Analysis Tip: The Magic Triangle

Do you have to analyze a literary work for a paper? Or maybe you’re going to the art museum and want to impress your date. Perhaps you want to say something more about the movie you watched last night than simply saying you enjoyed it. The magic triangle works in all of these instances.

The triangle is equiangular, and each angle is assigned a letter:  A, R, T, which forms ART.  The “A” stands for “Author” or artist.  “R” stands for “Reader” but can also mean audience, and “T” stands for “Text.”  These are the three aspects of textual analysis: the work, artist, and audience. The triangle demonstrates the relationship between these aspects. 

Let’s say your assignment is to analyze a poem. Your first step is to read the poem. What do you notice about it? Remember: You know more than you think you do. Write down everything you see. 

Tip: In poetry, every single word is important. Each word represents is the poet’s choice. This applies to the structure, rhyme scheme, rhythm, and every other element present in the poem. 

So, when I say write everything down that you see in the poem, I really mean it. Write the rhyme scheme (if there is one; if there isn’t one, write that). Describe the structure. Are there particular images that strike you? Write them down. What do you think is going on in the poem? Describe the “story” of the poem in your own words. 

Are there words you’re unfamiliar with? Look them up:  Like I said, every word is important in a poem, so when there’s a word you don’t know, it’s blocking you’re entry into the poem. I promise you, I’ve had entire poems become clear to me after spending a few moments with a good dictionary. (I recommend the Oxford English Dictionary, OED, but any reliable dictionary is fine). 

Are there references to history, other works of art, etc? You can usually tell these when the poet uses italics or quotation marks. When these aren’t clear, don’t despair. Part of writing everything you notice is including the aspects of the poem you don’t understand. Knowing what you don’t know is a very important part of learning. My professor once said to treat each word like a hyperlink. Don’t be afraid to do a google search.

Once you’ve written everything down, think about what interests you the most. Your analysis is as much about you as it is about the poem itself. This is when the “magic triangle” comes in. Pick an element and think about how that element functions in the work: “What does X do?” “What if it were Y instead of X?” In that second question, substitute another element for the one you’ve chosen and think about how that would change the overall work. 

Now, that you’ve analyzed the work and its impact on you as the audience, think about the author. I talked about how the author specifically chooses every element in a work. The next step is to consider why. Thinking about how different the work would be if different choices were made can help with this. 

You can use the same steps I discussed above for any work of art: music, visual arts, films, literature, etc.