SHORT PASSAGES FOR DISCUSSION

Begin practicing the analysis of tone by using short passages that use a specific device such as Diction, Images, Details, Language or Sentence Structure to convey tone. Suggest what tone words you would use to describe the speaker's attitude.

1.      In his "The Fall of the House of Usher," Edgar Allan Poe has created clear tone. Identify the tone, then examine and provide examples of diction, details, imagery, and syntax that create the tone

During the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been passing alone, on horseback, through a singularly dreary tract of country, and at length found myself, as the shades of the evening drew on, within view of the melancholy House of Usher...I reined my horse to the precipitous brink of a black and lurid tarn that lay in unruffled luster by the dwelling...(with) vacant eye-like windows.

Edgar Allan Poe From "The Fall of the House of Usher."

1. Color code the literary devices in the paragraph by using the following key:

red = diction

blue =details

purple =imagery

dark green =syntax

2. Choose three to five examples of each literary device listed above and explain connotation, and the effect of the literary device on the tone.

Ex: Diction such as " ______," " _______," "_______," and "________" offers the connotation of _________, etc. These examples help reinforce the tone because  . . .

Diction is used by words such as oppressively, melancholy, precipitous, and lurid are examples of details that help describe and allow you to have a better knowing of what’s going on

 

Imagery such as eye-like windows, shades of evening drew, low in the heavens, and autumn of the year help describe and push forward the story.

 

Details such as dull, dark, and soundless, dwelling, vacant and unruffled are examples of details that help describe and allow you to have a better knowing of what’s going on