FICTION

Note: Examples (taken from Premium Harmony): Plot: Mary suffering a heart attack in the supermarket. It triggers a lot of action, through which we learn a lot about Ray and his relationship to Mary.Tone: Ironical – even satirical – in its criticism of the American way of life, the materialism, the accomplishment of superficial happiness through material consumption. Structure: Logical progressing action along a time line. Themes: Obesity. Materialistic consumption. A love-less marriage. Provincial, small-town America, in the midst of economic recession, and dominated by in-authentic values. Big business dominates the town (“Wally World” and Wal-Mart having its own stoplight).

In literary analysis you often use the following terms:

To make an analysis of the text, you combine them in various ways, cf the figure below. For instance when you analyse the dialogue in the text, you infer from the dialogue character traits of the main characters. They reveal who they are through the way they speak and what they say.

An example: A piece of text taken from Stephen King’s short story Premium Harmony (The New Yorker Nov. 9,  2009), which tells the story about the janitor Ray and his wife Mary, who live in the fictional town of Castle Rock in Maine (setting):

“Then another year goes by and we’re still there,” she says. “We can’t wait another year, Ray. We’ll be bankrupts.”

When she talks, Biz looks at her from his place in the back seat. Sometimes he looks at Ray when Ray talks, but not always. Mostly he looks at Mary.

“What do you think?” he says. “It’s going to rain just so you don’t have to worry about going bankrupt?”

“We’re in it together, in case you forgot,” she says. They’re driving through Castle Rock now. It’s pretty dead. What Ray calls “the economy” has disappeared from this part of Maine. The Wal-Mart is on the other side of town, near the high school where Ray is a janitor. The Wal-Mart has its own stoplight. People joke about it.

“Penny wise and pound foolish,” he says. “You ever hear that one?”

“A million times, from you.”

He grunts. He can see the dog in the rearview mirror, watching her. He sort of hates the way Biz does that. It occurs to him that neither of them knows what they are talking about.

“And pull in at the Quik-Pik,” she says. “I want to get a kickball for Tallie’s birthday.” Tallie is her brother’s little girl. Ray supposes that makes her his niece, although he’s not sure that’s right, since all the blood is on Mary’s side.

“They have balls at Wal-Mart,” Ray says. “And everything’s cheaper at Wally World.”

“The ones at Quik-Pik are purple. Purple is her favorite color. I can’t be sure there’ll be purple at Wal-Mart.”

They are on their way to Wall Mart to buy grass seed. Through the dialogue we learn that their financial situation is rather strenuous, partly due to the financial crisis of 2007-9, during which a lot of American home owners got close to financial ruin. The setting is small town America, and an important theme is how this affects the characters. Through the dialogue we get a sense of Mary being the sensible one. Ray is shying away from the work with the lawn, and she is reasoning with him: “We cannot just wait for the rain”.  She is tired of listening to his clichés (“penny wise and pound foolish”, which she has heard a million times). The dialogue cannot give all the information. We’re supplied with background information about Tallie. Events are seen from Ray’s perspective (point-of-view): “Ray supposes that makes her his niece” – but family matters don’t seem to be his strong side.
    Like many old married couples they argue about trivial matters, in this case whether balls are cheaper at Wal-Mart or Quik-Pik. 
    It irritates Ray that the dog seems to be more attached to Mary than to him (is he even slightly jealous?): He can see the dog in the rearview mirror, watching her. He sort of hates the way Biz does that.

The story can be considered a kind of morality tale. The author tells a story of the obesity epidemic through Ray’s and Mary’s life. The author’s message is: Don’t live that kind of life, be more authentic in your love relationships and the way you communicate with people around you. Ray is dishonest in his dealings with people around him. He regards attractive women as potential “easy lays” and he stays in a marriage he is fed up with. 

The short story

A short story may be very short or very long. Generally, however, a short story is neither very short, nor long. Being  a short story it wants to convey its message or excitement/thrill in a rather compressed form. It is not like the novel, which is so long that more detailed character analysis and deeper exploration of themes can be made. 

