Look at Theme and Form
Literary analysis can take into account all kinds of history, biography, and philosophy. But a foundation for all literary analysis is to begin with a close reading for theme and form. That's not everything, but it's a sound starting point. Essentially, in grappling with a given text, one asks the basic questions:
- What is this about? (looking for the main ideas, not just taking note of events)
- How is this expressed? (looking for structures and elements of form)
so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
beside the whiteWhat is this poem about?
chickens.
Well, it mentions a wheelbarrow, rain, and chickens. Maybe it's about farm life. There's not much to go on here. Let's stick with that. It appears Williams' poem is about rural or farm life.How is this expressed?
Obviously it's being expressed as a poem, a poem divided up into four parts. There are the images of the wheel barrow, the rain, and the chickens. And not much else. In fact, this isn't even a whole sentence and seems to start mid-thought. There's a period at the end, but no capital letter for the first word.Look at Function
Okay, have we done literary analysis? Almost! The next step is to connect something you've discovered about form to something you've explored about the theme. This is most easily done by looking at function. In other words, what does the form do? Let's try that using what was just explored about form in this poem. We might ask ourselves, How do the three images in the poem influence how we think about farm life? Or, What does dividing the poem up into four sections do?
Trying to decide the function of form is where a lot of the interpretive work of analyzing literature is done. It is also where there is a lot of individual choice. So, using our example, one could emphasize the role of those images or the role of the divided up structure of the poem, or one could focus on other kinds of form (such as the incomplete sentence, or the brevity of the whole poem).
Look at Intention
It becomes quite natural to speak about a work of literature in terms of what the author intended. We don't often know exactly what the author did intend, but that doesn't really matter. It's really just a way of finding some unity across a given work. We work off the assumption that the author used each element of his or her creation in order to convey a specific effect, impression, or meaning. In this case, I can talk about the theme I've found (farm life) by showing how the various aspects of form I have found (imagery, divisions) work together in a unified way to create the meaning or effect that the author intended. Watch how this is done:
In his poem, "The Red Wheelbarrow," William Carlos Williams uses just a few images (of a red wheelbarrow, of rain, and of chickens) to suggest the simplicity of farm life. That simplicity is also suggested by the brevity of the poem (it is only 16 words long) and by the way each image is isolated in its own stanza.A Summary of Steps
- What is this text about? (Look for themes)
- How are these ideas expressed? (Look for form)
- What does the form do? (Look for function)
- What is the author intending? (Look to see elements working together to create a unified form or theme)
Introduce the Text and Context
A literary analysis is no good if one assumes all readers know the work in question really well or that all parts of it are fresh in the mind. You have to set up the text for your reader. That could include a brief historical or biographical context, and perhaps a brief paraphrase or summary of the work, like this:
William Carlos Williams, a 20th century author known to be an "imagist" poet, wrote a poem that is really just a quick snapshot of farm life. It's called "The Red Wheelbarrow."A longer poem might require more of an introduction or explanation. And by the way, in looking up something about the poet, it can give me a clue to interpreting things. In this case, finding out Williams was famous as an "imagist" poet tips me off that imagery is probably the most important part of the form for me to focus on in my analysis.
Quote the Text
For your analysis to be convincing, you have to quote directly from the text at times. Compare the difference between these two:
In his poem, Williams' images, though sparse, work together to create a rural scene.
In his poem, Williams' images, though sparse, work together to create a rural scene. First we see "a red wheel / barrow" but later we know this is "beside the white / chickens." Together, the two images place us imaginatively in a farmyard.A Complete Miniature Analysis
Though brief, this analysis contains all of the elements discussed above for creating a competent literary analysis:
William Carlos Williams, a 20th century author known to be an "imagist" poet, wrote a poem called "The Red Wheelbarrow" that is really just a quick snapshot of farm life [introduction of text and context]. First we see "a red wheel / barrow" but later we know this is "beside the white / chickens" [quoting the text]. Together, the two images [form] place us imaginatively in a farmyard [function of form]. His few images suggest [attributing an intention to the author and a unified effect] the simplicity of farm life [theme]. That simplicity is also suggested by the brevity of the poem (it is only 16 words long) and by the way each image is isolated in its own stanza [more instances of form to support the theme].Adding Concepts and Terms
The formula above will work on any literary text. Hopefully, it is clear that even a very few elements of form (in this case, the images and the sentence structure / layout) are enough to begin doing serious and convincing analysis. And one need not have to write 1000 words in order to be doing real literary analysis. The completed mini-essay above is only 95 words long.
But typically you will want to expand your analytical abilities by learning additional literary elements and then other literary theories that increase your repertoire of available ideas to apply to the text at hand.
Basic Elements of Form
Some aspects of form are common to all literature (for example, language use). Others, are particular to a given genre (meter, for example, is exclusive to poetry). But usually there is a lot of overlap. Here is a basic set of formal elements to use in analyzing literature, with an emphasis here on poetry.
- Genre
- What category of literary work is this? (Poetry, Fiction, Drama, Nonfiction)
- What subgenre does this belong to? (In poetry, for example: narrative poetry, dramatic poetry, lyric poetry, or even more specific subgenres such as ballad, sonnet, epic, etc.)
- Character or persona
- Who is speaking? What can we infer about the speaker(s)?
- What is the narrative point of view? (first person? third? limited? omniscient?)
- Setting
- What is the physical or geographical setting (if evident or described)?
- Language
- What is the "diction" or word choice, including the connotations of words?
- Is there figurative language? (imagery, symbols, metaphors, etc.)
- Are there allusions to other works, people, events, places, etc.?
- Structure
- What structure is evident in the poem? (stanzas, number of lines, line length, and the pattern by which a poem is laid out, even visually)
- Repetition
- Are there patterns evident? (stanzas, lines, or rhymes; or repetition of images or sounds or grammatical components)
- Tone
- What is the emotional feeling or attitude conveyed, directly or indirectly? Is there irony? What is the mental state of the narrator or persona? Is there a shift in tone?
Sometimes plot is also analyzed if there is a narrative component to poetry, but usually plot is more a part of analyzing fiction and other narrative literature.
This is not an exhaustive list of elements of literary form, and it the analysis of genres other than poetry will include some addition elements, but this is a great starting point!
Thank you!
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