Writing Help 129 | - ☆ Freelance Writer
Apr 05, 2013 | #1
Terms You Need for Writing about the Novel
Although some academics make distinctions between these three terms, they are widely considered interchangeable, and whichever one you use will be comprehensible to your teachers or professors; as a result, if for some reason you are making a distinction between them in a paper or report, make sure you explain what this distinction is, because it will not be obvious to any of your readers. Also, as is the case for all of the terms in this series and the previous ones, make sure you know and follow the definitions and distinctions provided by your instructors when they do so. Knowing is useful, but knowing something according to the way you will be tested on it is even more so.
Mood, atmosphere, and tone (known as MAT from this point forward) are words used to describe the evocative elements of a literary work which prompt (or are at least supposed to prompt) a general feeling in the reader. After reading the following passage, see if you are able to identify the dominant mood the author is striving to produce:
A dripping passageway followed me down through the utter darkness, into the bowels of the abandoned dungeon. Distorted echoes emanated from every surface, seeping through cracks in the ancient pipes overhead where sightless carnivores slowly breathed the blood of their next victim. An oppressive chill momentarily paralyzed my shivering legs, and I thank God what came next was driven from memory by the thick sewage that swept me into oblivion.
The first step in detecting the mood is a highly intuitive one; merely ask yourself how you feel after reading a given passage. Picture yourself there, in the place described or, even better, in the place of the character who appears there. In the example above, the MAT might be described as dark, dank, damp, disgusting, lonely, hopeless, despairing, powerless, empty, cold, fearful, and sinking, or some combination of these. It is important to note that determining MAT is not a precise science, so use whatever terms you feel most strongly and accurately convey the feeling of the passage.
After reading through the passage in question and determining the general mood, it is important to revisit specific aspects of the passage to discover (and to show to others) why it is that the passage feels that way, and why it would likely feel the same way to almost anyone. In this case, the most telling features are the things found in the place and the words used to describe them, like dripping passageway, utter darkness, bowels, abandoned dungeon, and many others. All of these work together to signify a scary place you would not want to visit, and the depth and enclosure of the place reinforces this feeling.
Note how the description plays with different sensory modalities, dealing with vision (darkness), hearing (echoes), scent (breathed the blood), and touch (paralyzed); the senses are a key pathway into feelings, and are indispensable in creating tone. Finally, look at how the reversal of agency influences the MAT of the passage on a more conceptual level. The narrator is followed by the passage, rather than the other way around, and he tells us the chill paralyzes his legs, rather than saying his legs are paralyzed by the chill. This gives the power of action to the underground location, and strips it from the character. Also, giving the setting agency serves to make it resemble a living thing, and this is further emphasized by the reference to its having bowels, and the sounds it makes independent of other living things.
Mood, Atmosphere, or Tone
Although some academics make distinctions between these three terms, they are widely considered interchangeable, and whichever one you use will be comprehensible to your teachers or professors; as a result, if for some reason you are making a distinction between them in a paper or report, make sure you explain what this distinction is, because it will not be obvious to any of your readers. Also, as is the case for all of the terms in this series and the previous ones, make sure you know and follow the definitions and distinctions provided by your instructors when they do so. Knowing is useful, but knowing something according to the way you will be tested on it is even more so.
Mood, atmosphere, and tone (known as MAT from this point forward) are words used to describe the evocative elements of a literary work which prompt (or are at least supposed to prompt) a general feeling in the reader. After reading the following passage, see if you are able to identify the dominant mood the author is striving to produce:A dripping passageway followed me down through the utter darkness, into the bowels of the abandoned dungeon. Distorted echoes emanated from every surface, seeping through cracks in the ancient pipes overhead where sightless carnivores slowly breathed the blood of their next victim. An oppressive chill momentarily paralyzed my shivering legs, and I thank God what came next was driven from memory by the thick sewage that swept me into oblivion.
The first step in detecting the mood is a highly intuitive one; merely ask yourself how you feel after reading a given passage. Picture yourself there, in the place described or, even better, in the place of the character who appears there. In the example above, the MAT might be described as dark, dank, damp, disgusting, lonely, hopeless, despairing, powerless, empty, cold, fearful, and sinking, or some combination of these. It is important to note that determining MAT is not a precise science, so use whatever terms you feel most strongly and accurately convey the feeling of the passage.
After reading through the passage in question and determining the general mood, it is important to revisit specific aspects of the passage to discover (and to show to others) why it is that the passage feels that way, and why it would likely feel the same way to almost anyone. In this case, the most telling features are the things found in the place and the words used to describe them, like dripping passageway, utter darkness, bowels, abandoned dungeon, and many others. All of these work together to signify a scary place you would not want to visit, and the depth and enclosure of the place reinforces this feeling.
Note how the description plays with different sensory modalities, dealing with vision (darkness), hearing (echoes), scent (breathed the blood), and touch (paralyzed); the senses are a key pathway into feelings, and are indispensable in creating tone. Finally, look at how the reversal of agency influences the MAT of the passage on a more conceptual level. The narrator is followed by the passage, rather than the other way around, and he tells us the chill paralyzes his legs, rather than saying his legs are paralyzed by the chill. This gives the power of action to the underground location, and strips it from the character. Also, giving the setting agency serves to make it resemble a living thing, and this is further emphasized by the reference to its having bowels, and the sounds it makes independent of other living things.