1. Imagery and Tone

2. Imagery
Imagery is the representation through language of the sense experience.
The sharpness and vividness of any image will depend on how specific it is.

3. Imagery Imagery should:
Convey emotion
Suggest ideas
Mentally evoke sense experience
In general, the poet will seek concrete or image-bearing words in preference to abstract or nonimage-bearing words.

4. Types of Imagery Visual Auditory Olfactory Gustatory Tactile Organic
Kinesthetic

5. Assignment: “After Apple-Picking”
1. How does the poet convey so vividly the experience of “apple-picking”? Point out effective examples of each kind of imagery used. What emotional responses do the images evoke?
2. The poem uses the word “sleep” six times. Does it, through repetition, come to suggest a meaning beyond the purely literal? If so, what attitude does the speaker take toward this second signification?
3. If sleep is symbolic, other details also may take on additional meaning. If so, how would you interpret:
The ladder
The season of the year
The harvesting
The “pane of glass”?

6. Tone
The attitude of the author toward the reader or the subject matter of a literary work.
“tone of voice”
The authorial presence that pervades a literary work
We cannot really understand a poem until we accurately sense the attitude of the author.

7. Tone Tone can be identified through almost any literary device.
It is the end product of all elements of the poem.
Devices that commonly indicate tone:
Connotation
Imagery
Metaphor
Understatement
Rhythm
Sentence construction
Formal pattern
Etc…

8. What is NOT tone
Atmosphere – the general feeling created in the reader or audience by a work at a given point.
Mood – synonymous with either
The author creates a somber mood (atmosphere)
The author’s mood is somber (tone)

9. Assignment: Carpe Diem Poetry
Marvell’s “To His Coy Mistress,” Herrick’s “To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time,” and Housman’s “Loveliest of Trees” all treat a traditional poetic theme known as carpe diem (“sieze the day”). However, they differ sharply in tone. Pointing out the differences in poetic technique among them, characterize the tone of each. (1 paragraph per poem)