Analytical reading of fiction. Учебное пособие для студентов старших курсов факультетов иностранных языков

Федеральное агентство по образованию ГОУ ВПО «Набережночелнинский государственный

педагогический институт»

Факультет иностранных языков

Кафедра романо-германских языков и методик их преподавания

Analytical Reading

of Fiction

Учебное пособие для студентов старших курсов факультетов иностранных языков

Набережные Челны

2009

ББК 81.2 Англ - 5

Р 15

Печатается по решению редакционно-издательского совета Набережночелнинского государственного педагогического института

Автор-составитель: С.А. Радионова, ст. преподаватель, кандидат педагогических наук

Рецензент: Г.М. Полькина, кандидат филологических наук, доцент

Радионова С.А.

Analytical reading of fiction: Учебное пособие для студентов старших курсов факультетов иностранных языков. – Набережные Челны:

НГПИ, 2009. – 142 с.

Пособие предназначено для студентов факультетов иностранных языков и включает три основных раздела. Теоретический раздел освещает основные принципы аналитического чтения и литературного анализа художественного текста. Вторая часть представлена системой практических заданий (построенных по принципу – от простого к сложному), которые могут быть использованы на лабораторных занятиях по аналитическому чтению, стилистике, а также для самостоятельной работы. Третья часть включает в себя аутентичные тексты коротких рассказов английских и американских писателей, предназначенные для полного литературного анализа и интерпретации. В заключительном разделе пособия представлены примеры анализа и интерпретации отрывков из англоязычных художественных произведений.

Характер материала обеспечивает благоприятные условия для успешного решения целого ряда важных методических задач: развития навыков неподготовленной устной речи при обсуждении прочитанного, стимулирования мыслительной деятельности студентов, обучения сознательному, глубокому подходу к художественному произведению, нравственного и эстетического воспитания.

Структура пособия также предполагает стимулирование научной направленности, развитие творческой активности, познавательных интересов студентов в вопросах определения лингвистической природы стилистических средств языка в их системе, определение функциональных возможностей этих средств в художественном произведении.

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I. Essential ideas about analytical reading and literary analysis

1.1. Why bother about the analysis?

Knowing how to analyse the language of literary texts certainly doesn't spoil them. On the contrary, the more we know about how a good piece of writing works the more we appreciate it, not less. We understand better how many complex things the writer has controlled and brought together to form a successful whole.

Knowing about the linguistic control of viewpoint does not get in our way of enjoying novels. And through analysis we can also go on to understand and respond to pieces of good writing in a deeper way precisely because we appreciate in a more precise way how a particular writer has succeeded at something we know we could never manage.

Analytical understanding is one of the things which makes human beings special, and if you choose to study literature rather than just read it in your spare time, you commit yourself to rather more than curling up by a fire with a good book. Once you decide to study literature, one of the things you also commit yourself to is the study of language in literary texts and how we interact with it (as well, of course, as other things, for example understanding the social conditions which helped to produce particular literary works). To study painting without learning in a detailed way about how different colours, tones or textures can be produced, or about how the human observer interacts cognitively with perspective or with foregrounding would seem quixotic. The same is true of the study of the language in literary texts. It is not enough to say 'language study is difficult work, so I won't bother'. If we set out to do something and achieving that goal involves hard work, the logic of the situation demands that we just get on and do it.

1.2. How to set about doing a stylistic analysis?

When you analyse, it is important to be systematic. An enduring problem in literary criticism is that critics sometimes come to partial conclusions by concentrating on some aspects of a text to the exclusion of others. Thus you should collect all the evidence that is in the text.

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This will probably also mean that you will need to work through the text one linguistic level at a time, to make sure that you don't miss out on important matters.

Part of what is involved here is the logic of argument. But you are also presenting your findings to another human being, who needs to be taken into account. One aspect of helping your reader is the order in which you present information. Some students tend to let the process by which they did their original analysis dominate the writing-up of their research, presenting their findings in the order that they happened to discover them, and delaying the presentation of their interpretation to the final section of their essay. But this way of going about things has considerable disadvantages.

