Questions - Alamance-Burlington School System

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Mood or Tone

By Cindy Grigg

Mood or tone is the feeling in a story. The author carefully sets the mood or tone by the choice of setting, details, images, and the words he or she chooses. The author sets the tone, but it may be easier to understand as the attitude or feeling you, the reader, get from the story. The author gets the reader to respond to the story in an emotional way. It is sometimes very hard to explain, but we often recognize the mood or tone of a story.

Probably the easiest tone or mood to recognize and describe is a humorous one. Have you ever read a story and just laughed out loud? The author was able to communicate something funny to you. It may have been a character's actions, words, or just a funny situation.

An author may create a mood of suspense or mystery. Unexplained things may happen. It may be a dark or scary setting. The characters may be acting in a strange, mysterious way.

An author can even combine these two things. The setting may be scary with unexplained things happening, but the way the character acts in that setting could be very humorous.

In describing tone, we must use adjectives. Tone can be exciting, boring, scary, humorous, serious, mysterious, creepy, horrifying, or happy.

The way an author sets the tone is to use strong verbs, descriptive adjectives, and to involve the reader's senses. The author may describe things in a way that you can almost smell, taste, touch, hear, or feel them.

In a poem called "A Murder in the Garden" by Joyce Furstenau, the author carefully chooses her words to create the tone:

There was a murder in the garden one dark and scary night. I saw it with my own two eyes. It gave me such a fright! The tiny little thing was caught. It had no chance at all.

I saw it happen in the corner, just inside the garden wall. I watched it disappearing, one leg at a time.

You can go to: and search for "A Murder in the Garden" to read the whole poem and find out who was murdered.

If you are getting ready to write a story or paragraph, think first about the tone or mood you want your readers to feel. If you're writing about a birthday party, the mood might be happy. But if everything went wrong for this party, the tone might be sad or even humorous. It's a good idea to brainstorm a list of words first that would communicate the mood you want your readers to feel. Then use those words in your story.

Writing can be like painting a picture with words. A writer should choose his words as carefully as a painter chooses his colors. Just as a painter might choose dark colors to paint a sad picture and bright colors to paint a happy picture, a writer must choose the right words to create the tone of his story.

Mood or Tone

Questions

1. Mood or tone is: A. the feeling in a story B. a way the author gets the reader to respond in an emotional way C. both a and b D. none of the above

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2. Authors set the tone by: A. using strong verbs B. involving the reader's senses C. the choice of setting, details, images, and words D. all of the above

3. In the poem "A Murder in the Garden," which word best describes the tone or mood of the first five lines? A. humorous B. boring C. happy D. scary

4. Which words in particular set the tone of the first five lines of "A Murder in the Garden"?

Using the list you created, write a paragraph about the topic you chose. Do you feel you succeeded in creating the mood?

5. What feeling does the author cause you to feel for the victim?

A. fear B. happiness C. no feeling D. sympathy

6. Which parts of speech do we use to describe tone or mood?

A. prepositions B. nouns C. adjectives D. verbs

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Choose a topic to write a paragraph about. What tone or mood do you want the reader to feel? Make a list of words you would use to create the mood.

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