Discovering Subtext Questions

Discovering Subtext Questions

These questions will help you start analyzing your novel.

 

Characters

• Who are the main characters in your book and what is their function? Why are they the main characters? 
•  How do they change and how does their change affect the other characters/story line?
• What is their flaw? What does that flaw say about the human condition?
• What gender, age, and race are the characters? Does the genetic make-up of the characters tell us something about a point the author is trying to make?
• Who is the antagonist? Why are they in the novel? Why are they portrayed the way they are? How do they act as a foil character?
• What is the protagonist good at? What does he or she like to do? How is he or she challenged? How does he or she grow/is he or she challenged?
• Look at what the characters do. Then, ask yourself this: what would make YOU act the way they did?

Setting

• Where is your story taking place? What is the time period? How do these two things affect your reading of the story? 
• Does the setting help you relate to the story better or worse?
• Why does the story take place when and where it does?

Conflict

• What is the conflict? Why did the author choose to focus on this conflict?
•  Consider the conflict. If the conflict had been different, would the ending have been different? Why did the author choose to end the story how he or she did?
• What does the conflict tell us about our lives?

Other Elements

• What symbolism occurs in the story? 
• What imagery is present? How does this help you read, interpret, and understand the story?
• Are any themes blatantly obvious? (war, friendship, love, prejudice, change, etc.) How does the author shape this theme? What is the author trying to say about this theme?
•  From which point of view is the narrator speaking? How does this affect your reading? How does this point of view shape the story?