• How does the author control what the reader sees and doesn't see?
• Are alternatives offered within the work?
• Does the author make evaluative descriptions of characters, scenes, or events?
• Are any motifs repeated to stress an idea?
• Are any aspects of the work highlighted through exaggeration?
• Are any details stressed by omitting others?
• Are any elements foregrounded while others are caused to recede?
• Does the author choose a particular context to make a point?
• Does the ending of the work influence its meaning?
• Does the author make any direct statements as to the work's meaning?

"All manner of thing shall be well/ When the tongues of flame are in-folded/ Into the crowned knot of fire/ And the fire and the rose are one." -- T.S. Eliot, Little Gidding