To understand tone, you first must define what it means.
Tone is the author's attitude toward his subject. You are right when you say many words
could describe tone. Tone can be serious, scary, warning, sarcastic, humorous, teasing,
and romantic. However, those are just a few
examples.
Usually in a piece of writing, the tone is not
directly stated. For example, you don't usually write, "The tone of this piece is
ironic." Tone usually is implied. You infer the tone by analyzing how the author treats
the subject. Is he poking fun? Is he deadly serious? Is he
sarcastic?
I don't know what piece you are analyzing.
However, the tone often is determined by the subject matter. For example, it would be in
poor taste to have a whimsical tone when you are writing about an accidental death.
However, whimsy might be just what you want when you are writing about some strange or
funny event that posed no dangers.
Generally speaking, when
you are writing a literary analysis, the tone is serious. You are trying to pull apart
different literary elements and explain their meaning.
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