Read this book first!Reading it and internalizing its lessons will likely cause at least a bit of a change in the way you read other books. Instead of reading and relating books to your own experiences, you will begin to see the bigger picture--the things an author does, the patterns authors use, the themes an author incorporates, etc.
And as you read this book, chime in here with your own comments about things that are confusing to you, or things that make good sense to you, or things that remind you of books you have already read but now think about differently or understand more, etc. Commenting is part of your assignment! :)
165 comments:
When Mrs. Nickerson handed me this book and said "start with this, then go on from there," she was trying to kill me and the fun out of my summer vacation. Nonetheless, I took her advice; I don't know an apostrophe from a synecdoche and I can use all the help I can get. Foster first started out by talking about literature like a quest, which I loved because it made me think of the cliché prince saving the princess, good triumphs evil, all that jazz. I began applying it to books that are more contemporary and it really works! There are always the same four elements in every book, no matter which genre. One of our books to read is Catch 22 and I've already read it previously to this class, however didn't really understand it. After I read about the quest, Foster was right, the rest was easy.
The "Acts of Communion" and "Acts of Vampires" were also quite hilarious. Sophomore year, one of the books was Ethan Frome and Mrs. Quinn made sure to point of the intense dinner scene between Ethan and their house keeper, Mattie Silver. Silver and Frome use a red pickle dish that was given to Ethan and his wife, Zenobia as a wedding gift and the cat knocks it off the table, shattering it as Ethan's and Zeena's relationship has shattered in the event of her sickness. After reading "Acts of Communion," I realized that dinner scenes really are very important to literature because that's where people come together to not only break bread, but also tensions and pickle dishes.
I'm sure any girl can guess what "Acts of Vampires" reminded me of. That amazing teen masterpiece by Stephanie Meyer called the Twilight Saga. However, Foster obviously wasn't talking about the seductive, golden eyed "vegetarian" by the name of Edward Cullen. He was talking about the decrepit, fanged predator that is set in the story to steal a woman's innocence or general happiness. He taught me to look at names, using the examples Winterbourne and Daisy from Henry James' "Daisy Miller," where Winterbourne acts so calloused toward Daisy that she gives up and according to Foster, dies of unhappiness. I've also seen this in the German film, Nosferatu, which is about Count Dracula. He seduces people into doing business with him and then attempts to steal their soul through their blood. However in the end, he dies from (of course) exposure to sunlight.
I love poetry, especially the way it is like a short story; weaving intricate patterns of hidden symbols and allusions of people and their pasts with their futures. However, sonnets aren't really my most favorite. I don’t really understand what the importance of them is, or if there even IS an importance. Foster did a good job explaining HOW to pick them out, but is there some underlying message as to WHY poets use them? Sonnets are definitely something that I will have to work on to better understand them. However on a positive note, I liked the Christina Rossetti work that he chose. I had to read it a few times to truly take in all of the beauty of the poem, and it was an incredibly well written piece. I think I might start picking up some books on poetry so I can hone up on my sonnet skills.
I also liked how Foster addressed that literature can never be entirely “whole” and it makes sense. Ever since I began reading, I wanted to become a writer. I wanted to write children’s books with elaborate pictures, cute names, and an incorporated moral just like my favorite author, Kevin Henkes. All authors (or aspiring ones) have an inspiration from somewhere and that inspiration is what continues that genre of writing. It was interesting to learn about where certain genres and characters are derived from and Foster did an excellent job explaining it. Foster is totally right when saying “there is only on kind of eel!”
It didn't surprise me, however I never really paid that much attention, that most literature, contemp. or "old school" is an allusion from Shakespeare. From Sharon Draper's more obvious Romiette and Julio to the musical "The Westside Story," as mentioned by Foster. I’ve only ever read two Shakespeare-s: A Midsummer Night’s Dream and his infamous Romeo and Juliet but from reading about how many of the “oldies but goodies” are still used and applied in different ways fascinated me! It made me want to refer back to the source of all great literature and read his work!
It wasn’t hard for me to pick out biblical names prior to reading this book. Mary, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, Peter seem to be the pretty standard (not to mention popular) names throughout history and literature. The question I have is why? I suppose it would be interesting, yet a sick joke to put an alter ego on the Virgin Mary, or make Peter an antichrist. It also made me wonder if the biblical qualities follow the character into the book. I suppose Foster’s example of Samuel L. Jackson in Pulp Fiction who swears constantly would say otherwise. I wasn’t aware of some of the books or stories Foster mentions. I think I’ll have to pick up my Bible and read some stuff so that I can further understand literature. Although I’m not an overzealous person, I really like how religion can be incorporated into everything, especially when it’s controversial.
I am thoroughly sick of fairytales. For German and Spanish my junior year, we did a unit on fairytales; reading them, writing them, dissecting them. So I cannot only pick out the English meanings, but I can also keep an eye out for a different vantage point to another language. What’s even cooler is that occasionally, the characters have biblical names, so I’m also able (now) to compare those two points. However, I suppose it wouldn’t hurt me to brush up on my Brother’s Grimm and Mother Goose a little bit, then I can have it fresh in my mind what characters to compare, what symbols match up. Literature is actually fun when understood and has an origin!
And finally, Greek myth. If fairytales and the Bible are intertwined with literature, of COURSE the ancient Greeks and their polytheistic ways would also hold a place in the complex heart of literature. The first author I thought of when hearing Greek was Homer. I loved The Odyssey and never can get enough learning about Greek and Roman history. The mythology really interests me and I always wonder how they come up with their stories. I also like how there is a God for everything and I think that’s where the symbolism comes from in a lot of literature. When there’s the sea, it is Poseidon and the underworld? The devil and Hades are pretty close. I think that I’ll have to brush up on my Homer though because I don’t remember a lot of the actual mythology. I have a feeling that the information I learned from freshman year is only the glaze and I’ll really have to do my research if I want to know everything about how Greek myth ties with literature.
Among the many symbols in literature, of course weather has to be included. The first experience I had with weather as a symbol was in Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms. Whenever it rained, it meant that happiness was fading from the lives of Catherine and Henry. It began to rain usually when Catherine and Henry were together, and after series of their passionate lovemaking. It was a symbol that although they may have thought they were in love with each other, they were most in love with the physicality of their relationship, and because their relationship is built on that false love, it made them both unhappy. Henry was unhappy about the commitment he had to make to Catherine, and Catherine was becoming increasingly unhappy about the possibility of becoming another “notch in his bedpost.” I also liked how Foster addressed the possible biblical meaning of rain. He used the book The Virgin and the Gypsy to demonstrate that the rain can also be a cleansing of lives, “a big eraser,” just like the flood in Noah’s Ark was. He also mentioned snow was like a blanket that covers things until the early spring and when it melts, it reveals the truths that winter had been hiding, such as murders and deaths.
Snow hiding murder brings up chapter 11 in Foster’s lit manual, a chapter on violence. Now, it never occurred to me that violence of all things actually meant something. Of course it has a cause; I mean people aren’t violent for no reason unless they are a sociopath. However, I like violence in my books and poems because it seems to show the most emotion; a couple fighting over an insinuated lover, bills need to be paid but there is no money, hiding from someone trying to kill you only later to find out that he/she is related to you. I also never thought of violence as a symbol, it just seemed kind of…there. I think in AP Lit this year I’d like to learn more about the symbolic reason for violence and just more about how it applies to literature.
However, until chapter 12, NOTHING was a symbol to me. I read the books, comprehended them, wrote the essay, and forgot about it. When teachers would explain “symbols” and how to look for them, I thought to myself: “really? That’s a symbol? Are you sure the author didn’t just make it a…coincidence?” I always thought teachers made stuff up about what the author implied because who really knows what the author means except him/her? However, I suppose not everything can be a coincidence because otherwise there would be no real story. I learned to look for symbols in 303 and I’m glad that I did, otherwise I probably wouldn’t be near ready enough to take this class. I learned if it’s not a motif, it’s a symbol and sometimes symbols and motifs are one in the same. Take Laurie Halse Anderson’s Speak. The tree reoccurred throughout the book, but also symbolized strength from what Melinda fears, which is the boy who raped her. From Foster, I also learned about allegories (things that stand for other things on a one-for-one basis, p 98. Foster.) but I think that Lit this year will have to teach me more about those.
Okay, so I’m probably not going to be the first person ever to say this, but I hate political writing. Anything from books, poems, and plays; if it’s remotely political, I won’t read it. I’ve never seen A Christmas Carol or read the book, but I’ve heard of it, mostly because of Ebenezer Scrooge. I always thought it was just a Christmas story, one with ghosts, lessons and a happy ending. However, I didn’t realize that it was political until it was explained to me. Dickens was very clever to symbolize Scrooge as social corruption while keeping the story entertaining. Another political writing is George Orwell’s Animal Farm. It tells the story of a farm of mistreated animals that takes over and the owners and people take place of the animals. It refers to the people of the Soviet Union overthrowing Stalin and the communistic lifestyle, replacing it with a democracy and a fair government. Although I despise it, I think as people, we can learn a lot from how politics has changed over decades and how it has changed the people that have lived in that era.
So Christ figures. Again like Biblical ones, not that hard to spot when following Foster’s checklist. I really needed this checklist because I wasn’t brought up religious. Sure I was baptized and had first communion and then I think it is called reconciliation? Well my point is I hated every minute I was forced to sit and listen to things I didn’t understand. In second grade, I didn’t care who the four guys were that contributed to the Bible, but I had to know their names. I had to know all Ten Commandments by third grade and by the time I was reconciled, I knew up to ten prays that I had to have memorized. What good did that do me? I don’t use them. Reading chapter 14 really helped me because it helped me further my knowledge on biblical characters and literature.
Along with violence from chapter 11, I had also never considered flight as a symbol. I liked Foster’s eight meanings for flight, mostly number three, which means the person is crazy I like how flight means freedoms; it reminds me of doves or birds released from captivity. Flight is also Christ-like because of angels and of course the demonic figures. However in my opinion, flight with angels usually means protection or in the case to demons, unfinished business and harm. I’d like to learn more about flight this year in Lit so that I can be more on top of my symbols.
With one look at this book, I figured that I would hate it too. I thought it was going to be the most boring read I had ever experienced, and additionally that it would take me all summer long, because I would just never have the motivation to finish it. I was so wrong! From the first page I realized that this really would be "a lively and entertaining guide to reading between the lines." I enjoy the style that Foster uses, speaking directly to me when I'm reading. In addition to this, his humor and informality make the book feel more like a class discussion than a lecture.
Learning about the Quest from Foster confirmed what I had already realized about many novels, but never quite understood. In many occasions, the so-called "quest" that the character is attempting to complete is usually never accomplished in the fashion they envisioned, and almost always the character returns a different person.
Just as Allig8rr mentioned, I immediately switched my thoughts to the Twilight series when Foster started to mention vampires. However, I thought that the vampires he was talking about were nothing like the Cullen family. Instead after reading more in to the chapter, I realized the vampires he was mentioning were more prevalent in Scott Westerfield's Peeps series, which shows the outcasts who are vampires in a large city, where they have to hide in the underworld, and seduce victims to increase their population.
Just like Allison and Chelsey, I too was a bit disheartened when I saw this book. However, I was pleasantly surprised at how much I actually enjoyed it. I found the book to be easy to read and quite entertaining. I liked Foster’s writing style and felt as though he was personally engaged in a conversation with the reader, not just lecturing about the technicalities of literature. I also appreciated his pertinent tangents about books and movies, as I felt they relayed his message on a more personal and “real” basis that I found easy to connect to.
I was glad Foster started off the book with a chapter about quests. Although they may not always appear in the form of a knight and a dragon, quests are the fundamental core of many texts. I immediately thought of one of my favorite books, Jack Kerouac’s On the Road, that is every inch a bona fide quest story. Foster shows us that a quest doesn’t always have to be in black and white, and I suddenly saw how countless novels I’ve read are in fact quests at their cores.
While reading the chapter about communion and meals, I realized that most of the communion scenes I could recall take place at Christmas: The Grinch, A Christmas Carol, etc.. It always seemed as though the climactic conflict was resolved and everyone came together for a meal. This makes sense in Foster’s reasoning of a meal as an event of community and peace.
Now, the first thing that came to mind in the chapter concerning vampire was, of course, the Twilight novels. However, shortly after, I remembered another bout of vampires that had scared me as a little kid: The Lost Boys, the 1987 film about a gang of intriguing, young vampires who plague a SoCal town, the title borrowed from Peter Pan’s band of friends in JM Barrie’s classic (which I again though of in the chapter about fairy tales and children’s literature). But unlike Twilight, the fundamentals of the vampires in The Lost Boys pertain true to Foster’s defination of destruction, consumption, and exploitation. I found interesting this elucidation: vampires don’t always have to physically be vampires. With this in mind I saw many vampires in texts I’d read, but at the time would never have thought they were “vampires.” Many of these included works of Edgar Allen Poe, like The Masque of the Red Death and The Cask of Amontillado, to name a few.
I’ve always liked poetry, both reading and writing it, so I found the “square sonnet” section useful. In the extremely condensed poetry units we study in school, we’ve only really studied one type of sonnet, this being of the Shakespearean sort. Foster’s analysis provided me with a more in depth understanding of sonnets and poetry in general.
Foster’s analysis of different patterns and archetypes in literature reminded me of a summer school English class I taught last year, in which students classified themselves as typical archetypes like villain, hero, warrior, and prophet. Of course such a simple activity would be employed to show the reoccurrence of these same basic figures in nearly all pieces of literature. I particularly liked Foster’s eel simile to express the unity of all literature. I also found that many of these same famous patterns stem from either the Bible or Shakespeare, which Foster addresses in following chapters.
Now, we’ve all read Shakespeare and hear his quotes thrown naively around. And although superficial allusions to Shakespeare may seem a bit cliche, I think we often overlook the underlying parallels. Even though students may groan and complain about reading Shakespeare, his works are classics for a reason and carry universal admiration. So we may not have read his actual stories, but we have undoubtedly witnessed modern takes on his classic like Kiss Me, Kate, 10 Things I Hate About You, and, of course, West Side Story. Even in stories that don’t take the literal plot from Shakespeare, his influence is still there; it may not be straight-up Elizabethan speak, but the Bard’s effect still resonates true. Compare, for example, The Little Mermaid and The Tempest. The plot may be quite different, but Ariel resembles Shakespeare’s character by the same name; both are, in one way or another, under the control of a Prospero-like character. Perhaps my favorite novel, Brave New World, is mentioned by Foster in this chapter. My first time reading it, I didn’t pick up on all of the Shakespeare references, but now looking back, I see that it is full of allusions to Shakespeare and his writings.
I agree with everyone who has posted comments on this book so far. When I first paged through the book, the task of reading it seemed daunting. I mean how could someone write two hundred and eighty one pages about how to read a book? I admit that I put off reading the book for a while, but I figured that I had to do it sometime so I might as well get it over with. When I started the book, it honestly took me a little while to get into, but now that I am further into it, it isn't a horrible read. I like how Foster uses a personable style in his writing; he writes directly to the writer, as if he is speaking directly to him or her. I also like how Foster tries to include humor in his writing, although sometimes it is a bit hard to follow. One thing that I dislike, however, is the amount of references to other works that Foster includes. Although this is beneficial to the book, I am personally unfamiliar with many of these incorporated works, making it hard for me to follow Foster's thought process in some areas. I do find it helpful; nevertheless, that Foster tries to explain the background of these stories while he is making his connection. Honestly, I do tend to skim over some parts and find myself having to go back and reread sections that are engulfed with unfamiliar literary references.
Although I am only to chapter 7, I think that Foster's book is preparing me to be a more analytical reader. For instance, in "Nice to Eat You: Acts of Vampires," Foster explains that works written in the Victorian era relied on fictional beings like vampires and ghosts to portray 'taboo' subjects, for example sexuality and sex, at the time. Because Foster points this out, it opens my eyes to see further into just a scary ghost scene. He makes it known that it is necessary to be familiar with the time period of the book you are reading so that you can unwrap hidden themes and issues of the time.
Another thing that I found quite interesting came from "Now, Where Have I Seen Her Before." In this chapter, Foster lectures on how a reader must look for allusions while reading because new works and old works share in 'intertextuality.' One example that Foster uses is from a book called Going After Cacciatio. He connects this book to Alice in Wonderland, and he also connects one of the book's characters to Sacajawea. This idea of looking for past scenes, historical events, people, and characters allows the reader to add more depth to their reading experience, and makes it easier to imagine the setting of a novel.
I’m pretty good at finding the Christ figures and allusions to main people and stories in the Bible, but I guess I had truly never realized just how many references there are, both subtle and straightforward. Foster does a good job explaining how many archetypal characters are direct references to the Bible and authors will intentionally name characters after Biblical figures to carry their message about said character. After reading this chapter and the previous one about Shakespeare, I noticed that there are many Biblical and Shakespearean references in songs as well as works of literature.
Hanseldee and Greteldum. I loved this chapter because fairy tale allusions always provide a bit of nostalgia. Everyone knows the basics of Aesop’s Fables and the Brothers Grimm, although the Disney versions are substantially less intense, to say the least, than the originals (I mean, you don’t see Cinderella’s evil stepsisters cutting off parts of their feet to fit into the forsaken slipper in Walt’s happy cheery version). But nevertheless, it is these same famous archetypes that constantly surface in fairy tales and children’s literature: the evil stepmother, prince charming, magical animals. And even today our favorite childhood stories still find their way into popular culture for mere entertainment value, as in films like Enchanted or Shrek. In this chapter Foster explained something that I suppose I had always subconsciously known but never full realized, that many writers employ standard fairy tales as a literary element because we are already quite familiar with the character or story.
Before Foster’s evaluation of myth in literature, my connotation with “myth” had always been Greek and Roman mythology. Sure, we’ve all read novels and epics, like the Iliad and the Odyssey, and seen films, such as 300 or Troy, that detail the ancient Greek and Roman myths and stories, but this chapter helped me the better realize just how extensive the word “myth” can be. I had also not realized how large of an impact myth has in literature. But then again, if the Bible, Shakespeare, and fairy tales have weight, then of course mythology would too. I was glad that Foster included the Coen brother’s O Brother, Where Art Thou? in his analysis because I think it’s a great modern ironized take on a text like the Odyssey that has such a profound significance in literature.
In the chapter about weather, Foster delves deeper into our connotations with different types of weather and their impact on literature. He made it clearer how weather can play a prominent role in both the plot of a story as well as the setting and mood. For example, in Our Town, the weather is a structural point, a topic in conversation among characters. However, in the Great Gatsby, the weather takes on the role as a reoccurring theme that narrates Jay and Daisy’s relationship with rain and sunshine.
Just like Allison, I never really saw the symbolic implications of violence. I never would have imagined violence plays such a large role in literature. Foster details the two categories of literary violence: the specific injury and the narrative violence. Violence and death in literature can be literal or symbolic. I now see how important violence is in literature because it can evoke emotion in a way that nothing else can. I think its important that I learn more about this because violence plays such a strong role in society and literature and I’m only now beginning to better understand its effects.
I’ve always loved the notion that there really is no right answer when it comes to symbols; they’re ambiguous. And as frustrating as that might be sometimes, it is comforting in that each individual reader can create a more intimate and personal connection. I enjoyed Foster’s analysis of Passage to India and the symbols in the meaning behind the caves. I found it to be a good example of explaining how to approach symbols. It was interesting that Foster said that the story’s Professor Godbole might say, “the caves must be experienced before they can be understood or that every person’s caves are different.” The same is true for understanding symbols in literature. This chapter was very helpful in decoding symbols and giving parts of texts meaning.
I'd definitely have to agree with everyone who has posted so far. Especially with the first impressions of the book. It looked as if my first summer reading would become a tiresome book, one which I would have to force myself to read. However, after reading further, I began to look at literature in a different light.
I absolutely love how Foster creates interesting titles to his chapters. It makes me try to figure out what the main idea would be before even beginning to read. Most of the time I am wrong in these attempts, but I ended up following the directions on how to look at things from Foster's point of view much better and as a result will continue to analyze literature more carefully.
My favorite part of the book so far has been about the quest. It seems as though a reader can't help but connect to a Fantasy series or book. This particular chapter reminded me of The Two Princesses Of Bamarre by Gail Carson Levine. Princess Addie ends up acquiring self-knowledge when she is not even looking for it. The pattern of stories is quite similar to the sequence Foster has set up for a "quest". I suppose that now I truly do feel like Foster said, "once you figure out quests, the rest is easy."
As many can probably expect, I too connected to the fantastic Twilight series. Although the chapter wasn't quite what I expected the knowledge I gained was great. I especially liked how Foster clearly stressed, "you don't need fangs and a cape to be a vampire". It is interesting how this does apply to many stories, as vampiric characteristics do not have to be associated with a literal vampire. An act that is deemed evil, out of the norm, or even inappropriate can constitute the connotation of the monstrous qualities of a vampire. As these can be applied to people and current situations, I found it useful to search out some of the "vampires" in today's society to try to better understand the concept of "vampires".
