Close Reading Essay

The answers to these questions emerge more from the doing than the talking. Briefly, last interlingual rendition is a basic tool for understanding, pickings pleasure in, and communicating integritys interpretation of a literary work. The skills employed in close yarn lend themselves to all kinds of cultural interpretation and investigation.Close reading takes language as its subject beca employment language behind operate in different ways to convey meaning. Reading sensitively allows one to repose open to the many ways language works on the judgement and heart.When an assignment calls for close reading, its best to start by choosing a brief but promising passage and checking your assumptions nigh its content at the door. Close reading lots reveals the fissures in the midst of what the speaker or narrator says and how she or he says it. You know from your own experience that life involves constant, often unconscious sifting of these nuances.Here are several(prenominal) e nforceful steps.1. cull a short passage that allows you to investigate the details closely. Here, for example, is the first carve up of Jane Austens Northanger Abbey, Chapter 2.In addition to what has al found been said of Catherine Morlands individualized and mental endowments, when about to be launched into all the difficulties and dangers of a six weeks sign in Bath, it may be stated, for the subscribers more certain(a) information, lest the following pages should otherwise fail of giving any idea of what her reference point is meant to be that her heart was affectionate, her disposition cheerful and open, without conceit or sanctimoniousness of any kindher manners just removed from the awkwardness and diffidence of a girl her person pleasing, and when in good looks, prettyand her drumhead about as ignorant and uninformed as the female headway at seventeen usually is.This single sentence will fork up us plenty to work with.2. Look at phrase. What kinds of words does Austen routine? Does she aim for lofty diction ( white plagued for special occasions) or common diction? Are the words extensive or short, Latinate or Anglo-Saxon, narrow (i.e. legalistic, medical, jargon, elite) or ordinary? Remember that the rules for diction are different at different times in history.3. Next, look at sentence structure. jackpot you map the sentence (find the subject and verb, locate phrases and clauses)? Is it a simple, compound, or hard sentence? How does the structure of the sentence relate to its content? Does the author useactive or passive verbs? What rhythms does the sentence structure createlong flowing ones, short choppy onesand how do these relate to the meaning?4. afterwards you imbibe looked at language (and there are other expert issues one might pay attention to), you rear end begin to go tone. Is the narrator being straightforward, factual, open? Or is she taking a little direct route toward her meaning? Does the voice carry any percept ion? Or is it detached from its subject? Do you hear mockery? Where? If so, what complications does the irony produce?5. At this point, you may discover some difference between what the author appears to be doing (giving you a complete, unbiased picture of her character) and what she also accomplishes (raising doubts about whether these qualities are worth having, whether her character is a heroine after all, whether women have minds at all, therefore whether this narrator can be trusted at all, etc.). You can now begin to talk about the ways Austens language, which seems to make our confidence, is also complicating its message by raising these doubts.6. At this point, you can put up a generic hypothesis, something like, In this passage, Austen raises doubts about Catherine Morlands character through with(predicate) her use of deliberately banal diction, her strained sentence structure, and her ironic use of the terms of character description for heroines.7. You can proceed to fill in the outlines of this point by explaining what you mean, using details and quotations from the passage to support your point.8. You still, however, take up an argument and will contain to go back to your opening to focalize the thesis. The question is Why? Or to what effect? Your thesis might clear on what youve already written by suggesting Austen creates this irony early in the novel to alert the reader to the ways shes subverting narrative conventions. Or The effect of this description of Catherine is to undermine any notion of her powers as a heroine and to introduce Austens theme that true character emerges from weakness quite a than strength. Or Austens cavalier treatment of her heroine suggests that she has little respect for the regular(prenominal) education of young women.9. Even with these more developed statements, you will need to explain and support your point further. But you will have achieved some very important things, namely 1) you have chosen a speci al piece of the textbook to work with, hence avoiding huge generalizations and abstractions that tend to shepherds crook a reader off 2) you have moved from exposition (explaining whats thereand really, shouldnt a reader be fit to find these things out for him or herself?) to arguing a point, which will involve your reader in a more interactive and risky encounter 3) you have carved out your own reading of the text rather than taking the more well-worn path 4) you have identified something about Austens method that may well open up other areas of the text for study and debate. Bravo10. With your more refined thesis in place, you can go back and make sure your supporting argument explains the questions youve raised, follows through on your argument, and comes to a provocative conclusion. By the end, you may be able to expand from your initial passage to a larger point, but use your organization to keep the reader focused all the way.The most evoke thing for a reader, and the mos t useful for an essayist, is that close reading broadly offers surprises. Your project is not so much about telling readers what they probably can see for themselves but what they might have missed that could pleasance them. Its helpful, then, to go into the paper with an open mind and be ready to adjust your thesis to the evidence you find in the text. Have a blast