Night essay

1. Night essay

2. prompt • The style of a piece of literature refers to the particular way in which it is written. Style is not so much what is said, but how it is said. It is the writer’s uniquely individual way of communicating ideas. Elie Wiesel, faced with the daunting task of recreating his Holocaust experience for his readers has a carefully crafted style that contributes to his memoir’s overall message. • Write a literary response essay in which you analyze Elie Wiesel’s use of style devices in his memoir, Night. Discuss how his use of style devices emphasizes the theme of his work. You may want to consider such style devices as figurative language (similes, implicit metaphors, explicit metaphors, personification, hyperbole), irony (situational or verbal), imagery/sensory details, characterization, repetition, foreshadowing, flashback, allusion, symbolism, tone, mood, suspense, diction, and/or syntax. Include examples from the text in order to support your ideas.

3. Step 1 – break down the prompt • What are you being asked to do? • How many steps are there within the overall prompt? • What are they?

4. Theme. A central idea. In nonfiction prose it may be thought of as the general topic of discussion, the subject of the discourse, the thesis. In poetry, fiction, and drama it is the abstract concept that is made concrete through representation in person, action, and image. No proper theme is simply a subject or an activity. Both theme and thesis imply a subject and a predicate of some kind – not just vice in general, say, but some such proposition as “Vice seems more interesting than virtue but turns out to be destructive.” “Human wishes” is a topic or subject; the “vanity of human wishes” is a theme. [“Religion” would be better stated as “the loss of religion.”] (Source: Handbook of Literary Terms)

5. Step 2 – identify theme • What theme will you be discussing? • Theme example: "The Story of an Hour"

6. Step 3 – identify literary devices • Which literary features are used most often to support the theme? Choose three at most. • figurative language (similes, implicit metaphors, explicit metaphors, personification, hyperbole), • irony (situational or verbal), • imagery/sensory details, • characterization, • repetition, • foreshadowing, • flashback, • allusion, • symbolism, • tone, • mood, • suspense, • diction, and/or • syntax

7. Step 4 – apply • HOW do those devices contribute to the theme? • Treat them differently; they may contribute in different ways. • Make a list of effects for each device.

8. Step 5 - examples • Whichever devices you chose, find examples of them. • Then, like you did with the characterization wheel, list the HOW for each example. This chart may help:

9. Step 6 - order • If you have more than one device, decide how you will order them. Which goes first? Second? Etc?