How I See Rhetorical Analysis in Shrek and Music

Sometimes everyone needs a reminder on literary analysis. People sometimes misunderstand the purpose and importance of rhetorical strategies, and sometimes lose the main point of them and how they build to a central idea.



Shrek states that he is like an onion, a quagmire of complexity in the world famous movie with the same name. Often this is akin to how most understand rhetorical analysis, by peeling off the outer layers to achieve a deeper meaning. Only difference is, the theme or center of the onion is usually much clearer than the strategies used to bring one to that same conclusion. However, that is not to state in any way that the outer layers do not contain less importance, on the contrary, the outerlayers are usually subconsiously picking up on these tricks, leading one to the main idea of a text.

Of course through reading this, some may think that I utilized the example of Shrek as some kind of juvenile joke or "meme", but I can assure you it is not. In fact, a common examples of small techniques used to constuct a deeper meaning are seen all throughout artwork, including but not limited to music, painting, sculpture, and even architecture (as seen in our study on war memorials). A common example I think about with this idea is music. For example, please listen to this song;

To an untrained ear, this beautiful masterpeice may sound like a cancophany of sound, and even a trained ear may still not pick up on the techniques in this piece. And yet, no matter who you ask, everyone still understands the overall theme, even without knowing the individual pieces. It doesn't take someone like Mozart to realize this music is used to convey an overall feeling of dispear, anger, suspense, and power. It doesnt take a genius to realize this is a bossfight theme.

The theme first starts off with strings and church bells, meant to build up your ear for what is to come. The drums and the tubular bells come in, building up more layers, more speed, and best of all, more suspense. You tense for what you expect to hear... but then it never comes. You wait for it to get even better, but then the beat slows again leaving you with a melody previously heard. And then it's given to you, the fight begins. The crazy arppegio excites you as you wait for more, but the song simply loops back around. Dissapointed? Well, that was the point. The whole time during the boss fight you start to think this boss is too easy. The boss is defeated in minutes and you are left wondering why the hell did it take so long for you to prepare for such an easy fight.

And then it hits you.

The beautiful harp reminds you that, no, infact, the song is not over just yet! You feel the drop as chills run down your arms. The battle continues, and its even harder than before!

I could talk about music for a millenia, but I have better things to explain. So many tricks were using in just these two basic songs, its hard to even count them all. Repeated melodies, instrument choice, and drum patterns are some of the first things that come to most people's minds, but throught detailed analysis these simple songs are much, much more.

Maybe that applies to literature too, hell if I know.

-Johnny