4.1 Plot, Character, Setting & Theme

Reading Literary Texts on the GED RLA

Roughly 25% of the passages on the GED Reasoning Through Language Arts (RLA) test are literary texts — fiction (short stories and novel excerpts), drama, poetry, and memoir. Literary passages ask you to analyze how a writer builds a story, not how a writer builds an argument. The four building blocks the GED tests most are plot, character, setting, and theme. Master these and you can answer most literary items, because almost every question is really asking one thing: what is happening, who is doing it, where, and why does it matter?

The Four Story Elements

Plot Structure

Most narratives follow a five-part arc, often drawn as Freytag's Pyramid:

1. Exposition — introduces the characters, setting, and situation before the trouble starts.
2. Rising action — a series of events and complications that build tension around a central conflict.
3. Climax — the turning point of highest tension, where the outcome of the conflict is decided.
4. Falling action — events that follow the climax and move the story toward closure.
5. Resolution (or denouement) — the conflict is settled and loose ends are tied up.

Conflict is the engine of plot. GED passages use two broad types: external conflict (character versus another person, nature, or society) and internal conflict (a struggle inside a character's own mind — fear, guilt, indecision). Identifying the conflict tells you what the rising action is building toward and where the climax will land.

Characterization: Direct vs. Indirect

Writers reveal character in two ways:

• Direct characterization — the narrator states a trait outright: "Marcus was stubborn and proud."
• Indirect characterization — the reader infers a trait from evidence. A common memory aid is STEAL: Speech, Thoughts, Effect on others, Actions, and Looks.

The GED strongly favors indirect characterization because it forces close reading. If a passage never says a character is nervous but shows her hands trembling and her voice cracking, the correct answer describes a nervous character — supported by the details, not stated.

Setting and Its Job

Setting is more than backdrop. On the GED it usually does one of three jobs: it creates mood (a storm outside a hospital window), it shapes the plot (a snowstorm that traps characters together), or it reveals character (a cluttered, neglected room that mirrors a grieving owner). When a question asks about setting, look for what the details do, not just where the story sits.

Theme vs. Main Idea

This distinction is heavily tested. In an informational text you look for the main idea — the central point, often stated in a topic sentence. In a literary text you look for the theme — a universal, implied message about life that the story dramatizes and rarely states outright.

A theme is not the same as a topic. A topic is one or two words ("courage," "loss"). A theme is a full sentence that states an insight: "Real courage means acting despite fear." If your answer is only a topic word, it is incomplete.

Point of View

Point of view controls what you are allowed to know. First person ("I / we") limits you to one character's perspective and may be biased or uninformed. Third-person limited follows a single character's thoughts; third-person omniscient knows everyone's. A first-person narrator's judgment is not automatically the author's — the GED may ask you to see past a limited or unreliable narrator.

Worked Example

"Maria sat at the kitchen table long after dinner, her coffee growing cold, turning the envelope over and over in her hands. The return address was the state university she had applied to three months ago. She had told no one. Her mother washed dishes with her back turned, humming quietly, unaware."

• Plot: the small, quiet moment just before Maria opens a life-changing letter.
• Character: revealed indirectly — turning the envelope "over and over" and telling "no one" show secrecy and anxiety, not excitement.
• Setting: an ordinary kitchen after dinner heightens the private, suspended tension.
• Theme (implied): the loneliness of carrying a private hope; the weight of a decision no one else shares.

A GED item might ask what "her coffee growing cold" suggests. The supported answer is that a significant amount of time has passed while Maria sat with the letter — an inference from the plot, not a literal statement.

A Reliable Reading Order

1. Read the attribution or blurb first; it often names genre and author.
2. On a first pass, track WHO, WHERE, and WHAT CHANGES.
3. Mark the moment of highest tension (the climax) and the conflict driving it.
4. For theme, ask, "What does this character learn, or what does the ending suggest about life?"
5. Return to the text for every answer — literary items are still evidence-based.

Common Traps

• Confusing theme with plot summary. A theme is the lesson, not the events. "A girl gets a college letter" is plot; "hope and fear often arrive together" is theme.
• Picking a topic word for a theme question. Choose the full-sentence message.
• Treating a direct statement as the only proof. Indirect evidence — actions and speech — can define a character just as firmly.
• Over-reading the setting. Do not invent symbolism the details do not support.