Text:

The text in the box above is probably the shortest short story in the history of literature. It does not contain many of the items mentioned above. There is no character, no plot, no dialogue, etc. And yet it is quite a powerful story, because it turns the reader’s imagination on. You cannot help wondering: What happened to the baby, - did something sinister (perhaps death) happen to it? And what about the parents – how do they feel about it? So, in a way this story is unfolding in the reader’s mind.

The story above is also very short. Actually, it belongs to a genre called a short short story.  

The story is set in Montana, a mountainous state in the United States of America. It derived its name from the Spanish word montaña, meaning mountain (the name of a character in the American writer Curt Vonnegut’s novel Slaughterhouse Five. The dramatic theme is stressed by the story taking place in Montana where some of the wars against the original inhabitants of  America occurred. There is a contrast between the savagery of the white settlers in the state in the second half of the 19^th century and the timidity of Dennis, the protagonist.
There are two characters, Dennis and Maury, who are cousins. 
Point of View (POV): 3^rd person limited, as the narrator is only seeing things from Dennis’ point of view. From this POV we can see that Dennis is a very cautious fellow. He is even afraid of very “menacing” concepts like heroin.
There is not much of a plot in the story. Two cousins stop at a roadside café in Montana and have a conversation about drugs. That is not a very interesting plot. There is no thrill. The thrill is in Dennis’ mind. He is thrilled by words describing things that border on what is abnormal, like taking a dangerous drug. Likewise “lynching, carcass and fish-gutting knife” make him shiver. He even feels potential castration at the thought of such dangerous and “sad” phenomena. Dennis obviously is afraid of facing life itself with its many potentially hurtful things and experiences.
   The main theme is not drugs. It is rather the existential challenge that Dennis is confronted with in the cousin’s history of drug use.
   Instead of enjoying the stay at the roadside café with his cousin, Dennis wished “he were alone in Montana, going the other way, perhaps in a plane”.  It’s meant to be funny, - and a bit ironic: “he could stretch his brain and almost understand….”.
   There is dialogue in the story. It facilitates the author’s point, which perhaps (if there is any seriousness in the story) is: Do not be fearful of life. Try it out! Take what it may give! If it was not for the dialogue the message would appear too heavy.  With the dialogue the message is served in a light and humorous way. The Gender perspective adds to the fun: Who is the fearful one? Who is the one who has tried the dangerous drug?

The Narrative Method

In many fictional stories, novels included, the author uses the narrative method. Narration means story telling. How do you tell a story so that it interests the reader to such an extent that this one continues turning the pages. Often identification with the protagonist helps: If the readers feels that he or she “is in the protagonist’s place, this helps. This requires a character as protagonist that the reader wants to identify with.

Freitag’s triangle

Gustav Freitag was a German writer in the 19^th century who described the general pattern of making suspense in a story.
    There is a pattern of rising action, a climax and falling action. It starts with an exposition where the reader is presented with necessary background information. In the exposition there is very often a presentation of the main conflict or tension in the story.It ends in the denoument (French word meaning “resolution of conflict”).

Of course, this is not necessarily an element in all stories, or one can find only some of these items. Many short stories start in medias res (“right in the middle of event”, that is without introduction). In the Dave Eggers story above the exposition is very short: “Two cousins were travelling through Montana”). The next piece of expository information is very short: “….and were rightfully astounded by the grandeur of the state, which is beautiful….”  We see the landscape through the eyes of the characters and are presented with their experiencing of it. In that way the setting is introduced in a light way, and a way that tells us something about the characters.  
    The climax of  These Two Cousins is Maura saying. "I tried heroin once," Maura said. The conversation leading up to it is the rising action. Then the story fades out very quickly with the shock taking hold of Dennis and his wishing he were alone.
    However, in this story the main point is not the method and procdure of the narration. The main point is the way the two cousins, man and woman, experience the raw facts of life: that people are different, and people close to you might have done things that are shocking to you.

