Vyacheslav Syssoyev Page 2 6/21/2019

Variants of the answer: The author of ___ is ___. ___ was written by ___. ______ is primarily known for his / her psychological novels presenting the profound observation of human nature…

1. 3. What substyle and genre does the text belong to?

Variants of the answer: This text presents a brilliant example of the emotive prose substyle (poetry, drama). The genre of the work may be defined as a love (heroic, romantic, epic, detective, psychological, philosophic, science fiction, historical, humorous, etc.) novel (short story, ballad, parable, myth, legend, sonnet, etc). This fact becomes clearly outlined due to the techniques peculiar to this genre…

2. Analysing setting and plot structure of the text

When one speaks about the plot of imaginative literature, then, one is referring to the deliberately arranged sequence of interrelated events that constitute the basic narrative structure of a work of fiction.

Questions to answer:

2. 1. What is (the book, novel, short story) devoted to? What is the plot of ___ focused on? What does __ describe? What does the ___ of the text deal with? What is ___ centered around? What problems does ___ touch upon? What does ___ tell us about?

Useful language: The (novel, story, book, poem) presents a typical example of _(name of the writer) works (Explain why!). ___ is a good sample of ___ individual style of writing. It is a very remarkable work from the viewpoint of the problems raised in it (What, to be particular?). The ___ presents a quintessence of ____ creativity. It deals mainly with two (three) interdependent problems, which are___. The ___ tells us about an interesting episode from the life of ___. It presents a description of ___. It reflects an important event in the life of__…

2. 2. Where does the action of ___ take place? Where is the scene laid? Where is the plot of the text set? What is the plot focused on?

2. 3. When does the action of ___ take place? (in the middle / at the beginning / at the end of the __th century).

Useful language: The setting of this romantic novel is very typical to such kind of fiction (is rather specific, unusual, agitating, etc.). It is set in Southern France at the beginning of its “Golden Age” (It is set in the virtual reality of the narrator’s mind tortured by enumerable temptations within an hour of human life, etc) .

2. 4. How many parts can this text be divided / split into? (How many parts does it consist of?)

Note: from the point of view presented in the classical theory of literature, most of fiction pieces (short stories, novels, etc.) fall into 5 stages of plot development:

1) exposition (introduction of characters and setting (time and space of the work));

2) development of the plot;

3) crisis (climax, culminating point) (the main event in the plot;

4) falling action;

5) resolution (dénouement) (presenting some general remarks on the observation, sometimes rather abstracted from the general line of the plot). This may also be illustrated graphically:

3. Crisis

2. Development 4. Falling action

of the plot

1. Exposition 5. Resolution (dēnoument)

Beginning Middle End

Diagram 1 – Stages of plot development.