Selected Elements of Fiction Analysis

I. Plot (plot vs. story)
-plot: artistic arrangement of events, how artist present story

-story: sequence of events in chronological order

Plot has:
a. emphasis: what author decided to focus on/ignore
b. pacing: how fast to cover certain materials
c. order: chronological? flashback? reverse? mixed? chain of causality or episodic?

Ways of describing Structure in Plot (see Freytag's Pyramid):

1. initial balance/exposition (characters/settings introduced)
2. disturbance, conflict
3. rising action: moments of crisis
4. climax: moment of ultimate crisis, turning point
5. falling action
6. denouement or resolution (unraveling of plot/conflict)

 

II. Narrator: character who tells the story, two major types
a. first person: character is story tells the tale

  • question: is narrator reliable or not?

    b. third person: voice outside the action tells the tale

  • does the narrator enter all minds/places--omniscient
  • narrator enters one character's mind--limited
  • narrator's attitude toward reader important
  • is narrator symbolic/poetic?

    c. effaced narrator: commentary obviously attributed to author's own ideas and opinions, not to one of her or his characters

    III. Point of View (the camera eye of the story)

    author's choice of who narrator is at any given time determines what and how much we know as readers

    IV. Setting: time and place of story (times and places)

  • physical and cultural environment where action occurs
  • must we "interpret" the setting?
  • could it signal character moods or events?
  • is it a "real world" setting or not?
  • is it a symbolic setting?
  • how is setting presented (all or once, a bit at a time)?

    V. Characterization: people/things which speak & act in story

    Central and Minor characters can be:

    1. Flat vs. Round

  • flat: one dimensional, stock, stereotype
  • round: multiple qualities, unique

    2. Static vs. Dynamic

  • static: does not change at all in tale
  • dynamic: changes and develops in story

    3. Protagonists and Antagonists

  • protagonist: the main character, we are most concerned with
  • antagonist: the opponent to the main character

    How characters are created:
    1. by name
    2. physical appearance
    3. speech, how they talk and what they speak about
    4. from what other characters say about them
    5. from narrator's descriptions
    6. from actions of character
    7. from thoughts of character and other characters
    8. if character is associated with object/surrounding

    Reuben's Elements of Fiction