Plot: What central conflicts drive the plot? Are they internal (within a character) or external (between characters or between a character and a force)? How are conflicts resolved?

Setting: Does the setting (time and place) create an atmosphere, give an insight into a character, suggest symbolic meanings, or hint at the theme of the work?

Character: What seems to motivate the central characters? Do any characters change significantly? If so, what have they learned from their experiences? Do contrasts between characters highlight important themes?

Point of view: Does the point of view—the perspective from which the story is narrated or the poem is spoken—influence our understanding of events? Does the narration reveal the character traits of the speaker, or does the speaker merely observe others? Is the narrator innocent, naive, or deceitful?

Theme: Does the work have an overall theme (a central insight about people or a truth about life, for example)? If so, how do details in the work illuminate this theme?

Language: Does language—formal or informal, standard or dialect, ordinary or poetic, cool or passionate—reveal the character of speakers? How do metaphors, similes, and sensory images contribute to the work? How do recurring images enrich the work and hint at its meaning?

Questions about social context

Historical context: What does the work reveal about—or how was it shaped by—the time and place in which it was written? Does the work appear to promote or undermine a philosophy that was popular in its time, such as feminism in the mid-twentieth century?

Class: How does social class shape or influence characters' choices and actions? How does class affect the way characters view or are viewed by others? What economic struggles or power relationships does the work reflect or depict?

Race and culture: Are any characters portrayed as being caught between cultures: between a traditional and an emerging culture, for example? Are any characters engaged in a conflict with society because of their race or ethnic background? Does the work celebrate a specific culture and its traditions?

Gender: Are any characters' choices restricted because of gender? What are the power relationships between the sexes? Do any characters resist the gender roles that society has assigned to them? Do other characters choose to conform to those roles?

Archetypes (or universal types): Does a character, an image, or a plot fit a pattern—a type—that has been repeated in stories throughout history and across cultures? (For example, nearly every culture has stories about heroes, quests, redemption, and revenge.) How is an archetypal character, image, or plot line similar to or different from others like it?