Unseen Prose

1
Unseen Prose

• Introductory Lecture

2
Beginning with the end in mind

• At the year end exam, you are expected
• to
• demonstrate ability to read and understand the
  text
• show ability to engage with the language ad style
  
• employ literary concepts and terminology in your
  evaluation of the text

3
Making Macro Sense

• You first have to read the text and
• establish for yourself its Meaning by
• asking the following questions
• Who Questions
• Who is the speaker?
• Who are the main characters?

4

• What Questions
• What is going on here?
• What is being communicated?
• What is the purpose of this passage?
• Where Questions
• Where are we?
• Where is the story set? Time period?

5

• How Questions
• How would you characterise the tone and attitude?
• How has the writer managed to convey that
  tone/attitude?
• How would you characterise the style used?
• How effective is the writer with his use of
  stylistic conventions?

6
Making Connections

• Therefore you will have to ascertain and make
  notes on
• The Content ( What is the passage about? Why is
  this extract given as a test piece?
• The Theme Connection between content and human
  significance, of universal value

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Making Connections

• Characters ( The Who)
• Find the speaker/narrator
• Is the speaker/narrator necessarily the
  protagonist?
• Who are the other characters?
• The Antagonist?
• What drives these characters? Conflict? Internal
  Conflict?

8
Making Connections

• Conflicts (The What)
• The Plot ( as driven by the conflict)
• Orientation? Climax? Resolution?
• Unique characteristics of each

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Making Connections

• The Setting ( The Where)
• Sympathetic background to flesh out or
  reinforce the theme
• E.g. Of Mice and Men
• Situational Irony contrast to evoke emotions
• E.g.

10
Making Connections

• Diction and Imagery (The How)
• Diction is essentially the authors choice of
  words.
• Diction gives rise to Tone (Attitude/Feelings)
• Imagery
• The Images conjured in the readers mind through
  use of diction
• Repetition and Recurrence

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Making Connections

• Tita was so sensitive to onions, any time they
  were being chopped, they say she would just cry
  and cry when she was still in my
  great-grandmother's belly her sobs were so loud
  that even Nacha, the cook, who was half-deaf,
  could hear them easily. Once her wailing got so
  violent that it brought on an early labor. And
  before my great-grandmother could let out a word
  or even a whimper, Tita made her entrance into
  this world, prematurely, right there on the
  kitchen table amid the smells of simmering noodle
  soup, thyme, bay leaves, and cilantro, steamed
  milk, garlic, and, of course, onion. Tita had no
  need for the usual slap on the bottom, because
  she was already crying as she emerged maybe that
  was because she knew then that it would be her
  lot in life to be denied marriage. The way Nacha
  told it, Tita was literally washed into this
  world on a great tide of tears that spilled over
  the edge of the table and flooded across the
  kitchen floor.

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Making Connections

• Alliteration Repeated consonant sounds at the
  beginning of several words in a phrase (Robbie
  saw rabbits resting by roses.)
• Hyperbole An exaggeration (That building can
  touch the clouds.)
• Idiom An expression that cannot be understood
  from the individual meanings of its elements, as
  in kick the bucket or under the weather.
• Irony The opposite of what is meant.

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• Metaphor A comparison of two unlike things that
  suggests a similarity between the two items.
  (Love is a rose.)
• Onomatopoeia Words that sound like what they
  are. (POP! BAM! Slosh)
• Personification Making an inanimate object or
  animal act like a person
• Puns A word or words, which are formed or
  sounded alike, but have different meaning to
  have more than one possible meaning. (Using that
  pencil is pointless.)
• Simile A comparison using "like" or "as" (She
  sings like an angel.)

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Homework

• Read the passage given, answer questions in point
  form
• Follow-up lesson discussion
• Essay due on _____.