

·         poetry, meant to be sung

·         heavily features tragedy using catharsis, and epics

·         tragedies end in a final scene of suffering

·         features a tragic hero with a fatal flaw (hamartia) who fails to follow the will of the gods and suffers

·         Contains the message: follow the gods, or bad things will happen

·         Strict code of masculinity,

Medieval: Beowulf, Canterbury Tales, Le Morte de Arthur

·         translated from Old English

·          elevated language, long, and detailed

·         Poetry, meant to be sung

·         Epic tales of knights and kings and smiting

·         Strict code of masculinity, and honorable death in battle

Renaissance: Shakespeare!!!!!

·         originated in Italy and spread to the rest of Europe

·         Took great interest in Classical Antiquity, allusions to Greek and Roman literature

·         Humanists take interested in the mind of the human being

·         Reflects reality

Romantic/Victorian: Dickens, the Brontes, Hugo, Jane Eyre, Oliver Twist, Les Miserables

·         Looks at issues of gender, class, money, industrial society, religion

·         Challenges society, often political and pushing for reform

·         Authors think about marriage—for love or for money? And Social Darwinism—are the poor to blame for their own situation?

·         Writers start really writing the way people actually talk

Realist/Naturalist: Wordsworth

·         Relationship between man and nature

·         Realistic portrayal of life, about everyday people, and their everyday lives.  Often quite pessimistic

·         Naturalists looked at human beings and how they are governed by passion and struggle to keep a cap on their tumultuous emotions, and their struggle with their inner beast and strong emotions of lust and passion.  Nature shapes the actions of man, and is a very indifferent force.  In this era, authors tend to argue that free will is an illusion. 

Modern/Post Modern: Albee, Miller,

·         Tests the conventional limits of literature: plots tend not to be chronological, or not everything is resolved at the end.  The theatre of the Absurd emerges.

·         Playwrights Albee and Miller are social critics of the consumer society around them

Synopsis of Course Material II: (The Arguably Unnecessary) Terms List

Terms Related Directly to Analysis

·         Motif: a repeated pattern (of symbols, images, ect.) found in literature, more individual to the work

·         Satire: a work intended to critique society, institutes, ect, through ridicule (generally funny)

·         Shift: a change in structure, tone, point of view, atmosphere, ect.

·         Structure: the order of the work

·         Style: the author’s idiosyncratic way of using language

·         Allusion: an indirect reference

·         Conceit: an extended and elaborate comparison

Poetry Terms

·         Ballad meter: four lines of alternating iambic tetrameter and iambic trimester

·         Iambic pentameter, tetrameter, trimester, ect.

·         Blank verse: iambic pentameter with no rhyme

·         Elegy: a poem eulogizing the dead

·         Eye-rhyme: words that look like they rhyme based on their spelling but don’t

·         Free verse: poetry without rhyme or a meter

·         Heroic couplet: two lines of rhyming iambic pentameter

·         Internal rhyme: rhyme inside a line of poetry

·         Octave: a stanza of 8 lines with a ABBAABBA rhyme pattern

·         Caesura: a pause inside a line of poetry

·         End-stopped: the line just ends naturally

·         Enjambment: when one line runs over into the next (that is, the thought runs over)

Parallelism

·         Parallelism: repeated pattern of syntax

·         Antithesis: contrast of ideas through a parallel setup

·         Chiasmus: crossing parallelism, where the structure of the first part is reversed

Repetition

·         Epizeuxis: repetition of the same word for emphasis

·         Diacope: repetition of a word or phrase with a couple words in between

·         Anadiplosis: repetition linking the end of one clause to the beginning of the next

·         Anaphora: repetition at the beginning of clauses

·         Antistrophe: repetition at the end of clauses

Conjunctions

·         Asyndeton: lack of conjunctions

·         Polysyndeton: lots of conjunctions

Speech/Language/Word Play

·         Apostrophe: talking to something that won’t talk back

·         Aside: speech which at least 1 character cannot hear

·         Internal monologue: a character’s actual thoughts

·         Didactic: preaching or lecturing

·         Invective: abusive language directed against one person or cause

·         Assonance: similar sounding vowel sounds used repeatedly close to on another

