theticklishpear:(A table of contents will become available once the series reaches three posts. It w
theticklishpear:(A table of contents will become available once the series reaches three posts. It will be kept up-to-date as posts are added. This series is indefinitely open to new posts.)Part One: Defining DifferencesOne of the more common topics for early literature classes is discussing how mood is infused into a piece. It’s pretty likely you were asked to identify the mood of at least one Poe piece in your life in school. You examined words and descriptions and how things were said, right? What you don’t realize is that you were also examining tone at the same time!Tone: The attitude of a piece.Mood: The feeling of a piece.It’s a subtle difference between the author taking an action and the audience being acted upon, but both are crucial for understanding story, theme, even character. Mood is created through the use of many of the same characteristics as tone, making the definitions more wiggly than preferred, however the biggest thing is that mood uses tone (as well as setting, voice, theme, etc.). Tone is created by using more specific literary devices such as syntax and diction (which create voice) as well as imagery and the inclusion of certain details.I’ve heard it said that mood is the more important of these two concepts–that the author should be able to instill feeling in the audience above all. The audience must experience the fear, the dread, the elation, and the peace a character is feeling or a work is trying to portray. I believe that this is essentially true, but impossible without a firm grasp on each of the pieces that make up mood, including tone! They work together inextricably to make your piece whole, round, and something more engaging than a piece of academic analysis of life. Your work needs to be full of you, your choices, your decisions, your opinions, and tone is how writers get that across. My goal with this post series is to examine how tone interacts with genre, style, and audience; how we can create tone in our works; and pass along some tips.Next up: Diction in writing! -- source link
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