THE “TIPCASTT” METHOD OF POETRY ANALYSIS

The TIPCASTT method encourages the beginning student of poetry to integrate the literal and figurative meanings conveyed by a poem into a coherent understanding of the poem, highlighted by an understanding of the literary devices that helped the poem’s purpose to be realized.

This systematic approach takes 7 steps. Use the rest of this worksheet to follow these steps for your given poem, writing in the spaces provided. Be sure to retain this and other TIPCASTT worksheets for future reference.

STEP 1: TITLE. Write the title and author of the poem: Ti

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Then, predict what the poem will be about: ______

STEP 2: PARAPHRASE Silently read the poem. Then, listen to it read aloud by someone else. Finally, restate its literal meaning P in your own words on the following lines. Try to write at least one sentence for each stanza of the poem, capturing all of its literal ideas: ______

STEP 3: CONNOTATION. Reread the poem and state its point of view. C ______

Then, reread the poem, looking for rhyming patterns. What is the rhyme pattern, if any? ______

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Next, look for especially significant or unusual words in the poem. Why were they included? What meaning do they convey?

Word Line # Why included/Meaning ______

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Finally, look for examples of poetic devices in the poem. Describe these devices. How do such devices aid the poem in achieving its poetic effects? State your answer in a complete sentence..

STEP 4. ATTITUDE A Reread the poem, looking for diction, images, and details that hint at or suggest the poet’s attitude to the poem’s subject. Note these examples below.

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STEP 5. SHIFT. Rarely does a poet begin and end the poetic experience in the same place. Discovery of a poet’s S understanding of an experience is critical to the understanding of a poem. Trace the feelings of the speaker from the beginning to the end, paying particular attention to the conclusion. Reread the poem, marking the places in it where the speaker’s feelings shift or change. Watch for changes in line length, sound, diction, and punctuation.

Look for the following to find shifts:

1. Key words (but, yet, however, although) 2. Punctuation (dashes, periods, colons, ellipsis) 3. Stanza division 4. Changes in line or stanza length or both 5. Irony (sometimes irony hides shifts) 6. Effect of structure on meaning 7. Changes in sound (rhyme) may indicate changes in meaning 8. Changes in diction (slang to formal language)

Annotate the text, or mark your notes here:

STEP 6. TITLE T Now, reread the poem’s title again and your initial explanation for it. Now that you’ve reread the poem several times and analyzed its features, explain the title of the poem interpretatively.

STEP 7. THEME First, identify the literal subject(s) of the poem. T ______

Then, identify the abstract or figurative subject of the poem. ______

Now, state what the poem is saying about its subjects: ______

Finally, write the theme of the poem in a complete sentence. ______

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