What does a close reading do?
It might look closely at a monologue or brief scene, such as Hamlet’s encounter with his father’s ghost, and analyze the explicit plot points and the subtle foreshadowing contained in that scene. It might examine the representation of concentric rings of social power in the opening of “Bernice Bobs Her Hair,” or it might make a specific claim about how and why the author uses references to other books.What words did the author choose, what do they mean, and what function do they serve? In what ways is word order and grammatical structure significant? (One character might speak only a few words at a time, but grunt a lot; another may ramble. Talk like Yoda, another character might.)See also:Getting an A on an English PaperThat means reading every word: it’s not enough to have a vague sense of the plot. Maybe that sounds obvious, but few people pay serious attention to the words that make up every work of literature. Remember, English papers aren’t about the real world; they’re about rep
