PROCRASTINATION (ugh!) / Elements of Literature notes, necessary for Q1 novel project

The information that follows was handed out in class today. I figured it'd be more reliable than the notes that students would take, though it's informational text and it bores them out of their minds. We tried reading it in melodramatic fashion, but I'm not sure if the information was actually received and put into their minds. Therefore, I'm posting it here as well. All of the information will be terribly helpful when working on the mystery novel project. The deadline for that cereal box project is looming and none of the students have started! Someone actually asked me WHEN they SHOULD begin. I did assign the project several weeks ago and HOPED that students would zip through their novels and dive into project-mode. (That has not happened. Parents, I beg of you, please encourage your child to NOT procrastinate. The project is worth A LOT of points and will have a large impact on quarter one grades!)

Elements of Literature

 
Plot Pyramid

·        Exposition (the “once upon a time” part where you’re introduced to a situation, characters, setting, conflict)

·        Inciting Incident (this is where the reader gets hooked because the action begins and you want to know what is going to happen next)

·        Rising Action (several things will happen in order to have a story; action builds while excitement and suspense increase)

·        Climax (high point of the story; most exciting)

·        Falling Action (again, several things will occur during this time; excitement starts to fall and action slows as loose ends begin to tie up)

·        Resolution (ultimately, this is the conclusion, the outcome, the ending; how everything is resolved)

·        Dénouement (the final piece that wraps it all up with a scene or even a line that really sticks with you; it’s like the nice little bow atop a gift)

 

Conflict

·        This is the struggle between opposing forces

·        Conflict can be internal or external

Ø INTERNAL: this conflict occurs inside the character (man vs. himself / can be mental or physical; think of things such as jealousy, addiction, moral situations, struggling to make decisions, wrong vs. right, uncontrollable rage, etc.)

Ø EXTERNAL: this conflict is when the character battles or struggles with outside forces (man vs. man; man vs. nature; man vs. fate)

Characters

·        Protagonist: the main character in a literary work

·        Antagonist: the character OR force in conflict with the main character in a literary work

·        Other types of characters that exist:

Ø Flat: a character with very few details given about them; they aren’t developed enough to have much in the way of personality traits; they exist to help move the story along and their personality traits do not change

Ø Round: a character with a lot of personality traits; the reader learns a lot of details about the character; they also exist to help move the story along and to help us learn more about our main character or our antagonist

Ø Static: a character that doesn’t change at all throughout the story; their personality, beliefs, etc. remain the same regardless of events that occur

Ø Dynamic: a character that experiences some type of change during the story due to events that occur. The change in outlook or character is permanent. (One way to remember this character type is to associate a dynamic character w/dynamite. Light the fuse and dynamite changes, right? It’ll change characters, too, if they don’t chuck the dynamite in time, lol.)

Characterization

·        How we learn about the characters in a literary work.

·        TWO TYPES:

Ø Direct characterization: the narrator OR a character in the story tells us what we need to know about a character. (Remember, narrators CAN and DO lie. They cannot be trusted 100 percent, so you have to pay attention to other things such as the second type of characterization, which is noted below!)

Ø Indirect characterization: the reader learns about characters through a character’s thoughts, comments, actions, etc. (Notice that this is how YOU find out about the people around you in real life! You only know what people tell you and what you can glean from observing someone’s behavior, attitude, reactions, etc. Remember that even a character can lie—just as people do in real life—so you can only trust so much of what you learn through this type of characterization as well. IF the character doesn’t realize anyone is paying attention, other characters (and the reader) can discover things about each other that they may not otherwise learn.)

Point-of-View

·        WHO is telling the story? This is the angle from which the reader experiences the story as events unfold. There are three major points-of-view as well as differences in third-person (see below).

Ø First-person POV: The narrator is a character in the story and refers to him or herself using first-person pronouns such as I, my, me, mine, ours, we, us.

Ø Second-person POV: Usually this POV is reserved for instructions. The reader is being spoken to directly and the narrator uses pronouns such as you and your.

Ø Third-person POV: A narrator is telling the story. They aren’t a part of the story itself (or else they’d be a character and it’d be in first-person). TWO TYPES:

v Limited third-person: This narrator relates the innermost thoughts and feelings of only ONE CHARACTER and tells the story as seen through the eyes of that character. Remember that they may be biased or untrustworthy!

v Omniscient: This narrator can get inside the characters’ minds. OMNI means “all” and SCIENT means “knowing”—so when you put it together, the narrator is all-knowing! The narrator has the ability to tell the thoughts, feelings and actions of any character.

Setting

·        The time, place(s), and circumstances where the action and scenes take place. Does the entire story take place in one room? Does it take place it a large city, a rural area, a foreign country, in cars and airplanes, or a variety of places? Is it present-day, in the past, or does it occur in a futuristic society? Setting involves both the “big” picture and the “smaller” picture where every scene takes place. Think of your story like a movie and where the scenes would take place and what they would look like if you were watching a film.

Mood

·        This is also known as atmosphere; it’s the feeling that the story creates in the reader. As you read, how does the literature make you feel? A novel can have an overall mood OR specific scenes can create mood. For instance, a dark night in an abandoned house evokes a mood that is gloomy or frightening whereas sunshine and a field full of lush green grass and daisies would bring about the sense of happiness or freedom or joy in the reader. (Note that writers can use this as a tool to create scenes that are unexpected or ironic. Perhaps a serial killer lunges out of the tall grassy field of daisies and murders someone.)

Imagery

·         When words or phrases appeal to the five senses to help the reader get a sense of the setting or the scene that is happening. Imagery creates a visual for us and can make writing more cinematic (like a movie) and it can help us to associate events with feelings of our own. (taste, touch, smell, sight, sound)

Theme

·        This is the main idea that the author hopes the reader will get from the story; it’s like an insight to life that should make you think. It is NOT the same thing as plot! Consider what point the writer tried to make when telling the story. What does he or she want you, the reader, to get from it?