First, readers usually cope better with complex analysis if they already know how, in general terms, they are meant to organise the detailed information they receive. The easiest way to do this is to begin by summarising your findings or the interpretative position you wish to take, and then proceed to the more detailed analysis. Your readers will then know where you are trying to lead them, and so be able to assess more easily how, and how well, the analyses you present relate to the general case. Your presentation of your detailed analytical findings then become a way of fleshing out the detail of your interpretation as well as substantiating the view you are arguing for.

Secondly, once you have decided to begin with a general account of your interpretation, it makes good sense to order your stylistic information so that the areas which bear most directly on that interpretation come first, and areas more indirectly related come later. Generally, there is good sense in dealing with more meaningful levels of linguistic organisation, like lexis and pragmatics, early on, leaving areas less intrinsically meaning-related, like phonetic structure, to later. But the main organising factor should be putting first what happens to be most salient, even if on some occasions that does turn out to be phonetic or graphological structure.

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1.3. Isn't it less objective if the interpretation comes first and the analysis second?

The short answer is no. The idea that you can do your analysis in some mechanically objective way and have your interpretation pop out at the end of it in some automatic way does not hold up under examination. If you analyse a text you cannot help but read it, and if you read it you cannot help but understand it. You could get someone else to do the analysis and then work out some findings on the basis of that analysis, but the analysis done by the other person would itself be based on understanding (for example, you can't parse sentences accurately without understanding them), and it is difficult to see how you could draw conclusions from the analysis without having some initial understanding of the text.

Objectivity comes not from the order in which you do things, but in being systematic and careful in your argument, not overlooking unhelpful facts, and, in more general terms, constructing a clear and detailed relationship between your interpretative hypothesis on the one hand and your analysis on the other. Note also that 'objective' does not mean 'true for all time'. Physical scientists, who are often held up as paragons of objectivity, also change their minds over the interpretation of their data, particularly when new aspects, previously undiscovered or overlooked, are taken into account. So it is with stylistic analysis. No analysis is entirely objective in the sense that it is true for all time. The discovery of new forms of analysis will always throw up new findings; and as meaning is generated through the interaction between texts and their readers, they will always be open to reinterpretation.

In making our analyses as open, clear and well argued as we can make them, we put in place the foundations on which others will be able to build, sometimes leading to new and interesting interpretations which would have been difficult to establish without that initial work. There is nothing dishonourable in turning out to be mistaken or only half-right, as long as the analysis you present is systematic, clear and well argued.

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II.Practice Section

2.1.Understanding prose

Analyse the SDs and EMs used in the given passages and say what role they play in the context. Give as many details as possible to disclose the situations described in the passages. While working, use the list of helping phrases below:

Helping Phrases

•The key idea that runs through the text/story/selection/extract/etc. is that...

•The idea is embodied in the character/image of...

•To carry the idea to the mind of the reader the author resorts to...

•The author's idea/aim/purpose/etc. is to convince the reader

that...

•For this purpose the author has selected those stylistic devices and expressive means of the language which serve best to achieve the aim set, namely...

•The writer doesn't impose on the reader his attitude towards...

•There's no direct implication of the fact that...

•To be implicit by nature (the main idea/the author's attitude...)

•To assume a pronounced stylistic significance...

•This SD is used as an emotional intensifier of...

•The arrangement of the section in the extract is by no means accidental, it's informative as it gives additional information about...

•The author adheres to this SD because...

•The repetition of... creates a dramatic ring in the narration/contributes to the romantic flavour of the passage

•The repetition of ... makes the members of the construction/ paragraph more conspicuous because of the stressed position they occupy

•To portray smb/ to draw smb's portrait in full accord with smb's moral properties/ etc. the author deviated from the narrative perspective

•The author is detached in his attitude towards.../he is deeply personally involved in the discussion of...

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•The atmosphere of tension/anguish/etc. is created and maintained by the author thanks to the usage of...

•The descriptive details that contribute to the realism of the fragment are the following...

1. But I can tell you he is furious about what happened with this MicroCon thing. He's taking a lot of heat from Akai Tokyo. And it's very unfair. He really was sandbagged by Washington. He got assurances there would be no objection to the sale, and then Morton pulled the rug out from under them. / Michael Crichton Rising Sun /

2. Skeet's eyes appeared to be not just swollen and bloodshot but sore, as if he'd seen too many painful things. But in the ice-pale, sunken wreckage of his gaunt face, his smile was warm. 'You're not just a half brother. You're a brother and a half." /Dean Koontz False Memory/

3. Martie pulled away from the curb, drove to the end of the short street, and turned left on to Balboa Boulevard. "Hold tight. You'll be in the doctor's office soon."

