Tone - Academic Mode

Definition of tone
Tone, in written composition, is a writer's attitude toward a topic or audience. Tone is usually conveyed through word choice, or a writer's point of view on a particular topic

Each written piece comprises a central theme o The way a writer approaches this topic and the topic is the tone. The tone can be formal, casual, serious, comical, sarcastic, sad, or cheerful, or it can be any other existing attitude. Consider the following examples. tone:

"I want to ask the authorities what the problem is. Why are they not controlling the epidemic? It is devouring lives like a monster."
"I want to draw the attention of the appropriate authorities to the damage caused by the epidemic. If measures are not taken to stop it, it will further damage our community. ”
The theme of both tone examples is the same. The only way we can tell them apart is their separate shade. The tone in the first example is casual or informal, while it is more formal in the second.

Examples of tone in common speech
We adopt a variety of tones in our daily speech. This intonation of our speech determines what message we want to convey. Read some examples below:

Example # 1

Father: "We're going on vacation."
Son: "That's great !!!"

– The tone of the son's response is very cheerful.

Example # 2

Father: “We can't go on vacation this summer.”
Son: “Yes, great! I expected that. “

– Son's tone is sarcastic Somebody told me what the hell is going on here? “

– This has an aggressive tone.

Short Examples of Tone
Although the starry sky was beautiful, his mood was so melancholy that he didn't care.
The old man took the handful of dust off his farm and sniffed at it with great pleasure.
The sweet smell of spring roses made him overjoyed.
The old man's face looked so peaceful after death that he seemed to be in a deep sleep.
The sunset spectacle was so amazing that people watched breathlessly.
The scorching heat of the desert sun burned his skin black and he could see death hovering over his head.
The singing of birds was seen as a harbinger of the approach of spring.
Her stinking breath kept the audience at a considerable distance from him.
The muffled church bell sounded as if it had come from an unfathomable deep well.
The friendly touch of her mother's hand comforted her in her pain.
He was on his way home when he saw one Boy of ten saw his heart move as he stood crying.
Negotiations between the two states came to a standstill after no conditions could be laid down.
The harsh gusts of cruel cold wind hit their bodies.
He went to the restaurant and ordered a hot coffee, the cozy atmosphere inside reminded him of the past.
Examples of tone in literature
Tone has a significant place in literature, since it manifests the attitudes of writers towards different topics. through the tone it adopts throughout the novel. Let's take a look at some of his comments:

"All idiots hate when you call them idiots."

"If a girl looks great when she meets you, who cares if she's late? Nobody."

"Damn money. It always ends up making you really sad."

"Catholics are always trying to find out if you're Catholic .

Holden's tone is bitterly sarcastic as he criticizes the nature of things in real life. His character can reveal the writer's attitude to life, as it is common for writers to use their characters as mouthpieces.

Example 2: The School (By Donald Barthelme)
Observe the tone of a short story, The School, by Donald Barthelme:

“And the trees all died. They were orange trees. I don't know why they died, they just died. Something is wrong with the floor Maybe or maybe the stuff we got from the nursery wasn't the best. We complained about it. So we have thirty kids there, each kid had their own little tree to plant and we have these thirty dead trees. All of these kids looking at those little brown sticks were depressing. “

The use of the adjectives“ dead ”and“ depressing ”sets a dark tone in the passage. Since trees mean life here, their unexpected "death" from an unknown cause gives the above passage an unhappy and pessimistic tone.

Example # 3: The Path Not Taken (by Robert Frost)
Robert Frost, in the last stanza of his poem The Path Not Taken, gives us an idea of the effect of tone:

“I'm going to tell this with a sigh
Somewhere get old and from here:
Two roads diverged in a forest, and I,
, took the one less traveled by,
And that has made the difference. "

Frost tells us about his past with a" sigh ", this gives the previous lines an unhappy tone. This tone leads us to think that the speaker of the poem had to make a difficult decision.

Example # 4: A river runs through it (by Norman Maclean)
“This was the last fish we saw Paul catch . my father and I talked about this moment several times later, and whatever our other feelings, it always seemed appropriate that, when we saw him catch his last fish, we never saw the fish but only the art of the fisherman. ”

The excerpt contains tones of loss and nostalgia; however, Characters seem quite satisfied with the way things are progressing

Example # 5: The Tell-Tale Heart (by Edgar Allen Poe)
WHEN WRAPPED IN COTTON. I gasped for breath, but the officers didn't hear it. I spoke faster, more vehemently, but the noise was constantly increasing. I got up and argued over nonsense, loudly and with violent gesticulations; but the noise was constantly increasing. Why shouldn't they be gone? I paced up and down with heavy steps as if I were angry at what the men were watching, but the noise kept increasing. O God! What could i do? “

This short story by Poe contains the tones of madness, nervousness and guilt. The character suffers from all of these feelings, which the author has translated into a story.

Example 6: A clean, well-lit place (by Ernest Hemingway)
“It was very late and everyone had left the cafe except for one old man who sat in the shade and turned the leaves of the tree against the electric light. During the day the road was dusty, but at night the dew settled the dust and the old man liked to sit late because he was deaf and now at night it was quiet and he felt the difference. “

In this short excerpt, the climax of the writer is that of peace and serenity, although he speaks of the time of day in a slightly different tone.

Function of Tone
Tone decides in a literature how the r readers read a literary piece and how they should feel while reading it. Encourage readers to read a literary work in a serious, comic, spectacular, or harrowing way. Furthermore, tone gives shape and life to a literary work because it creates a mood. In addition, the tone gives voice to the characters, and sheds light on the personalities and dispositions of the characters that readers understand best.