181 Introduction to Literature

181 Introduction to LiteratureFiction: Part I

"The Story of an Hour" by Cate Chopin Interpretation: when you interpret a literary work, you explore its possible meaning. Knowledge of the genre, the author, the setting, the events, the readers' response, are all very important for a substantial interpretation. [Although no single reading of a literary work is correct, some readings are more defensible than others. A literary interpretation must have a basis in facts, and the text supplies these facts against which your interpretation should be judged]

Narrative: A narrative tells a story by presenting events in some logical or orderly way. Fiction is a narrative that originates in the imagination of the writer. Fiction comes in different forms: novel, novella, short story, short short story, fairytale, fable, . . .The difference is not merely in length, but in form and content. The short story: It is a short narrative. The short story usually focuses on a single incident, or a single character. The writer of short stories cannot devote a great deal of space to develop a highly complicated plot, or to describe a large number of characters.

Theme: The theme of a work of literature is its central or dominant idea. This idea is seldom stated explicitly. Instead, it is conveyed through the selection and arrangement of details; through the emphasis of certain words, events or images; and through the action and reaction of characters. [In a literary work, usually one theme dominates the main stream of the work, but other themes might also be explored. Ex. In The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, the central theme is that the individual's innate idea of right and wrong is superior to society's artificial values. Yet, the work addresses other themes as well like racism, religious hypocrisy, double-standard values, and the influence of the West on the American identity.] With times, some themes become conventional themes.

Plot: Plot is more that "what happens" in a story. It is how what happens is revealed; the way in which a story's events are arranged. Plot is shaped by causality. What challenges the reader is the conflict. [ Conflict suggests a clash between the protagonist and the antagonist. The antagonist is not necessarily a person, it might be a concept, a disease, a supernatural element, or any element that causes conflict.]

Stages of a plot: A plot is usually developed through stages. Exposition: In exposition, the writer presents the basic information readers need to understand the events that follow. It establishes the scene, introduces the major characters, suggests events. The exposition is not restricted to the beginning of a narrative. It can come whenever the writer feels he needs to expose some information about the characters of the conflict. Rising action: after the setting is introduced, the rising action introduces the conflict. The events unfold to maximize the conflict between the protagonist and the antagonist. Climax: the climax is the point of greatest tension in the plot. It is the most important point in the plot in which the story takes a turning point. The climax scene may come in the middle or the end of a story, but what comes after the climax is a form of resolution to the main conflict in the plot. Denouement: or the ending is when the writer draws the action to a close, and accounts for all remaining loose ends. [ The ending does not have to be so definite. Some stories have "open endings" leaving the reader uncertain about the resolution of the conflict.]

Sequence of a plot: Events is a plot can be arranged in one of the following orders: chronological order, backwards, flashback, foreshadowing, in medias res. Fiction : Part II Character "The Diamond Necklace" by Maupassant

Character: A character is a fictional representation of a person. Writers may develop characters through their actions, through their reactions to situations or to other characters, through their physical appearance, through their speech and gesture and expressions, and even through their names.

How do we know about characters?

Third person omniscient narrator can provide information about what characters are doing, saying, and thinking; what experiences they have had, what they look like; how they are dressed, and so on.

Alternatively, a character's personality traits and motivation may be revealed through action, dialogue, or thoughts. [Sometimes the character is the narrator]. WE WILL DISCUSS THAT FURTHER IN "POINT OF VIEW"

Kinds of characters:

Round: round characters are ones that are well developed, closely involved in a responsive to the action. Usually the major characters in a story are round, they are complex and well developed; if they are not, readers do not care what happens to them.

Flat: flat characters are barely developed or stereotypical. Usually, minor characters are frequently not well developed . They do not change much, and in some cases, they work as foils to the protagonist. [Foil is a supporting character whose role in the story is to highlight a major character by presenting a contrast with him or her].

Stock Characters: some flat characters are stock characters, easily identifiable types who behave so predictably that readers can easily recognize them. [The kindly old priest, the tough young bully, the kind and loving mother, the mean mother-in-law].

