Close reading helps you not only read a text, but analyze it. The process of close reading teaches you to approach a text actively, considering the text’s purpose, how the author chose to present it, and how these decisions impact the text.
The close reading strategy improves your reading comprehension, your analysis, and your writing. Close reading will help you write essays and perform well on standardized tests like the SAT Reading Section. Any age group can practice close reading, and it works with any text.
This article will outline everything you need to know about close reading, including what it is, why it's important, how to do a close reading, and 5 strategies to improve your close reading abilities.
What is close reading?
Close reading is a reading method that examines not only the text’s content but how the author’s rhetorical, literary, and structural decisions help develop it to achieve a purpose.
No matter the text genre–narrative, informational, argumentative, poetry, or editorial–the author uses language to achieve some purpose: to inform, convince, entertain the audience, or a combination. In every text, the author utilizes a variety of rhetorical and literary strategies, or devices, to achieve these effects on the audience.
Common literary strategies or devices that impact every text:
Diction: Word choice
Syntax: Sentence structure
Tone: Emotion of the words used
Conflict: Problems, issues, or disagreements within or related to the text
Structure: The order of the words, sentences, paragraphs, and ideas
Point of view: The speaker’s perspective on the events or subject matter
Genre: The category or “type” of text–fiction, science-fiction, scientific article, etc.
Imagery: The sensory or visual language the author uses to describe the subject, characters, setting, etc.
Close reading observes how the author uses these strategies to develop the text, create an intended effect upon the reader, and build a central message or main idea.
Why is close reading important?
Close reading is important because it helps you comprehend the text, develop deeper ideas about its meaning, and write and talk about the text with more sophistication. When you consider not just what the text says, but how and why the author constructs it that way, you move beyond surface-level reading into analysis.
Close reading allows you to notice details, language, and connections that you may have previously overlooked. These observations create insights about the text, leading to richer class discussions, better essays, and more joy while reading. Observing an author’s strategies also improves your writing, as you gradually begin to emulate the strategies you notice.
How do you do a close reading?
Do a close reading by selecting a text passage, closely observing the writing style and structure while you read, noticing the author's language choices, underlining and annotating your observations, and asking questions about the text.
General Close-Reading Process:
Select a text passage: Pick a piece of text or passage that you want to analyze. The sweet spot usually lies between roughly one and three paragraphs. Songs and poems also work well for close reading.
Notice the writing style: As you read, ask yourself “What stands out to me about this author’s style? What patterns, words, and choices do I notice?” Pay attention to the emotions you feel as you read, identifying what in the text triggers that response.
Observe the structure: Notice how the author orders words, sentences, lines, and paragraphs. Consider how this order builds an image or idea about the text’s subject. Ask yourself, “How does this structure develop my understanding of the subject?”
Notice language choices: The author selected particular words to build a tone, evoke images in the reader’s mind, create a nuanced argument, or have some other effect on the reader. Note powerful or significant diction–word choice–and consider the purpose it serves, or how it develops any of the devices listed above, such as tone or imagery.
Underline: Have a pencil while you read and–if you’re allowed to mark the paper–underline any observations you make. Underline any of the devices listed above, anything that has an effect on you, or anything you enjoy. There’s no right or wrong way to underline a text, so underline whatever catches your interest.
Annotate: Record your thoughts and observations as you read, by writing in the margins, on a separate sheet of paper, or using an assigned annotation format. Feel free to note questions, individual words, literary devices, or anything you notice.
Ask questions: Along with the annotation ideas listed above, formulate questions and write them down while you read. Generally, the best questions begin with how or why. For example, “Why did the author use this word?” or “How does this detail affect the reader?”
5 Close Reading Strategies to Improve Analysis and Comprehension
Here are my 5 favorite strategies to improve your close reading, analysis, and reading comprehension:
Generate a purpose question (PQ)
Annotate with your PQ in mind
Track the 5 Ws
Notice the conflict
Identify the tone
Generate a Purpose Question
A purpose question (PQ) is a question you pose before reading a text to help you read actively. You can create a PQ for a text of any genre or length–a novel, a short story, a poem, a passage, or an informational text–and there is no right or wrong way to create a PQ.
To create a purpose question, consider any pre-reading context you have:
Title
Topic
Genre
Text images
School assignment guidelines
Any task you’re expected to complete when you finish reading
Examine the text’s title to guess what the text is about, then formulate an open-ended question that relates to the text, what it might say, and what might be important. As you read, seek and underline information that relates to your PQ and helps you answer it. By the time you finish reading, you should be able to answer your PQ.
Generally, the best open-ended questions begin with how or why.