Fiction and Non-fiction

Fiction is based in the author’s imagined world. Non-fiction is writing based in facts, real life, the real world.

     But sometimes the distinction is blurred. That is often the case in modernist and postmodernist writing. Today, many writers view the dividing line between fiction and non-fiction as thin, artificial, or even non-existent. Some writers use the same writing techniques in both:

…..when a writer comes to a story, whether fiction or nonfiction, they employ many of the same techniques, of narrative, plot, pace, mood and dialogue. This is one reason I think the distinction between fiction and nonfiction … is, well, a fiction. (Aminatta Forna,The Guardian Dec 6 2015)

   Postmodernist writers often want to break with the illusion of “the imagined world looking  real”, when the realistic author has created look-alike characters that he or she moves around on the stage which is a look-alike replica of the real world stage. Postmodernist writers want to break this illusion in order to show how contingent everything is: It happens, or has happened, but something else might just as well have happened. The scope for choice is infinite. Identities are constructed, and they may be reconstructed.

There may be several endings, and the reader may have the option to choose one ending - or the option to continue writing the story.

- There is a real environment and events are real.  ….. At least that was what we thought, the postmodernist might add.

NON-FICTION TEXTS

THE NEWS ARTICLE

 Inverted Pyramid

   It deals with factual events. In some ways, however, the text might appear fictional if we didn’t know it is an article. There is more of a plot in this “story” than in the previous one.
    There is not much description of character in the story about the unfortunate priest. We only get factual information about the characters. We are told what they do and what they say.  But we can safely conclude that both of the two main characters are very moral and ethically committed persons. They are competing about what is the more ethical act: encouraging poor people to find the “easy way” out of the most urgent poverty, or keeping young people out of crime.
   The article/story was printed because it fulfills the news criteria: Something extraordinary happened, which makes it interesting to a newspaper’s readers. It is newsworthy, because it happened not so long ago. There is tension and  a dramatic conflict between Tim and Martin, which leads to a very unusual event: The pouring of pasta on a priest. There is something controversial: The priest’s sermon.  (Compare how the story is dealt with in The Daily Mail).

Communication Model

Whenever you want to analyse a text, a film, a speech, or anything else, it may be useful to see it through the lens of the communication model.

Above is a version of the simple communication model. In the simplest form it may be A (communicator) saying something to B (receiver). A’s message may be understood – or it may not be understood - by B. It is understood if A speaks sufficiently clearly and sufficiently loudly. And, of course, they must share the same language in order to understand each other.

When we read a short story, we may be aware of the fact that the sender is an author and a publisher. The message (the short story) may be encoded in such a way that it can be easily understood by almost everybody, or it may be encoded in such a way that it is only understood by those with a high education.

If the author wants to get on the best seller lists, he or she has to write in a code that is understood by many different people (target groups involve readers from various social backgrounds).

The complicated communication model can be used to analyse how a message is transmitted from sender to receiver (the five wh-questions may be answered), when society at large is taken into account. Then we attempt to answer the question: How do the surroundings, technology and other factors have a say in how the message is sent and to what extent it is received.
    Take the news article about the priest encouraging poor people to shoplift. The sender is the journalist, who wrote the piece, and the newspaper The Guardian.
    The receiver is the readers of The Guardian. And furthermore: The Readers of The Guardian online. It is generally considered a “serious” paper with some left-leaning tendencies. So one may wonder why they publish such an item of news?
    The Daily Mail, which is a more sensational paper, prints a longer article about it. It is more in line with this paper’s editorial policy. In the Mail there is an ironic twist to the story. In the title it says. Thou shalt shoplift….”, thus suggesting a kind of biblical message (ten commandments!), but turning it upside down by writing it as an affirmative title.  There are more than 700 comments from readers. That means it has a considerable effect.
    The two papers code the message, which is the news article, differently. In The Mail there is a photo of the priest. And the paper stresses the biblical connotations, thus perhaps provoking more resentment and indignation among religious people.
    Newspapers (in paper form and online) are privately owned. They have to make a profit or avoid a deficit on the bottom line in order to survive. Therefore sensational news is printed. But it is dealt with differently in different types of media (compare local media, where there is even a transcript of the priest’s sermon).  

