DIDLS DIDLS DICTION IMAGERY DETAILS LANGUAGE SYNTAX STYLE TONE THEME WORD CHOICE IMAGERY APPEALS TO SENSES DETAILS SUPPORTS ATTITUDE AND TONE LANGUAGE FIGURES OF SPEECH SOUND DEVICES LITERAY TECHNIQUES SYNTAX SENTENCE STRUCTURE STYLE WRITER’S MANNER OF EMPLOYING LANGUAGE TONE WRITER’S ATTITUDE TOWARD SUBJECT THEME GENERAL STATEMENT ABOUT LIFE OR HUMAN NATURE

DETAIL Details are most commonly the facts given by the author or speaker as support for the attitude or tone. The speaker's perspective shapes what details are given. What details does the author include and exclude in the story? The kinds of details the author puts in or leaves out reflect his/her style. Sometimes piling on details creates an effect. Sometimes not mentioning things that you would expect to be mentioned forces a shift in focus.

ex. An author describing a battlefield might include paragraph after paragraph of details about the stench of rotting bodies, but he might just say that soldiers died, or he might not even mention death. Each method creates a specific effect. Look closely at what's there and what's not there. Figure out why.

“The soldier is on friendlier terms than other men with his stomach and intestines. Three-quarters of his vocabulary is derived from these regions, and they give an intimate flavour to expressions of his greatest joy as well as of his deepest indignation. It is impossible to express oneself in any other way so clearly and pithily. Our families and our teachers will be shocked when we go home, but here it is the universal language”(8). What is the effect of the lack of details here? What’s the TONE?

Details: The facts given by the author or speaker as support for the attitude or tone. The speaker's perspective shapes what details are given. Look at the following passage from Tolkien's The Hobbit. Pick out three details and choose a TONE word. What is his attitude toward the hobbits? Details "I suppose hobbits need some description nowadays, since they have become rare and shy of the Big People, as they call us. They are (or were) a little people, about half our height, and smaller than the bearded Dwarves. Hobbits have no beards. There is little or no magic about them, except the ordinary everyday sort which allows them to disappear quietly and quickly when large stupid folk like you and come blundering along, making a noise like elephants which they can hear a mile off. They are inclined to be fat in the stomach; they dress in bright colours (chiefly green and yellow); wear no shoes, because their feet grow naturally leathery soles and thick warm brown hair like the stuff on their heads (which is curly); have long clever brown fingers, good- natured faces, and laugh deep fruity laughs (especially after dinner, which they have twice a day when they can get it). Now you know enough to go on with." J.R.R. Tolkein. The Hobbit. Ballantine Books, New York. Copyright 1937, 1938, 1966, p. 16.