After 3 chapters, I am enjoying How to Read literature Like a Professor a little more than I thought I would. It's not exactly Harry Potter (WHEW! MOVIE CAME OUT YESTERDAY!), but I see that it provides some essential tips to better my understanding of the fine details of literature. I particularly liked the first chapter about quests, and how Foster laid out the facts that a story isn’t really about the trip it tells about, “The real reason for a quest is always self-knowledge.” I understand now that in the past I have focused too much on following the details of events within a story. I have not paid enough attention to the messages of self-discovery that the author intends to get across; a message that (Foster later describes) is oftentimes wrapped up in symbols, patterns, analogies and metaphors.
One thing that, I’ll admit, has started to frustrate me a little, is all of the examples from other books I haven’t read. I truly understand the importance of using examples to more successfully get a point across, and the examples that Foster takes from other novels do well to elaborate on the central aspect he is trying to touch on. Although, I feel like these examples from novels would mean a whole lot more to me if I had read them. I know this isn’t Foster’s fault, because how is he to know which books I have and haven’t read? But I know that the few examples that I have read have given me a whole new sense of perspective. For example, Grendel is a novel I recently read in my Comparative Mythologies class last semester, and Foster told about the monster Grendel symbolizing both the hostility of the universe, and the darkness in human nature. This made me better understand the importance of looking into books as the “world in symbolic terms.” I reacted to this example, taking what I had gotten out of the book Grendel, and comparing it to Foster’s symbols that had apparently went way over my head. Like I said, I now know that I have to dig deeper than just the “quest” and look for the inner symbols of the plot-line. And as far as not knowing the other example novels, I guess this is my calling to read more books!
For the most part I agree with Foster’s views on political writings. I’m not really a fan of overly political writings; however, I do enjoy stories that have subtle ageless political motives. Brave New World, okay it may not be that subtle, is unlike most other political writings in that it is still uncannily relevant today, 77 years later. I never would have thought that Edgar Allan Poe was political, but Foster’s explanation of nobility really made sense.
I thought it was really understandable that Foster said both writers and readers should learn about the specific religion that is the subject of the text. When we read The Chosen this year, we learned about Judaism and I felt that helped tremendously in the overall comprehension of the novel. The Old Man and The Sea was a wonderful example because Foster explained each characteristic of a Christ Figure well. I also found it quite interesting that not all Christ figures have to be good, which got me trying to figure out which antagonistic characters that would fit the description.
Just like with violence, I didn’t realize all the implications and meanings of flight. I’d always known that flight represented a form of freedom, but to me wings were just wings. I learned that the freedom offered by flight can come in physical or emotional forms and that irony is often involved with flight in literature, like in Foster’s example of “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings.” I will definitely have to pay closer attention to flight in literature in the future.
I’d never realized that many of the symbols of sex in literature come from Freud. I’d also never really paid much attention to many of those symbols, like a lance or a bowl in Foster’s knight and fertility evaluation. But it makes a lot of sense considering that, until quite recently, it was taboo to write openly about sex in literature. I found it a bit confusing that there are symbols for sex, while at the same time, sex can be a symbol for other things.
I always knew that water was symbolic of cleansing and rebirth, but I didn’t realize the full extent of baptism symbols. For instance, water can express rebirth in life as well as in death. To me, drowning was simply just drowning; I didn’t know, like violence and flight, that it could be so cryptic and meaningful in literature.
I never realized just how much thought writers put into finding the right location for their story to take place in! I thought it was notably interesting that geography can also be any element in the text, like theme, symbol, or plot. But after thinking about it, it makes a lot of sense because it seems that the geography of a story always affects most of the other aspects of the text.
While reading the chapter about seasons, I was flooded with prominent memories of season in literature that I’ve read, and how the time of year has such a profound impact on the mood and themes of the text. In literature, seasons are similar to weather in that they can both represent age and emotions of characters. I think that as readers, we’re so familiar with seasonal associations that we don’t put much emphasis on them, but this chapter really helped me to pay more attention to the season and not overlook its importance.
The interlude entitled “One Story” was eye opening for me because it gave me a better sense of what writers go through and how much is actually put into creating a story and its characters.
I found the chapter “Marked for Greatness” one of the most interesting in the book because of Foster’s statement that questers/heroes have been marked in some way or another. This makes sense because we would find a perfect and flawless hero far less interesting and harder to connect to than one who is marked in one way or another. I instantly thought of my favorite “questing” protagonists and their “marks,” and I discovered that not all of them are obvious physical marks. For instance, Eliza Doolittle of Pygmalion and My Fair Lady fame has no distressing outer mark. Instead, her “mark” is her speech and etiquette. This chapter also reminded me of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story “The Birth-Mark” in which a man obsesses over his wife’s hand-shaped birthmark on her cheek, but the quest to remove it turns disastrous . This chapter was thought provoking, especially Foster’s reasoning that outer beauty/appeal can sometimes conceal inner scars and outer physical marks can hide inner beauty and strength.
It seems as though in literature, blindness and irony go hand in hand. Those who cannot physically see are always able to understand things more clearly and possess a greater wisdom. For instance, in The Chosen, after being hit in the eye with a baseball, Reuven sees the world more clearly, but also in a different way than before. In literature, a blind character is never just blind for no reason and the blindness always directly impacts their character.
In the chapters about heart disease and illness, I felt I really understood what Foster was talking about. From a young age, we know the heart is associated with life and emotion. So, naturally, any problems dealing with the heart in literature are usually metaphors describing the characters’ emotional state. Disease too, like the heart, reflects emotions. Foster mainly discussed two diseases in literature: cholera and tuberculosis. Whenever I think of the latter, Edgar Allan Poe immediately comes to mind, most evident with the Masque of the Red Death.
The chapter “Don’t Read with Your Eyes” was very helpful for reading any literature in general. Too often, we only read a text from our point of view and fail to enter the author’s setting and take on the perspective of the characters by seeing the story through their eyes. For me this is sometimes quite hard to do, especially if I don’t particularly like a certain character or find them difficult to relate to.
And now at the end of the book, once I thought I was beginning to get the hang of analyzing each topic previously discussed, Foster throws in the ironies that go along with each element of literature. Irony is probably my favorite element in literature because it flips our preconceived expectations and usually there’s a bit of humor and brilliance involved. I was completely speechless and shocked when Foster suggested A Clockwork Orange’s Alex as a Christ figure. He is anything but kind and holy. I had always considered Alex one of the best villains in literature and film and one of my favorites as well. He’s an absolutely unforgiving and repulsive character, yet you find him so interesting to the point you dare yourself to put up with him. However, Foster’s reasoning behind Alex’s classification as a Christ figure actually made sense and made me think more about his character. Another thing I found ironic about the drugged-milk-drinking, Nadsat-speaking, psychopathic murderer/rapist was that listening to Beethoven’s symphonies, one of his favorite things from his “violent days,” is what ultimately leads him to madness even after being reformed. Foster’s analysis of Alex, as well as the rest of the irony chapter, was my favorite part of the book. In the future, I’ll just have to remember that, in the words of Foster, “irony trumps everything.”
I thought the Test Case was a nice culmination of the book because it was a way to put our newly developed skills to the test and see how much we learned in the past 244 pages. This example I found the most helpful because, unlike each chapter’s condensed examples, Foster provided us with a substantial example which made understanding the entire book considerably easier. I also liked how he offered his perspective and analysis of the text along with probing us to find the answers. Overall, I thought the book was very helpful and surprisingly enjoyable.
Like almost everyone else has already said, when I was handed this book at the end of the year I thought that it would be a trial to get through; however, I found the book entertaining and really quite enjoyable. Even in the introduction I found interesting advice and commentary on books, scenes, symbols, etc. But once Foster began his first chapter on quests, I became a little nervous. I did not see it at all until he sounded it all out, word for word. After he explained it though, it made perfect sense and remembered a book I had read a couple of years ago that now sounded like a quest, Breath My Name by R.A. Nelson. It followed all the requirments needed to be a quest and relating this new information to a story really gave me some confidence; I didn't know if i would be able to see some of this on my own, but i seem to be farring quite well. All in all, I really liked how the book was written because it not only explained things, but I felt as though these ideas were being taught. Even reading as a younger girl, it always seemed as if there were deeper meanings below the surface of books. I could always feel them, but I could never put my finger on what it might have meant. Now, just like Foster said, I feel that the books I read take on a whole new meaning, and I have a new found appreciation, and understanding for the works I read.
The next chapter about communion I found was easily applicable to many works I have previously read. Just like in Carver's "Cathedral" that Foster writes about, I remember reading book as a little girl, and while the title eludes me, I remember a scene where the main character, a young girl about eight or nine, sits down with her family and some guests for dinner. However, the little girl of the visiting family is blind. The main character is curious, even a little frightened of the blind girl. However, throughout the scene, the protagonist begins to see that there is no reason to be afraid, even though she is blind, she is still a human. After learning that sharing a meal, whether it be holy or inherently unhloy, if the author writes about it, it is undeniablly important and will almost always have an important meaning behind it.
Just like Chelsea and Allig8rr, the next chapter on vampires really caught my attention thanks to Stephanie Meyer and the Twilight series. While reading the chapter, however, the Cullen family and the "vegitarian" aspect of their life was simply not mentioned and clearly not what Foster intended to talk about. I did like how he explained that one can be a vampire without all of the bloodsucking drama that is typically associated with being it; a vampire can be defined as someone who preys on something smaller than his/herself for personal gain, or in other words, selfishness. The example Foster uses of the story "Daisy Miller" I found a perfect fit, it's a classic case of an older man stripping away the life of a younger woman. I especially like the play on the names of Daisy and Winterborne, it taught me to pay close attention to names and look for all the hints that authors give us (and after reading Allig8rr's post, it seems that she noted the same thing). While this was probably my favorite chapter out of the entire book, when I finished the chapter I was curious as to where Twilight fit in to all of this. What made Twilight commercial fiction compared to literary fiction? Granted, I read the book before I learned how to read like a professor, but I couldn't help but wonder what it was lacking to make it literary fiction. Was it because the Cullen's were vampires but didn't have vampire traits? Or was the story lacking symbols, quests, depth, allusion, references to Shakspere etc.? I remember Mrs. Nickerson saying it was just commercial fiction last year but now that I understand what it means to be a work of literature I am curious as to why it isn't and would like to re-read them and see what I can find now that escaped my blind eyes before.
I too, Allig8rr, love poetry. It's like looking into the ocean-it is beautiful on the surface, but the most beautiful part lies within. Despite that, the sonnet chapter did very little for me. I learned what it is and how the structure is important to the poem itself, but I still need work on noticing them in other works. As Quinn said, I am only acquainted with the Shakespearian sonnet (at least, that is the only one I am consciously aware of) and I will need to become more exposed to sonnets of other types. I also liked how Foster used "An Echo from Willow-Wood" mostly because I really liked the poem and also because he did a great job explaining it.
While reading, "Now, Where Have I Seen Her Before?” all I could think of was one time in fifth grade when I had to do an art project; my friend finished hers first and I saw it and could not think of an idea of my own to do. I've also noticed this with essays (I won't even proofread unless I have already finished) and realize that this is kind of the same with literature. Except these authors do more that just copy, they incorporate. Once one learns to see this, one can learn so much more about a character or a plot, I personally think that's amazing. Foster even reveals a name to us for this: intertextuality. I haven't really noticed this much before in my reading, mainly because I haven't been looking for it, but now that I know what to look for, I am sure that I will be able to see this more and more in my reading.
I have often heard that Shakespeare is the master of all literature but I never really realized how important he was to so much literature! I can only imagine how many times I have read him and not even realized what it did to my understanding of the story. Some obvious examples of Shakespeare I HAVE noticed are West Side Story, and Romiette and Julio, just like Allig8rr. Foster also mentions that Shakespeare is often quoted because he often makes one sound intelligent, but I remember in Huck Finn when Twain uses irony to make Dauphin quote Shakespeare incorrectly. Not only will many understand this humor but they will also understand what Twian is trying to portray because Shakespeare is pretty universal. Another thing Allig8rr and I share is that we have only read two of his works, which puts us at a severe disadvantage for noticing allusions and parallels. I for one have always loved Shakespeare but still am rather naive about allusions, parallels etc. to his work other than the obvious.
Well, now that I have read nearly the entire book and so far have neglected to fulfill my blogging duties, I realized I now need to go back and re-read the whole thing (if not just skimming). However I've come to realize that isn't the worst thing in the world, as this book has proved quite useful in my reading adventures. So skimming over it again can't hurt.
So far what I've gotten from most of you fellow bloggers is that you dislike the amount of real literary examples Foster relies on. I actually feel indebted to him, as he has introduced me to all of these works that I am not terribly familiar with. (This will prove helpful on the English Academic Team this year Mrs. Nickerson, will it not?) What I have done and also recommend to all of you is to look up a brief summary for the works that you are unfamiliar with if you find yourself completely lost on what he's trying to say. Otherwise, the details of the literary work being alluded to aren't always important to understand what Foster is trying to say at that very moment in time, so don't worry too much.
No one's really talked about the introduction, but I couldn't help but laugh when I read about the awkward moment we've all experienced at one point in English class where teacher and student each "adopts a look." Ah yes, the moment where we're completely dumbfounded at whatever seemingly bogus interpretation the teacher decides to throw at us. Priceless.
I enjoyed the chapter about the quest in literature. After all, many young adult books could be considered quest stories, now that I think of it. Think of the main characters in young adult fiction: young? Check. Room to grow/something to learn? Check. Throw anything at me from the Teen section at Barnes and Noble, and I'll bet I could argue it's a quest. After reading this chapter, all of these books-Twilight, the A-List, Gossip Girl, City of Glass, Speak, anything by Sarah Dessen-suddenly took on new meanings that I hadn't quite seen before.
I learned quite a bit from "Acts of Vampires." Foster has now slyly morphed me into a vampire hunter. Okay, we have Twilight and The Vampire Diaries, which ovbiously have vampires, and I had indeed seen that there is more to Dracula's actions than simply sucking blood. What I hadn't before thought of was how vampirism can take place even without an actual vampire being there. A vampire in "Daisy Miller?" I thought he was crazy at first, but I now understand what Foster means. So now I have a new checklist of things to look for while reading: I'm going to hunt some vampires.
Kaitlyn,
To answer your questions about why Twilight is considered more commercial than it is a work of literature, it comes down to what makes a classic... well a classic. As much as I love the series, I think the books are more about the story they are telling than they are about symbolism, themes, etc. Take the first chapter in Foster's book about quests. Is Twilight really about Bella's quest self-knowledge? Not as much as it is just about her relationship with Edward.
The short answer?
Commercial: about the events and the story itself
Literary: about what these events mean, what does this symbolize, or what does that tell us about the character
I hope that helps to answer your question. This is really just my opinion, I suppose, more than factual answer. (Hm doesn't that sound oddly like Chapter 12 about symbols. :P)
Biblical references. I already knew they were quite common mainly because I have already seen them numerous times before, but now that Foster showed me more ways that biblical references can occur, I am sure I will see them even more frequently. Reading this chapter made me think about the Scarlet Letter, I saw plenty of biblical and religious references in the book, (which I’m pretty sure was easy for everyone because that’s what the book was really about) but I can't even begin to imagine how many I overlooked, disregarded or ignored! Also, like Allig8er, I liked Foster's use of the example of Pulp Fiction because I find the twist on the Christ figure interesting and ironic only in a way that can make the story great.
Who didn't read at least some version of the Brothers Grimm as a child? So then why wouldn't an author follow some patterns or borrow some ideas from these classic childhood stories? Like Shakespeare or the Bible, these stories are almost universally known and therefore perfect candidates to reoccur in literature. Foster also said something very interesting in this chapter, "...we want strangeness in our stories, but we want familiarity, too". He couldn't be more right. I hear alot of times that people want something new, fresh, one-of-a-kind, exciting, never-been-done-before etc. etc. But even if we don't realize it, we crave familiarity too. We desire something to grab onto, something to relate to so we can better understand it. That something can be an emotion, a person, a pattern, almost anything really, and an author’s ability to fulfill that desire by relating their story to something else is what can make his/her story great.
After finishing the chapter on Greek mythology, I realized where my weakness will be in my reading. Personally, I love Greek mythology, but I haven't studied it since sixth grade and I know that I don't have a good enough understanding of it to make the connections I need to make. I know the story of Hercules pretty well, thanks to Walt Disney, but many of the other myths are, well, Greek to me. This is definitely something I will need to brush up on throughout the year.
The next chapter about rain and snow seemed almost too easy. I have always been the person who assumes something’s a symbol until proven otherwise, so I have already looked at weather in this way a few times already. I also find that movie directors will use rain to "cleanse" characters quite often. I've seen countless movies where people hit rock bottom (in the rain, of course) and then from that point on, bam! Their life is going better and everything is coming together. However, that is only one of the many ways rain can be used and it would be impossible for me to name what rain could all mean, so I’ll just leave it as this: rain (and weather in general) is situational, but undeniably important.
One of the most frequently asked literary question seems to be, "does he really mean that, or are you just making it up?" I too have asked that question. How does anyone besides the author know that A means this and represents B and so this is what it means. I always kind of wondered if teachers were just full of it or if they could really see things that I couldn't. After reading this book, I have learned to read books at a whole new level and I will hopefully be able to see these things on my own now. I am glad that Foster incorporated this into his book because I have always wondered about that and it adds validity to every point that he’s making. I felt that it made his book even more trustworthy and believable, which only helped me and my skepticism. :)
The next chapter on violence I found very intriguing. Like what Allig8rr said, I looked at violence like it was just there, especially in mystery novels. I would try to look at violence symbolically, but I wasn't looking at it the right way and I often just disregarded it as an essential part to the plot and nothing more, but after reading this book and knowing what questions to ask, I am certain that violence in books will become even more memorable than it already is. This chapter also made me think of "Snowflower and the Secret Fan" and the chapter on foot binding. Before, I just looked at it as if it were simply part of the story and an important aspect of Chinese culture that couldn't be ignored, but now I look at it and see that it represents a society’s force to mold their citizens in one uniform way. Now that I know how to look at violence, everything about it and related to it takes on a whole new meaning.
The next chapter on symbols was a fun one for me because everything is a symbol (or motif) with me. I tend to look at everything as a symbol until it's proven otherwise. The easiest example that I think everyone can relate to is The Chosen. Potack’s use of motifs and symbols was easy to see and, in my opinion, really helped all of us identify with symbols and learn how to identify them. I think that after reading Foster's book I will only see more symbols than the ones that I can find already.
About the political writings, I think I'm on my own when I say that I don't mind them. Personally, I like political writing because I find it interesting to know what people felt at the time when the piece was written. I don't know exactly know why I like political writings, maybe APUSH got me interested into history a little more than I thought! I also believe that we can learn things from political writing that normally we wouldn't find in other literature from that time period. Foster writes about “Rip Van Winkle” in this chapter as political (obviously), but I never really looked at it that way before. This made it seem that political writings make good allegories and I find allegories fascinating so I think that makes me prone to liking political writing. I guess I’ll just be the odd one out here and admit that I like a good, political work of literature once in awhile.
I never really thought to look for a Christ figure in my reading before I read this book. I am sure I have come across a few in my previous readings, but I never knew what to look for so I simply overlooked or disregarded them. Now that I have Foster's checklist and his example of The Old Man and the Sea (which really helped me see how to figure this out), I know that Christ figures will be much easier to identify and relate to.
If I had a superpower, I would definitely want to fly. Flight is fascinating and the symbolism and irony that can be associated with it are endless. Flight usually represents freedom, as Foster explains, but when there is an ironic twist on it (as in “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings”), a whole new dimension is added. I can't wait to read about flight and discover what it symbolizes in the story. :) I also liked how Foster explained how symbolic falling can be in addition to flight itself. He explained that falling typically means rebirth, and the first thing I thought of was the TV show, Lost, which I am sure everyone is remotely aware of. (I saw the rebirth in that they fell out of the plane and were “born” into a brand new world). Flight was interesting in literature before, but I never looked twice at falling! Once again, Foster has opened my eyes to a whole new thought process.
As soon as I read the title "It's All About Sex" I figured that it would have something to do with Freud, and I was right. I learned about Freud last year in psychology class, and I'm sure it will help me in my readings this year. Seeing sexual innuendos in books really doesn't seem that hard, for example Foster's illustration of a bowl and keys is clear as day! We live in a society that is all about sex. It's inescapable. In older times, however, there was the Hayes Code as Foster explains. This meant that all sexual references had to be hidden, maybe not subtle, but hidden none the less. Personally, I think that all the sexual innuendos in our literature this year won’t be too difficult to find.