Rhetorical Analysis (Example.)

Rhetorical analysis is used on speeches in which the speaker tries to convince an audience that he or she is right. It may also be used in other contexts when a writer, film maker og singer wants to persuade people to accept an argument.

The following are some of the steps it may be useful to go through:

1 How can you use the communication model to see how the framing and putting the pessage depends on the communication situation? That means: You may beging by answering the five wh-questions in the simple communication model (Who sends to whom, etc.). You may proceed with a more complex model: What is the target group (målgruppe)? How was the sender influenced by his/her perception of the target group when encoding the message? What is the primary target group (for instance the audience in a lecture hall), what is the secondary (when the press and other media report it to the public at large).
    You may look on the speech as a text. But you may also be aware of the speaker’s body language, mimicry and visual background effects in media messages.

2 The speaker’s ethos, that is his or her trustworthiness. How do the audience perceive the reliability of the person speaking. Does he or her have academic credentials, respected titles, or other attributes that evoke respect among the audience? 

3  How is the speech/message composed? Is there a logical structure that progresses from start, main body, to a conclusion at the end? Or does the speaker hit at all flying targets in a more or less chaotic way?

4 How does the speaker put forth arguments, and are these arguments logically structure and supported by valid reasons and facts? Or does the speaker put forth invalid arguments that are not reasonable and supported by verifiable facts?
    In other words: Does the speaker use Logos (rational and logical arguments based on facts)? Does the speaker use pathos (appealing to passion/emotions). Does the speaker use ethos (appealing to the trustworthiness and reliability of the speaker by way of dress, titles, education, social status etc)?

5 How is the message coined? That is: Does the speaker use simple words and sentences, or does he/she use a more complex language – subordinated clauses, causal relations (because, as), and conditional clauses (if)?
Does he or she speak literally (bogstaveligt) or are metaphors (metaforer) or other types of figurative language being used?
 

Analysis of Argumentation

In an analysis of argumentation you test the arguments of a speaker hold water. You want to see if the arguments are valid, reliable and consistent. 
    Generally, a speaker makes some claims (påstande) about something, and he wants to support the claims through various types of arguments. For instance: “Most people vote for Candidate X. He is a good man. He does not get money from Wall Street”.
     It starts with a claim about people voting for a certain politician in an election. Why? – because: “he is a good man”.
    The argument for voting for X consists of (in the Toulmin model):

A claim (påstand): People vote for X
A ground (belæg):  He is a good man
Backing of the claim: He does not receive money from firms in Wall Street for his campaign
Warrant (hjemmel): It can reasonably be assumed that politician who do not receive money support for their campaigns from big business are “good” politicians.

Whether X is actually a “good man” remains to be seen. Is “not receiving money from big business” sufficient criteria for being a “good man”? – Hardly. To support the argument we should need further evidence.

Discourse Analysis

In a discourse analysis we want to explore a text/message for hidden power relationships. The hypothesis is that language is never completely objective. It is subjective. Even if you may want to base your message on facts, the way you choose among facts and how you describe them may reveal something about your personal preferences. Objectivity may be an ideal you want to pursue, and perhaps you succeed to some extent. But it is impossible to be a one hundred per cent objective. Bias may sneak in in a variety of ways.

A discourse consists of a core concept, for instance democracy, free market, freedom. And then there a concepts, words that support this key concept in chains of equivalent signifiers.

