What, Why, and How?

12 LITERATURE
Fiction

Drama
 WHAT ARE THE MAIN LITERARY
FORMS?
The main literary forms are Fiction, Drama & Poetry.
Although each of the three major literary genres, fiction, drama, and poetry are different, they have many
elements in common. For example, in all three genres, authors make purposeful use of diction (word
choice), employ imagery (significant detail) and each piece of literature has its own unique tone (emotional
quality). An important element that you will find in all three genres is theme, the larger meaning(s) the
reader derives from the poem, story, novel or play.

Each of the literary genres is distinguished by its form: Fiction is written in sentences and paragraphs.
Poetry is written in lines and stanzas. Drama is written in dialogue.

WHY IS KNOWING THEM IMPORTANT?

As you read different forms of literature you will need to know specialized vocabulary to be able to best
understand, interpret, and write about what you are reading. Also, how you approach a literary text and what
you focus on will depend on its literary form. For instance, fiction and drama are typically anchored by a
reader’s engagement with characters while many poems do not contain a character or tell a story.
Therefore, plot is often not a factor in a poem. A poem can be an impression or reflection about a
person, a place, an experience or an idea.

HOW DO I APPROACH EACH FORM?

FICTION

KNOW THE DIFFERENT TYPES OF FICTION:

Short Stories are usually defined as being between 2000-6000 words long. Most short stories have at least
one “rounded” (developed and complex) character and any number of “flat” (less- developed, simpler)
characters. Short stories tend to focus on one major source of conflict and often take place within one basic
time period.

Novellas generally run between 50-150 pages, halfway between a story and a novel.

Novels don’t have a prescribed length. Because they are a longer form of fiction, an author has more freedom
to work with plot and characters, as well as develop sub-plots and move freely through time. Characters can
change and develop over the course of time and the theme(s) can be broader and more intricate than in shorter
forms of fiction.
 DRAMA

KNOW THE DIFFERENT TYPES AND STRUCTURE OF DRAMA:

Drama Types:
Tragedy – generally serious in tone, focusing on a protagonist who experiences an eventual downfall
Comedy – light in tone, employs humor and ends happily
Satire – exaggerated and comic in tone for the purpose of criticism or ridicule

Experimental – can be light or serious in tone. It creates its own style through experimentation with
language, characters, plot, etc.
Musical – can be light or serious. The majority of the dialogue is sung rather than spoken.

Drama Structure:

Plays are organized into dialogue, scenes and acts. A play can be made up one act or multiple acts. Each
act is divided into scenes, in which a character, or characters, come on or off stage and speak their lines. A play
can have only one character or many characters. The main character is the protagonist and a character who
opposes him/her is the antagonist.

The plots of plays typically follow this pattern:

Rising Action – complications the protagonist must face, composed of any number of conflicts and crises

Climax – the peak of the rising action and the turning point for the protagonist

Falling Action – the movement toward a resolution

COMMONALITIES OF FICTION AND DRAMA TERMS:

Both fiction and drama are typically anchored by plot and character. They also contain literary themes as
well as having other elements in common, so we will look at literary terms that can be applied to both of
these literary forms.
FICTION AND DRAMA TERMS:

PLOT: Plot is the unfolding of a dramatic situation; it is what happens in the narrative. Be aware that writers of
fiction arrange fictional events into patterns. They select these events carefully, they establish causal relationships
among events, and they enliven these events with conflict. Therefore, more accurately defined, plot is a pattern of
carefully selected, casually related events that contain conflict.

There are two general categories of conflict: internal conflict, takes place within the minds of the characters and
external conflict, takes place between individuals or between individuals and the world external to the individuals
(the forces of nature, human created objects, and environments).

The forces in a conflict are usually embodied by characters, the most relevant being the protagonist, the main
character, and the antagonist, the opponent of the protagonist (the antagonist is usually a person but can also be a
nonhuman force or even an aspect of the protagonist—his or her tendency toward evil and self- destruction for
example).

QUESTIONS ABOUT PLOT: What conflicts does it dramatize?

 What is the main conflict?  What qualities or values does the author associate
 What are the minor conflicts? with each side of the conflict?
 How are all the conflicts related?  Where does the turning point or climax
 What causes the conflicts? occur? Why?
 Which conflicts are external, which are internal?  How is the main conflict resolved?
 Which conflicts go unresolved? Why?

CHARACTERS: There are two broad categories of character development: simple and complex. Simple (or
“flat”) characters have only one or two personality traits and are easily recognizable as stereotypes—the shrewish
wife, the lazy husband, the egomaniac, etc. Complex (or “rounded”) characters have multiple personality traits
and therefore resemble real people. They are much harder to understand and describe than simple characters. No single
description or interpretation can fully contain them. For the characters in modern fiction, the hero has often been
replaced by the antihero, an ordinary, unglamorous person often confused, frustrated and at odds with modern life.

QUESTIONS ABOUT CHARACTERS: What is revealed by the characters and how they are portrayed?

