Writing about Literature

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Writing about Literature

• Writing about Mood/Atmosphere

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Writing about Literature

• MOOD dominant emotion, feeling

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Creating Mood - Starter

• You have made a film about a group of students
  lost in a forest, trying to escape from
  something thats following them.
• Rank these words as possible titles for the film
  and give three reasons which your top choice is
  the best.
• Trudge, Hurry, Flight, Creep, Slither, Struggle,
  Hunted
• 6 mins!

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Creating Mood

• DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless
  day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds
  hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been
  passing aloneand at length found myselfwithin
  view of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not
  how it was -- but, with the first glimpse of the
  building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded
  my spirit.
• I looked upon the scene before me -- upon the
  mere house, and the simple landscape features of
  the domain -- upon the bleak walls -- upon the
  vacant eye-like windows -- upon a few rank sedges
  -- and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees
  -- with an utter depression of soul which I can
  compare to no earthly sensation more properly
  than to the after-dream of the reveller upon
  opium

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Creating Mood - Nouns

• Nouns are the things referred to by a writer.
• List the nouns you find in this passage.
• Look at the list and see if some of the nouns
  belong together.
• Highlight the words that belong in a group and
  give the group a label. E.g. Religious words.

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Creating Mood

• DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless
  day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds
  hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been
  passing aloneand at length found myselfwithin
  view of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not
  how it was -- but, with the first glimpse of the
  building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded
  my spirit.
• I looked upon the scene before me -- upon the
  mere house, and the simple landscape features of
  the domain -- upon the bleak walls -- upon the
  vacant eye-like windows -- upon a few rank sedges
  -- and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees
  -- with an utter depression of soul which I can
  compare to no earthly sensation more properly
  than to the after-dream of the reveller upon
  opium

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Creating Mood - Nouns

• DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless
  day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds
  hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been
  passing aloneand at length found myselfwithin
  view of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not
  how it was -- but, with the first glimpse of the
  building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded
  my spirit. I looked upon the scene before me --
  upon the mere house, and the simple landscape
  features of the domain -- upon the bleak walls --
  upon the vacant eye-like windows -- upon a few
  rank sedges -- and upon a few white trunks of
  decayed trees -- with an utter depression of soul
  which I can compare to no earthly sensation more
  properly than to the after-dream of the reveller
  upon opium

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Creating mood - Adjectives

• Adjectives describe nouns
• Now list the adjectives in the passage
• Again, try to identify anything that links them
• Try to find a term or label for the kind of
  adjectives being used

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Creating Mood - Adjectives

• DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless
  day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds
  hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been
  passing aloneand at length found myselfwithin
  view of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not
  how it was -- but, with the first glimpse of the
  building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded
  my spirit.
• I looked upon the scene before me -- upon the
  mere house, and the simple landscape features of
  the domain -- upon the bleak walls -- upon the
  vacant eye-like windows -- upon a few rank sedges
  -- and upon a few white trunks of decayed trees
  -- with an utter depression of soul which I can
  compare to no earthly sensation more properly
  than to the after-dream of the reveler upon
  opium

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Adjectives

• DURING the whole of a dull, dark, and soundless
  day in the autumn of the year, when the clouds
  hung oppressively low in the heavens, I had been
  passing aloneand at length found myselfwithin
  view of the melancholy House of Usher. I know not
  how it was -- but, with the first glimpse of the
  building, a sense of insufferable gloom pervaded
  my spirit. I looked upon the scene before me --
  upon the mere house, and the simple landscape
  features of the domain -- upon the bleak walls --
  upon the vacant eye-like windows -- upon a few
  rank sedges -- and upon a few white trunks of
  decayed trees -- with an utter depression of soul
  which I can compare to no earthly sensation more
  properly than to the after-dream of the reveler
  upon opium

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Creating Mood

• Imagine that you are creating rules for writers
  aiming to create a sense of menace or suspense.
• Write two rules, one for nouns, one for
  adjectives.
• If it helps, begin with When using nouns to
  create suspense, try to