Your PQ will sometimes simply repurpose the text’s title into a question, like these examples:
Text TitleExample PQ“A Good Man is Hard to Find?” (fiction)Why is a good man hard to find?“The Lady with the Dog” (fiction)What is so important about the lady and her dog?“The Fringe Benefits of Failure” (essay)How can failure be beneficial?“An Epidemic of Fear” (essay)What is causing the epidemic of fear?“New Therapies to Aid Muscle Regeneration” (article)How do these new therapies aid muscle regeneration?
Write down your PQ, either on the text itself or on a separate sheet of paper for note-taking. When you read with a purpose–like answering a question–it becomes easier to identify and annotate what’s important in the text.
Annotate with your PQ in Mind
It’s much easier to take good notes when you have a reading goal–something to answer or accomplish, such as a PQ.
As you read and annotate the text, refer to your purpose question. Search the text for details that relate to and help you answer your PQ. When you find relevant details, underline them and record how the detail relates to your PQ. If you can’t write on the text itself, record your thoughts on a separate paper or word document.
Here’s how and where I annotate a text, and what I usually write in my annotations.
Where and How to Annotate a TextWhat to WriteUnderline the textQuestions–what did you ask or wonder while reading?Write in the marginThoughts and connections–what did the text make you think about?Use a separate sheet of paperComments–what made you underline that particular word or detail?On your phone or computer–use a notetaking app or a Google DocSignificance–why is that particular detail important?
As you read the text, constantly ask yourself, How does this information help me answer my PQ? When you’re finished with the text, you should be able to answer your purpose question–and the notes you’ve taken should help you do that.
Track the 5 Ws
To monitor your own comprehension while you read, remain aware of the text’s 5 Ws: who, what, where, when, why.
After every sentence or section, reflect to verify the following information:
Who: Who is the text about? Who is narrating, or telling the story?
What: What is the text about?
Where: Where do the text’s events take place?
When: When did the text’s events occur?
Why: Why did this main event occur? Why did the storyteller write this text?
At any given point while you read, you should be able to identify this context. If you realize that you’re disoriented and have lost track of some key Ws, revisit the most recent sentences to see if you missed something critical. Then, continue on with the text, mindfully searching for the information you’re missing.
If you finish reading and still feel uncertain about this core information, revisit the first paragraph. A passage’s first paragraph usually provides fundamental details–such as the characters, setting, main event, and the story’s general context. Revisiting this paragraph sometimes alerts you to basic details you overlooked during your first readthrough.
The 5 Ws also work as an annotation strategy, where you underline all textual information related to the 5 Ws.
Notice the Conflict
Every story or passage centers around at least one conflict. A conflict is the characters’ primary struggle–the issue they’re faced with, the main challenge they try to overcome.
Keep in mind that a conflict can be external or internal. An external conflict takes place outside the character in the physical world–such as a fistfight, an argument with a friend, or committing a bank robbery. An internal conflict takes place inside the narrator–such as struggling to get over a girlfriend, becoming jealous of a friend, or worrying about how peers will perceive a behavior.
As you read, ask yourself “What is the character’s primary issue or challenge?” While there may be more than one, try to identify the most central, prominent conflict. By identifying a story’s conflict, you can observe and annotate how the author emphasizes it through storytelling elements–character development, tone, word choice, and structure. Underline these elements and write a few words describing how they build or relate to the central conflict.
Identify the Tone
A text’s tone is the speaker’s attitude toward the subject matter–actions, characters, or events in the text. Every piece of writing has multiple tones, which develop and change throughout the text according to the writer’s word choice.
Describe the tone using adjectives:
To Kill a Mockingbird began with a lighthearted tone and progressed to a dark, tense tone as the plot continued.
The article about bees used an informative, professional tone.
My writing always has an informal tone, even when I want it to be academic.
Hermann Hesse ends Siddhartha with a serene and beautiful tone.
Each sentence carries a unique tone, causing a story’s tone to change subtly every few lines. As you read, notice how the tone develops as the story continues. Underline the words and phrases that most powerfully create the tone, describing the tone in the margin. If you notice a sudden shift in tone, underline the point where it changed and write a few words about how it changed.
Close Reading Strategies Make You a Better Reader
Close reading is more than just a classroom assignment–it’s a reading method that helps you analyze and comprehend all texts. It will help you in class, on your own, and on standardized tests such as the SAT and ACT Reading Sections.
While you may initially practice close reading by underlining and writing notes in the margin, over time it will influence the way you approach all texts: You will find yourself prereading a text, considering the title, generating a purpose question, tracking the 5 Ws while you read, asking questions, observing the text’s conflict, and noticing the tone.
Close reading helps you comprehend difficult texts, and it helps you write essays for class. It’s an all-purpose writing strategy.
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