 Are they simple, complex, dynamic or static?  What problems do they have?
 If they are complex, what makes them complex?  How do they attempt to solve them?
 What are the traits of the main characters  Do they experience epiphanies (life
in the story? changing moments of insight, discovery or
 Do they change? How and why? revelation)?
 What events or moments of self-realization  What emotional reactions do the main
produce these changes? characters have and in reaction to what?
 What do they learn?  Do they have traits that contradict one
 Does what they learn help or hinder them? another or cause internal conflicts?
 How do they interact with one another?
 How do they relate to one another?
 FICTION AND DRAMA TERMS:

THEME: The theme is an idea or point that is central to a story, which can often be summed up in a word or a few
words (e.g. loneliness, fate, oppression, rebirth, coming of age; humans in conflict with technology; nostalgia; the
dangers of unchecked power). A story may have several themes. Themes often explore historically common or cross-
culturally recognizable ideas, such as ethical questions and commentary on the human condition, and are usually implied
rather than stated explicitly.

QUESTIONS ABOUT THEME: To help identify themes ask yourself questions such as these:

 Is the title or are the character names related  What image of humankind emerges from the
to the theme? work? How is society portrayed?
 Does the main character change in any way? Are characters in conflict with their society?
Realize anything important? If the society is flawed, how is it flawed?
 Does the author or do the characters make
 What control over their lives do the
characters have?
any important observations about life, human nature or
human behavior?
 What are the moral issues or conflicts in the
work?
 Are themes revealed through actions,
 What did you feel after you read the story?
dramatic statements or personalities of characters?
 If characters convey conflicting values,
What part of your life connected with the story and where
did that connection happen?
which values does the work seem to be defending?
Are there repeating patterns or symbols?
 What ideas are implied by the total
impression of the work?

SYMBOLISM: In the broadest sense, a symbol is something that represents something else. Words, for example,
are symbols. But in literature, a symbol is an object that has meaning beyond itself. The object is concrete and the
meanings are abstract.

QUESTIONS ABOUT SYMBOLS: Not every work uses symbols, and not every character, incident, or object in a
work has symbolic value. You should ask fundamental questions in locating and interpreting symbols:

What symbols does the work seem to have? Is there evidence in the text that can be used to understand
Are you sure you are not finding a “symbol” where none and develop this symbol?
was intended? What does the symbol mean?
How do you know it is a symbol? What larger meaning can be understood though this
What does the author do that gives symbolic meaning to symbol?
this element?
 MORE FICTION AND DRAMA TERMS:

SETTING: The social mores, values, and customs of the world in which the characters live; the physical world; and
the time of the action, including historical circumstances.

TONE: The narrator’s predominant attitude toward the subject, whether that subject is a particular setting, an event, a
character, or an idea.

POINT OF VIEW: The author’s relationship to his or her fictional world, especially to the minds of the
characters. Put another way, point of view is the position from which the story is told. There are four common points of
view:
*Omniscient point of view—the author tells the story and assumes complete knowledge of the characters’ actions
and thoughts.
*Limited omniscient point of view—the author still narrates the story but restricts his or her revelation—and
therefore our knowledge—to the thoughts of just one character.
*First person point of view—one of the characters tells the story, eliminating the author as narrator. The narration is
restricted to what one character says he or she observes.
*Objective point of view—the author is the narrator but does not enter the minds of any of the characters. The writer
sees them (and lets us see them) as we would in real life.

FORESHADOWING: The anticipation of something, which will happen later. It is often done subtlety with
symbols or other indirect devices. We have to use inferential thinking to identify foreshadowing in some stories, and
often it occurs on an almost emotional level as we're reading, leading us further into the heart of the story.

EXPOSITION: The opening portion of a story that sets the scene, introduces characters and gives background
information we may need to understand the story.

INTERIOR MONOLOGUE: An extended exploration of one character's thoughts told from the inside but as if
spoken out loud for the reader to overhear.

STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS: A style of presenting thoughts and sense impressions in a lifelike

fashion, the way thoughts move freely through the mind, often chaotic or dreamlike.

IRONY: Generally irony makes visible a contrast between appearance and reality. More fully and specifically, it
exposes and underscores a contrast between (1) what is and what seems to be, (2) between what is and what ought to be,
(3) between what is and what one wishes to be, (4) and between what is and what one expects to be. Incongruity is the
method of irony; opposites come suddenly together so that the disparity is obvious.

CLIMAX: The moment of greatest tension when a problem or complication may be resolved or, at least, confronted.

RESOLUTION, CONCLUSION or DENOUEMENT ("untying of the knot"): Brings the problem to

some sort of finality, not necessarily a happy ending, but a resolution.
 PRACTICE Using the literary vocabulary and questions, let’s
analyze a literary text.

Read the memoir, “Learning to Read,” by Jessica Powers which can be located in Chapter 1: Critical Reading
in the “Faculty-Written Texts” section. Powers employs many of the elements of fiction in this
autobiographical piece. When you have finished reading, answer the questions below.

Questions about plot:

1.What is the main conflict in the story?

2.What causes the conflict?

3.Is the conflict external or internal?

4.What is the turning point in the story?

5.How is the main conflict resolved?

Questions about character:

1.Is the main character simple or complex? Explain.

2.What are the traits of the main character? Make a list.

3.Does the main character change? Describe.

4.What steps does she go through to change? Make a list.

5.What does she learn? Describe.

6.Does the main character experience an epiphany? Describe.

Questions about theme:

1.What does the story show us about human behavior?

2.Are there moral issues raised by the story? Describe.

3.What does the story tell us about why people change?