8.5–Analyzing Nonfiction through Literary Elements

As mentioned earlier in the chapter, concepts like structure, point of view, tone, themes, and symbolism are more commonly associated with fiction than nonfiction. However, nonfictional literature also incorporates them for similar reasons. These reasons often include:

• Framing and describing the experience of the writer or a group with whom the writer identifies;
• Conveying the writer’s emotions towards the subject matter;
• Shaping the reader’s experience with the text (either in terms of comprehension or in creating a particular ambiance);
• Shaping the reader’s understanding of a concept or experience through comparison, substitution, or representation;
• Emphasizing important information;
• Organizing information on the sentence level for comprehensive and stylistic effects.

Let’s review the role that prominent literary elements can play in analyzing the composition of a nonfiction text.

Structure

Structure can best be understood as the writer’s attempt to reconcile their purpose(s) for writing with their understanding of their audience’s needs and expectations. Some of these needs and expectations are predetermined by the genre. For example, people who read a biography expect (reasonably) that the author will cover their subject in chronological order.

Other times, however, the writer will subvert the audience’s expectations to create a particular effect. David Sedaris’s Me Talk Pretty One Day, for example, is a collection of humorous essays/memoirs of moments in his life. Instead of telling these stories chronologically, beginning with the onset of the actual event, Sedaris may start with a description of the main person involved in the story–their childhood, their likes and dislikes, another incident that helps define their character for the audience, etc. By doing this, Sedaris contextualizes the “character” for the audience, so that they will have a deeper understanding of their motivations and actions when the actual story unfolds.

In “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July,” Frederick Douglass also subverts his audience’s expectations by at first seeming to cater to them. The first portion of his speech extols the legacy of the American Revolution and the Founding Fathers–in part because his (mostly white) audience is familiar with and culturally connected to this legacy, and also because he is setting up his eventual critique of the holiday to be more nuanced. When the speech shifts to the emotions that the holiday evokes for himself and enslaved Black people, the audience feels the contrast of these experiences more sharply due to the speech’s structure.

Point of View

In fiction, point of view helps the writer establish different relationships within and around the text. This includes the relationships between the reader and the writer, between the reader and the characters, and between characters.

These principles also operate in nonfiction texts. Just as in fiction, a third person or omniscient point of view puts distance between the author and the content, so that the former is observing or removed from what unfolds (see Ch’s 3 and 4 for more on narrators). For example, Hunter S. Thompson’s essay “The Hippies,” describes the broader progression of hippie culture in the 1960s, the subcultures within it, and cites other writers’ perspectives on it as well. Although Thompson’s writing style is distinctive (as was his lifestyle), he does not insert himself into the piece. This creates a distance from the subject that potentially adds to his credibility, and also implies that he did not consider himself part of this phenomenon.

In Common Sense, Thomas Paine does the opposite and inserts himself directly into the subject matter. He primarily does so through plural pronouns like “we” and “us,” which explicitly link him to the patriot cause and the colonial experience. Since the pamphlet was initially published anonymously, this created the impression that it was written by someone who had spent a great deal of time in the colonies. When Paine was discovered to be the author, the plural pronouns reflect that the ideology of the American Revolution was more important to him than his being a recently arrived native Briton.

Some nonfiction writers even use second person, which frames the reader as the subject and thus a more active participant in the writer’s thoughts and focus. Ralph Waldo Emerson often invokes second person in his essay “Self Reliance,” which engages the reader in considering the advice Emerson gives:

But why should you keep your head over your shoulder? Why drag about this corpse of your memory, lest you contradict somewhat you have stated in this or that public place? Suppose you should contradict yourself; what then? It seems to be a rule of wisdom never to rely on your memory alone, scarcely even in acts of pure memory, but to bring the past for judgment into the thousand-eyed present, and live ever in a new day.

In each of these cases, the writer’s adopted point of view has a significant impact on the reader’s experience. Furthermore, each point of view option offers similar effects and advantages whether used in fiction or nonfiction.

Themes

While themes are present in both fiction and nonfiction, they are typically much more explicit in the latter. If F. Scott Fitzgerald had had Nick Carraway utter aloud, “The point of this story is that the American Dream is dead, if it was ever a reality to begin with,” in The Great Gatsby, it would have been a little on the nose, and probably disrupted the reader’s experience of the narrative. Instead, Fitzgerald conveys this theme through more subtle means, such as imagery, symbolism, plot arcs, and character interactions. By contrast, works of nonfiction tend to focus more on informing the reader, which means that the text’s central ideas need to be more directly stated.

Both Common Sense and “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July” get to their main ideas extremely quickly. Not only does this efficiency show respect for the reader’s time in consuming a nonfiction text that’s meant to inform and persuade, it also signposts the structure and focus of each piece for the reader (especially in Common Sense). In other words, theme and structure are often more explicitly linked in nonfiction than fiction.

Symbolism

Symbolism in nonfiction literature often serves at least one of two purposes. Rather than anchoring a narrative, symbols can help to concretize abstract ideas in a nonfiction piece for the reader. Conversely, symbolism can also allow a nonfiction writer to express information in a more creative or poetic manner. In an 1873 letter to his sister, for example, famed American naturalist and writer John Muir wrote his famous line, “The mountains are calling & [sic] I must go.” Here the mountains symbolize Muir’s transcendentalist beliefs, as well as the natural world as a whole. Muir also personifies the symbol, which reinforces his connection to the wilderness.

Throughout Common Sense, Thomas Paine uses the image of a parent and child to symbolize Britain’s relationship with the colonies. This symbol is powerful and reinforces his argument in a few different ways. First, the parent and child reflect the cultural connection Britain had with the American colonies. It also reduces the moral and ideological scope of the conflict to a familial relationship most people experience. Further still, it embodies the tension, difficulty, and pain of outgrowing or severing a relationship that had previously been beneficial. Ultimately, this image and Paine’s use of it reflects the important role symbols play in tapping into the emotions of a nonfiction text’s audience–even when the primary goal of the text is simply to convey information.