Commentary Writing Guidelines

Commentary Writing
Guidelines and FAQ
Dr Hannes Opelz
Dr Alexandra Lukes
What is a commentary?
 A piece of prose writing
 …based on the close reading of a short text such as:
 a poem
 a passage of dramatic or narrative fiction
 …producing a detailed account of the passage / poem in
question, in terms of context (where applicable), content,
and form
 …presenting your findings in an organised and clearly
structured way
Preliminaries
 Read the passage / poem carefully
 Make sure you have understood all the vocabulary
and that you have grasped the literal sense of all the
sentences in the text
 If the text is an extract from a longer work, make sure
you have read the entire work
Main Elements
 Introduction
 Main section
 Conclusion
Introduction
 Context
 If the passage is an extract rather than a complete work (like a
poem) you must situate it briefly in relation to the text as a
whole
 This part should be kept as concise as possible: it only serves
to provide a context for your detailed analysis
 Give a brief summary of Content and Form
 Content
 State concisely what the passage is about: what happens in it
and what changes occur as it develops
 Form
 State concisely how the text conveys its content: note briefly the
most important structural aspects only (narrative techniques for
prose, verse form for poetry).
Main section
 Essential part of the exercise
 Analyse in detail the relationship between form AND
content
 Read ‘interrogatively’:
 ask what effects the text is creating and how it is creating
them
 Structure your observations either by:
 proceeding line by line (typically if a poem), or
 identifying and concentrating on particularly important
moments
Things to avoid
 Don’t lose sight of the ‘big picture’: as well as looking at details, look out for
the general structural features such as parallels, contrasts, repetition,
variation, etc.
 Avoid gratuitous description: don’t just give a catalogue of recognisable
technical features (such as alliteration, metaphor, etc.) – you must be able to
identify the effects or meanings these technical features produce
 Avoid paraphrase, i.e. simply recounting the story without analysis
(Remember: your reader knows the story, too; the reader is more interested in
how the story is told, how it functions.)
 Refrain from giving personal impressions (unfiltered feelings, hasty
opinions): your analysis must be firmly rooted in the words on the page
 Avoid generalisations about the work or the author
Conclusion
 Take a step back and summarise your findings:
 How themes or character or plot are developed and how
formal techniques are deployed
 Where applicable, note which aspects of the extract’s
form and content link it to the text as a whole
Sample Prose Passage
Camus, L’étranger (1942)
Aujourd’hui maman est morte. Ou peut-être hier, je ne sais pas. J’ai
reçu un télégramme de l’asile: « Mère décédée. Enterrement demain.
Sentiments distingués. » Cela ne veut rien dire. C’était peut-être hier.
L’asile de vieillards est à Marengo, à quatre-vingts kilomètres
d’Alger. Je prendrai l’autobus à deux heures et j’arriverai dans
l’après-midi. Ainsi je pourrai veiller et je rentrerai demain soir. J’ai
demandé deux jours de congé à mon patron et il ne pouvait pas me
les refuser avec une excuse pareille. Mais il n’avait pas l’air content.
Je lui ai même dit: « Ce n’est pas de ma faute. » Il n’a pas répondu.
J’ai pensé alors que je n’aurais pas dû lui dire cela. En somme, je
n’avais pas à m’excuser. C’était plutôt à lui de me présenter ses
condoléances. Mais il le fera sans doute demain après-midi, quand il
me verra en deuil. Pour le moment, c’est un peu comme si maman
n’était pas morte. Après l’enterrement, au contraire, ce sera une
affaire classée et tout aura revêtu une allure plus officielle.
Context
Where does the passage come from?
 What leads up to it?
 This is the opening passage of Camus’s L’étranger
 Having read the text might help you bring out certain
elements of the passage in question. For instance:
 the relationship between emotion and lack thereof
 how the character is seen from the perspective of others
(tension between the personal and the social)
 how this allows us to arrive at different interpretations of the
title, etc.
Content
What is this passage about?
 Basic content: The narrator receives a telegram from the
old people’s home where his mother was, stating that she
has died
 What themes does the passage explore?
 Death and grief
 ‘mort’, ‘deuil’, ‘condoléances’, ‘comme si maman n’était pas
morte’
 Time (here, put into question)
 ‘aujourdhui…ou peut-être hier’
 Self, perception, and others
 ‘quand il me verra en deuil’
 Possible link with the title, L’étranger
Form
How does the passage convey its meaning?
 Structure
 Two paragraphs
 Short paragraph stating mother’s death: ask yourself why it is
short (the paragraph itself is written in telegraphic style). What
does this say about his emotional responses to the death of a
close relative? (personal dimension)
 Long paragraph relating failed conversation with boss: ask
yourself why this paragraph is longer. What does this say about
his perception of himself in his relationship with others? (social
dimension)
 Is there a change between them? (progression? status quo?)
 ‘maman est morte’
 ‘comme si maman n’était pas morte’
Form (cont’d)
 Narrative form
 Narrator: Who is telling the story? ‘Je’
 What is the status of this first-person narrator? What generic
question does its use raise? Is he a reliable narrator? Is his
perspective omniscient or limited?
 Narrative techniques: How is the narrator telling the story?
 Presence of direct speech and indirect (reported) speech and
first-person narration
 Impersonal telegram: ‘Mère décédée. Enterrement demain…’ leads
to little or no reaction ‘Cela ne veut rien dire’
 Personal direct and indirect speech: ‘Je lui ai même dit: « Ce n’est
pas de ma faute.»’ produces no dialogue, lack of communication: ‘Il
n’a pas répondu’
 First-person narration: ‘J’ai pensé alors que je n’aurais pas dû lui
dire cela’ questions the limits of communication
Form (cont’d)
 Language and style



