Prose Review for AP English Literature

Levels of Interpretation

Complex works of literature afford many avenues of interpretation. After you read a work, consider the following areas of exploration. We use Ibsen's Hedda Gabler as a model.

• Literal level: A young woman is frustrated in her life and eventually commits suicide.
• Social level: Ibsen explores the role of women in society and presents the despair connected with a male-dominated existence.
• Psychological level: The play traces a descent into madness and the motivations for aberrant human behavior.
• Religious level: The loss of a soul to temptation, the encounter with the devil, and the inspiration of godliness are all in the play.
• Sexual level: Gender issues, the Electra complex, phallic symbols, abortion, and homosexuality are all developed and explored through numerous love triangles.
• Political level: The play could be read as a treatise on socialism. It denigrates capitalism and pays homage to the ideas of Marx's Communist Manifesto.
• Obviously, you need to supply the evidence from the works to develop your interpretations in a concrete manner.

Obviously, you need to supply the evidence from the works to develop your interpretations in a concrete manner.

Final Comments

One of the most rewarding forms of preparation you can do involves developing a sensitivity to the words of a piece of literature.

Get a journal or set aside a section of your notebook for recording lines you respond to for their beauty, appeal, meaning, or relevance. For each work you read:

• Enter the lines.
• Identify the speaker and situation.
• Interpret, connect, comment, or reflect on your choice.
• Free-associate as well as relate the quotation to the original text.
• Make connections to other works you read.
• Project and expand on the lines

For each full-length work, record at least ten references. Write these quotations out and include the page numbers so you can easily find them if you need to. Try to take them from throughout the work. Here is what is going to happen. Soon, you will automatically identify and respond to significant lines and passages. It will become second nature for you to identify lines of import and meaning in a work as you read. You will also begin to remember lines from a work and to connect them to important details, episodes, and themes. You will be able to understand and analyze a character in light of his or her own language. In other words, you will be interpreting literature based on text.

Review

• Every narrative is composed of plot, setting, character, theme, and point of view.
• Motifs develop characters and themes.
• Themes require specifi c illustrations to support them.
• There are many types of characters and heroes.
• There are many forms of narration.
• Novels may exhibit many characteristics.
• Meaning may be revealed via multiple approaches.
• Parables and allegories operate on symbolic levels. Connotations of words reveal the subtext of a work.
• Tone is a description of the attitude found in a piece of literature.
• Transitions aid movement and unity in a written work.
• Titles and names are important areas for analysis.
• First and last lines often carry great meaning in a work and demand careful attention.
• Works may be interpreted literally, socially, psychologically, sexually, politically, and so on.
• Quotations from works are an accurate way of understanding meaning and characterization. They also provide support for your interpretations.