I also liked how Foster explained, in chapter 17, that everything is about sex, except sex because it when sex is simply about sex, it's porn. Once again, Foster is undeniably right and brings up a valid point. Sex can be about liberation, going against the grain, rebellion etc. but being only about sex is just tacky. Also, I found it true from my past experiences that authors often skip over sex scenes entirely because, as Foster said, sex is sex, and there is only so much one can do with it. If I were an author, I would too! I just think it would be awkward writing about that. Although it is seemingly ironic, the statement that everything is about sex, except sex, is crystal clear to me.
The next chapter about baptism was classic. One sentence that really moved me and helped me really grasp the concept was this: "One cannot step into the same river twice". It is perfect for explaining baptism! Once baptized, one can't go back to the way s/he was, mainly because baptism most often stands for death and rebirth. Baptisms have potential to be tricky, so I will have to make a note to watch for them. Also, like Quinn mentioned, I never realized that drowning was such a meaningful way to die; I simply disregarded it as another way for the author to kill a character off and advance the plot.
In the past, I tended to disregard the geography of a scene or entire story as being just description and part of the setting. Landscape always seemed...trivial, and it typically didn't have too much to do with the plot, if anything at all. Of course there are exceptions, but I never really found the landscape significant in a book. Poems were easier; the geography was often a defining feature of the poem. When Foster explained the geography, though, it was obvious that if one pays attention to the details, the story begins to be so much more. I will have to make sure I pay more attention to that in my readings over the course of this year.
Seasons. This one was MUCH easier than geography! This is most likely because spring always felt like rebirth because it was a time of new, whereas winter was an end to life, so it seemed. Part of us always knows what the seasons represent, even as little kids, but in literature, it can give everything a new feeling. I first noticed the significance of seasons in Speak. Melinda was hurt and dying that fall, pretty much dead that winter, and reborn that spring...a perfect match to what we expect to see.
In another Interlude, I like how Foster explains that everything is one story, and brings up the idea of intertextuality again. The ironic thing I love, that Foster also explains, is that when an author borrows something from another's work and incorporates it into his story, he writes something original. In a literary world where COMPLETE originality is an impossibility (and not even completely desired), originality is attainable.
Chapter 21 made me instantly think of Harry Potter (and most likely had the same effect on Ella). While there are a million different ways to be marked, ones that have meaning in literature seem to be the ones separating one from the rest of society, marking them to be something better (or worse) than the people around him/her. I also liked another point that Foster brought up: it's not easy to accommodate characters with deformities, so if the author give the character a problem, he means something by it.
After reading Chapter Four, I will admit that I still do not like analyzing poetry. I was reminded of a poem we read in LA303, however I do not wish to have that huge book back, that had a lot of different terms used to describe poetry which was difficult to comprehend. Moreover, the use of words such as villanelle, rondeau, and rondel end up creating chaos in my mind as I try to process a poem. I felt as thought Foster was trying to get the point across that you don't have to know all of the technical terms; however, punctuation is key and the form of a poem matters. If a writer did not use commas or periods to state separate thoughts, a poem would end up being a huge run on and would affect the mood or feeling trying to be portrayed. I liked how Foster made me feel like I was doing an adequate job even thought I have a basic knowledge of poetry.
I was quite confused when Foster said, "There's only one story." I immediately thought "no...?" However, I understood where he was coming from after reading and understanding his notion that "stories grow out of stories". It made me think of the fantasy story of Cinderella. Most likely because it has grown and changed into multiple versions. There is one from the Brothers Grimm, Walt Disney, a Rodgers and Hammerstein musical, and even more recently it has branched off into a movie set in modern time, A Cinderella Story. All of these stories have some of the same underlying qualities of the story, however, they have been altered and changed. Understanding this process, through the changes of Cinderella, helped me to realize that distinctive characteristics are taken from stories and used in others. Although it may be subtle, you can recognize that the same attributes of characters are used in numerous stories.
Oh, William Shakespeare. I loved reading Romeo and Juliet in my freshman language class, more so because it was a love story than because of the experience I would gain reading a great work of literature. I made the connection of the allusion of Shakespeare through watching "West Side Story" at Bay Port. On the other hand I saw a quote used by many sports teams, one that I had no idea was from Shakespeare, “We few, we happy few, we band of brothers. For he today that sheds his blood with me shall be my brother..." I find it to be incredibly cool that people today still make references to Shakespeare and I enjoyed recognizing something! Previously I felt like Ella, and identified with the statement, "One thing that, I’ll admit, has started to frustrate me a little, is all of the examples from other books I haven’t read." I feel like just goes to show that even if you don't think you know much about literature, you probably do. Now I realize how many Shakespeare allusions are consistently used in the present time.
Foster brings up a good point in his chapter "When in Doubt, It's from Shakespeare." Foster states that, even if readers don't necessarily know every quote from each one of Shakespeare's works, it is necessary to be able to recognize that if the quote sounds too good to be true, it is probably from Shakespeare. I think that this advice is useful because it helps a reader work with the theory of 'intertextuality' and deepen their reading experience. Foster emphasizes that links and connections to characters, places, etc. in one novel to another add a great amount of depth to a story. For example, if a character in one novel is connected to Hester Prynne from the Scarlet Letter, as readers, we can assume that the said character probably has a secret concealed within herself or has committed a sin that forces shame upon her from her community. This allows for the reader to learn a great deal more about the character just by drawing on that one connection.
This also relates to Foster's chapter "...Or the Bible." Like Quinn mentioned, I am also pretty familiar with the Bible and can pick out references fairly easily. However, I like how Foster gives the example relating to Pulp Fiction because, both like Allig8rr and Kaitlyn said, it helps to show that biblical references can be used ironically.
With both of these two chapters and "Hanseldee and Greteldum," Foster does a good job of instilling in the reader that all literature grows out of other literature and all works connect to one or another in some way. This really made me think about how much references I have probably missed in all of my reading. Foster teaches us to be aware and on the look out for such references, and, when we find them, to ask ourselves why the reference would be used to illuminate the particular piece of literature.
The next chapter about blindness was a real eye opener. I always looked at blindness as a physical deformity and really nothing more, but the way Foster explained how to look at blindness helped me see it in a whole new light. It wasn't just a tragic trait for a character to be blind, but there is often meaning and irony behind it. The fist book that came to mind while reading this chapter was The Chosen. Even reading it last year I realized that Rueven nearly losing his sight gave him a whole new world to look at. In a figurative sense, it was like he was blind before the accident but after, his eyes were opened. Even though author's can do amazing things to their stories by incorporating blindness, it still freaks me out to think about being blind. I can't imagine not being able to see and I personally think that blindness is one of the scariest things that can happen to a person.
From the day we are born, we are taught to associate the heart with love and all tender emotion. Think about the Valentine’s Day cards you made in second grade, they were all hearts! That was probably the first thing I learned how to cut (with the exception of those snowflakes for Christmas). So, it was easy to understand what Foster was talking about when he referred to heart diseases representing emotional shortcomings. No matter what the reason, if an author kills a character with some sort of heart disease, it always seems a little more important than if they just die of, oh, let's say lung cancer. The heart is just a more emotional organ and breaking or killing ones heart just seems to have more of an emotional effect on the reader than anything else.
Being that illness and death are a part of life, I would just look at diseases as part of the story, but they are clearly much more. It feels like I’ve said that before about this book… Anyways, Foster did very well at explaining the reason behind some diseases. For example, he explained paralysis as a form of being trapped, very symbolic and very interesting because it can be used so many ways. The disease that kept reoccurring in this chapter, however, was tuberculosis. Reading about TB always makes mw think of books I read by older authors or books set in an older time. I used to think that it was just because it was a common disease of the time period and a popular choice for authors because it’s fun to say. He also brought up another interesting point: every age has its disease, and ours it AIDS. When I read that line, the first thing I thought of was RENT and the prominence of the disease throughout the entire piece.
Wow. Well after reading the introduction to this book I was just about ready to call it quits on this book.However, I was able to tough it out and stick in there. I decided to read at least the first couple of chapters and see how bad it really was. However, after reading this book I've realized that a lot of what Foster says makes a lot of sense. I really wish I had a book like this to explain everything when I first started to read. All of the complicated ideas from books that I've read in years past seem so simple after reading this book.
For the chapter "Every Trip Is a Quest" I instantly thought of the book A Tale of Two Cities. It is full of questers on missions. For example when Darnay goes to Paris to help Gabelle, a former servant of the Marquis, he himself is imprisoned for being of the Evremonde line. Everything Foster says about quests can be related to this book. This example contains all five of the parts of a quest. Darnay is the quester. He is going to Paris to save a servant of his uncle. Part of the challenges along the way include the fact that he is actually imprisoned along the way. And his real reason to go there is to finally pay the price for all that his family had done to the peasants in France.
Like Allig8rr I also could relate what Foster said to Ethan Frome. I thought of Ethan Frome when I read the section about the vampires. Foster stated that "sometimes the really scary bloodsuckers are entirely human". I thought of Ethan Frome after this because throughout the book he was always more than attracted to Mattie the young attractive cousin of his wife Zeena. One could argue that after Ethan Frome was done sucking most of the life out of his ailing wife he moved on to a new younger woman to prey on.
I'm going to be honest I never really paid any attention to poetry. I hated the way poems sound and the way that they always seem to have hidden meanings. However, after reading Foster's chapter about sonnets I've realized that a lot of work actually goes into the creation of sonnets. After reading this chapter I think that I probably would be able to recognize a sonnet without to much trouble. However, I would like to improve my poetry skills to help me identify other types of poems such as a rondeaus, sestinas, and villanelles.
In response to "Now, Where Have I Seen Her Before?" I think that Foster has a really good point that a lot of things in literature are copied from each other. I'm pretty sure though that if I had read Going After Cacciato I probably would not have picked up on the connection to Alice in Wonderland. I actually find it kind of cool that he saw that connection.
I'm not really a fan of Shakespeare and his works. He had a lot of great pieces; however, I'm just not a fan of his style. Nevertheless, his work shows up everywhere whether in tv shows or modern books. I have to admit I thought the Romeo and Juliet movie that came out in the 90's was really horrible. I have to give the director credit though because it is quite hard to match the genius of Shakespeare. No matter how I feel about Shakespeare I have to admit that he really was a great writer and should be revered for all he has done for English literature.
When reading a story, I never really had too much trouble looking through the eyes of the characters. I could see situational circumstances and some problems of the time period, really basic things, but in Foster's example of "The Dead" I don't think I would have ever picked up on the significance and difficulty of the meal the women prepared. I also tend to look at things with twenty first century emotions, clearly that is not a good thing when reading books set in different time periods. Reading through the eyes of the character doesn't seem too difficult; I will just have to give myself reminders to make sure I do it. :) Foster also mentioned a category of stories that he named "last-chance-for-change”. This little bit of the chapter almost seemed like an add on to the first chapter on quests. Reading about these last-chance-for-change stories made me think of the movie 17 again. It fit perfectly to what Foster was explaining as these stories.
Personally, I love irony! The way it toys with one's mind, playing on ones expectations...it's great! It adds a whole new dimension to stories and as Foster said numerous times throughout his book, irony trumps everything. I especially liked his example with the roads. I felt like it really showed how big of a difference irony can make and how it's effects really do "trump everything". I also found the "ironic mode" Foster explained to be quite interesting. I have felt it before, that feeling that characters are less than myself, but having a word to put with it makes it a whole lot easier to explain. :) All in all, I find irony fascinating, and as Foster says, if one wants to find irony, all s/he has to do is listen.
The test case. After I finished reading the story, I was thinking maybe something along the lines of a quest. Maybe I was kind of right, maybe I was completely wrong, I'm not too sure. Either way, I definitely did NOT see the Greek parallel. Like I said earlier, I know that Greek mythology is going to be my weakness and it obviously is. :) Despite that, however, I really liked how Foster put this at the end and explained it, really giving the reader an idea of what we will need to do. Another thing I find noteworthy is that this test case was a short story; I never liked short stories because I always thought they were stupid. I thought this mainly because they don't really have a deep plot, but now that I realize there is more to a story than the plot, I think I will appreciate short stories much more. Whenever I think of short stories, I think of The Yellow Wallpaper and how much I hated it at first because there was so many hidden literary elements that I missed. I was extremely frustrated because I knew that I was missing so much, but I just couldn’t see it. Now, I have more of an appreciation for short stories and I know that I will be able to see much more in them...well, maybe not all the Greek references, but hopefully many other things. :)
"It's Greek to Me" was a difficult chapter for me to understand, personally, because I am fairly unfamiliar with Greek mythology. This makes it hard for me to pick out the allusions. I agree with Kaitlyn that this is where my weakness in literature will be. I can hardly remember The Iliad and the Odyssey from Freshman year so I guess I am going to have to brush up on my Greek mythology quite a bit if I want to pick up on those references! I did think it was interesting, however, how Foster explained how ancient myth can serve as a revived storyline for modern works. He compares Icarus and his flying expedition to kids in the sixties who bought muscle sports cars. Many of them ended up dying (like Icarus) because they ignored the warnings and played too hard with the sports cars.
I am going to jump back to chapter one, "Every Trip Is a Quest (Except When It's Not)," now because some of its aspects relate very well to Greek mythology and mythology of any civilization for that matter. In this chapter, Foster explains what a quest actually is and what it consists of. Essentially, it involves a character who is going someone for one purpose but ends up returning accomplishing a different goal or realizing something that began abstract during the process. Foster states that, "The real reason for a quest is always self-knowledge" (3). I knew this piece of information was probably pretty important and a useful hint considering it was in bold text. I remembered reading this, and, when I came to the chapter on myth, it became clear to me that quests are used quite frequently in mythology. Foster educates readers in the fact that old civilizations used to make of myths to explain things that happened with things in their society that they couldn't clearly explain, for example, nature. These stories, I noticed by the examples, often involved a quest of some kind. This helped me to learn some examples of how quests were relevant in literature and how much importance and impact they can really have in a novel.
One thing that I really like about Foster is how he connects the chapters to each other. For example, in "It's More Than Just Rain or Snow," Foster explains how weather ailments can be used in literature and he gives examples of their possible meanings. Foster introduces the idea of a flood. He connects this to the Great Flood and Noah, from the Bible. I like how Foster does this because he is explaining to us how to use the techniques as well as using them himself. It helps to show that they are present in every work.
In this chapter, Foster teaches how rain symbolizes a cleansing. I connected this to the movie, A Cinderella Story. In the movie, two people fall in love over an internet relationship, and when they find out who each other are, they see that one is popular and the other is not. This stops the relationship until the end when one character confronts the other and tells him how she feels. In the last scene, the two put the 'class' differences aside just as rain begins to fall. I think this is a good, modern example of how rain can be used as a cleansing.
My favorite part of this chapter, however, is how Foster states that weather effects symbolize democracy: snow, for example, falls on everyone in the area regardless of class, color, creed, etc. I really like how Foster shows how weather is an equalizer for all people.
Quinn brings up a good point in her comment about violence. She says that it evokes emotion more than a lot of other things can. I never really realized this about violence. Like Quinn and Allig8rr mentioned, I never really thought past the surface of violence in literature. I always figured it was just a dramatic way to spruce up the story. After reading Foster's chapter about the symbolism in violence, however, I realized that it can do a lot more. For example, Foster emphasizes the violence in slavery and why it is used. He draws upon Go Down, Moses as an example. He talks about the violence that occurs in the novel including one of the character's suicides. He explains that suicide in slavery novels by the slaves themselves is rather common because it signifies the inferiority of slaves and their inability to control anything other that their own death. This opened my eyes to looking at violence in a new light.
The chapter on symbols was also eye-opening to me. I am pretty good at picking out symbols in literature, but Foster helped me to be more precise in my ways. He taught me the difference between an allegory and a symbol, which I didn't know before. He also pointed out that symbols don't just have to be items or images, but they can be actions or events as well. This reminded me of the Scarlet Letter. Hester decided to actively wear the letter not just as a punishment, but she wore it to show her pride in her daughter and to show that she wasn't fully ashamed of the 'sin' she committed.
I thought that "It's All Political" was a very interesting chapter. Kaitlyn you are not the odd one out on this one; I guess we're together because I enjoy political writing too. Foster pointed out that often times writers use characters and their actions to make a point about social situations. I liked the example he used with Scrooge because almost everyone has experience with that story. I honestly always read it at face level. I thought that it was a cute story about how a man changed due to holiday spirit. I guess I was being quite naive considering Foster explains the situation as a ridicule on how the rich failed to reduce poverty at that time in history. Another example that came to my mind while reading this was A Tale of Two Cities. I think that it was a political writing making a point about how life in France was at that time; scary and a bit uneasy and unsure due to the revolutionaries. Foster makes a good point when he says that writers are influenced about what is happening around them during the time in which they write so there is a pretty good chance it will make an appearance in their work somehow.
Foster comes back to religion in his next chapter. He states something along the lines of culture is influenced by dominant religions of a certain area so literature is, as well. I think this makes a lot of sense because people in society act the way they do based on their religious teachings and their morals. This forms the culture of an area based on how religious it is and what kind of people it consists of, and, since writers are influenced by what is happening around them, this is bound to have some effect.
I agree with Allig8rr about using flight as a symbol. I never would have imagined that flight could mean so much. Like violence, I figured it was a dramatic element. Foster depicts flight as meaning freedom, escape, etc. One example that came to mind when I read this was Peter Pan. In the novel, and now film, Peter Pan and the other children fly away from home in order to escape the burden of growing up and facing some tough responsibilities. They want to keep their innocence forever, it seems. This never occurred to me while watching the movie, but Foster helps point out the symbolism behind flight.
I thought that it was weird how Foster stated that sexuality in stories can come from landscapes, objects, or anything the writer wants compared just to human sexuality. Like Quinn said, this makes a lot of sense due to the fact that writing about this was strongly censored until recently. I think that it is also interesting how, in chapter 17, Foster says that things stand for sex while sex stands for other things. This sounds confusing, but I guess it makes sense when you think about it considering almost everything in literature is used to symbolize something else.
I found "If She Comes Up, It's Baptism" was another chapter in which Foster relayed back on some of his previous chapters. He reinforced the idea that water signifies cleansing, like in his chapter about weather, and he also touches a bit on religion again is this chapter. One of Foster's explanations that stuck with me from this chapter was a point he made about drowning. He explained that, when a character survives a drowning, he or she is usually reborn with a new perspective. This kind of relates to baptism; before a person is baptized, they have original sin, but after, they are cleansed and begin life anew.
"Geography Matters..." was a chapter that made me think about things that I don't really think about while reading. I truly never gave the setting a thought before, I just figured that that is where the author wanted the story to take place; I didn't look to find the symbolism or reason behind that decision. Foster expresses that it is necessary for readers to ask why the writer chose the particular setting that they did. Foster suggests the questions of "Why does this character die on a mountain top...why does this take place on a prairie?" These are questions that I never asked myself before in my reading. Foster uses the book Bean Trees as an example. He talks about a character who leaves her home and travels out west. Thanks to Mr. Bouchandville, we all know that the west symbolized the "Last Frontier;" one of the last places Americans could go for a fresh start. This choice of setting embodies this idea for the character in the novel.
I agree with Quinn when it comes to what Foster has to say about the seasons. Many of us, like Quinn said, already have a profound sense of the seasons and thoughts automatically pop into our heads while reading about them. Foster does a good job building up these thoughts, however. For example, I thought that it was interesting how he related age to the seasons. I knew that spring pertained to birth, but I never really connected fall to growing in age or 'personal harvests' of our inner selves.
In the interlude, I learned the difference between an archetype and a pattern, which wasn't clear to me before. An archetype is a type of pattern that gets used when something in literature really catches on with an audience. Foster lended me some examples to help me understand this better.
I find it pretty ironic how much everyone relates to this book. I too, like everyone else saw the book and thought ohhh great. and it took me awhile to get into it..but once i got into it, it became much easier. but i do admitt the first part took me awhile, just because it seemed rather boring and no fun. I like all the points he makes though, i found that it really applys to everything i've read. Like allison said, i immediately thought of Ethan Frome with the dinner scene!
One thing i didn't like, was that a lot of the examples he uses to explain, are books i haven't read. which isn't really a fault of his, its just harder for me to understand. But, nonetheless he did try to summarize the books well and that helped a lot, i guess i have a lot of reading to do to catch up with him!
Like everyone else stated, i found everything very interesting and that it helped me understand other books that i may have not fully got before. It also seems ironic in a way reading it, and then realizing "ohhhh so thats why.." for many other books i have read.
There was one chapter that really interested me, which was how all stories came from only one. I admitt i didn't fully understand that chapter..it seemed a good point but not so sure i understood all his points to support it. Besides that every story is a quest.. that is very true and is funny how every book is, even ones that seem like real life and wouldn't have anything to do with a 'quest'.
Green mythology and Shakespeare he talked a lot about, which i think explains a lot of stories now, and how they still play out old myths or come from the famous lines of shakespeare. The list he had of famous phrases from shakespeare was funny how i heard almost every one of them before.
