Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Critical Analysis
Critical Analysis
Poetry
To analyze is to separate into parts and to examine them in order to
determine the nature of the whole. What are the most important parts of
X? What principle unites these parts into a whole?
SELECTIONS
READING/LITERARY STUDY
Sonnet form
Shakespearean
Petrarchan
Annotation
Determining Audience
Determining Author’s purpose
Main idea
Inference
Tone
Apostrophe
Metaphor
Paradox
Personification
Pun
Simile
Alliteration
Meter
Rhyme
Rhythm
INQUIRY/RESEARCH
Ethics of Research:
Evaluation of Sources
TEKS 14A-G
VIEWING/REPRESENTING/PRODUCTION
View the PBS video on Shakespeare’s life, particularly noting aspects of his
life relating to the sonnets.
Students read their original sonnets aloud to the class and display them in
the classroom.
Listen to an oral interpretation of Shakespeare’s sonnets as they are read on
the McDougal CD, or students prepare and read aloud.
TEKS 21A
RESOURCES
Students will keep a list of QUOTABLES from the play, quotations both
suggested by the teacher as well as quotations selected by the students
that relate to themes and motifs.
After completion of the play, students will choose a favorite theme or motif
as the topic of their critical analysis. Plan a definitive thesis, which may be
approved by the instructor. In a paper on theme, present the theme and
apply it to a character or characters, WHAT the essay is about. In a motif
paper, relate the motif to another element (theme, irony, characterization,
etc.) WHAT the essay is about. The analysis with textual evidence
comprises HOW the paper will be developed. Insights about theme or
effects of motif provide the WHY of the essay.
SELECTIONS
Aristotle – “Tragedy and the Emotions of Pity and Fear” WOI pp. 681-696
Karen Horney – “The Distrust Between the Sexes” WOI pp. 357-370
Carl Jung – “Anima and Animus,” pp. 297-315
READING/LITERARY STUDY
Drama
Catharsis
Hamartia
Hubris
Antagonist/ Protagonist
Epiphany
Foil
Motivation
Stock
Diction
Idiom
Vocabulary
Style
Theme
Tone
Apostrophe
Metaphor
Metonymy
Paradox
Pun
Simile
Synecdoche
Alliteration
Meter
Rhyme
Rhythm
Allusion
Cause/effect
Characterization
Irony
Dramatic
Situational
Verbal
Motif
Symbolism
INQUIRY/RESEARCH
Schedule library time for researching online and print sources of literary
criticism.
VIEWING/REPRESENTING/PRODUCTION
Students view three/four different interpretations of scene 1 of Hamlet.
Suggested:
Hamlet – Dir. Laurence Olivier, 1948;
Hamlet –Dir. Franco Zeffirelli, Perf. Mel Gibson 1990;
Hamlet – Dir. Kenneth Branagh, 1997;
Hamlet – Dir. Michael Almereyda, Perf. Ethan Hawke, 2000.
Analyze setting, music, costume, lighting, camera angles, building of
suspense, and acting, particularly the portrayal of Hamlet in the three
different versions. Write individual responses and discuss.
View the entire video of the drama, using a selected version. Compare the
dramatic interpretation of the film to students’ own interpretations from
the reading. Focus particularly on characterization, tone, building of
suspense, and mood.
In a journal entry, examine Vincent Van Gogh’s painting, “The Starry Night,”
DiYanni, p. 584, for tone, mood, and meaning.
Reader’s Theatre
Groups of students are assigned one act of the play to prepare and read
aloud with enthusiasm and expression. Each student brings in a symbol of
the main character for whom he/she is responsible on the day that his group
reads the act. Groups are responsible for interpretation of their acts as
the need arises in class.
Annotate selected lines in the drama as an outside assignment. Share the
best examples of devices with the class. A group effort at annotating may
be shared by marking selected lines on a transparency.
Memorize the “To Be or Not to Be” soliloquy and quote it to the class or just
to the instructor, as time allows.
Participate in a Socratic dialogue at the end of the unit with each student
bringing in two insightful questions. All students must ask questions and
participate in the dialogue.
Analyze and relate the WOI essays to the play(s) using the questions in The
World of Ideas section of this guide.
Analyze the painting and Robert Fagles’s poem, “The Starry Night,” DiYanni
p. 585 in groups. Relate to Hamlet’s opening scene in terms of mood and tone.
How might Fagles’s ideas about madness relate to Hamlet?
RESOURCES
Robert DiYanni – Literature: Reading Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and the Essay