https://drive.google.com/open?id=1bVLDF05DScwHxKipK-VRl5NKM4T63S7q
[Start at home page of The Paris Review]
A rhetorical analysis can be performed on The Paris Review. The Paris Review is a professional literary magazine that features original writing and various types of art. They also discuss opinions on art and literature through interviews and podcasts. The Paris Review is an effective literary magazine because it is very neat, professional, and easy to navigate.
When you open the website, you are taken to the home page. The first thing that catches my eye is the huge title at the top of the page that is written in all capital letters in a fancy font. This makes it clear that their audience consists of high class, rich, and elegant art lovers who love to read and discuss art.
The header is located below the title and is clearly organized to separate the different categories of information they have on their website. For example, when you hover over “The Review” tab, you can see some of the genres of text you can read, such as fiction, poetry, or essays. This makes it easy to navigate to the page you are looking for.
However, if the headings and subheadings do not narrow down your search enough, then there is a search bar in the heading that makes it simple to find anything. A search bar is essential for an online magazine because there are tons of material within the website, so a search feature makes everything easy to find.
[Search soccer]
Right away, you have all the results from The Paris Review with the word soccer in it. Then, you can even filter it further by genre. This is a quick, easy way to get filtered results.
[Go back to home page of The Paris Review]
The next thing I notice is the color scheme. The color scheme for the online magazine is composed of neutral colors like black, white, and gray. This makes it look very clean, neat, and professional. Although they use these colors to look professional, the main purpose is to make the material in pink stand out. For example, the subscription box is highlighted in pink to capture the reader’s attention. The writers do this to hopefully get the readers to click the subscribe box to enter their email. Additionally, they have the current issue highlighted in pink to get the readers to purchase the hard copy issues. Also, if you place your cursor over anything, it will turn pink. Clearly, the pink color scheme is used symbolically to make things stand out from the rest of the neutral colored page.
[Go to Ploughshares]
On Ploughshares, almost everything is the same color. Therefore, nothing really stands out to the reader. I think the idea of a bright color among a bunch of neutral colors is a great idea to focus the reader’s attention on specific aspects of the website.
[Go back to home page of The Paris Review]
If you haven’t noticed already, the header remains at the top when I scroll. This is an underrated feature because there is nothing more annoying than scrolling all the way back to the top to view the menu or search box in the header. By pinning the header to the top, it makes it very easy for the reader to navigate the website.
[Go to Guernica]
Here you can see how the header does not remain at the top, which makes it time consuming to scroll your way back up to the top just to access the header.
[Go to “The Daily” page of The Paris Review]
The content is organized chronologically with the newer information at the top and older information towards the bottom. By organizing from newest to oldest, it saves the reader time and provides them with the most up-to-date information. For the reader, the less scrolling, the better.
[Go to “Arts & Photography” page of The Paris Review]
Since the audience is prestigious art lovers, they expect to see high quality artwork. The Paris Review delivers in this aspect. It is exceptional work and the reader can view a lot of pictures at once. The reader is also scrolling, which is much easier to do than click through a slideshow of pictures. Then, once they find an artist they like, they can view their art in one place.
There are also side bars on some of the pages with filters to limit your search. These filters are alphabetically by author last name and decades. Once again, this makes it easy to find information that is relevant to what you are looking for and it also remains on the side when you scroll.
The page looks organized since all the pictures are the same size and shape, and the text is lined up. It makes it very easy on the eyes to view. There is also plenty of white space between everything, so the viewer does not feel overwhelmed by all the content.
[Go to “Podcast” page of The Paris Review]
Podcasts are becoming super popular today. Many people will listen to them on their commutes to work. They are also good for people who prefer to listen to articles rather than read them. The podcasts give viewers an auditory option, which cannot be found many other places on the website.
Like the rest of the website, the podcast feature is easy to use. They provide a short description of the podcast episode, while also embedding the episode within the website. This means there are no annoying pop ups or new browsers opening with the podcast. You can also subscribe on Apple or Google, which makes it easy for cell phone users to listen on their phones.
As you can see, The Paris Review is very well organized. Everything is consistent throughout which makes it look very professional. They also include many user-friendly options like sticky headers, filters, and search bars to make the website easy to navigate.
Works Cited
Guernica. https://www.guernicamag.com/. Accessed 13 Feb. 2020.
“Morrison, Toni, et al. Before the Light. 13, https://www.theparisreview.org/podcast/6047/before-the-light. Accessed 13 Feb. 2020.
Ploughshares. https://www.pshares.org/. Accessed 13 Feb. 2020.
The Paris Review. https://www.theparisreview.org/. Accessed 13 Feb. 2020.