Notes from Francine Prose & Reading Like a Writer

Close Reading Notes by Francine Prose

Words = Diction
Sentences = Syntax
Paragraphs = Unit of Composition
Narration = Perspective & Negative Space
Character = Characterization
Dialogue = Whachoo say?
Details = Pay attention to technique
Gesture = What you do speaks so loudly

Close Reading Notes by Francine Prose
Long before the idea of a writers conference was a glimmer in
anyones eye, writers learned by reading the work of their
predecessors. They studied meter with Ovid, plot construction with
Homer, comedy with Aristophanes; they honed their prose style by
absorbing the lucid sentences of Montaigne and Samuel Johnson.
And who could have asked for better teachers: generous, uncritical,
blessed with wisdom and genius, as endlessly forgiving as only the
dead can be? (3)
Close Reading Notes by Francine Prose
Words = Diction

Every page was once a blank page, just as every word that appears on
it not was not always there, but instead reflects the final result of
countless large and small deliberations. All the elements of good
writing depend on the writers skill in choosing one word instead of
another. And what grabs and keeps our interest has everything to do
with those choices. (16)
Close Reading Notes by Francine Prose
Words = Diction

The grandmother didnt want to go to Florida. She wanted to visit some of her
connections in east Tennessee and she was seizing at every chance to change
Baileys mind. From Flannery OConnors A Good Man is Hard to Find

Calling her the grandmother at once reduces her to her role in the family, as does the fact that her daughter-in-
law is never called anything but the childrens mother. At the same time this gives her an archetypal, mythic
role that elevates her and keeps us from getting too chummy with this woman whose name we never learn, even
as the writer is preparing our hearts to break at the critical moment to which the grandmothers whole life and
the events of the story have led her.
Close Reading Notes by Francine Prose
Words = Diction

The grandmother didnt want to go to Florida. She wanted to visit
some of her connections in east Tennessee and she was seizing at
every chance to change Baileys mind. From Flannery OConnors A Good Man is Hard to Find

http://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~surette/goodman.html
link to full text of A Good Man is Hard to Find
by Flannery OConnor
Close Reading Notes by Francine Prose
Words = Diction

http://bcs.bedfordstmartins.com/virtualit/fiction/

Here is a link to a close reading resource that is
accessible through our textbook agreement.
Close Reading Notes by Francine Prose
Gesture = What I do speaks so loudly

Gesture includes small physical actions, often
unconscious or semi-reflexive, including what is
called body language and excluding larger, more
definite or momentous actions. (210)
Close Reading Notes by Francine Prose
Gesture = What I do speaks so loudly

Gesture I would not call picking up a gun and
shooting someone a gesture. On the other hand,
language, that is, word choice can function as a
gesture: the way certain married people refer to their
spouses as him or her is a sort of a gesture
communicating possession, intimacy, pride,
annoyance, tolerance, or some combination of the
above. (210)
Close Reading Notes by Francine Prose
Gesture = What I do speaks so loudly

Gesture Mediocre writing abounds with physical
cliches and stock gestures. They fail because they are
not descriptions of an individuals very particular
response to a particular event, but rather are a
shorthand for common psychic states. He bit his
lip, she clenched her fists our characters are
nervous. The cap adjuster is wary and determined,
the couple intimate, and so forth. (210)
Close Reading Notes by Francine Prose
Gesture = What I do speaks so loudly

Gesture clich
Her heart pounded.
He wrung his hands.
Her hands were as cold as ice.
His sweet breath was warm against the back of her
neck. (210)
Close Reading Notes by Francine Prose
Gesture = What I do speaks so loudly
Gesture Properly used gestures plausible, in no
way stagy or extreme, yet unique and specific are
like windows opening to let us see a persons soul,
his or her secret desires, fears or obsessions, the
precise relations between that person and the self,
between the self and the world, as well as the
complicated emotional, social and historical male-
female choreography that is instantly
comprehensible, even in these times. (213)