The part i find most helpful would have to be about not reading with your eyes. I think that is probably the best advice someone could give to a reader. Stories are all written in a certain time and place, so it follows that periods characteristics. Things change with time, so it's important to read it as if you were there, otherwise certain, key, components may be overlooked. He also helped a lot by pointing out different things that when you come across them in a scene, definately is important and means something, like heart disease, the seasons, or a dinner scene. By noting about those it helps me really pay attention in other books and know when something comes up as such, that i should really be paying attention to what else this could signify.
One last thing, i think it's important to read books both ways, as he mentions, to fully enjoy it. Maybe first without disecting it into every little piece of symbolism and literary devices, but to enjoy it for the story it is. Then go back and find all teh devices hidden in it, because by reading it just one way you're missing out on a lot.
Soo, I'm still reading it... I'm about halfway through and I'm setting a goal of about one book a week during the last month of our summer vacation, and i honestly believe I can do it. :)
While reading the book, I, not unlike everyone else on this post so far, was pretty sure i was going to hate this book with a burning passion. However, once i got into it a little bit, i could almost see myself as a part of his class, sitting there listening to him lecture about weather, vampires, the bible, caves (a chapter i found kind of pointless) and pretty much everything else known to man. I have to admit, too, that once i started to read the book, i began to apply what Foster said to other things. my primary example is a movie called Gran Tourino. I don't know if all of you have seen it, but you should. I won't ruin it, but towards the end, i saw a HUGE biblical reference. I think the reason why I saw it is because I was applying this book to what I was watching. It gave me a cool feeling inside to say to myself, "wow, that adds a lot more meaning to the end of the movie!"
It really made a lot of sense to me when he said that all books come from other books, and that there's only really one story. I mean, it's always the main character going and doing something, and learning something along the way, about themselves, or the world, and they go through some hardships to get there. if they didn't, that wouldn't be much of a story, would it? ;) Overall, i think the book is a pretty good read so far.
"Marked for Greatness" pointed out some aspects to me that I never really thought about before. For instance, Foster expresses, "Sameness doesn't present us with metaphorical possibilities, whereas difference-from the average, the typical, the expected-is always rich with possibility" (194). As true and significant as this is, I never really ever thought about physical or mental abnormalities as symbolic. Foster uses Harry Potter's scar as an example. Even if you are one who dislikes the whole Harry Potter saga, we all know that Harry Potter is different than most boys his age, and his forehead scar represents this. Foster also explains that scars represent the toll life takes on some and represents personal history. He connects this to the play, Wounded Foot the King, and more specifically the main character, Oedipus, whose feet were tied together when his parents tried to avoid catastrophe by leaving him on a mountain to die. These scars, for instance, relate to Oedipus's personal history.
I know that Quinn already said this, but I agree completely that irony and blindness seem like peanut butter and jelly: you can't have one without the other. Quinn's connection to The Chosen was a very legitimate one. Another example could be the novel, The Giver. The characters in this novel are shielded and blinded from real emotions and feelings. Jonas, however, receives the gift to feel and see the effect of these real life emotions. Once he does his whole world changes, and he sees everything in a different light.
Now that I am farther along in this book, I can't help but relating almost everything I've read in the past to some thing or another. I guess the book has been doing its job.
I enjoyed chapter nine, "It's Greek to Me" because it made the true stories of the Illiad and the Osyssey clear. The stories had such a great influence on literature the way it exists today that it is imperative for a reader to understand the actualities written by Homer (as oppposed to Brad Pitt's actions in Troy). I enjoyed throughout the whole chapter thinking of various book that relate to these epics, from Lord of the Rings to Harry Potter.
Especially in the chapter "It's More than Just Rain or Snow" I was able to relate the book to many of my prior readings, specifically A Wrinkle in Time by Madeline L'Engle, who starts the novel with "It was a dark and stormy night..." This beginning cliche establishes the series' dark undertones and also the sense that somehow the trouble that ranges over Meg and her family will be resolved.
I particularily enjoyed the chapter called "It's All Political" because it displayed in various ways how writers with strong views subtly snuck their points in to their works, therefore engraining them in them in to the minds of readers without the reader even realizing it. Fosters examples showed that among the first to bring radical view points concerning for instance revolution or homosexuality were authors.
And Jenny, I throughly enjoy Foster's use of examples! Although I have not read nearly all of the works he mentions, it validates his points and make his words much more believeable. I also am compelled to pick up nearly every story that he mentions!
Chapter 7 was interesting, and yet it seemed very familiar. Just like Shakespeare there are always multitudes of allusions to the Bible. When Foster talked about "The Fall" I was reminded of a loss of innocence and immediately thought of the story of "Pandora's Box". Since curiosity over powers Pandora, and she opens the box, she ends up releasing disease, violence and other evils into the formerly innocence and good world. I found it interesting how many troubles in writing are modeled from scripture, as the Bible proves to be not only a historical reference, but also a very efficient literary tool.
In "Hanseldee and Greteldum" Foster taught that fairy tales are the essence of stories. I liked that they make up the core plots of many works of literature in modern day because their familiarity gives context to the new story a reader is trying to understand. When the story of Hansel and Gretel came up, paired with the paragraph on lost children, I somehow thought of The Blair Witch Project. This creepy movie accurately portrayed the panic, confusion, and distress experienced by those lost in the woods. On top of everything, the fact that there is a "witch", or any other form of evil, lurking outside their campsite every night adds to the resemblance of Hansel and Gretel.
"It's Greek to Me" only reminded me of Hercules until Foster listed the troublesome situations of Hector, Achilles, Penelope, and Odysseus. I felt as though the internal and external disagreements experienced by characters are essential to understanding a story, as he states that there are many possible conflicts, "with nature, with the divine, with other humans, and with ourselves"(71). I liked how everything seemed linked and how there is a meaning for everything explained within Greek or Roman myth. For example I thought it was cool how they had a way to explain the seasons so I looked up the conflict experienced by Demeter, Persephone, and Hades.
I loved the chapter on weather! I understand how it is mood-setting element or plot evidence. I thought of the movie CLUE and how a huge storm occurs right as guests arrive to meet an anonymous blackmailer. The rain is torrential and the setting is dark, except for the occasional blots of lightening; the weather definitely creates a gloomy and mysterious sensation. I also liked how Foster refers to rain as restorative and cleansing; it gives me the notion of making something brand new and it made sense because later Foster points out that Spring is a time for renewal and of hope. He also talks about rainbows and their biblical functions, which furthermore proves the point of numerous allusions to the Bible. In reference to snow, I always had the connotation of someone being blameless because of the phrase “clean as snow”. And perhaps it’s just me but when I think of snow and other white things, I think of weddings!
Chapter 11 was interesting to me, because I dislike anything having to do with violence or confrontation. However, I discovered that there are multiple layers of meaning regarding violence. When Foster was talking about slavery and how suicide was the only option for the character “to express her outrage”(94) it really hit me that violence may really be an incredibly important part of a novel. In a story finding out the implications of suicide and the motivation the character had to take a route to violence create deeper meanings in the story. I agree with Foster’s theory on mysteries, that the violence in them carries no weight, because a reader cannot usually form a personal attachment to a character if they are involved in a random murder case.
Ever since we began looking more in depth into literature, symbols were something I really liked. The fact that one element in a story can represent something else, even a feeling, was really cool. Knowing that there are endless possibilities is great and, as Quinn pointed out, symbols are open to interpretation. Although I stated earlier that I was frustrated with Foster’s mentioning of novels, and poetry, that I didn’t know, I can almost take back the statement a little. When he talked about Huck Finn and all the symbols in it, I was happy to understand exactly what he meant. Also, when I was reading through the blog I saw that Chelsea had talked about Hester Prynne in The Scarlet Letter I recalled an action symbol. When Hester rips the letter off of her chest it becomes an action symbol for freedom and one that symbolizes a new life carefree of what others think.
Throughout my entire reading career I've realized that my favorite genre would have to be historical fiction. I love the stories about wartime and the brotherhood that connects soldiers together. I can't help but love the David and Goliath type battles with one smaller unit facing an entire army. When I read chapter seven I couldn't help agree with Foster that there are numerous connections to the Bible. The story of David and Goliath can be found in the Christian Old Testament. The majority of books I have read always seem to have an individual or smaller group against a large seemingly unbeatable force.
I also have to agree with Kaitlyn and csequin that the chapter on Greek mythology was very hard to follow. I enjoyed the connections that Foster made when talking about The Odyssey and The Iliad. I could not help but think of the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Frodo like Odysseus both set out on epic quests Frodo to destroy a ring he really doesn't want to destroy and Odysseus to fight in a war he wants no part of. There is a great connection between these two stories. Looking back at chapter one about quests, I've noticed that the majority of Greek mythology is based on the idea of the quest. I have to applaud csequin for noticing this connection between the two chapters also.
When I first looked at this book and read the first few pages, I wasn't thrilled and thought that I would find myself in one of those "how to" books. Though the title and format would indicate that it would be similar to a "how to" book, it was much different than that. It turns out that the book was much more helpful and interesting to me than I thought it was going to be. It made me realize that authors really do try to put meaning and symbolism into all or most of their writing. As I began reading My Antonia, I applied many of the “techniques” that I learned from How to Read Literature Like a Professor to the novel. It has made My Antonia much more meaningful and interesting to read, and I can find meaning and symbolism throughout the novel in things as simple as setting, weather, and the season the particular chapter takes place in. I’m sure these same strategies can be applied to Catch 22 and any other literature that I have read or will read.
How to Read Literature Like a Professor was not the most exciting book to read, but it has already helped me to find a deeper meaning in all literature that I read. I am excited to see what else it will help me find in My Antonia and Catch 22, and other works that we will have to read this year.
As soon as I read the title of chapter ten I instantly thought about a book that I had read last year in 303, Farewell to Arms. Throughout the book the rain served as a metaphor for death. It seemed that every time it rained someone would die. I couldn't help but find pleasure in the fact that Foster used the same book that I had originally thought of when he brought up this chapter. Another book that I also thought of was The Shining by Steven King. As Foster stated "snow is severe, inhospitable, and suffocating"(80).I couldn't help but notice those same qualities in the snow that occurs in The Shining as it traps the characters in an old hotel. The snow traps them in the possessed hotel. The hotel forces its inhabitants to do its bidding. The hotel forces one of the characters to dismantle their only way out of the snow when Jack destroys the snowmobile. The snow enables the hotel to take a hold on the hotel's inhabitants.
I really liked the interlude about whether or not authors really mean what they write. I have always wondered whether some English professors just looked way to deeply into books more than really intented. I am happy that Foster addresses this issue because it has always been a problem with me because I have always had doubt as to what the authors really mean what they write. I agree with the chapter on symbols also because to some people a tree could just be a tree but to others it could be a lot more. I am glad that he acknowledges the fact that some people see symbols in certain books and others don't really notice those connections.
"It's Never Just Heart Disease..." and "...And Rarely Just Illness" were two chapters that talked about how disease and illness usually stand for more than just the thing itself. For example, Foster explains that, when a character dies or suffers from ailments of the heart, we have to look past it and see why the author chose the heart compared to a liver or a kidney, for instance. Ailments of the heart usually pertain to a character's love life, loneliness, and other things that play on emotions of the heart. Foster's example using Lolita's character, Humbert, is a good example of this because Humbert dies of heart disease in jail because he is separated from his lover. One of the things that I found interesting in chapter 24 was the author Joyce's theme he uses pertaining to illness in his novels about Dublin. Joyce uses the paralysis- physical, moral, intellectual, political, etc. in his novels. This is because "Dublin is a city in which the inhabitants are paralyzed by the strictures laid upon them by the church, state, and convention" (214). I thought this was pretty cool how Joyce connects this illness with the stereotype of how the city of Dublin and its people were.
"Don't Read with Your Eyes" emphasized many things that Foster had already touched on in his novel to that point. Foster states that readers must read with the perspective of the characters in order to fully understand their emotions and decisions and fully interact with the novel. When readers do this, it is necessary to remember the time period in which both the author writes and the story takes place so that it can be easily understood the different attitudes, stereotypes, lifestyles, regulations, etc. of those times. Like Kaitlyn said, I also tend to look at things with a 21st century view, so I will need to try to develop that skill this year. I also liked Foster's explanations of "last-chance-for-change" stories. An example that I could compare this to would be the movie The Family Man. This chapter helped me to learn how to read better in each book's context.
I was glad to get to "Is He Serious? And Other Ironies" because Foster talks about irony throughout his whole book, and now it was finally explained to me in more detail. Foster bolds "irony trumps everything" (215) which I could see coming based on his emphasis on it in the novel. I know that an ironic situation is the opposite of what the reader expects to happen, but Foster really elaborates on this idea. I agree with Kaitlyn that Foster's road analogy was a good one; it certainly helped me to understand where to find irony and different ways it can occur a lot easier.
I was very excited to get to "A Test Case." I really wanted to see how much Foster's book had truly taught me. I got eighty percent of the things Foster and his students suggested a reader should consider at the end of the chapter. I didn't see the Greek mythology reference, for instance. I think that seeing it in a real example will help me to be able to look for it when I read, though. I also never caught the connection of the birds in flight.
Like I said in one of my previous blogs, I like political writings so this story interested me since it played on the class systems of the time period. I was able to use my knowledge of political writing techniques to help me see how the author was trying to depict the stereotype of the rich caring less about the poor. One way the author made this visible was by calling all of the 'help' not by names but by positions, for example, Cook and Godber's Man. Also, I used Foster's advice of putting yourself in the time period of the story. This helped me see how many of the characters in the novel, mostly the mother and sisters, thought that treating the poor as lowly creatures was a perfectly appropriate gesture.
Kaitlyn, I agree with you that the story could symbolize a quest. When Laura goes down to the village to bring the leftovers from the party, she leaves in an attempt just to bring the basket with a feeling of pity for the family, but, when her brother finds her, she has experienced a sense of how the other half lives and it changes her perspective. She realizes that the rigid structure is just the way life is, and she can't really do much to change it.
All in all, I learned a lot from Foster's novel.
I really liked the chapter on baptism. I understood what he meant as baptism not being a "divine cleansing" per-se, but a rebirth into a new life or lifestyle. The examples of books that he outlined were excellent, and the saying about never being able to enter the same river twice really made the chapter that much more understandable.
I also really enjoyed the chapter about different seasons. I've always felt that seasons were a vital part of the story's tone, often a foreshadowing to how the books following events will play out. I agree with Nick, that The Shining is an excellent example of this. I can see how the snow at the beginning has a lot to do with almost all of the events that follow. I guess it's kind of obvious once you think about it, I mean, what good ever comes from winter (besides my birthday and christmas)? Or summer, the one season that every kid and teacher looks forward to. Of course there are going to be good things happening! Unless you're Harry Potter, and the summer is like three months of torture (a good example of irony!). So yeah, I would have to say that the chapter about seasons helped me a ton.
I have to agree with Kaitlyn that the chapter on politics in literature was extremely interesting. I consider Rip Van Winkle a very interesting story. I don't know why but ever since I read it a few years ago in language arts it has always stuck with me. I enjoy reading books that focus on a person's political mindset. I find it really interesting when they talk about how they view a certain political party. I've found that every person has their own beliefs when it comes to politics and I enjoy viewing another person's perspective. I also enjoy political writings because it gives me a sense of politics during the time that the story discusses. Sure you can learn about a presidents accomplishments from the history books but you need stories like Rip Van Winkle to truly understand how people felt at that time.
I also liked chapter fourteen which focuses on christ and different religions in literature. I like how Foster mentions how difficult it is to pick up on Christian references in literature especially when that person's not Christian. I had a similar problem last year in language arts that I'm sure a lot of other people had. I'm Catholic and when we read the Chosen it was very hard to understand all of the Jewish references. Without the help sheet of common Jewish terms I would have been more lost than I already was.
Back at the beginning of summer, just the thought of reading this book made me think, "No, why, why, why? This is going to be boring, slow, boring, maybe slightly confusing, and did I mention boring?" Needless to say, the assurance on the front cover that it is "lively and entertaining" did little. But once I started, I actually found the book quite enjoyable. Definitely not a favorite, but much better than I thought it would be.
Seeing how it's now almost the second week in August (and looking at the number of posts already up) I doubt I will be able to contribute much original thought to the board. Hmm, sounds like Foster's constant insistence that no work is wholly original--which I agree with wholeheartedly, by the way.
First, my general reaction, other than what I said above. Though the constant references to works of literature that I've never read (some I've never heard of) got annoying, I liked how Foster kept going back to some of the same works or authors. I noticed many references to Toni Morrison (Especially Beloved) and D.H> Lawrence. Seeing the names as they became familiar gave me a slight sense of, "Hey, I know who this author is; he's mentioned them before." Not to mention proving that multiple meanings can be extracted from a single piece of work.
I liked the way that Foster started out in "Every Trip Is a Quest (Except When It's Not)" with a hypothetical situation and didn't begin with one of his all too often references to literature I haven't read. I think it both calms the reader by not starting off with something he/she might never have even heard of, and makes it obvious that finding a meaning really isn't as hard as you think it is, as long as you know how to look. One of the best parts of this chapter, I think, was the disclaimer-type paragraph at the end. By Foster saying that not every trip is actually a quest, he's making us look deeper into the books where the main character goes on a journey and see if it really is just a journey--or something more. Saying that no literary rule is always/never true leaves things up for debate, so people's own opinions can be formed.
As soon as I saw the chapter about meals and eating, I realized, as Foster says only a page or so into the chapter, that pretty much all meal scenes contribute to the telling of the story. Characters are developed, a plot point is introduced, something happens to move the story forward. I was confused a bit at first with the use of the word "communion." When I hear communion, my mind immediately goes to the bread and wine during church, and I had a hard time getting past that picture in my head. But once I thought about it in ways of sharing food and company with others, the chapter was much easier to understand.
With the mention of vampires comes, of course, thoughts of the massive popularity of the Twilight series. I've read the series, and thought they were entertaining books, but obviously nothing like what Foster was getting at when he talked about vampires. He was talking about the more sinister nature of vampires, ghosts, and other mythical creatures that are generally seen as evil. The reference to A Christmas Carol was something I appreciated. Though I've never read Dickens's version, I read the kiddie version every time I went to visit my grandma when I was younger. Seeing a familiar ghost (even if not the original one Foster intended me to see) made the chapter much more relateable. Once Foster talked about vampires really meaning selfishness and exploitation, I was ready when he said that some "vampires" are completely human. After reading the example of Winterbourne from "Daisy Miller," it seemed like (dare I say it?) he was more of a vampire than Edward Cullen.
I'm sure I'm not the only one who doesn't like discussing poems. Couplet, sonnet, rhyme scheme, iambic pentameter, octave, sestet, quatrain. It just seems like a lot of work to put into what is usually so few words. But because it was a chapter on poetry, it was easier to understand because Foster was able to present us with an entire sonnet instead of a brief overview. Being able to go back and look at exactly what Foster was talking about made the process of understanding the chapter go much more smoothly.
I really liked "Now, Where Have I Seen Her Before?" First of all, it reiterated what I already knew: no piece of literature is completely original. I guess in a way it also made be feel a bit less stupid about having no idea what to write and referring to others for ideas. I enjoyed the example of Pocahontas and Sacajawea because they were both names I recognized and had some background knowledge on. The chapter also provided a good setup for the next few chapters.
The chapter on Shakespeare did not surprise me very much, the reason possibly being that we've been exposed to him more than many of the writers mentioned throughout the book. Although I've only read two Shakespeare plays (Romeo and Juliet and A Midsummer Night's Dream) I did recognize a fair number of the quotes given by Foster, even though I only knew where two or three of them were from. I also enjoyed this chapter because it referenced pieces I already knew, like "West Side Story." Obviously, it will take a great deal more reading of Shakespeare to really understand all of the parallels authers draw to his plays.
As I delve farther in to the book, I find it becomes more interesting with each chapter.
The main thing that Foster has addressed that I still have a hard time with is the question asked by nearly every student, "did the author intentionally put all of this meaning in his work?" I often sit in class discussions thinking "how is it humanly possible to write all of these symbols and themes, can it really be planned?" Foster tells us that at least in works of literary merit, it usually is. I still find it hard to believe, although Foster has done a good job of proving his point. Regardless, I still think the author of a piece of literature is the only one who truly knows his intentions, and analysis is merely guesswork.
I thought chapter 14, titled "Yes, She's a Christ Figure, Too" was interesting. I had never really thought of any characters as Christ figures in my past reading experiences. Now that Foster has brought this to my attention, it adds to the piles of biblical allusions that I see in nearly everything I read. In particular, this chapter brought brought to mind a book which I am currently reading, titled Galapagos by Kurt Vonnegut. It is a very strange novel, but uses prominent connections to the Bible, with two characters who represent a modern day Adam and Eve, and many who suffer at the hand of "big brained people" that make mistakes while running the world. All of these, now by Foster's standards, seem to be something along the lines of Christ figures.
