Writing is hard work. It doesn't always have to be difficult, but it is always challenging if you seek to do it well. Because good writing requires good thinking. Consider, gentle reader:
Good writing is 90% good thinking done before the writing.
I just made that up. That percentage is totally arbitrary. Gardner and King and Strunk would quite possibly cringe at it, but I don't think they would disagree with the idea here: that good writing derives from quality thinking done fully and done well before the writing begins.
One of our biggest challenges in AP Lit. is analyzing the function of figurative language. We can identify literary devices, can categorize them into their proper rhetorical tropes and schemes. We can articulate themes in broad strokes. We can characterize people and things as good or bad, as positive or negative. But can we analyze what the figurative language actually accomplishes in the text? Can we connect the definitions of these terms with the context of the poem or novel surrounding it? Can we qualify our themes and characterization? And finally, can we write about it?
Let's take a quick look at Seamus Heaney's poem "Blackberry-Picking," from lines 15-16:
"Our hands were peppered / with thorns, our palms sticky as Bluebeard's."
Heaney provides us with a reflection on the memory of the childhood madness of over-picking a blackberry field to the point of wastefulness. In their euphoric glee, the children cut themselves to pieces on the thorns as they lust for more and more bucketfuls of blackberries, so many, in fact, that most of berries later rot in the barn. Yikes! What awful little whelps these children are, their hands peppered with thorns, their palms sticky as Bluebeard's.
Sticky as a murdering pirate's.
The children are murdering pirates.
Murderers!!!
No, gentle writer. Let's back up and quickly discuss the function of the figurative language in this line. At first glance, I notice two pieces of figurative language:
1. the simile palms sticky as Bluebeard's
2. the allusion to Bluebeard the Pirate.
Ok. So we have identified the figurative language. Check. And we know the definition of both terms, simile and allusion. Check again. What next? Here's what. Answer the following questions:
How does the simile function in the context of the poem?
How does the allusion function in the context of the poem?
A quick sidebar: so far, all of this stuff is thinking. Sure, you might be annotating things along the way, providing yourself with notes to consult later, but let's be clear: none of this belongs in your essay. This is all pre-writing info, stuff to clarify in your head before you attempt to organize it in your paragraph.
For the sake of brevity, let's tackle question #2: how does this allusion to Bluebeard function in the context of the poem? Now, since you've read this poem already, I will briefly highlight that Heaney organizes his poem into 2 stanzas, and the first stanza is exclusively about describing the manic act of children picking berries. And the kiddies are out of control. But out of control as children are out of control. They aren't looking to pillage and plunder literally, there is no real threat of violence, but they are acting like it. Because they are kids.
When Heaney inserts the line about Bluebeard, he is alluding to the fact that these crazy kids are like that crazy pirate who murdered his wives. Now, the moment of truth:
Crazy how? How can we qualify the word "crazy" in our analysis?
Murderer how? How can we qualify the word "murderer" in our analysis?
Well, how do we? We revisit the text. Remember, these are kids Heaney is describing, and none of them belong in a juvenile detention center. They are crazy excited and crazy wound up and crazy immature but crazy dedicated to the task of picking and so they become crazy cut by thorns that they don't notice until later. They are children acting crazy. Not crazy psychotic or crazy unsettling like a creepy Boo Radley.
Crazy how? Crazy, qualified by the context of the poem. The allusion to Bluebeard activates the ideas of murder and danger. But we're still describing children. Or at least childish behavior.
Crazy, qualified.
This is challenging stuff. And this is quite a lot to process for 2-4 sentences worth of analysis. You might be questioning to cost-benefit ratio of this. Perhaps it is small, but only for now. Only here at the beginning. Because we get good at this. Very good. And you will do much of this in your head, naturally, without formally going through the steps. At that point, the only thing we will have to do is write it down as clearly and concisely and accurately as possible.
And that will be a good day.
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