Saturday, May 31, 2014

THEMATIC PORTFOLIO


This course is designed to provide students with the idea how to make an attempt at restoring that vision of the world that was created by the author in his work by using the model scheme of the stylistic analysis. Students will be required to read and interpret the text of their own choice in a written form. Students will be expected to get ready with the thematic Portfolio which should be necessarily brought to the last class to get credits.
 Required elements for the portfolio include:


-         The report about a novelist/ short-story writer/ essayist (e.g. Ch. Dickens, W.S. Maugham, O. Wilde, W. Saroyan, E. Hemingway, A. Hailey, K.Mansfield and others) you particularly like. While researching, consider also contemporary writers such as Brian Patten, Benjamin Zephaniah, Graham Swift, or women writers like Maya Angelou or Wendy Cope, or writers from Africa, India, or S.E. Asia who write in English, such as Wole Soyinka, Chinua Achebe, R.K.Narayan or Bessie Head. (You can check on all these with a simple Google search.)
-         Text Interpretation (of your own choice in a written form)

Theoretical questions


1.    Hermeneutics as a branch of investigating a text.
2.    Internal and external factors in text analysis
3.    Pre-reading strategies
4.    Types of reading
5.    The Question-answer relationship (QAR). Definitions.
6.    Character. Protagonist. Antagonist. Hero
7.    Symbolism in literature
8.    The process of understanding a text (the tips how to interpret a text)
9.    Theme, plot, setting, atmosphere, message
10.  Narrative method. Types of narration

11.  Composition of a story

QUESTIONS FOR INTERPRETING A TEXT


1. Speak about the author. What do you know about his world outlook, his philosophical and aesthetic principles?

2. Give the gist of the passage/ story. (Summarize the content of the passage/ story.) Divide it into logically complete parts and suggest titles to each.

3. Point out the composition parts of the passage/ story: exposition, complication, climax, denouement. Is there a clear exposition or does the narration start abruptly? Are time, place and background stated or only implied? Analyze the use of the articles, pronouns and adverbs. Say whether their specific usage creates the implication of precedence. What is the function of this implication? How does the action move: slowly or fast? What part of speech prevails: verbs, nouns, adjectives, adverbs, etc.? What is the effect of their use?

4. What is more important: the events that make the plot or the implication? What is implied? How does the passage/story end: in a clear or ambiguous and vague way?

5. What does the passage/ story present: narration, description, dialogue, monologue, inner monologue of a character, the author’s argumentation? What is the prevailing narrative form?

6. In whose name is the story narrated? Is it a first-person (a third person) narration? Outline the character of the narrator, if there is any. What is the function of the narrator?

7. What mood (key, vein, slant) is the passage/ story written in? Does the mood change as the narration proceeds?

8. What is the author’s method of presenting characters? Does the author resort to direct characterization? Point out instances of direct characterization. Is it ample or sparing? What are the other ways of portraying characters (through their actions and speech, other characters’ perception)? Are the characters represented statically or dynamically? What direction do they change in? What stages in the development of their personalities can be singled out? What character is the most picturesque and vivid? How does the author achieve the vividness of portraits? Does the main character happen to be in conflict with himself (with other characters, circumstances of life)? Are there any background characters? What is their role in the story? Can we feel the author’s attitude towards his characters?

9. Speak about the language means employed in the passage/ story. What episodes abound in various tropes? What is their effect? Are there any places which are devoid of any imagery? What does this dry manner of writing contribute to? Does the author contrast expressiveness of some parts of his story? Why? What layer words are mainly used in the passage/ story: formal, bookish, colloquial? Does the author resort to stylistically coloured vocabulary: terms, archaisms, neologisms, barbarisms, foreign loans, slangy words, jargonisms, professional and dialectal words, vulgarisms? What is their function? Are there any discrepancies between the plot and the language means used to reproduce it?

10. Analyze the syntactical structures employed in the text. Which places are written in long, complex sentences? Where do short and simple structures prevail? What effect do these syntactical structures create? Are there abrupt changes in syntax, in style in general? Why does the author resort to such contrasts?

11. What is the author’s message? Interpret the title of the story. What is your attitude towards the characters, ideas and style of the text? What feelings and thoughts does the text arouse?