The next chapter in which Foster discusses flying took me by surprise. Although I wish the truth was otherwise, I have not read too many books of literary merit. Therefore, in my past experiences, flying seemed to be simply flight, and nothing else. However, now because of his chapter, it is easy to find meanings and irony in these books. In Harry Potter for instance, Sirius Black uses an animal to escape his imprisonment and attain freedom. However, he must live in hiding and cannot be with Harry or his friends.
I completely agree with Kaitlyn on the chapters about sex. Foster's points seem so true that I cannot think of examples that prove him wrong. Nearly every time there is sex involved in a novel, it is happening because of some other idea formed about it in a character's head. If there is no reason behind it, than it is blatantly pornographic.
The last chapter I read about baptism was compelling. It is hard to think of every rebirth in a novel as a baptism, but i was unable to think of an example in which the character had not dramatically changed following the experience.
"It's All Political" was truly an eye-opening chapter for me. I can honestly say that I do not know very much about politics and branching off of that, I didn't realize that many stories have underlying political themes in them. For example, when I first read that A Christmas Carol had political intentions I was confused because I always believed it was more a story created to teach morals. It also made me think of Robin Hood and how he stole from the rich to give to the needy. After reading Chapter 13, I would definitely have to agree with Foster that authors point out some of their own political views in stories, sometimes "so subtly that we may not think of it as political, but it is"(116).
Chapter 14 was very interesting to me. I don't usually think to compare characters in books to Jesus Christ. However, after seeing the list of distinct qualities of Christ, I started to think that I have noticed those traits in other characters. I liked that Foster said that if someone is a "Christ figure", it doesn't mean that they have all the traits of Christ, but more so they exhibit Christ-like qualities, only hitting a few of them. I also looked up John 3:16 after Foster had said that it is commonly on football posts, I still have no idea what he meant by that, I guess I just don't follow how that verse would be used in that situation?
"Flights of Fancy" almost automatically made me think of a risk/reward scenario. As Foster later explained, with flying, you are taking the risk that either you fall, which is symbolic of many things, or you end up flying. I thought that flying usually symbolized freedom before I came to page 128 and the statement "flight is freedom"(128) was shown in bold. Flying just seems to be a form of breaking free, loosening inhibitions and rules, and letting go.
Hello everyone! I recently returned home from vacation in Michigan and forced myself to finish this book with the at least eight hours of our car ride. I’ll admit, and I’m sure I'm not the only person, that this book was not the most interesting book I've read this summer. However, I did find many points in the book to be funny. I especially liked that he teaches for U of M. The real U of M, as in Michigan, not Minnesota. I also found it quite cool that in chapter 9 he mentions Troy, Michigan. Not only did I spend the last week there, my mom attended the Athens High School that he talks about!
In his first chapter about quests, I really didn’t see the “quest” that Kip made. Yes, after he explains his rules and how they fit, I understood where he was coming from, but I was reminded of an old adage. “If you look hard enough for something eventually you will find it”. I'm paraphrasing of course, but the idea is the same. I think with most literature that you can essentially take any part and make it mean whatever you want it to mean, and that’s something I get really frustrated about with literature. However, I’ll make the best of it and move on…I guess I kind of have to.
I also was reminded of the Twilight series when reading “Acts of Vampires” and I'm not a girl, thank you very much Allig8rr. I think that his quote “ghosts and vampires are never only about ghosts and vampires” doesn’t quite apply to the Twilight books, but nonetheless it is an important thing I think to remember. Unless a writer just has an obsession with the supernatural, I think that there’s probably a very important reason that he/she would waste time and effort to include one into their stories.
I wasn't looking forward to reading "...Or the Bible." I was glad that Foster started out with Pulp Fiction, an ironic reference, because it sure made the chapter easier to read! Although the chapter itself was informative and helpful, I get the feeling that I'm going to need some help when it comes to Biblical references. My main question, though, is, "Why the Bible?" There are so many different religions in the world. Christianity, Judism, Islam, etc. Why is the Bible the book that gets all the references and parallels?
I enjoyed "Hanseldee and Greteldum" because fairy tales are something that everyone is familiar with. As Kaitlyn said, familiarity is something we want when we read. I totally agree when Foster says, "...we look for it to be sufficiently like other things we've read so that we can use those to make sense of it" (63). Reading that gives the idea that if we were to pick something up and see nothing familiar when we begin to read, we would be really turned off by the book.
Allig8rr: Mythology has always interested me, too. Even though I don't know many of the actual myths. Although The Odyssey has always a favorite of what I do know. Other than that, mythology is something I'm going to have a hard time drawing parallels to, simply because of my current lack of knowledge about them.
Weather in literature has always interested me. It just seemed like it would be so much easier to write a scene taking place on a nice, party cloudy, sixty-five degrees with a slight breeze type of day, rather than one with lightning every thirty seconds or snow so thick you can't see three feet in front of you. That was my thinking, at least. This chapter made me think of the novel The Lovely Bones, where it is snowing. The snow eventually turns into sleet and hail. The weather parallels the conversation between Susie and Mr. Harvey, which started out calmly but ended in Susie's murder.
The interlude "Did He Mean That?" was really helpful for me to get past some of my skepticism. I've always wondered whether authors actually meant to make all of these tiny references or draw these parallels, or if it just happened and our teachers were just trying to get us to think a bit more. After reading the interlude, I concluded that Foster was right--with all the time authors have to think about what they're putting down on paper, these allusions almost have to be on purpose.
Before reading "...More Than It's Gonna Hurt You: Concerning Violence" I always saw violence in novels as a way to move the story along or make it more interesting, without having any special meaning behind it. I mean, face it, Harry Potter just wouldn't exist if Voldemort hadn't attempted to kill Baby Harry. I found the two different types of violence (specific injury and narrative violence) interesting, along with the reminder that there are no accidents in literature and anything that seems like one was thought up by the author.
I really enjoyed the chapter about flight. I enjoy flying whenever I go anywhere, but I didn't realize all of the symbolism that goes along with flying. I was happy that Foster included Icarus in his chapter about flying. Not only did he connect his chapter about greek mythology to flying but he also showed the symbolism that can be seen with the flying. Not only do the wings give Icarus an angel-like appearance but it also reflects a religous background. Icarus refused to honor his commitment to his father to avoid flying too high or too low. Icarus flew too high and melted his wings and then perished in the sea.
When I first read the title of this chapter I thought of the story/film The Birds. I really want to know the symbolic reasons for flight in this novel because I think that this is a good example of flight in literature.
When I read the chapter about sexuality I never really knew there were so many symbols. Like Foster said I guess we have to blame it on Freud because he put a lot of these ideas into people's heads. I don't agree with Foster though because throughout the two chapters he makes it seem as though the majority of sex in books is purely symbolic. I'm pretty sure that there are plenty of books that are banned for their sexual references. However, I'm glad Foster brought this up because now it will be easier to read between the lines and see what the author really wants us to read.
While reading chapter four about poems, the one thing I liked the most was the rule about how to recognize sonnets. After thinking about it I realized that the rule really does work. I like how people are able to recognize simple patterns like this and make them usable for other people. I highly doubt I would have been able to ever figure that out by myself.
While reading the chapter about Shakespeare I liked trying to see how many quotes of his I was able to recognize. Unfortunately…I didn’t recognize a large number of them. I liked the quote about the band of brothers a lot because during my week at Navy we had classes and one of which was Language Arts. We spent the time tracking that quote through history up until its most recent usage with the hit HBO show “Band of Brothers”.
Towards the end of chapter five I related his analogy about how he wasn’t able to recognize different types of mushrooms when he went mushroom hunting with his dad to how I have slowly learned to identify different types of airplanes. After quite a few years of attending air shows with my dad and spending time just reading about them, I am now fairly confident in my ability to recognize a large variety of WWII airplanes and a fair amount of modern jets. My week at the USAFA gave me a great opportunity to learn even more about planes, as it was mandatory to study and learn a sheet of rates to be drilled about on the second to last day.
I was never really able to see many symbols when I read. Foster did a good job explaining the multiple meanings behind things and how almost anything can be a symbol if you want it to be. While reading the chapter, I thought the example of caves as a symbol went on a little too long, but once it was over, I enjoyed the chapter a little more because of the variety of examples.
In, "It's All Political," I liked how he also used Rip Van Winkle as a big example, because it's a story that everyone knows, and Foster explained it so well. I agree with Quinn on political writing though: if it's overly political I won't like it, but if it's subtle, I probably will. It's interesting to see how people felt about politics during other time periods.
In "Yes, She's a Christ Figure, Too" I liked the way Foster provided us with a list of ways to identify Christ figures instead of just throwing examples at us. I've always liked things nice and orderly and, well, list-like, and the cut and dry "Here are some ways to identify a Christ figure" helped me with my understanding of the chapter. That being said, Foster's saying that finding Christ figures if you aren't Christian brought to mind when we read The Chosen last year. Knowing next to nothing about Judism, I would probably have been completely lost without the little cheat-sheet list of terms given to us at the beginning.
I never really realized that nothing is what it seems in literature. So of course, the chapter about geography shouldn’t have surprised me. I never really paid attention to place when reading a novel, assuming everything I read takes place in 2000-what-ever-the-year-is and the norms are present-day American. Wrong. I recently read Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre and Emily Brontë’s Wuthering Heights and not only is the speech completely old English, but the way men treat women in both of these books just drives me insane! As Foster later says, one must ALWAYS consider the time frame of the book because that is the only way to be able to fully understand what’s going on.
Season appeared to me as a chain reaction. Winter is a symbol of death; spring a symbol of growth and love; new beginnings; summer a symbol of heat and passion; fall is a sign of falling apart; the sultry heat fading away and then back to winter, where everything dies again. I read Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle and when the winter comes in “Packingtown” the wage enslaved Lithuanian immigrants barely make it through the winter and Ona dies giving birth to her child (in winter I believe). Jurgis usually finds his jobs in the spring or early summer and goes to jail (many a time might I add!) in the fall. All in all, the book was excruciatingly sad and nauseatingly disgusting on the aspect of how immigrants were treated. Hmm, sounds familiar in today’s standards!
As I was reading the Interlude, it took me a bit to agree with Foster. I tried to think of a book where it was totally different, not another book like it. All I came up with was biographies and autobiographies, and the only reason those are different is because no one leads the same life! Everything can be categorized into genres and from the genres one can look at just which story he/she is looking at. Love stories for example usually have the underlying plot of Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. Boy meets girl, girl meets boy, they fall in love, something tragic happens and most of the time, there’s a happy ending for everyone (not so much like Romeo and Juliet). Other genres seem to kind of follow a Romeo and Juliet-esque type of plot as well. There is always two people who have/ grow a close friendship and something tragic happens to one, leaving the other one feeling awful inside. All of it is one story.
Of course it’s not JUST a birthmark. In fact, according to Foster, it’s also never just a tattoo or scar, either. I guess I agree with the tattoo thing…for example I want to get a tattoo of a Forget Me Not on my foot as a symbol of remembrance for people who’ve died in my family. However, Foster made a good point about how some people are “marked for greatness” with birthmarks or scars, showing people that although they may have physical deformation, they are meant to do great things. I now look at people with marks with different eyes and wonder what their life circumstance is. I also enjoy tattoos that are dedicated to people and watch Miami and L.A. Ink to learn about what markings mean to other people.
Chapter 4, the sonnet chapter, was one that I found kind of random compared to the first 7 chapters I have currently read. But it also was extremely helpful to me, and brings up some good points that I had never thought about before. I have always been amazed at structured poems such as the sonnet, consisting of 14 lines and 5-foot iambic pentameter with a rhyme scheme, because whenever I’ve had to write semi-structurally, I’ve found it pretty much impossible. Since I can’t quite understand how people write such poetry, I find Foster’s advice at reading these poems very helpful. After understanding the importance of paying attention to punctuation, I realize how much I had not been doing that in the past. I always got too caught up in the lines and rhythm of a poem, that I missed a lot of its meaning by simply looking at each individual sentence. “An Echo from Willow-Wook” was a great 2-sentence example of Foster’s point. Although, I’d have to say, those are some major run-on sentences.
Along with the season, I also found interesting how Foster figures rain, snow, and other precipitation play a role in different works of literature. Chapter 10 talks about this, and I found Foster’s “diagnosis” of precipitation in literature as both very interesting and very insightful. As Foster says in chapter 10, “It’s never just rain” (Foster 75).
Foster explains in the chapter that rain is a unifying force, and throws the “Condemned man and hangman” (76) into the same boat, so to speak. It creates a unique bond between characters, and can toss them into unique situations. On a rainy day, people generally do stay confined to indoor activities, and it is this intimacy inside that also creates this close bond between characters in literature. Foster also says that rain can create fog, which gives a story a mysterious, or “murky” feel. On the other hand, he also explains that rain holds a cleansing force that is used in literature. It can create a transformation in a character when an author lets him “walk through the rain to get there” (77). It is the dual nature of rain that makes it so unique in literature.
As for snow, Foster says that there are numerous interpretations. He says that snow is “clean, stark, severe, warm, inhospitable, inviting, playful, suffocating, and filthy” (80). Snow, as one can see, has multiple meanings, and that must make it fun for an author to use in literature. Foster also says that snow is the “great unifier” (81), a powerful symbol in literature.
I learned in chapter 10 that weather is important and symbolic in literature. The weather in a work of literature can be so complex even though it seems so simple.
In chapter 5, when Foster talks about the whole “stories grow out of stories” thing, just like Molly thought of Cinderella, I thought of (maybe a sillier example) the book, The True Story of the 3 Little Pigs! It was one of my childhood favorites, and was a story from The Wolf’s perspective of the classic, Three Little Pigs. There are countless examples of old stories being retold in different versions or sequels being added on. It seems like the majority of the constantly “growing” stories begin with a classic childhood fairy tale or old fable too. A more subtle example that doesn’t necessarily consist of fairy tales, but more of Wild West legends, is the book Holes. It takes the actual legends of Kissin’ Kate Barlow and her buried treasure, and adds them into a great work of literature about an unlucky boy at a character- building camp. It makes the legend’s meaning grow, and provides a whole new aspect to the original story. In more advanced literature that I will be reading in my future, I am better prepared to look for, pick out examples of, and “connect the dots” of alluding characters, story lines, and settings that have been found in pervious well-known stories.
When Foster talks about geography in chapter 19, I was skeptical at first. Just as his students ask, isn't geography merely geography; hills, mountains, rivers? Well, yes. But reading this chapter made me realize that geography changes the ways characters live. I thought of the novel Snow Treasure by Marie McSwigan, a favorite from my childhood. This story only could have occurred where it did, in a northern area full of snow, providing an escape for the children who lived there. Foster also discussed the implications of season. This book had to occur in winter, and the author uses it ironically. Instead of the gloomy attitude that usually occurs with the winter months, the children find excitement and treasure in the chilling temperatures.
My favorite chapter thus far has been "One Story" in which Foster explains again that every single story ever written is part of a larger, singular story. The story of the universe, the earth, people, for all time. It's an interesting concept to ponder, that every story is connected, most like everything in life. Also, it is somewhat sad, that a work of writing can never be truly original.
When Foster talks about deformities and blindness, my thoughts went immediately to Harry Potter and his lightning shaped scar (which Foster mentions at one point) that is meant to separate him from the rest of the wizard community. He is marked because he is the Chosen One, and he and only he can defeat the evil Lord Voldemort.
In chapters 23 and 24, Foster discusses illnesses in general, and specifically heart disease. These chapters reminded me of a novel I read my sophmore year titled Ethan Frome by Edith Wharton. In the novel, Ethan's wife Zenobia is a hypochondriac, and her imagination makes her illnesses very real. Her condition is representative of her unhappiness with her life and also her jealousy of Ethan's love for Mattie Silver, Zeena's cousin.
Chapters 5 6 and 7 all gave me good types of allusions that I need to more closely look for and pick up on when reading literature. Although I haven’t exactly read every one of Shakespeare’s plays (besides the one we were forced to read freshman year), the list of common lines in the chapter on Shakespeare made me realize that I know Shakespeare better than I think I do! I could recognize a few of his insightful lines, even with the little knowledge of him that I have at this point in my life.
As I continue to learn more about the Bible, I start to recognize more and more examples of books or movies I have read/watched in the past that allude to specific stories. Lord of the Rings, The Chronicles of Narnia, and like Kaitlyn said, The Scarlet Letter, a novel we read this past year, was swamped with Biblical references! The Bible really is an amazing book, whether it’s look at religiously or not. Not only is It God’s word and the recorded life and teachings of Jesus, but it’s full of great stories of heroism, love, pain, life lessons, human nature, and faith. Allusions going to the Bible are probably my favorite kind, because like Foster said, biblical dimension adds a whole new timeless and archetypal depth to a story.
Kate, you asked “‘Why the Bible?’ There are so many different religions in the world. Christianity, Judaism, Islam, etc. Why is the Bible the book that gets all the references and parallels?” This question got me to think too, because to a person who isn’t a Christian, you’d think the Bible wouldn’t mean a whole lot to them, right? I think that although it may not religiously stand for much to a person, like I said before, the Bible has so many stories that when taken non-religiously, still have a whole lot of significance and value. Also, it is a well known book around the world, to people of any religion, therefore making it a deep and meaningful place to make references parallels to.
While reading Chapter 7, which deals with the Bible, I was forced to think back upon all of the books that I have read and try to see if any there were any connections that I could make with what I know about the Bible. Kate, you asked why does the Bible get mentioned the most often, but then you listed Judaism and Islam as other religions that should be. Unless I am mistaken, don’t all three religions deal with essentially the same stuff? For example, Judaism has their Torah (The Old Testament), and Islam has the Quran that I think is the bible with more stuff beyond the New Testament. So yes, I agree that the Bible is most recognized in literature, but I also think that it could just be a regional thing. The same book read in Israel or Iraq could be seen as references to their respective holy book.
Also as I read the same chapter I was reading about Salman Rushdie and his whole debacle. I found this to be quite abnormal so I mentioned to my dad about this guy who was issued a fatwa. Not only did my dad know whom I was talking about immediately, he knew the book that had caused the problem. I was quite shocked because earlier this summer I had been practicing interview questions with him and he couldn’t even remember what an adjective was! Now, however, I found out that his four years of college apparently had done something useful and it was fun talking to him about that topic.
Chapter 16 was very interesting to me because I had only really heard about Freud and his ideas in Psychology class. Although some of his ideas were controversial, he influenced many people's thoughts and I can now see how people can apply hidden sexual meanings and messages in literature. It is usually considered too raunchy or as Chelsea said, "taboo" for authors to come right out and talk about sex and so they disguised it in other things. For example, while reading Ethan Frome, I recall a discussion about a reference to pickles and doughnuts. Before that I had never considered normal objects to be symbolize sexual things. In some cases, there may be more to a scene that describes how a character thinks of themselves and how they interact with the other characters.
In Chapter 17, I realized that adding sex scenes in a book actually detracts from the story because many times there is no reason to include them. They can be too graphic and essentially become pornography.
During the chapter called "If She Comes Up, It's Baptism" I found myself really enjoying the explanations Foster gave as to why drowning and baptism are connected. I read the quote "you can't step into the same river twice" (154), and it seemed very familiar to me; I found that almost the same version of the quote is in Disney's Pocahontas, when she is singing "Just Around The River Bend". I think the quote is interesting because new water is always coming into a river so it isn't the same as before, just like if a character has a near death drowning experience or is baptized, almost anything to do with water, they may be transformed. I thought the story about Conrad and his brother was very interesting too, because even though Conrad didn't think so, he proved to be strong and survived. He gets another shot at living his life differently, knowing that it isn't something to take granted of. I liked all the life lessons you can take from reading about a character's experiences with water, whether it be like baptism and someone is reborn, or finding out information that is necessary to keep a story's plot going through a drowning incident.
When I read a piece of literature, especially now, I try to find the symbolic meanings in what I read. I often find myself asking, “is that a symbol of something or symbolic of anything in any way”? I might try to further delve into it, or I might pass it and let it slide. Reading chapter 12 in How to Read Literature Like a Professor, however, changed my mind about this. I don’t try to let anything slide anymore, but instead try to find the meaning and symbolism in everything I read.
The name of the chapter, “Is That a Symbol”, really intrigued me when I saw it. I believe it is a thing every reader goes through when reading a work of literature (trying to figure out whether what they are reading is symbolic or not). In the first sentence, I got my answer. The first sentence reads “Sure it is” (Foster 97), which let me know that there really could be symbolism in everything that I read. I thought Foster was spot on when he said that different readers might interpret a symbol in a different way than another reading the same exact thing. It truly is in the eye of the beholder, and Foster’s statement confirmed this. He says that many people think that a symbol should stand for only one thing, but “in general a symbol can’t be reduced to standing for only one thing” (98). I believe it is this openness in literature that can make it so exciting, where as a movie or something of that nature puts a single picture into the viewer’s head.
Chapter 12 taught me a lot about symbolism in literature and how it cannot be confined to stand for one thing and one thing only. The open nature of symbols in literature make it that much more fun to interpret and enjoy.
