1. Explication and Research
Understanding Fiction and Poetry

2. Explication: A Definition
An explication is an interpretation of a literary or artistic work which accounts for as many of the details of that work as possible.
You may find additional information on explication at our class website.

3. Explication: Steps
collect data
The most important thing to remember is that explication does not come “naturally.” Explication is a learned behavior--like dancing. You don’t start knowing how to dance: you need to learn the steps. I am going to outline the steps of explication for you here.
Should we even talk about data when we discuss works of art? What exactly constitutes this data? What do we collect, how do we collect it, and where do we find it?

4. How do we know our interpretation is correct? Does correctness matter?
Explication: Steps
collect data
build interpretation
What does it mean to interpret? How can we assemble our data into an interpretation?
How do we know our interpretation is correct? Does correctness matter?

5. Explication: Steps test interpretation
If an interpretation cannot be said to be absolutely right, how can we evaluate our interpretations? Are some interpretations more effective than others? What does it mean to test an interpretation?
collect data
build interpretation
test interpretation

6. Collecting Data: Sources
Let’s make a more formal list of the sources of data we can identify for both poetry and fiction.

7. { Collecting Data: Sources     the audience the format the genre
the date 
the world 
the writer

8. Collecting Data: The Audience
How was the work received by readers of its own time?
Who reads the work now?
What effect does/did the work have on people?
What effect does the work have on you?
Does the work contain the blanks and gaps that Wolfgang Iser talks about?
Who was the intended audience of the work?
Who actually read it?

9. Collecting Data: The Writer
What was the writer’s educational, religious, political background?
Was the writer male or female? Middleclass? Working class? Gay or straight?
Whom did the writer like to read?
Who influenced the writer?
Did the writer have interesting problems or conflicts or causes?
How did the writer seem to relate to his or her own creativity?
What other works did the writer create?
How did the writer support him or herself?
Emily Dickinson

10. Collecting Data: The Date
When was the work written and when was it published?
What other works were published during the same period?
Into which literary period does the work fall?
Does the work fit the ideas we have constructed about the period?
Does the work undermine the ideas we have about the period in which it was written?

11. Collecting Data: The Form
What does the work look like on the page?
How is the work collected or bound?
What was the original manuscript like?
Are there illustrations?
Is punctuation noteworthy?
Is there white space?
Are there divisions, chapters, stanzas?
Are there titles and headings?

12. Collecting Data: The World
When does the work take place: past, present, future?
How was the work published and by whom?
What relationship does the work bear to the world— critical, romanticizing, realistic, utopian, dystopian?
What means of production were involved in making and disseminating the work?
What’s happening during the time of the work’s creation and publication that may be noteworthy?

13. Collecting Data: The Genre
genre: “A class or category of artistic endeavor having a particular form, content, technique, or the like.”
What kind of a work is this?
Is it poetry, fiction, drama, essay?
Does the work blend traditional genres? Does it create a new genre?
Is the work considered popular, serious, trash?

14. Collecting Data: Poetry
Who is speaking in the poem? And to whom?
Do you find figurative language in the poem: metaphor, metonymy, personification, simile?
What characterizes the diction of the poem?
Do you see patterns in rhyme or in meter?
Does the poem seem to conform to any traditional, fixed poetic structure.
Does the poem have stanzas?
Do the lines of the poem evince any arrangement or order?
How does the poem sound?

15. Collecting Data: Fiction
Who is the protagonist?
Who or what might be termed the antagonists?
Is there conflict? Over what?
Where and how does the conflict reach a climax?
Is the conflict resolved?
Who is the narrator?
Who is the hero?
Is there figurative language in the story?
What constitutes the physical setting of the story?
What is the chronological setting?
How do the history and the plot of the story differ?

16. Building an Interpretation
To build an interpretation, you proceed inductively; that is, you use the details you have collected to make generalizations about the work
There is no irrevocably or absolutely right interpretation, but a persuasive interpretation accounts for the largest number of details in the poem and relates them to details about the writer, the world, the audience, the literary period, and other matters.
Your interpretation answers the question:
What does
And meaning is dependent upon your interpretation of your collection of data.
this work mean?

17. Testing Your Interpretation
Building meaning is a group effort. Even if you explicate a work alone, you will be aided by the explications of others.
This may be why Cliff’s Notes are so popular! I think people automatically reach out for help when they want to learn something. But avoid Cliff. He doesn’t always give reliable help.
You will compose the most effective interpretation of a work if you test your interpretations against those of other people.
Talk with others in the class to hear their interpretations.
Read interpretations of experts in the field today and in the past. Read interpretations of readers in the past.
Be able to defend your interpretation but listen closely to the interpretations of others.
Think of the interpretation you are building as a community effort. In explicating, you become part of a conversation; you are negotiating meaning.

18. A Sample Explication collecting the data building the interpretation
Let’s listen again to Alexander Borodin’s String Quartet #2 in D Major. We are listening to the third movement, the Nocturne. After listening, let’s see if we can explicate it.
Be sure to consider how you would find information on some of these issues, where you could look to discover the answers to the questions you might pose concerning this piece. Sometimes research is most effective when you have a specific question to answer.
collecting the data
audience
writer/composer
date
format
world
genre
building the interpretation
testing the interpretation

19. Assignments
For next time, explicate one of the following: a music video, a film, or an episode of a tv show.
List the data you collect, enumerate your conclusions, and write your explication in a one-page essay.