In the following excerpt from a speech given  by Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn the nodal point is  justice

We celebrate the values of solidarity, of compassion, of social justice, fighting for the under-privileged, and of working for people at home and abroad.  Whilst we value and protect the rights that we have in this country, the same thing does not apply to trade unionists all over the world.  Those people that died in that dreadful fire in China where there was a free market philosophy around the operation of a port, fire-fighters died trying to protect other workers who should have been protected by decent health and safety conditions……  Source: https://www.tuc.org.uk/about-tuc/congress/congress-2015/speech-leader-labour-party-jeremy-corbyn-tuc-annual-congress .

Justice is a floating signifier. It is a word that may take on a multiplicity of meanings, according to the context and how it is articulated in communication. In this case the chains of equivalent signifiers give it meaning in the concrete articulation. It is “social justice”. The speech is given at a congregation of trade unionists. This helps to explain the meaning of the word solidarity. A group of home owners also want to show solidarity to each other to help develop the value of their property. In this case, however, it is working class solidarity, between members of the trade union and to other members of society, particularly other workers. “Free market”, which may be a positive term in the words of liberalists, is in this context given a negative meaning by the use of “philosophy” and the context of a work related accident in the Chinese port.

The ideological content is furthermore stressed by the choice of facts and value terms, and the contexts in which these are used.

An Example: “The Big Society” – construction of a new discourse

In 2010 the Conservative political leader David Cameron tried to convince the British people that a new discourse for society was needed. It was not enough any longer to be conservative in the traditional way, i.e. basing your conservative beliefs in the notions of tradition, royalty, “Britishness”, and long-cherished conservative valutes. A new direction for Britain was needed. And when he won power at the general election in 2010 he wanted to impugn the narrative of “the big society” on Britain.

He delivered a speech in Liverpool, one of the “troubled cities” of Britain at the time. In the speech he talked about “broken Britain” and how it had to be mended through his vision of the “Big Society”.  

Figure    : Wordle of Big Society Speech

In a wordle the frequency of words being used is counted and the result can be seen (figure above). The most frequently used words and phrases may reflect the dominant discourse – or parts of it. You can also use the website www.wordclouds.com (click on file and paste text. There is in this site also a wordlist menu in which you can see the frequencies of words being used, and you may edit by removing words).

First of all, we can se that “society” and “local government” are frequently used expressions in the text. For Cameron it is important to stress that we live in a society, and we have local government to help run and manage society. He does not share the former conservative leader Margaret Thathcer’s notion “that there is no such thing as society”  (meaning, in the final analysis, that we are perhaps isolated, atomized individuals competing with each other in the market place). 

In a discourse we look for key words that reveal what the discourse is about.

Opponents to Cameron might argue that his discourse is about saving money for the public purse. The welfare state has become too costly for the taxpayers to continue supporting it. So we might as well try to find another way. And the big society may be appropriate as a way to tell people that they must be a lot more effective in helping themselves – in their families and their local communities.

On the other hand Cameron does not want it to be a saving exercise – at least this is not the way he puts it in his speech. Reality may prove the opposite. But until that is the case we must take his words at face value.

In discourse analysis you may be interested in key words and words that operate as so-called “floating signifiers”. These are words that change their meaning with the various contexts in which they may be used.

Discursive Social Constructions

We have already seen how “society” was used very differently by a former conservative leader, compared to how Cameron uses it. To him it is a positive term, signifying the fact that we are connected in a society, and that there is hence a measure of solidarity among the members of a society.

In discourse theory society is a discursive social construction. In the sense the word has been used here we cannot see a concrete representation of it. It is not like a stone we see lying in the street. It is a concrete thing and we use the word “stone” to denote it.
    “Society” is not a concrete thing that we can see. It consists of institutions, people, and relationships, and, most importantly, it changes “form” and substance according to who use the term, and how they use it.  But that also implies that it changes its content according to how the speaker wishes to construct it.

This applies to a number of terms, for instance “democracy”, “love”,“gender”, “justice” and “faith” (tro).  That means that we are constructing society through the way we are talking about it.