TEXTUAL ANALYSIS: PROCEDURES

• To consider the title: it pushes the reader to make conjectures, expectations, curiosities.
• To consider the lay out: the lay out is how the poem looks on the page, it gives the reader some hints and clues about the kind of text.

DENOTATIVE ANALYSIS: it helps to find out what the speaker is telling the reader.

• To read the text at least twice, in order to understand each word.
• To consider the structure: the structural analysis takes into consideration the function of each part of the text.

CONNOTATIVE ANALYSIS: it takes into consideration connotation, which takes into consideration different levels that all together contributes to make the message.

• Level of sound: to take into consideration the phonological level and to analyze all the sound devices (repetition, assonance, consonance);
• Level of semantic: to analyze word choices, semantic fields, verb tenses;
• Level of syntax: to take into consideration punctuation, word order, anaphor (it pushes the reader backwards), cataphor (it pushes the reader forwards), deviations from the norm (regular pattern of the sentence);
• Level of figure of speech.