Short, simple sentences, lack of subordinate clauses
 addition, accumulation, lack of self-reflection – possible reaction to shock or indifference
Accessible vocabulary: ‘maman est morte’
Lack of description, neutral register
 Suggests lack of emotion, engagement, commitment: ‘Ce sera une affaire classée’
 Tone

What attitude do the words of the speaker (narrator or speaking character) convey?
 Possible tension between content (death of mother) and form (lack of emotion)
 Facts: ‘maman est morte’
 Emotion and destabilization: ‘je ne sais pas’, ‘cela ne veut rien dire’, ‘c’était peut-être hier’
 Focuses on the boss’s reaction, rather than on his personal feelings
Sample Poem
Gérard de Nerval: ‘Vers dorés’ (1854)
Eh quoi! tout est sensible!
Pythagore
Homme, libre penseur! te crois-tu seul pensant Dans ce monde où la vie éclate
en toute chose? Des forces que tu tiens ta liberté dispose, Mais de tous tes
conseils l'univers est absent. Respecte dans la bête un esprit agissant: Chaque
fleur est une âme à la Nature éclose; Un mystère d'amour dans le métal repose;
« Tout est sensible ! » Et tout sur ton être est puissant. Crains dans le mur
aveugle, un regard qui t'épie: A la matière même un verbe est attaché... Ne la
fais pas servir à quelque usage impie! Souvent dans l'être obscur habite un
Dieu caché; Et comme un oeil naissant couvert par ses paupières, Un pur esprit
s'accroît sous l'écorce des pierres!
Content and Form
 What is the poem about AND how is the poem’s theme
articulated?
 It is even more impossible to paraphrase a poem than a piece
of prose because its meaning is a direct function not only of its
words but also of its form and its range of stylistic devices
 But we can give a first overview of what the poem is ‘about’: the
relationship between man, nature, and the universe
 Think not only about what the poem does but also what it is
(e.g. a love-song, a lament, a celebration, an address, etc.).
This can be mentioned in your introductory remarks
 Here, it is an address/appeal from the poet to mankind / the
reader: “Homme, libre penseur!”
Content and Form (cont’d)
 Verse form and structure


Sonnet (14 lines) divided into 4 stanzas – traditional form addressing a traditional
content (i.e. man’s place in the universe)
How does this influence the development of the ideas in the poem?
 ‘homme…seul être pensant’ (l.1) to ‘un pur esprit…l’écorce des pierres’ (l.14) – from
man as a thinking being to nature as living spirit
 ‘respecte’ (l.5) – ‘crains’ (l.9) – from internal reflection to external apprehension

Epigraph
 Pythagoras – moral maxim
 ‘Eh quoi! Tout est sensible!’ – exclamations (appeal, call)
 Intertext: ‘Tout est sensible!’ (l.8) – repetition
 Meter and rhyme scheme (generally, in poetry, regularity is the norm.
Irregularities will highlight points of interest)
 Rhymes can produce powerful connections or oppositions:
 ‘pensant…absent’ – thought and absence (man’s rationality is put into question)
 ‘agissant…puissant’ – action and power (value the force and power of nature)
Content and Form (cont’d)
 Vocabulary
 Abstract (‘penseur’, ‘force’, ‘liberté’…) and concrete (‘fleur’, ‘bête’, ‘métal’,
‘mur’…)
 tension between reason and nature, mind and body, man and animals
 Title: poetics and world-view
 ‘vers dorés’: ‘à la matière même un verbe est attaché’ (l.10) – connection
between the material (world) and the abstract form of language
 Word combinations and oppositions
 ‘Penseur…pensant’ – ‘vie…chose’ (connects thought, life, and matter)
 ‘bête…esprit’ – ‘âme…Nature’ (endows nature with human characteristics)
 ‘mur aveugle…regard’, ‘paupières…pierres’ (connects inert matter with
human vision)
 ‘matière…verbe’ (content and form)
Content and Form (cont’d)
 Figures of speech / rhetorical devices:
 Personification:
 ‘Chaque fleur est une âme à la Nature éclose’ (l.6): nature is
alive and blooming
 ‘le mur aveugle’ (l.9): matter (the wall) is a seeing being
 Simile:
 ‘comme un oeil naissant couvert par ses paupières / un pur
esprit…’ (l.13): comparison creates secrecy that calls for
revelation
 Repetitions:
 ‘Tout est sensible!’ – epigraph and in quotation marks in the
body of the poem: who is speaking? (through the poet’s verse
the thinker’s language reveals the language of Nature)
Content and Form (cont’d)
 Imagery:
 Abstract notions are enclosed within concrete images to
reveal the concreteness (materiality) of these notions and
thus of the spiritual world
 ‘fleur’ encloses the spiritual life of ‘Nature’
 ‘métal’ encloses ‘mystère d’amour’
 ‘mur’ encloses the ‘regard’
 ‘matière’ encloses the ‘verbe’
 ‘paupières’ encloses the ‘oeil naissant’
 ‘pierre’ encloses the ‘esprit’
Notes
 Most of the information used above is taken from the
‘JF Guidelines to Essay and Commentary Writing’
which is available on Blackboard under ‘JF Texts 2013–
2014’ at: http://mymodule.tcd.ie
 Consult the Narrative and Poetry glossaries included
in the JF Texts Critical Anthology HT to use the
appropriate analytical vocabulary, also available on
Blackboard
 You can find past exam papers at the following
address:
http://www.tcd.ie/Local/Exam_Papers/index.html