Modernism in fiction: modern readers often expect characters to behave as "real people" in their situations might behave. The flaws that are revealed as round characters are developed make them believable. In modern fiction, the protagonist is seldom if ever a "noble hero," more often, he or she is at least partially a victim, someone to whom some unpleasant things happen, and someone who is sometimes ill-equipped to cope with events.

Dynamic or Static characters: In addition to Forster's classification of round and flat, another classification is based on the character's ability to change. In that sense characters are either dynamic or static.

Dynamic: a dynamic character grows and changes in the course of the story, developing as he or she reacts to events or to other characters.

Static: a Static characters may face the same challenges a dynamic character face, but will remain essentially unchanged.

Round characters are dynamic while flat characters are static. Motivation: we need to understand characters' motivation, so that we understand their actions and reactions. Understand but not necessarily predict.

Setting The setting of a work of fiction establishes its historical, geographical and physical context. Where a work is set influences our reactions to the story's events and characters. When a work takes place is equally important.

In some works, setting is deliberately marginalized because the writer wishes the work to seem timeless and universal.

In some stories, the setting is very important and influential and it affects the characters and the plot dramatically.

Sometimes, the conflict might be between the character and the setting {The story of an hour}.

Types of settings: Historical Setting: a particular historical period, and the events and customs associated with it, can be of vital importance to the story; therefore, some knowledge of the period is useful or essential to readers who wish to understand the story fully. Geographical Setting: knowing where the action takes place has an equal importance to when it takes place, whether the story is set in the United States, Europe, or in a developing country can explain anything from language and customs to attitudes and behaviors and motivations.

Hence the size of the town or city in which a story takes place may also be important. In small towns, characters are more integrated with their societies, but in large towns, or in cities, characters are more likely to be isolated and anonymous. Of course, a story may not have a recognizable geographical setting, and by this, writers free themselves from stereotypical or archetypal restrictions. It allows them to experiment with situations and characters unaffected by reader's expectations or associations with familiar settings.

Fiction: Part III

Point of View "The Yellow Wall Paper" Gilman P. 366

Narrator: The narrator is the voice that tells the story. This is the point of view from which the story is told, and the events are presented. (Explain a crime described from 5 points of view).

The narrator of a work of fiction is not the same as the writer. Writers create narrators to tell their stories.

Personaliterally meaning maskindicates the narrator.

There are two major types of narrators: first person narrator, and third person narrator.

First person narrator: sometimes the narrator is a character in the story that uses the first person pronoun (I or we) to tell the story. Often, this narrator is a major character who tells his or her own story, and is the focus of that story.

Sometimes the first person narrator tells a story that is primarily about someone else.

Writers gain a number of advantages when they choose first person narrators. First, they are able to present incidents convincingly. Second, their restricted view can create irony: which is a discrepancy between what is said and what readers believe to be the truth. Irony may take one of three different forms: Dramatic irony: is when a narrator perceives less than readers do; Situational Irony: is when what happens is at odds with what readers are led to expect; Verbal Irony: is when the narrator says on thing but actually mean another. Third person narrators: sometimes the reader uses the third person pronoun (he, she, they) to tell the story from the point of view of a narrator who is not also a character. Third person narrators fall into three categories: omniscient, limited omniscient, and objective.

Omniscient Narrators: Omniscient, all knowing, narrators can move from one character's mind to another. They can present a more inclusive view of events and characters than first person narrators can.

Limited Omniscient Narrators: such narrators focus only on what a single character experiences. In other words, events are limited to one character's perspective, and nothing is revealed that the character does not see, hear, feel, or think.

Objective Narrators: or dramatic narrators remain entirely outside the characters' minds. With objective narrators, events unfold the way they would in a play or a movie. They do not reveal the characters' thoughts or attitudes. Thus, they allow readers to interpret the actions of the characters without any interference. See P 296 to discuss this further through a well-written example.

Style, Tone, Symbol and Allegory Style: the way with which a writer uses language. Style encompasses elements such as word-choice, syntax, sentence length and structure, and the presence of imagery and figures of speech. Tone: it is the attitude of the narrator or author of a work toward the subject matter, character or audience. (Intimate or distant, bitter or affectionate, straightforward or cautious, supportive or critical).