·         Cacophony: harsh joining of sounds

·         Imagery: language that appeals vividly to the senses

·         Lyrical: particularly musical and expressive language

·         Musical devices: techniques that create a desired “sound”

·         Onomatopoeia: words that mimic the sound they describe

·         Paranomasia: word play

·         Synesthesia: when something is described in a way that is usually associated with a different sense

·         Colloquialism: regular speech, slang, regional speech

·         Epithet: adjective that qualifies a noun (laughing happiness)

·         Euphemism:  substitute for something more unpleasant

·         Malapropism: using the wrong word

·         Epigram: witty statement

·         Non-sequitur: statement that is out of context

·         Paraprosdokian: unexpected ending

·         Rhetorical question: not meant to be answered

Irony

·         Irony: contrary to what is expected and yet having a bend of fitness

·         Dramatic irony: irony where the audience knows something important that the characters don’t

·         Situational irony: circumstances themselves are ironic

·         Verbal irony: words are the opposite of what is really meant

·         Editorializing: writing that departs from the narrative and tells the reader how to feel

·         Sarcasm: verbal irony that ridicules a specific target

Contrast and Juztaposition

·         Juxtaposition: putting two elements next to each other to make a point

·         Lilotes: something is affirmed by stating the negative of its opposite

·         Oxymoron: contradictory terms suggesting a paradox

·         Paradox: statement or situation that appears to not make sense but has some degree of validity

·         Incongruity: surprising contrast

Comedy and Exaggeration

·         High comedy: thoughtful laughter

·         Hyperbole: exaggeration for comic effect

·         Grotesque: exaggerated…hugely exaggerated

·         Metonomy: when something closely associated with the subject stands in for it

·         Synecdoche: whole represents part or part represents whole

Synopsis of Course Material I: DIDLS and Basic Elements of Literature

There are certain literary elements which may seem insignificant, but greatly affect meaning.  The main five are:

DIDLS=Diction, Imagery, Details, Language, and Syntax

·         Diction: the individual word choice.  Includes elevation vs. colloquialism (formal vs. ordinary speech), regionalisms, dialect, connotation vs. denotation (definition vs. associated meaning).  Diction can set mood and tone.

·         Imagery: details and language create images that appeal vividly to the senses

·         Details: appeal vividly to the senses, tells the reader more about the situation.  Details create imagery.

·         Language: the tone, style, voice of the work, elevation vs. colloquialism.  Sets mood and tone.  Dictions is the indivigual words, language is the whole thing.

·         Syntax: the way the sentences are structured.  For example, words at the end of sentences stick more in the reader’s heads, so if a word is at the end of a sentence, it’s probably important

·         Note: ton reflects the speaker’s attitude, whereas mood is the feeling the reader experiences because of the tone

·         MOST IMPORTANTLY: Why?  How do the DIDLS contribute to the work as a whole?

Poetry:  questions you have to ask before you analyze                                                     

·         Is there a rhyme scheme?

·         Is there a meter?  Does it ever break?

·         Is there a form? Does it break form?

·         Is there any enjambment? How about caesura?

·         How does the poem sound? 

·         MOST IMPORTANTLY, FOR ALL OF THE ABOVE: Why?  And how does that contribute to the work as a whole?

Fiction and Drama: important elements for analysis

·         Plot: what happens in a narrative

·         Conventional narrative: exposition, inciting incident, rising action, climax, falling action, resolution, and finally denouement

·         Modern works don’t usually adhere to the conventional narrative structure.  Greek literature and Shakespeare generally does.

·         Symbol: represent something significant, and can ALWAYS be interpreted in slightly different ways

·         Characters:

o   Steryeotype—you have to ask why was this employed, and whether the character breaks the steryeotype or archetype, and why they did that too

o   Foil--two characters alike in every way except one...and that difference is really, really important

*Consider ALL of the elements during analysis.