"Geography Matters" seemed to be a very important chapter to me because I had alwayss just thought about geography as being the setting.However, Foster pointed out that geography is more than just landscape and place; it can be used in the plot, help develop character or interestingly enough, even be a character itself. I was surprised to hear that "literary geography is typically about humans inhabiting spaces, and at the same time the spaces that inhabit humans" (166), all I gather from that statement is that the geography talked about with humans is where they reside, what their lifestyle is like, and how the place in which they live shapes them as characters. When Foster says, "geography can also define or even develop character"(167) I thought of Gary Paulsen's Hatchet. The main character, Brian, is faced with many hardships as he tries to survive in the wilderness. This experience develops his character into a strong young man who is able to rely on himself.
Season is also very important to a story. Foster refers back once again to the names of Daisy Miller and Frederic Winterbourne. He illustrates that the names are very important to the character's attitude. While reading, it becomes evident that the seasons have many emotions associated with them. Summer is usually equated with happy feelings, good memories, sunshine and fun. While winter can be brutal, cold, and dangerous. As I said before, I had looked up the triangle between Demeter, Hades, and Persephone after the chapter "It's Greek To Me". This explaination of seasons is very interesting and I really enjoyed the story.
After reading "Marked for Greatness" I realized that birthmarks, scars, and deformities are not just there to be there and symbolize something unique, but also let the reader in on personal history. For example, deformities may be the result of a war, birth defect, or tragic event in a character's life that the author wanted to pay specific attention to. I thought it was also interesting how a deformity can define what a character can and cannont do.
When reading "He's Blind for a Reason, You Know", with Foster's help, I reaffirmed what I learned while reading The Chosen. That being blind doesn't necessicarily mean that someone doesn't have the ability to see the world around them. It may be they are ignorant to the world or are blind to people's actions, or even other characters. One thing that I felt Foster really stressed was that an author should introduce something important about a character early so that the reader can learn how it affects that specific character and others.
I seriously did not like the “It’s Greek to me” chapter. While almost finished with it yesterday, I dozed off into an hour and 15 minute nap. It was long and boring, and I didn’t understand a lot of it (maybe because I was tired). One thing that I do have to associate with it though, is the Comparative Mythologies class that I took with Mr. Leland last year. We learned about the significance that myths have on shaping many ancient and modern cultures. Like Foster said, myth is “the ability of story to explain ourselves to ourselves in ways that physics, philosophy, mathematics, chemistry… can’t” (65). Throughout the Comparative Myths course, we leaned about various different cultures and the myths they were built on. From the Mesopotamian creation stories, to Plato’s theories on imagination & reality, to Greek gods and goddesses, to the Christian Apocalypse, myths have been set on the same exact components. Past or present, myths are rooted in people’s fear of dying, they provide answers to the unknown (such as afterlives and creation), and they give societies guidelines on how to morally behave, bringing people together. No matter what a person believes, scientific, religious or both, everything is rooted in myth, “A body of story that matters”(65). It is no wonder that so many works of literature are rooted in myth also!
Speaking of Ethan Frome, Chelsey (And others), while reading “It’s More Than Just Rain or Snow” that book was all I could think about! Also, speaking of Mr. Leland, in his language arts class my sophomore year, weather symbolizing emotions and aspects to relationships was drilled pretty far into my head. One thing I remember about Edith Wharton’s Novel is how the weather emphasized the mood and theme of the book. The story is set in winter, and is constantly describing the cold, ice and snow. The elements of winter bring out sorrow and depression in the characters, and they are frequently complaining about the snow and cold. An element of deadness is added by the winter season, as Ethan and his relationship with his hypochondriac wife, Zeena (who is always sick) is quite dull and lifeless. Foster mentioned that snow can be seen as “suffocating” (80), and it plays out in this novel when the sense of dreary hopelessness that Ethan feels ends in suicide, which takes place in the snow (while sledding).
Overall, I thought this chapter was helpful and gave more meaning to hidden symbolism behind weather. I think the weather in books and movies subconsciously put us in the mood that the author intends, but this chapter was helpful in identifying the varieties of meanings that those different elements of weather could have.
Chapter 14 was really interesting to me in how it talked about connecting characters in literature to Christ and the works of Jesus being displayed in different symbols in literature. I understood what Foster was talking about throughout the chapter, and I understand how much Christ is portrayed in literature.
Reading the chapter, it reminded me of the poem unit we did at the end of the year in 303. I was assigned the poem "The Lifeguard" by James Dickey, and there were references to Jesus Christ throughout the poem. At one point, the narrator steps "outward from earth onto water/in quest of the miracle" (lines 11-12). This passage alludes to the bible, when Jesus walks on water, and is an obvious connection to Christ and the power that he holds and the power that the narrator feels that he also holds. Another connection or allusion to Christ also comes up later in the poem. After a flashback which covers the death of a boy who drowned under the care of the lifeguard, the narrator talks about the boy rising from the water. The boy "rises, dilating to break/The surface of stone with his forehead" (lines 49-50). He rises from his death, much like when Jesus rises from his death.
These allusions to and symbols of Christ are easily seen in "The Lifeguard". As Foster says, some symbols of Christ are harder to find than others, and the ones in "The Lifeguard" were rather easy to find. For me, chapter 14 was a rather interesting chapter.
When it comes to matters of the heart, I'm quite a sap. I honestly tear up in about every love story there is! While reading "It's Never Just Heart Disease" I found out that there are many different ways a heart may be symbolic, but mainly that it evokes emotion. The reason why many people use the heart in literature is because we feel and experience emotions in our heart. I really understood how characters can be killed off because of their bad hearts, not as in the physical condition of their heart is poor, but that they are slowly dying because of their own attitudes. It also reminded me of how Hawthorne's character, Dimmesdale, in The Scarlet Letter suffers from medical conditions because of the guilt that plagues his heart.
In Chapter 24, I was initially concerned when I read that diseases could be seen as "picturesque". However, after I remembered the story I had previously mentioned, The Two Princesses of Bamarre by Gail Carson Levine, I was reminded of the illness called "The Gray Death". There are several different sequences that have to occur before someone actually dies from the illness, one is a fever and then a sleep. Throughout the book I had the feeling that when someone was in the slumber they were quite angelic looking and peaceful after battling the disease for a while. They also turn a shade of gray, as it shows why the illness is called that.
I didn't really enjoy Chapter 25, but I did like the quote "we have to accept those values for those characters"(232). Sometimes I don't understand why a character is portrayed a certain way and think "well if they had these skills, qualities, attributes..." that it would be a much better book. However, after reading this chapter I learned that characters are written about in a certain way because the author wants us to understand something. Also that you can find different ways to look at things while reading and not stay in one frame of mind.
Chapter 12 “Is That a Symbol?” served to further frustrate me with the problems of literature. I just have never liked the fact that a book can be changed completely just because you think something means something else. I understand the importance of symbolism and how it is an effective tool for authors, the thing I don’t like is how people read a book and decide that they found symbols that mean something. I mean how do we know what exactly an author meant without directly asking them? That’s just something that’s bugged me.
I was interested in chapter 13 when he reveals what A Christmas Carol was intended to mean when it was originally published. I had always thought of that to be a typical bad guy turns good type story, but it was cool being able to understand what Dickens had meant by writing the story.
Reading all of this stuff about Oedipus and everything that’s found in the trilogy really makes me want to read what it actually is about. I’ve only vaguely heard about the plays but the way that Foster describes them makes them sound really interesting and entertaining. Also now on my list of books that I hope we read is The Old Man and the Sea. Again, a story I have heard bits and parts about, but never actually read.
Violence strikes a chord with me, especially when dealing with an important character in a novel. I get caught up in a story, feeling the emotions that the characters feel, and since violence isn’t quite a familiar thing in my experiences, my heart goes out to the character in whatever situation they are in. When reading about the examples of slave violence that Foster gives, I immediately thought of the book Kindred, which I really enjoyed. Dana, the main character, travels back in time to experience slavery in the South. She is put through many acts of violence; mainly whippings. Slavery in itself is “A system that should have been unthinkable” (88), and after reading this chapter on violence, my eyes were opened to the symbolism of the brutal acts related to it. Whippings are a common act of punishment that the white slave owners inflicted upon the slaves. The whip not only symbolizes the punishment, but the power the white person has, a way to get what they want, and a source of reliving their own irritation. It signifies the whole mindset of the slave-owning white culture. They were numb to the effects of inflicting harm upon another person, and thought that it was the normal thing to do. They established a culture of fear in the slaves, and like the institution of slavery itself, whipping slowly put a sense of hopelessness and misery into a slave.
Any act of violence within a book can have so many different meanings. I particularly liked the questions that Foster asks at the end of the chapter, “What does this type of misfortune represent thematically?” and “Why this sort of violence and not some other?” (96) And as an act such as whipping is easily broken apart and looked at symbolically, so are many different types of violent acts portrayed throughout literature.
"Is He Serious? And Other Ironies" was a very appealing chapter to me because there are many instances in my life that seem to be ironic in nature. I, however, disliked the whole signified and signifier explanation of irony. Foster gave a great description of irony when he talked about a character that commits suicide to escape his enemies who are, interestingly enough, doctors. He then leads the us to the thought that doctors are supposed to be associated with healing the sick and trying to keep people alive instead of pushing them towards death. Something I really enjoyed about this chapter was the notion that "for goodness to mean anything, not only must evil exist, but so must the option of choosing evil"(243). I find this to be one of the most interesting statements made by Foster because, exactly like he said, to achieve an ideal world there has to be something that could ruin it, which is a backwards way to think, although it is very true. It's almost like Spiderman, in order for there to be a superhero for any city, there has to be some evil to battle against, for example The Green Goblin, and then the option for Spiderman to turn evil too. I'm not exactly sure which of the movies it was in, but Peter Parker was consumed by greed and arrogance. Eventually his ego took over and he wore a black suit for a while, which was possessed by something evil that changed him and is something he struggles with for a while in the movie.
Overall, the "Test Case" was really interesting to read. I could pick out some of the things Foster had us learn about; the flying allusions, I saw that right away with the statement that Jose was a butterfly and especially recognized the piece of that story that was about the class distinctions. I still found myself not recognizing many things until Foster explained them. I know it will come with practice and I will definitely use the techniques and look for underlying qualities in stories that the authors have. How to Read Literature Like a Professor proved to be a very good tool, one that I will refer back to if I get stuck while tackling some difficult stories in AP Lit this year!
I must first and foremost say that I was NOT looking forward to reading this book by any means. The title did not sound too promising, and made me wonder why I actually decided on taking this class. So I put it off but now I have to say that once I started reading it I found myself really enjoying everything that Foster has to say. It really is a pretty good read and thus far I've actually learned quite a bit about how to approach literature and some key things to look for.
The first part where Foster talks about every trip being a quest was easy enough to understand once I realized that the majority of the books I've read contain the 5 points he talked about, thus turning what may have seemed like a mundane trip into an action packed quest. (Maybe not always packed with action per say, but packed with symbolic possibility for sure.) I also liked that he said the real reason for a quest is always self-knowledge because it is very true. You'd be hard pressed to find a book, or even a real life story, where the character(s) take a quest and come out of it completely unchanged.
The sections “Acts of Communion“ and “Acts of vampires” both intrigued me quite a bit. The idea behind the whole when people eat together it’s communion thing is very simple and very basic. So basic, in fact, that I completely overlooked it in my normal reading until it was brought to my attention. When you really start to think about it you realize that eating and drinking really are such mundane activities that there has to be something else happening on a deeper level. Either that, or the author really just wants to bore the reader to death with silly unnecessary details. When I read this I immediately was reminded of Ethan Frome. Wharton sets a couple down to dinner, but it’s much more than just the two of them eating together. People eating together are usually acts of sharing and peace, but in this specific scene, however, the atmosphere is charged with tension. It ends with the cat breaking a pickle dish, and as Foster states in his book, a failed meal carries negative connotations.
For the “Acts of Vampire” section Allison’s comment is very similar to what was going through my head while reading it. My thoughts drifted towards Edward Cullen, but then after I realized that that was not what Foster meant I was reminded more of Dracula and Nosferatu: The literal vampires with their sexual implications. Then, when he mentioned the symbolic vampire, I began to think of a different kind of book; a more stretch of a connection, but a connection nonetheless. Take your average chick lit story about a high school girl and you have yourself a case of social symbolic vampirism. You can look at high school as the vampire, or society in general. In both cases you have a young woman, you have selfishness, exploitation, refusal to respect the autonomy of other people, using people to get what you want, placing desires above the needs of others, and in many cases this leads to the destruction of the young woman whether that be because of the struggles of high school or because of the high pressures society has placed on her. Minus the part about needing an old man to strip away the girls youth (and even that is a possible scenario in these cases), it sounds very much like a vampire story to me.
When I read the chapter called "Don't Read With Your Eyes" I had a hard time understanding it at first. I did not know exactly what Foster was asking me to do when I read. With further examples, I realized he was requesting that I put myself in the time and place of the reading. In order to truly enjoy and understand a literary work, I must understand first the context in which it was written. I then realized that with all the books I have enjoyed in the past, I was able to do this. Often, however, when I have not had enough background on the setting of the book, I tend to think it is boring or pointless. I now understand the importance of research prior to reading.
The chapter about irony was very explanatory. Foster's examples of irony are great, and he makes an important point in stating that irony trumps everything, as he has mentioned throughout the entire book. I was surprised when he tried to say Alex from A Clockwork Orange was a Christ figure, but when he explains it in ironic terms, it makes sense. I agree with Molly when she states that the best part of the chapter explained that the option of choosing evil must be present in order for true goodness to exist. The idea makes me think not only of Spiderman, but of every other superhero. Heroes in general make a mess of the city, are freaks of nature, and usually are very strange overall. However, the presence of a villain makes all of their actions noble.
When reading "The Garden Party" I was surprised by my own new ideas. Although I did not realize it, my reading skills have improved from this book. Although I was not able to come up with an explanation as detailed or perfect as the one concerning birds and flight, it was very easy for me to realize that the story concerned much more than a simple aristocratic party. I recognized immediately Laura's internal struggle with her family's imposed values concerning class and the worth of a human being. It was also easy to recognize Mrs.Sheridan as the true ruler of the situation. I am excited to see if my newly acquired skills will carry over in to the rest of my readings.
Another chapter that really stuck with me was chapter 20, which regards the seasons and how they are reflected through characters and events in literature. Foster says that summer “is passion and love; winter, anger and hatred” (Foster 177). He also says that autumn represents fading and the middle ages, and that spring is a representation of growth and renewal. All of these associations make sense to me, and I understand how a character might feel anger because of the winter season that he or she finds themselves in.
This chapter reminded me of how seasons played a role in Speak, a novel I read in sophomore language arts. I remember Mrs. Quinn talking about how the main character, Melinda, displayed the season through her thoughts, emotions, and actions. In winter, Melinda was often angry and confused, and she felt lost in her everyday life. In spring, however, things changed. Melinda went from an angry, confused, and lost girl to a person who found a sense of direction in her life. Melinda experienced a maturation and “growth” in the spring, just as the season itself is seen as a time of growth and renewal. The effects of the changing seasons were clearly evident in Speak and did play a role in the development of the novel.
Chapter 20 was interesting to me, and I learned a lot from Foster about his interpretation on the seasons and what they mean in literature. It has made my reading of My Antonia much more enjoyable and also much more meaningful.
I didn’t really enjoy the section about sonnets, mainly because I really just didn’t get it. It was too much about form and all that, which is stuff I tend to pay no attention to. Don’t get me wrong, I love poetry, and I write a lot of my own but sonnets don’t interest me because they are too much about form and I take more of a liking towards free verse. I did, however, really like the Christina Rossetti poem “An Echo from Willow-Wood.” It’s beautifully written, and sounds just as beautiful when you read it out loud (yes, I did).
In “Now, where have I seen her before”, I really liked the idea he brought up of intertextuality, and of literature growing out of other literature. It’s truly a brilliant idea, and like the communion idea, very basic in its entirety. It must be very near to impossible to write a book that is completely original with no ties whatsoever (even accidental) to previous works. With almost every book I read I find something in it that connects it to another work of literature, whether that be plot, a character, a use of a symbol, or allusions to works like the Bible. Sometimes the author does it on purpose, but many times I suspect they don’t.
As shocked as I am to say this, I really enjoyed the section on Shakespeare. I haven’t read much of him, just the classics like romeo and juliet, and still I found myself absolutely fascinated by how many modern works take material from Shakespeare. I think it will be much easier now for me to spot Shakespeare inspired plot and characters in literature I read. I even have a sudden urge to go read his works, and trust me when I say THAT is really saying something.
First:
To Kate Koslowski’s question “why the bible?” I happened to be scrolling down and landed on your comment and thought I would answer your question. Why the Bible you ask? Well, the Bible is the number one selling book in the entire world, and Christianity is unarguably the largest religion with a following of approximately 2.1 billion people. Therefore, if you make a reference to the Bible your chances, statistically speaking, of people recognizing it are going to be greater than your chances if you make a reference to any other religion. Of course, I’m sure there are other reasons as well, probably ones that don’t have to do with numbers, but that’s my answer for you.
Now to my comment. I really enjoyed the next section “…Or the Bible” because I couldn’t even begin to count the number of times I’ve recognized a biblical connection while reading, or even in movies (anyone see Facing The Giants?). While reading this chapter I was reminded of so many different novels I’ve read, but one I’m sure you’re all familiar with is A Tale of Two Cities. While the story is not overtly religious by any means, it contains quite a few religious themes: redemption, resurrection, sacrifice, martyrdom, and even a very Christ-like figure (Sydney Carton). Though I know some stories from the Bible, I don’t know them all, but this chapter made it a bit easier for me to recognize possible Biblical parallels in the future.
I thought Foster was spot on when he talked about the Bible and its role in literature in chapter four. The Bible shows up a lot in literature, and it is easy to understand why Foster would dedicate a chapter to this very subject. Millions of people throughout the world read and worship the Bible, and because of this it is easy to see why an author would try to incorporate that into their work. Like someone in this blog mentioned earlier, it would be common sense to make a reference to the Bible in literature when so many people throughout the world read and worship it.
Without even reading the title of the chapter, I could see where Foster was going with the chapter when he mentions words such as “garden, serpent, plagues, flood, parting of waters, loaves, fishes, forty days, betrayal, denial, slavery and escape, fatted calves, milk and honey” (Foster 48) in the first sentence. These were to me, and I’m sure to many other readers, obvious references to the Bible. These are the kinds of things that Foster believes a reader should look for in a work of literature when trying to find references to the Bible. He also says that the Bible can be referenced right in the title of a piece of literature, such as Tongues of Flame by Tim Parks or The Sun Also Rises by Ernest Hemingway. Foster says the author might do this if they don’t want to use “enriching motifs, characters, themes, or plots, but just needs a title” (50). Foster also says that the Bible can show up through characters, events, and places in literature. Then, of course, there are the symbols and indirect references to the Bible that show up all of the time in literature. I mentioned in a previous post the references to Jesus Christ and the Bible I saw in the poem The Lifeguard by James Dickey. The lifeguard in the poem walks on water, and the boy that drowns rises from his death. These are more obvious references to Christ and the Bible, and intentionally placed into the poem for this powerful biblical effect.
The Bible is incredibly important throughout the world in the lives of many people, and for this reason it shows up in numerous works of literature.
In Literature, it seems that symbols dominate every page of every book ever written. So it didn't wuprise me taht the sense are one of the biggest symbols; sight ranked number one in my book. In 303 with Mrs. Greene, we read Chaim Potok's The Chosen and both Danny and Reuven had eye problems not only physically, but religiously as well. Until their paths happened to collide (literally) at an archrival baseball game, they wouldn't have known how, although they may practice two very different types of Judiaism, they are really one in the same. I also noticed that blindness was a punishment for wrong doing. Note to self, beware of things wanting to attack my eyes!
"It's also never just heart disease" either. Foster makes sure to point out that a good reader watches for what the heart is made of, e.i. stone (symbol of humanity), iron from Homer's The Odyesey and The Illiad (symbol of strength, possibly rebirth?), and gold (loyalty, value Joseph Conrad Lord Jim, who had a heart of gold I love how Foster always incorporates ancient history because it reminds us that everything is from the same orgin. However, it made me wonder about something important. My grandma just underwent a quad bypass and a valve replacement and has a family history of heart disease. Coincidence? Perhaps.
The thing that cuaght my ee most in Goster's section on primary literary disease was how hilarious the theme was. Foster's point about venerial disease was dead on and I felt he was right about the religious symbol it serves for "no sex outside of marriage." TB was also a good example of disease that doubles as punishment. Also called consumption, it literally consumes people with coughing until they die; symbolizing to me pathological sinners.
Brittany, I totally agree with your reasoning on "why the bible."
