Explication de Texte is a French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 formalist

Formalism (literature)

Formalism is a school of literary criticism and literary theory having mainly to do with structural purposes of a particular text.In literary theory, formalism refers to critical approaches that analyze, interpret, or evaluate the inherent features of a text. These features include not only grammar...

 method of literary analysis that allows for limited reader response, similar to close reading

Close reading

Close reading describes, in literary criticism, the careful, sustained interpretation of a brief passage of text. Such a reading places great emphasis on the particular over the general, paying close attention to individual words, syntax, and the order in which sentences and ideas unfold as they...

 in the English-speaking literary tradition. The method involves a detailed yet relatively objective examination of structure, style, imagery, and other aspects of a work. It was particularly advocated by Gustave Lanson

Gustave Lanson

Gustave Lanson was a French historian and literary critic. He taught at the Sorbonne in Paris.-Biography:...

.

It is primarily a pedagogical tool, similar to a formal book report.

A simple format for writing an Explication de Texte is this:

1. A brief summary of the literal, not the figurative, content;
2. A description of the text's type and structure (e.g. Was it a sonnet? What kind?) and its tone;
3. The poetic devices used in the text (e.g. personification)
4. Conclusion

See also

• Book report
• Close reading
  Close reading
  Close reading describes, in literary criticism, the careful, sustained interpretation of a brief passage of text. Such a reading places great emphasis on the particular over the general, paying close attention to individual words, syntax, and the order in which sentences and ideas unfold as they...
  
  
• Explication
  Explication
  The idea and practice of explication is rooted in the verb to explicate, which concerns the process of "unfolding" and of "making clear" the meaning of things, so as to make the implicit explicit...