Explication de Texte

Explication de Texte is a French formalist method of literary analysis that allows for limited reader response, similar to close reading in the English-speaking literary tradition. An "Ex de Texte" (as it is often abbreviated) contains 9 to 11 sections, depending upon the work of literature under examination. Those sections are:

1. Subject - What is the author talking about?

2. Theme - What judgement does the author pass on his subject?

3. Diction - How does the author use language? Connotation, denotation, etc.?

4. Tone - What tones (or moods) does the author employ and how?

5. Symbolism - How does the author use symbols and signs? What are they?

6. Structure - Internal and external. How does the material appear physically (your book's characteristics); does it follow chronological order or merely logical order?

7. Speaker - who's the narrator? Is narrator named, unnamed? Involved, uninvolved? Omniscient observer? Author him/herself? Who speaks for the author (opinions, etc.)?

8. Imagery - What images does the author employ? Does the author use similes, metaphors?

  a. Metaphoric Language
     i. Conceit
     ii. Irony
        a. Verbal Irony
        b. Irony of Situation
        c. Dramatic Irony
     iii. Apostrophe
     iv. Metonymy
     v. Antithesis
     vi. Reification
     vii. Hyperbole
     viii. Personification
     ix.Lytotes
     x. Oxymoron
     xi. Onomatopoeia
     xii. Alliteration

9. Metrics - FOR POETRY ONLY. How does the author use metrics, poetic form (iambic pentameter, Alexandrines, etc.)?

10/11. Genre. How is the work of literature classified? This part of Explication de Texte is sometimes split up into two parts, Genre Technique (how does the author use his chosen Genre's characteristics) and Genre Mechanics (how do the Genre's inner-workings figure-in and shape the story?).

The Explication was extensively taught and modified (to the cumulative version above) by one Dr. Robert H. Rempe, a recently retired high school and university teacher of Literature, Advanced Placement English IV, British Studies, Composition, Journalism and Shakespeare.

The following shows an extended view of the Theory: [1]