SAT Critical Reading : Tone, Audience, and Point of View in Literary Fiction Passages
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Example Question #1091 : Passage Based Questions
Adapted From "Tony Kytes, The Arch-Deceiver" in Life's Little Ironies: A Set of Tales, with some colloquial sketches, entitled, A Few Crusted Characters by Thomas Hardy (1905 ed.)
I shall never forget Tony’s face. It was a little, round, firm, tight face, with a seam here and there left by the small-pox, but not enough to hurt his looks in a woman's eye, though he'd had it baddish when he was a boy. So very serious looking and unsmiling 'a was, that young man, that it really seemed as if he couldn't laugh at all without great pain to his conscience. He looked very hard at a small speck in your eye when talking to 'ee. And there was no more sign of a whisker or beard on Tony Kytes's face than on the palm of my hand. He used to sing "The Tailor's Breeches," with all its scandelous lyrics, in a religious manner, as if it were a hymn. He was quite the women's favorite.
But in course of time Tony got fixed down to one in particular, Milly Richards – a nice, light, small, tender little thing; and it was soon said that they were engaged to be married. One Saturday he had been to market to do business for his father, and was driving home the wagon in the afternoon. When he reached the foot of the hill, who should he see waiting for him at the top but Unity Sallet, a handsome girl, one of the young women he'd been very tender towards before he'd got engaged to Milly.
As soon as Tony came up to her she said, "My dear Tony, will you give me a lift home?"
"That I will, darling," said Tony. "You don't suppose I could refuse 'ee?"
She smiled a smile, and up she hopped, and on drove Tony.
"Tony," she says, in a sort of tender chide, "Why did ye desert me for that other one? In what is she better than I? I should have made 'ee a finer wife, and a more loving one, too. 'Tisn't girls that are so easily won at first that are the best. Think how long we've known each other—ever since we were children almost—now haven't we, Tony?"
"Yes, that we have," says Tony, struck with the truth o't.
"And you've never seen anything in me to complain of, have ye, Tony? Now tell the truth to me."
"I never have, upon my life," says Tony.
"And—can you say I'm not pretty, Tony? Now look at me.
He let his eyes light upon her for a long while. "I really can't," says he. "In fact, I never knowed you was so pretty before!"
The tone of this passage could best be described as __________.
local and humorous
whimsical yet verbose
open-minded and admonishing
unrepentant and obstinate
serious and lecturing
local and humorous
We can tell that the story is written in vernacular or dialect as there are substitutions of words like “'ee” for “thee," which means “you." We can also tell that the story is intended to be humorous in tone as the subject matter is an admired young man and the many women in his life.
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