Symbol: is a person, object, action, place, or event that in addition to its literal meaning, suggests a more complex meaning or range of meanings.

Conventional symbols suggest the same thing to most people. (rose=love, white=purity, skull and crossbones=poison, spring=rebirth, autumn=death or decay, summer=youth and beauty).

As you read, you should not try to find one exact equivalent for each symbol; that kind of search is limiting and unproductive. Instead, consider the different meanings a symbol might suggest. Then consider how these various interpretations enrich other elements of the story and the work as a whole.

Recognizing symbols: why is the yellow wall paper a symbol for male confinement of the protagonist.

Allegory: an allegory communicates a doctrine, message, or moral principle by making it into a narrative in which the characters personify ideas, concepts, qualities, or other abstractions. An allegory is a story with two parallel and consistent levels of meaningone literal and one figurative. The figurative level, which offers some moral or political lesson, is the story's main concern. The allegorical figures are significant only because they represent something beyond their literal meaning in a fixed system.

Whereas a symbol has multiple symbolic associations as well as a literal meaning, an allegorical figure a character, object, place, or event in the allegoryhas just one meaning within an allegorical framework. (Good vs. evil)

Myth: is a story that is central to a culture, it embodies the values on which a culture or society is built. Although many myths have to do with religion, myths are not limited to the theological. Myths explain everything from natural phenomenonsuch as the creation of the worldto the existence of human beings and the beginning of agriculture.

Take the creation myth as an example in p. 398-399.

Theme: it is the central or dominant idea of a work of art. Theme is not the same as plot or subject. A summary of the plot does not convey the values and ideas expresses in the story. Many effective stories, however, express more than one theme.

When you write about theme, you need more than tell what happens in the story. The theme you identify should be a general idea that extends beyond the story and applies to the world outside fiction. Read with the students the part on "identifying themes" on page 446-447.

Fiction: Part IV

Read Alice Walker's "Everyday Use" (412-19) in class, and then address all the elements of fiction discussed in class.

First In-term exam:

1- What kind of narrator tells the story in Charlotte Gilman's short story "Yellow Wall Paper"? How would you characterize the tone of the narrator? Does she sound depressed? Delusional? Hysterical? Support your answer with examples from the story. 2- What is the general theme of Gilman's story "The Yellow Wall Paper"? Explain with examples from the text.

3- What is the nature of the conflict in Kate Chopin's short story "The Story of an Hour"?

4- Analyze the plot of "The Story of an Hour" following the classical pattern of a plot.

5- Analyze the characters of the two main sisters in "Everyday Use", and explain how the difference in their character influences the story's theme.

6- Discuss the main character in "The Diamond Necklace." Drama 1 Dramatic works differ from other prose works in a number of ways. Plays are divided into acts and scenes; they include stage directions that specify characters' entrances and exits and describe what setting looks like and how characters look and act.

Plays consist mainly of dialogue, lines spoken by the characters.

Of course plays are different because originally they were no written to be read, but to be acted on a stage.

To compensate for the absence of the narrator, and to reveal the inner thoughts of the characters, the playwright can use monologues (extended speeches by one character), asides (brief comments by a character who reveals thoughts by speaking directly to the audience without being heard by the other characters) or soliloquies (monologues in which a character expresses private thoughts while alone on stage).

When you read a play, you will notice features it shares with works of fiction. In addition, you will notice features that distinguish it from fictionfor example the presence of stage directions and the division of plays into acts and scenes.

The plot of plays is fundamentally similar in form to those of fiction. A play typically begins with exposition, which presents characters and setting and introduces the basic situation in which the characters are involved. Then, during the rising action, complications develop, conflicts emerge, suspense builds, and crises occur. The rising action culminates in a climax, a point at which the plot's tension peaks. Finally, during the falling action, the intensity subsides, eventually winding down to resolution, or denouement, in which all loose ends are tied up. August Strindberg (18491912) was born in Stockholm, Sweden, the child of a chipping merchant and his former maid. Strindberg was a prolific artist, and his work includes novels, plays, poetry, and paintings.