I laughed that you said the Bible is the number one selling book in the entire world because I'd never thought of that before! I also liked the religious themes you pointed out from A Tale of Two Cities. Redemption, resurrection, sacrifice, martyrdom,and Christ-like figures plague books like it's going out of style. You are so knowledgable and I made a mental note to myself to use you as a religious reference if I ever have a question :)
I especially liked chapter 15 and its topic of flight. I'm looking at the Air Force Academy and Naval Academy for college, and I want to fly. I have always loved plane rides. Pre 9/11 I would always ask to look in the cockpit. I have spent over six hours flying towards a license, so of course I love planes. Not only do I like flying, I thought his opening paragraph was the funniest one in the book. Flying has always been a way to relax for me. Just being able to look outside the window and see all the clouds makes me calmer. I agree completely with his statement “flight is freedom” (128). Just being able to get up off the ground makes me feel like I'm untouchable and that’s why my dream job is flying fighter jets.
Obviously if I love flying one of my favorite myths is going to be the one with Icarus and his wings of wax. I remember watching the Hercules movie and TV show and always finding Icarus to be the funniest person and I just like the idea that back then they thought it was possible to fly so close to the sun that your wax wings would melt. Just the whole idea seems so impossible today, but probably no less unimaginable back thousands of years ago.
When I first picked up this book I was a bit apprehensive about what it would be like. Oh no, another boring book with rules about how to become a better reader. Surprisingly, I was wrong. When I started reading I realized that John Foster has quite a sense of humor that he puts into his books. Foster is easy to understand and trys to relate to his student audience by using examples like the one about how reading literature is like connecting the dots of little kid pictures. He blunt and puts it all out there but still manages to keep us reading.
The first chapter was about quests and journeys and I automatically thought of Huckleberry Finn. Foster's analysis of journeys fits exactly with Hucks journey down the Mississippi River and everything he overcomes. He ends up gaining that "self knowledge" that one would assume to gain on a hard journey and grows up along the way.
"Acts of Communion" caught my attention because I usually don't pay enough attention to everything in the book to realize that a simple meal could mean so much more. So maybe the Pilgrims knew more than we did on Thanksgiving day when they got together to eat that big meal, rejoicing for their arrival. I would think they were just hungry and wanted to eat some good food, but it meant so much more. This chapter also reminded me of the dance team spaghetti dinners we use to have the day before a big competition. We weren't just hungry from 3 demanding hours of practice, we wanted to spend time together and eat something hearty so we could win big.
"Acts of Vampires" reminded me of what other than...Stephanie Meyers series like Twilight of course! I just started reading the series this summer so everything was still fresh in my mind. One thing that did stick out to me was that Foster describes vampires as selfish and sort of evil which totally goes against the story behind Twilight. Edward Cullen says at one point during the book that he isn't doing any of this nonsense for himself but for Bella, which is the most unselfish thing I think. So maybe Twilight doesn't hit upon all the elements of the true vampire story, but if it did then that wouldn't be any fun!
I love the idea of flight, so I was really glad to get to "Flights of Fancy." The big, bold, "flight is freedom" (128) caught my eye right away, and it makes perfect sence. However, I found Foster's explanation of flight with irony to be interesting. The example of A Very Old Man With Enourmous Wings brought to mind a sci-fi series I read a few years ago, Maximum Ride. In it,k the protagonist, Max, and her friends have been genetically altered so they have wings and can fly, but are trapped in a laboratory, being studied to see why they've managed to survive with such changed DNA. Though their wings should give them freedom (and they occasionally do) Max and her friends are instead given a fairly sheltered life throughout much of the series.
"It's All About Sex..." and "...Except Sex" basically said, "If it's not sex, it's about sex. If it is sex, it's not about sex." The example of Janus was easy to understand because Foster practically spelled out how the bowl and keys symbolize sex.
I totally agree with Molly that adding a sex scene to a story can interupt the flow of the novel. Unless it adds something to the story (has actual meaning to the story) and can't be replaced, I don't think sex scenes are really all that necessary.
So I was reading the chapter about sonnets and realized..I don't even really know if I've ever read one. How sad. I'm sure I have read one but never realized it because I don't really get into counting the lines of poems. It was interesting to me that short poems, like sonnets, with 14 lines, are harder to create than longer ones because the writer has to get all of their thoughts into a certain number of lines. Personally, I could never even have enough thoughts for a poem to meet the 14 line requirement, but that's just me.
"Now where have I seen her before?" kind of ruined my original thoughts about each book I've read. Foster said that there is no such thing as a wholly original work of literature. I understand his meanings behind it, but each work of literature I read or hear seems so new and unique to me. I always thought that everyone used their own thoughts and ideas, how naive of me. But don't get me wrong; I've definetly had deja vu before when reading a book.
It's funny to think that these well known authors and artists turn fairy tales like Hansel and Gretel or Little Red Riding Hood into real, serious life issues and stories like "Going After Cacciato." I think that I'm reading inbetween the lines so well when I read a book and try not to miss anything but reading this book by Foster makes me realize I still have a lot to learn.
To be or not to be, that is the question. Shakespeare bores me honestly and I really didn't understand the point of reading A Mid Summer Night's Dream sophmore year. It's about strange people falling in love, jealousy, revenge, and some guy turning into a donkey. Although, I can't hate on Shakespeare, he was a great guy with some major talent. Bay Port did West Side Story last year for the musical I believe, and now I believe it's a remake of Romeo and Juliet? I definetly didn't see that one coming when I was watching West Side Story in the audience. But once you pick it apart and analyze it, it makes sense. One of the famous Shakespearean (?) quotes that stood out to me was "Double, Double, Toil and Trouble." I believe that was one of the Olsen twins favorite sayings in their series of movies. Since when are Mary-Kate and Ashley repeating after Shakespeare?
To say the least, the first thing that struck a chord with me was the mention of students adopting a look, often times I have looked around the room and seen many a "we don't get it. And think you're making it up" after a more obscure reading in class (Foster xiii). Ironically enough, all it seems to take in situations such as those is merely a change of perspective or a more open mind, or I'm speaking non-sense.
The always and never comment seemed a bit, obvious? Not only are then inconsistencies in literature, but in every aspect of one's life. Can one even say the mail (one of the largest constants in life) will ALWAYS come? Of course not, just as there is not one who can say the world will NEVER end, there is no basis for such long range assurance on any account in life.
Nice to eat with you, a peculiar chapter name, but duly explained when looked into, admittedly, I had never really thought about the well, dishonest side of a communion with someone. Truth be told, the saying "keep your friends close and enemies closer" is usually held to be truth, as the best offense happens to be a structurally sound defense, as well as the opposite. This could almost make for an assumption that things are best when they are not of the original purpose.
Vampires, vampires everywhere, but no blood to drink. Yes, cliched, I know. Though, if one thinks about it, like any good paradox, it is all but completely true. Foster makes many a good example of how people, pressure, or even an item can have the life draining tendencies we expect of vampires. Just for a random connection, I cannot help but see Serverus Snape, from the Harry Potter books, as fulfilling these qualifications nicely. Not only does he seem to gain livelihood from the torturous homework he likes to so generously bestow upon his students, but also the hawk eyes for mistakes and zeal for docking points from all houses but his precious Slytherin.
Lauren, to give my two cents upon following the penny for your thoughts (though, monetarily I can never quite figure out where the other penny went, much like a subtlety in speech or literature, the overlooked and ignored bit of profanity, which is being used in the sense of being profound). As far as "not having enough thoughts to fill up 14 lines", I sincerely doubt it, all it takes is an inspiration, as incredibly vague as that is.
As far as sonnets go I'm very happy that Foster made such a large deal of them, that yes, they do carry a great weight of importance. Admittedly, this poem strikes close to home for me due to life experiences, but, I was able to pick out his stated meanings without much thought. I have a feeling this was only because of the connection to it, if I had no such connection I may find it much more cryptic.
The entire chapter of "Now Where Have I Seen Her Before?" amuses me with such blatant and hidden allusions. I doubt many people would read that a character fell into a hole, and it happened to lead them into a estranged land not like the above, and immediately think of Alice in Wonderland (though ironically, when stated like that, I actually believe some would). The almost "sleight of narrative" authors can pull us into because of connections, is amusing, amazing, and at the same time vexing (Foster 36). How one plans far enough ahead to make their readers think a certain way to establish more of a connection to characters, or heighten the drama will never cease to amaze me.
The phrase "You can never forget the classics" is hugely reinforced in this chapter, obviously. Shakespeare seems to carry much more weight in knowledge than any single man could bear. Ironically, he turned his vast knowledge of live, love, etc, into plays, entertainment. I can only wonder if this could have been the creation of an enlightened generation if his morals were instilled into them. Honestly, it is a shame his works are so obscure these days, touched upon only mildly during high school or college, and most readers without the knowledge to pull its true meanings out.
Before reading, "If She Comes Up, It's Baptism," I never really thought of water symbolizing baptism. I always saw it more as just part of the story, put there for geographic reasons, or, in the case of rain, just as part of the weather. After reading the chapter and the example of Ordinary People I wondered why I had never seen it beofre.
I always figured authors put a lot of thought into the location of their story, but I never really thought about how important the setting could be, and on so many levels. First, there's the obvious--the story needs a location to take place in. But I didn't give more than a stray thought to other reasons the author picked that particular location or what someone moving to a different part of the country would mean for them. After reading this chapter, I'm definately going to be looking more closely at the location of the story.
With seasons, my thinking was pretty much the same way. I thought of it as part of the setting, and not much more. Not anymore!
The interlude "One Story" reminded me of the chapter "Now, Where Have I Seen Her Before." Both emphasized that nothing is original and that everyone borrows from everyone else.
When I saw that "Marked For Greatness" was about heroes with scars, tattoos, etc., my mind immediately went to Harry Potter, who Foster mentions later in the chapter, and how his scar sets him apart from the entire Wizarding World. Foster made a good point when he says that "Sameness doesn't present us with metaphorical possibilities" (194). If every hero in every story was perfect, not only would it make for a pretty boring hero, but there would be little depth. Not to mention that a scar can provide an interesting backstory for a character.
"He's Blind for a Reason, You Know" brought The Chosen and Reuven's eye injury to mind. He sees the world so much more clearly after his surgery, and isn't as close-minded as he was before the accident with the baseball. I think Foster did a good job explaining how blindness has all sorts of possibilities when interpreting literature, from figurative blindness to irony. And I totally agree with Kaitlyn that blindness would be a horrible thing to have to endure.
In "It's Never Just Heart Disease..." Foster explains what is obvious to anyone over the age of about three. The heart represents emotion and love. But going to a deeper level, Foster explains how heart diseases have deeper meanings than a lot of illnesses. I had always seen heart disease (and any other illness, for that matter) as just a part of the novel, part of life, and nothing more than a plot device. Now, though, I'm going to look more closely at the types of illnesses that claim the lives of literary characters.
"...And Rarely Just Illness" simply expanded on the information given in the previous chapter, broadening the category to illnesses in general. While reading about the list of literary characters with tuberculosis, I saw Mimi from La Boheme. My mind went from there to RENT, which is partially based on La Boheme and the character Mimi there, who has AIDS. Sure enough, later in the chapter AIDS is introduced as the disease of the century.
I've never had much trouble seeing things through the eyes of the narrator, so "Don't Read with Your Eyes" was a pretty easy chapter for me to understand. But I find that the further the setting is from my own life and experiences, the harder it is for me to read through the eyes of the characters. That's something I'm working on. Also, I liked how Foster explained "last-chance-for-change" stories as the opposite of quests. It made the entire explaination more rewarding. It made me feel like, given this is almost the end and the chapter on quests was at the beginning, the book was being brought full circle.
I thought that it was weird that in this day and age the Bible can still play such a large role in literature and movies. An example is "Passion of the Christ" which was all over the media and had lines out the doors to see it on its premiere night.
Sometimes I don't realize when I'm reading if a serpent comes up or if the author talks about someone dying for what they believe in. I don't know why but I just keep reading and don't relate things like that to the Bible right away in my head. Although, I do realize when the names of characters come up like John, Peter, Eve, or Abel- those do ring a bell for me. Foster talks about a "resonance test" to see if what you're reading is alluding to anything. Which reminds me of chemistry, unfortunetly, where we had resonance structures in which an element bonded to another can take on many forms, which is exactly what the literature is doing.
After reading the chapter "Hanseldee and Greteldum",I realized that it is so much harder for writers to use other authors plots or ideas without getting caught by their readers because we know so much more these days- or are expected to. It surprised me that the authors of modern literature use fairytales and twist them into a story about anxiety, sexism, or drugs. These fairytales are meant for little ones to enjoy but instead authors are putting a different take on it and coming out with someone a kindergartener would not enjoy. At this point Foster explains literature to us like we're just a friend and he's giving some helpful advice; it's so laidback and comfortable.
I once thought that writers just wrote about a bird they saw one morning and expanded upon it. Foster explains that every story a writer writes means something personal to them- they're not just writing it to write, they're writing it to get it out and share.
Things Greek never really interested me- like "The Iliad" and "The Odyssey". What did interest me though, was that there are Greek inspired city names all over the U.S. and no one knows it, or perhaps it's just me that didn't know. Greek myths and meanings do influence a lot of our every day lives but everyone takes them a different way. An example is the "Fall of Icarus", where one author can use the imagery, setting, and everyday life of the people, while the other uses the violence and emotions that were experienced. Everything usually is Greek to me.
After reading the chapter about rain and snow, I started to recognize these elements in other books that I'm reading. Another thing I thought of when reading about floods and rain was Hurricane Katrina. The massive amount of water poured on the south, particularly New Orleans, restored the city in the end and brought the U.S. closer. It's also interesting that a form of precipitation can bring people together, cleanse and renew them, or pull people apart. It is significant but it isn't, if that makes any sense. This chapter also reminded me of a book I once read called "Life As We Knew It". The family experiences this blizzard of a snow storm, the mom gets real sick, the heat won't work, and they're running out of food. In the end, after months of this, the snow starts to melt and the family is closer than ever. So one thing I should always remember is..check the weather says Foster.
I don't think that I've ever read a book where violence isn't a subject; from getting into a fist fight with a bully, or a wife getting killed by her husband over money (that's in "My Antonia"). Although violence is often suspenseful and scary, it sometimes tells a story. Like in "Beloved" by Toni Morrison- the story isn't about a mother killing her child, it's about the millions of innocent slaves that died every year. Or how Robert Frost had a hidden meaning of child labor in some of his poems. Without violence and action, the story really isn't that interesting, sadly. Even Homer and Shakespeare were killing characters off way back when. One thing I did learn was that someone dying instead just an idea to kill some time or pages, it always mean something more.
"Is That A Symbol" chapter really stuck out to me. I've always struggled with determining if that was symbol or if this isn't. Foster made it clear that everyone sees things differently and that I can make a symbol mean whatever I want it to. But then again it's hard to accept that some things really mean nothing. I've sat reading a book before thinking what does this mean? what does this mean?, when really I could have been worked up over nothing because their was no symbolic relationship to anything in the author's mind. In "The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn", the symbols were evident once I finished the book and thought about the river, the raft, and the increasing dead people. When I read "My Antonia" things weren't so clear. Maybe it's because I wasn't getting other people's input or it might have just plain been confusing, but I guess I'll just have to find out.
And now, for my last comment of the summer on this book. The chapter that taught me the most in Foster's guide to literature for idiots was 25. The title tells readers not to read with their eyes. Well then what do we read with, right? Wrong. Of course there's an alternative! I've found that reading more with your heart seems to allow you to dig into the character and almost "be" them. In the begining of the summer, I read Push by Sapphire and it was an increadable true story about an African American woman who grew up in Harlem, one of the roughest bourrows in New York. On top of it, she is subject to sexual abuse by her father and has two kids by him at the age of 15 and has contracted the HIV virus. Some how, she miraculously is able to push (oh the irony) through the hardest parts of her life to learn to read and write at a center for kids who live rough lives. I cried my eyes out through the entire book as did I in Alice Walker's The Color Purple. I can't believe that people can treat others that way but it was almost as if I could feel their pain. When you picture yourself in their shoes, you can better become subject to the circumstance the character is in.
I really liked his section on irony, because it's probably my favorite thing in life. I like when things have double meanings and of course, when what people say can be misconstrued as some type of innuendo.
To be honest, I didn't learn anything that Foster didn't already teach me from the Test Case. I really liked that Foster allows you to test your skills, but I've been doing that all along this summer, even with my fun books. I suppose I can't be a total pain though. He did teach me a lot of good tips that I'll be using in the class as well as on the AP test.
Allison, you make me smile. :)
Now, the “Hanseldee and Greteldum” section didn’t do much for me. Don’t get me wrong, I liked the chapter, but I didn’t learn anything too profound or new. I do love a good fairy tale, though, that’s for sure! When I was reading this chapter I was strongly reminded of the movie Sydney White, which is a modern version of Snow White. It’s cute..watch it!
Okay, so here’s the thing: I REALLY liked the “It’s Greek to me” section. Yes, it was confusing sometimes because I haven’t read all of those books or heard all of those myths. However, even though I haven’t read them I somehow knew the basic outline of all of them when they were mentioned. Greek mythology really has been engrained in history and we see it everywhere. So many authors take things out of Greek mythology just as they take things from Shakespeare. I also really like Greek mythology because it is full to the brim with symbols and I love symbols!
“It’s more than just rain or snow” was an interesting section. I love when an author describes the weather in a scene because it’s almost always for some specific reason. I like Foster’s idea of the paradox of rain: "how clean it is coming down and how much mud it can make when it lands" (77). When I read this chapter I though of Ethan Frome because Edith Wharton often takes time to describe the setting which is always snowy and cold. In this particular example I think that the weather (the cold and the snow) was symbolizing a relationship between Ethan and his wife which was cold, dull, and somewhat depressing. I think weather really is a good way for the author to get the reader to feel what he/she wants them to feel.
The chapter "It's All Political" opened up my eyes to the real meanings behind some the best known stories. Like how "A Christmas Carol" is really about the social shortcoming of society then. Also, how Edgar Allen Poe used his poems to tell about the unfair European class system. When I watched "A Christmas Carol" I definetly didn't think about politics but how nasty Scrooge is. Then another familiar title came up. "Rip Van Winkle". I think I've had to read it twice- once sophmore year and then again junior year, and I still learn something each time. It seems to me that everything is always disguised as something else and usually it isn't positive.
I was reminded of "The Chosen" by Potok when I read the chapter about Christ figures. When I/most of us started reading it I didn't know much about the Jewish religion or culture. So it's kind of hard to understand the importance of certain things they do. So as an assignment we had a Jewish culture day and did a slideshow on Jewish words. What I did find difficult was that it's hard to determine if a character is like a Christ figure when they don't have to have all of the characteristics. So if a character I read about is around thirty years old and is good with children, should I assume Christ has risen again?
"If it flies, it isn't human"(Foster 125). Flight interests/confuses me, like levitation and how the heck crazy people can do that. There is so much truth in the phrase Foster says,"flight is freedom." When I think of flying I don't think of souls, angels, and spirits, but after this chapter it's definetly something to recognize. My dad use to skydive, which is kind of like flying. So maybe that was his freedom from getting away from his stresses and the world.
It seems like everything has a meaning but nothing subtle. Flying, vampires, fairytales, the weather, communion. How does a person keep all of these things in check?
The two chapters about sex were kind of..inappropriate. Foster's audience is aimed at younger students wanting to read literature better, so why the need to put this section in? Dickens knew that he was writing for families who read his novels at the dinner table so why in the first place put sexual meanings in? The Hayes Code was made for a reason, not just something to work around and find a different way to have sex scenes.
Foster said that it's hard for writers to write and come up with sexual inuendos, so why do it? It just seems like some people have sick minds. It apparently wasn't hard for Joseph Heller to write about sex in "Catch-22." Heller was constantly talking about whores and virgins and to me it wasn't a fun time reading through those parts.
The chapter "If She Comes Up, It's Baptism," is confusing. Foster says if you almost die but live, you're reborn again. Or at least that's what I got out of it. An example is in "Ordinary People," where Paul almost dies and it ends up changing his life because of his experience. I guess I could relate to some point; when something so tragic happens it changes your life no matter how hard you try to fight. So many aspects of Christianity have already come up in the book and how big of a role it plays in our literature despite the world changing. After reading this chapter I realized how many meanings drowning can take on that I never knew. You expect that when someone drowns they die, but oh no, it's mean so many other things like failure, guilt, or maybe just some action.
I really enjoyed the chapter on geography. It was probably the first thing in this book that I know I can handle without too much practice. I mean in most books it's pretty obvious where a story takes place and during what time period the story is going on. I was really happy when he brought up the geography in Huck Finn. I thought that was a very good example of how where the story takes place affects the characters. I'm kind of glad he mentions this because the idea of whether they where in the slave south or the free north was always in jeopardy. It affected how the characters interacted and on their trip downriver. Another book that I thought geography had a huge impact is the Scarlet Letter. If that story hadn't taken place in Massachusetts the story could have been a lot different. Hester had to face a Puritain town that was deeply religous. If her situation had occured farther south she may not have faced such persecution.