"Not if we're in an accident," Susan fretted. "I'm a good driver."

"The car might break down." "The car's fine."

"It's raining hard. If the streets flood -"

"Or maybe we'll be abducted by big slimy Martians," Martie said. "Be taken up to the mother ship, forced to breed with hideous squid like creatures."

"The streets do flood here on the peninsula," Susan said defensively.

"This time of year, Big Foot hides out around the pier, bites the heads off the unwary. We better hope we don't have a breakdown in that area."

/ Dean Koontz False Memory /

4. Jason was awakened rudely the next morning by a rapping on the door that made his headache even worse. It was only when he started groggily toward it that he noticed he was still in last night's clothing. Anyway, his soul felt wrinkled. So they matched. / Eric Segal The Class /

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5.Amber the stripper made a grand entrance in a short skirt and low-cut blouse that gave away most of her expensive breasts. The deputy escorting her down the aisle couldn't believe his good fortune. He chattered her up along the way, eyes glued to the edge of her blouse. /John Grisham The Testament /

6.From off the cold Pacific, waves of black clouds washed across the sky, as though the tide of night were turning and would drown this bleak new day. / Dean Koontz False Memory /

7.In the health-obsessed final decade of the century, eating fatty foods was widely regarded as a far more delicious - and more damning - sin than envy, sloth, thievery, and adultery. / Dean Koontz The Eyes of Darkness /

8.Earlier, in the street, deep breathing had cleared her head, flushing away the fear. This time, however, each inhalation seemed to fuel her terror, as oxygen feeds a fire. / Dean Koontz False Memory /

9.Sitting by the window twenty rows back, he ignored the memo on Indians in his lap, and admired the countryside below. It was vast and lush and green, rolling with hills, dotted with cattle farms and crisscrossed with red dirt roads. / John Grisham The Testament /

10.When the sky was clear again, they returned to the stump and huddled around the phone. Watching Jevy's end of the conversation was torture for Nate. He understood not a word, but the body language told the story. Smiles and frowns, urgings and pleas, frustrating pauses, then the repetition of things already said.

2.2. Analysing fiction fragments

In this unit you will learn how to analyse fiction fragments with the help of provided analysis schemes and sets of questions. Before analyzing any work of fiction one should remember that there are NO absolutely uniform fragments, all fragments are peculiar. Thus it is hard to make a universal analysis scheme; therefore, some points of the given schemes can fall out and some new ones can be added by the analyst. For the same reason we supplied each fragment for practice with an individual set of helping tasks.

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Tips on literary work analysis

Answers to the questions below will help you to give and form your own opinion on the language of the story/extract/fragment.

1.Is the language of the work expressive/ powerful/ charged with emotion/ stylistically coloured?

Does the author make a vast use of tropes and figures of speech?

2.Is simplicity/ accessibility/ brevity/ concision/ etc. a characteristic feature of the author's style?

3.Is the story written in a high-flown /plain/ colloquial/formal/pompous/ bombastic/ lofty/ florid/ an informal/ elevated/ ornate/ ornamental/ austere/ etc. language?

What mood and atmosphere does it create?

4.Do all the personages speak good English? Is their accent or dialect suggestive? What can you say about the personages' educational background and social class?

5.Which stylistic groups prevail in the story: bookish, colloquial, or neutral? What effect does it produce?

6.Are all the parts of the story written in the same style or are there any fragments, which are stylistically contrasted to the rest of the story because of the language and style?

7.Are there passages written in a kind of rhythmical prose? How is this rhythmic effect achieved? Does the rhythm create the effect of dynamism (monotony)?

8.What kind of atmosphere is rendered? (That of fuss/ fatigue/ haste/ annoyance/ panic/ terror/ etc.)

From The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King

1.Read the extract below, state where the character is.

2.Do you think she is familiar with and feels comfortable in the environment judging by the first sentence of the extract? What stylistic devices help you to form your opinion?

3.Is the extract a description, a narration or an exposition? Give your reasons.

4.Speak about the image of the woods.

a)What method of characterization is used: direct or indirect?

b)Is the image rendered through the author's or the character's eyes?

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