During the research for his paper he read other critics opinions on the subject. While doing this Graff gained confidence realizing that he had the same thoughts as famous published critics. Towards the end of the Huckleberry Finn debate Graff makes a realization that reading and logical talks about literature may actually have to do with his
It is based on philosophic grounds. The emergence of reader response theories in the field of literature teaching has shifted the exclusive emphasis on the text, while acknowledge its importance, to an emphasis on the reader. It was Louise Rosenblatt who began the march to a transactional theory of reader response, which emphasizes a mutual interaction between the reader and the text in the process of creating and recreating meaning. Texts do not come into existence alone nor do they acquire their meaning or invoke feelings unless they are read by a reader. Without a reader texts are no more than marks can a
Throughout the article, she introduces studies which suggest “that literary fiction improves a reader’s capacity to understand what others are thinking and feeling.” (line 3,4) She then explains the results of the test which measures one’s “ability to infer and understand other people’s thoughts and emotions.” (line 9) By using a tone of a lecturer, it drags the reader’s attention to the effects that reading gives someone. With these tones, Chiaet tries to convey how reading is not only for entertainment but to allows the readers to reflect it to the real world. The poetry “There is no Frigate Like a Book” written by Emily Dickenson, she uses a simile to show the similarities between real-life transportation methods and a book. As the title says, she first says, “There is no frigate like a
The beauty of the literary criticism is that as a reader, you a free to choose from a variety of approaches to analyzing the literary work, consequently, the reader can expand, go beyond and understand many details about the work and the author. It also permits the reader to enhance his or her critical thinking besides giving special skills to consider the different approaches. As Casano, (n.d.) mentions: “literary criticism provides some general guidelines to help us analyze, deconstruct, interpret and evaluate”. The biographical approach focuses on the events that round the author’s life, the author childhood, studies, life experiences, family facts and any type of information related to his or her lifetime. According to Thanatassa, (2012):
Reading and thinking for oneself are both present in everyday life. However, Arthur Schopenhauer argues that thinking without restraints produces more benefits than reading. There is evidence in other texts that support this claim. One is Sarah Crowley’s argument in A Plea for the Revival of Sophistry that argues against the use of textbooks to teach in classrooms. Another example provided further in the same text discusses the differences between “teaching by example” and “teaching by theory”, where teaching by example is shown to be the more appealing choice.
In addition, literary criticism includes narrative criticism where the goal is to understand how each author wrote in order to produce a “desired effect on the reader” (Strauss 68). For instance, Mark was encouraging believers to stay strong under persecution by showing how Jesus endured the cross. Also, Luke includes so many outsiders—non-Jews, interacting with Jesus, which causes the reader to feel included in the Gospel story or to become one who includes those who have yet to meet Jesus. Additionally, literary criticism includes point of view; meaning, “The Gospel narrators always affirm the evaluative point of view of God, who is righteous and just and loving. By contrast, Satan and his demons are deceitful, evil, and destructive” (Strauss 70).
Throughout our educational careers reading literary fiction has been one of the most important aspects of our learning experience and most students would agree; it’s definitely not a waste of time. In Jordan Bates’s article, “Three Cognitive Benefits of Reading Fiction,” he refutes Noel Gallagher's comment that reading literary fiction, in summary, is a lost cause. Bates goes into detail about how reading literary fiction improves many aspects of life including social perception, emotional intelligence, empathy, and more at ease with ambiguity. He’s able to convince his reader of this by successfully using three rhetorical appeals throughout his argument. Even though Jordan Bates uses ethos as his strongest appeal by his knowledge of reading
Not only can one piece of writing be understood differently by its audience, but an author can interpret a certain topic in a completely unique way from another writer. This phenomenon can be seen in the two distinct pieces Superman and Me from The Most Wonderful Books: Writers on Discovering the Pleasures of Reading by Sherman Alexie and “Books are Dangerous” by Frank Furedi. Although Alexie’s short story is a personal narrative and Furedi’s article is essentially the opposite:
According to this theory, the book, movie, or other creative works were not simply accepted by the audience or the readers as in the case of books but they also interpreted the meaning of the texts based on their own cultural background and experiences. Hence, the meaning was not only on the text but on the connection between the text and the reader. Connecting this theory to the study, the reader in this theory referred to the respondents of the study; the EFR 2 – 3 students of the Institute of Education of Far Eastern University. The reading interests of the respondents were reflected and from there, it would be the basis in selecting supplementary reading materials in
The result suggested improvement in learners’ ability to critically read literary texts in the second language. The research literature indicates the need to understand , metacognitive knowledge and reading strategies in order to develop our students into active, constructively responsive