I also enjoyed the chapter about seasons. I agree with Foster that seasons set the tone for the story. For example, the seasons play an important role in My Antonia. Summer in this story is a time of happiness in which food is plentiful and there is work to be done. Winter is more gloomy and is hard for the characters to survive the cold and isolation that the winter gives. Mr. Shimerda died during winter because of all of the sadness that winter provided him along with his sadness for his homecountry.
Okay I'm super happy that everyone made the connection in chapter twenty-one to Harry Potter. That is the most obvious connection for anyone who's ever read any of the Harry Potter books or even seen the movies.It's the obvious example of how his scar demonstrates how great he would be in the future and that he was meant to defeat Voldemort.
I really liked what Quinn had to say about the chapter on blindness. I have to agree completely that the Chosen is one of the better examples for showing blindness in literature. Not only is this because we just read it last year so it is fresh in our minds but also because the number of times blindness is seen is numerous. When Reuven gets hit in the eye with a baseball he sees the world differently and eventually comes to accept that there are others in the world different from him but are still good people. As he grows up Reuven's eyes also get worse and he needs to get glasses. This is the perfect example of seeing things clearer and in a new perspective.
I liked the chapter on illness and how it affects other characters in the story because I thought of Ethan Frome. His wife is always sick and they have to have her niece come and stay with them to take care of the house. Her illness allows Ethan to think about cheating on his wife with her. His wife's illness allows him to look for love from another individual and changes the entire aspect of the book.
I didn't particularly like the chapter don't read with your eyes. I found it too general with its ideas on reading literature. I however do think it would be a good idea to work on focusing on the story more than reading just to read.I usually find it hard to relate to a lot stories because they lack things that I'm interested in or don't fit in a time period I'm totally familiar with. For example I tried reading A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court by Mark Twain a few years ago and found it horrible. I found it so hard to understand because I found it extremely hard to relate to.
The long awaited chapter on irony. I think a lot of people were probably anxious to get to this chapter because Foster references irony throughout the entire book. With the explaination of A Farewell To Arms, Foster said that Hemmingway rewrote the last page twenty-six times. I think that just goes to show how difficult it can be to write ironic scenes. Also, if an author puts that much work into one page, isn't it the least we can do to recognize the irony he/she's written?
I was really thankful that Foster put the test case in. It showed me really how much I had learned in the book. Though I didn't get the Greek reference, I did catch some of the other things, like the obvious class distinctions. I also caught part (not all though) of the references to birds and flying. I saw Laura's trip to the Scott home as a quest, but Foster didn't mention anything about that in his explaination. Maybe I was completely wrong, maybe not, but either way I learned a great deal from How to Read Literature Like a Professor.
I was really happy to finally get to chapter twenty-six. Irony is something that Foster harped on throughout the entire book. I was glad to get to that chapter so that he could finally explain irony better. I liked it when Foster said that "every chapter in this book goes out the window when irony comes in the door" (244). I thought this summed up what he said throughout the entire chapter. However it did make it a little confusing because he stated that sometimes it can be hard to spot the irony in some situations. I agree with Kate when she said that she hopes to be able to recognize the irony in situations when it comes up.
I was really happy that Foster put in the test case. It finally allowed me to test what I've learned this entire book. I really feel as though I was able to pick up on a lot of things that he was trying to get across. I picked up on the obvious distinction between social classes. I only picked up on some of the references to flight however I feel as though with more practice I will be able to fully understand a lot more. I am really happy that we had to read this book because I think it will definitely make me a better reader.
Throughout the book I've been attempting to correlate the various lectures to my own prior experiences in reading. At first I was skeptical, and highly critical, as always with any school assigned book. What sets this one apart is that I've learned to look at all these books I've read in the past, and finally realize that no, reading them was never the epic waste of time that it seemed to me. When Foster initially talked of symbols, "Is that a symbol? Sure why not." (97) I felt obligated to come up with questions pertaining to the subject. I came up with things from Catch-22 (I'd read it a year ago) such as Yossarian's crawlspace to safety and the dead man in his tent. So the crawlspace was obvious for me, being his lifeline in the event of being hit. Move on to the next one? No, Foster says there's more, so I looked twice. Rather than a symbol, I realized the crawlspace was a staging ground for other symbols. Aarfy (who always blocks the passageway) represents those who will get him killed, while the plane itself is the thing that will almost certainly kill him, not the anti-air or the ground rushing up to meet him. As Foster said, the symbol in this case has way more than a single meaning. The dead man in Yossarian's tent was another matter, I couldn't figure it out, but Foster said it was a symbol. I though about it and could only come with one possible meaning. He is what Yossarian might become. So is that allegory then? Yossarian says it himself what it means, but a symbol is rarely so clearly mentioned in my experience. Even so I felt enlightened because of the chapter, and found the reading much easier if I took it slow and though of examples I can relate it to.
Likewise with Kate, I had not seen just ordinary water as to be baptizing. But now it’s quite simple to look back on books that I have read and see how noticeable authors use water to symbolize the baptism of a character. Of course I understand that you can't immediately assume that just because there is a rainstorm, the protagonist is washed of his sins. I really found that reading all of these chapters about recognizing symbols and reading the stories underneath the story to be helpful with Catch-22 and My Antonia.
When asked the question in Chapter 19 about what’s the first thing you think of when told you are going on a vacation, I did not think of where first. My first impulse when asked that is when. It is just something that I’m different with I guess. However, that’s not to say that I don’t agree with Foster that the setting is crucial to stories. Obviously you can't have a story that focuses heavily on snow and winter take place in Florida. Unless of course you are trying to be ironic, then it seems that no rules apply to you.
Irony is something I have trouble recognizing and I don’t know why. I can see the obvious ones like being in an ocean and not having any water to drink, but I have trouble finding the subtle irony. It may be just because it’s subtle, but I hope to improve on that skill at least this year.
The chapter about geography was obviously coming at some point in the book- I mean what book about literature doesn’t touch upon one of the most important aspects. To me, the setting gives the book character and depth through the attitude and history of the small town or big city. What I am wondering is how the writer of a piece of literature picks a setting for their piece? There are so many options and creativeness waiting to be unfolded, so how does one pick the right place? When I thought of geography, and tying in with the season chapter, I thought of “My Antonia.” The beautiful landscapes with the red grass within the Nebraskan borders were perfect- I could picture it in my head. I never thought that when a character goes falls down a hill like Jack or goes skiing up into the mountains, it means something more than just the original plan.
When I thought about the seasons and what summer means I came up with a great example of it in reality. Foster says that summer means passion and love, which is probably the reason why many shows or movies focus around summer flings. Everything is great, school’s out, time for some fun and one ends up finding someone to spend it with. But in the fall, dun dun dun, people go their separate ways if it’s either off to school far away, or back home after a long vacation. Authors are never straightforward about why they chose to start their story out in summer, but you just have to read through until the end and then it’ll make sense.
I thought it was interesting that back when Richard III’s character was made, everyone believed that everyone was marked because of their distance from God, like his scoliosis. Just because he wasn’t a disciple of God, he had to have scoliosis for the rest of his life-I believe God isn’t like that. One reference that everyone can relate to is Harry Potter’s scar. The meaning behind his scar is probably more obvious since there’s been, what four movies out now of his story. Others aren’t so straightforward because we only see one point of view, one story behind their mark. To me, marks or physical challenges give people stories and special qualities despite their shortcomings.
The chapter “He’s Blind For A Reason, You Know,” made it clear that every character who is special like being blind, having a disability, or being terminally ill is “special” as in having something extra cool about them. The play “Oedipus Rex” seemed like a strange thing to write about; the boy murders his father and then marries his mother? That reminds me of Freud. One thing I do need to learn is what Foster calls “literary blindness”- how phrases and sentences correlate to a character’s blindness. I don’t really catch on that quickly to get it right away. Authors do make these things difficult to decode but for them I assume it’s even more difficult to write and organize.
This chapter did remind me of that special book called “The Chosen.” Reuven always had a bit of vision problem, and then Danny throughout the years gets weary eyes. They’re both not wearing glasses just because they can’t read the board while at school but because Reuven's life changers after getting hit by the a baseball and was kind of reborn and saw things in a different perspective after. Now Danny, is kind of blind to certain things like why his father doesn’t want him to read Freud or why he insists he becomes the next Rabbi.
When I thought of heart disease, what came to mind first was the condition of someone having a “hole in their heart.” It’s both literal and figurative to me. The person could actually have a hole in their heart, or it could mean something deeper, like being heartbroken or not having that special someone in their life. Another thing that came to mind was “The Scarlet Letter” and the character Dimmsdale. I don’t think I realized this or even thought about this when I was reading it the first time last year (maybe I did and don’t remember), but he has a heart condition. In other words, he cannot express his love for Hester publicly and he will always be shunned by God for loving someone like her. His heart is being torn in so many directions and it just isn’t holding up anymore. Poor guy.
The chapter about illness caught my attention because right before I read this I was watching re-runs of Grey’s Anatomy. Ironically at the part where Izzy (Patient X) discovers she has cancer of the brain. I don’t know what this means at the moment because I haven’t really analyzed it, but it must mean something more and I’ll have to find out in the next season. I thought it was kind of cruel that writers use diseases that are what they call “picturesque.” It’s a disease for goodness sake and people are suffering- who cares about being picturesque. Something that doesn’t give present and future writers much hope is that they aren’t allowed to use their imagination to the fullest for illnesses and diseases because research and science is so up to date that scientists have discovered almost everything. Like Foster said, an author can’t give their character a simple fever anymore and have them die because come on, this is the twenty first century and that rarely happens.
What I usually do IS read with MY eyes, because I try to enjoy the book to the fullest extent and just want to get to the end and see what happens. I don’t try to take on another characters view or ask myself a bunch of questions- I just want to read and that’s it! Although, what would be best is to take on that main characters life as if it were my own and get involved, feel what they feel. It’s kind of like all of our own life stories- no one truly understands and why would they unless they’ve walked a mile in our shoes. Sometimes it is hard to get involved with a character because some of the pieces of literature we read we written sooo long ago. An example is “The Scarlet Letter.” It’s hard to understand what it was really like for the Puritans and Hester and Pearl; that isn’t our way of living and hasn’t been for quite some time now. But then again, we don’t have to accept or even like the perspectives or views of the characters, but try to understand.
The question I constantly ask myself is…what’s so good about irony anyway. It gets a whole chapter devoted to it plus many paragraphs in other chapters. To me, it’s just another literary element like allegory or illusion. Maybe I don’t like it because yes, irony does trump me. I’m an over thinker and it’s just plain mean when authors do weird things that mean nothing, but I didn’t know that at that time! It is comforting to know that Hemingway had to re-write his last page twenty-six times before getting it right. So we readers aren’t the only one’s doubting ourselves and having to re-read a section a few extra times. The harder I struggle to figure out a symbol, the harder the author had to struggle to make it a good one.
It was nice to have a test case at the end of the book to test out what I had learned. The whole time reading it I was like, “what’s that mean?, Did he really just do that?” Foster doesn’t just throw a bunch of words and terms at the reader and expect them to take it all in and be a whiz. He lets us think about it and give it a little try when all is said and done. Foster just isn’t telling us, he’s letting us do and that’s a great teacher…and author.
"...Or the Bible", if this didn't scream "ALLUSIONS" to me, I don't know what would. To say the least, this chapter amazes and amuses me. Yes, I know many a writer has snatched a verse or moral from the bible, but the diversity in which one could do so is almost vexing. I would not have appreciated the allusion at the end of "Sonny's Blues", even though I have a fair amount of biblical exposure. Of the many possibilities that come from allusions, naming and irony seem to be the most profound for me. However, I will never look at a Matt, Mark, Luke, John, or Peter without trying to find some biblical parallels. Strangely enough, irony seems to be one of the stronger ways to allude, using a "holy" or "biblical" idea to show the very contrast, is amazing, and that much more satisfying if one can spot it. As for Foster's comment on "the tensions and difficulties that exist always and everywhere between brothers never growing old, I feel he could not be more correct as there are, and most likely will be many more works of literature and theater incorporating this plot (56).
Hanseldee and Gretledum, an obvious butchering of Alice In Wonderland's Tweedledee and Tweedledum, and the famous story of a little boy and girl who get lost in a forest to find a witch that would like them for a snack. The butchering, or simple mismatching of the names served to yet again back Foster's idea of al literature stemming from other literature. Truthfully, I have caught many allusions in books before, but I fell that I may have missed the emotional connections behind them. Almost as if I saw an old friend at a distance, but never went to catch up with them, and thus far, missing out on an entire plane of familiarity with the work. The question of "why" that Foster brings up is like a little mental prod. "Oh! They alluded to the bible here!" Great, but why would they do that, what meaning or depth is added by doing so? It seems this little question will have many very long answers.
Myth, an interesting way of looking at a story that matters. The way of describing ourselves when maths, sciences, and reason cannot. Ironic how we (as a people and/or society) have learned so much about the work and how things work, but still lack a moral fiber without these myths. Ah, Icarus, I was hoping to find him here, the youth who could not follow instructions, and plunged to his certain doom. Foster makes an interesting point how his literal fall can very easily represent many personal "falls" we have in life, often times caused by the neglect of adult advice during adolescence. Maybe I'm ignorant, but it seems that Greek mythology did not place wisdom in the minds of young ones, as most seem to be foolish adolescents, and very very few knowledgeable ones. I cannot help but chuckle after seeing the epic of the Iliad put into the simple terms of "a man who goes berserk because his stolen war bride is confiscated, acted out against a background of wholesale slaughter, the whole of which is taking place because" of another man losing his wife to Paris (who just happens to be the half brother of Hector)(71). To see so much bloodshed over a lost love, I'm amazed it is not cliched yet. Though, I believe the struggle for the other sex, is often more sexual than the sex itself...so it seems.
It's more than just rain or snow, because every other thing hasn't been more than it seems, right? Sarcasm aside, the fact that we as land beings have a constant fear of drowning is a very good point,and honestly, one I had neglected. But, back to rain, as Foster points out is has several affects on characters; discomfort, atmosphere, and of course, there is nothing more miserable than a soaked, freezing character, well, minus those in torture, dying, etc. A cleansing rain is no new idea for me, as a character (as Foster states) can be physically or personally cleansed by rain, though it may lead to death...ironic how pneumonia strikes. Mud, dirty, annoying, and troublesome, has been up to no good with our travels since moving became useful. Wagon wheels stuck in mud, shoes, tires, no matter the case or type of transportation, a wonderful nuisance it makes. The point of a character falling in or being covered by mud adding to a stain on their personality, I did not think of, call me shallow, but for a long while I assumed the mud was just a physical, not personifying a moral or personal filth. Restorative rain, personally I found this a tad obvious as rain is a transporter for the life giving substance of Earth. Admittedly, I don't believe I caught the irony of a death during a Spring rain, sad. Just another reason to reread books, nobody gets everything the first time, especially not after reading this book.
Does he mean that? A good question, though, the simple answer is yes, can anyone truly be certain that an author intended to apply every single possible allusion, no. Though, the point of how long it takes to write novels, and all the lateral thinking involved with each diminutive part of each book we read. Something else we as readers could take from this chapter would be yet another way to make our papers that much better by trying to incorporate some of these aspects.
Violence, I had never really thought of it as an intimate act, but a personal one as there is nothing more personal than a murder caused by a lost lover or family member. The comment about how any act of literary violence could also be a metaphor or any other literary device makes an interesting point of view for any future scenes of violence. The idea of nature being cold, silent, and merciless towards humanity has been used many times, one in particular would be Hatchet. Many know the story, Brian is traveling to his father's house in Canada, the plane crashes, and he has nothing but his hatchet and will to survive. His encounter with nature follows the pattern stated above as it offers no easy path to survival. A perspective I had never really thought about are the different degrees of violence, the "simple" violence, anything that does not further the story, and then what Foster likes to call "Authorial Violence", an act that pushes the story onward in some shape or form. The depth at which some authors use violence is a tad astounding, using a death or act of violence to represent class struggle or even fulfill a story that was only alluded at reminds me how little I have read in my lifetime, and how much more I feel I must to be able to recognize these allusions much more easily.
When I read “More Than it’s gonna hurt you: Concerning Violence” I was reminded of dozens of books I’ve read. I thought of Kindred, with the violence towards the slaves, and I thought of the many Shakespeare plays, like Romeo and Juliet, that contain violence. When Foster started talking about how violence can be symbolical, I was thought of the book Water For Elephants by Sara Gruen. There’s actually quite a bit of (mild) violence in this book, but the one scene that really stood out to me is where Rosie, the elephant, gets a brutal beating from August, and the menagerie men find her lying on the floor with her foot still chained to a stake. The violence in this scene is symbolic of the relationships between August, Marlena, and Jacob.
I really enjoyed the “Is that A Symbol” chapter, because I really love symbols in books. I like how anything can be symbolic, like actions and people and images, and not just certain objects. When Foster states that symbols have no one definite meaning it resonated with me because I remember teachers asking about symbols, and me struggling to find out exactly the one meaning they held, but I now realize that that’s not how it works. I also really like when Foster said that symbols vary depending on “how the individual reader engages the text. Ever reader’s experience of every work is unique, largely because each person will emphasize various elements to differing degrees”(103). I like this because it taught me that each person might see a symbol represent something different than someone else because of the way they engage the text and the way it relates back to them.
The “It’s All Politcal” chapter was really interesting to me because up until now I didn’t think I liked political writing at all. That wasn’t the case, however, when I learned that A Christmas Carol and many of Edgar Allan Poe’s novels are political, because I really enjoy both. I suppose I can say that I don’t like the political novels of this time period because of the things they deal with that make them political. I do like political works from other time periods because I don’t mind reading about the things they engage in that make them “political.”
The interlude to the chapters provided some good insight as to how to write novels I thought. You really have to make sure that you write what you want to write and not have others influencing you. I can see a very marked change in my styles of writing when I have strict instructions to follow or I am writing on a whim just for fun. Not just the topics are different, but my word choice, and structure fluctuate greatly.
Reading Chapter 21 helped me to gain a lot of insight as to the impact that physical problems lead to the development of a plot and character. For example, in the book I read for our semester novel project at the end of the year the main character and a large wound in her leg. She had been attacked by a cave lion and and barely managed to survive. However, she was left with the reminder of the attack and it lead to many controversial events in the book. Another character in the book was born deformed and further mutilated by a cave bear. He had just one eye and arm and walked with a very noticeable limp. While he was made fun of as a child, when he grew up he was able to use his deformed body to help create the illusions of his magical power. He was appointed The Mogur of the tribe which is the lead magician essentially. So I understand how much a physical deformity or whatever can affect the way a book flows.
Symbols, something I have a feeling every language teacher above the eighth grade has harped on at one point and time. The first thing that caught my eye is an interesting difference between a symbol, and an allegory. As we now know, an allegory stands for one thing, while symbol is multiple, and subject to perspective. I'm glad this was finally cleared up because for the longest time I had been given the definition of essentially, something that represents something it is not. Very vague, glad to finally clear it up. Foster makes a decently humorous note about readers and symbols, we all just want to make them one thing, simple, clear cut, and dry, but as Foster points out, this would completely kill the ambiguity of symbolism. Something I have come to like about symbols, the mass amount of interpretations you can achieve by merely taking on a different perspective. Or in other words, I love the fact that symbols can have near infinite meanings, a stretch to the imagination.
Politics in A Christmas Carol, that is something I honestly had not thought of, I noticed the class system, but I did not have the background knowledge of Malthusian thinking to connect to. Foster makes another strong point about the different kinds of political writings, I had recently thought of political writings as the pushy, dull, dry, boring, etc (with the exception of A Tale of Two Cities). I hadn't originally thought of many other writings as political, though it seems if connected to the culture and lifestyle of the writer. Poe's works have recently caught my interest after reading the Masque of the Red Death, and The Pendulum. The masque, as Foster points out, is fairly blatant in his criticism of the English class system. Rip Van Winkle, I actually remember hearing this explanation given before, but I honestly don't think that I fully understood how it all connected.Looking aback it seems obvious, but I probably did not have the historical knowledge off the top of my head. An interesting perspective, to try and see a political side of every story. I can only wonder what sort of mild epiphanies I will find.
She's a Christ figure too gave me a bit of confusion at first glance. Two things stuck me as odd, the, and too. She obviously implies female, I was more so thinking of the Jesus Christ many know, which also implies singularity. The Christian society comment of Foster's almost made me chuckle for a moment, until I looked at it from his perspective of which religion shaped America's history the most, then I'm forced to agree. Foster's Christ Figure Checklist is very useful, even with a decent biblical background, as far as finding Christ figures, the only reason I can see for finding them would be to stretch the imagination or create yet another plane of perception or greater meaning to a character's actions.
Foster mentioned how Oedipus constantly references sight in his speeches and that the audience knows something that he doesn’t, I immediately thought of Romeo and Juliet. Both of these stories have a great deal of dramatic irony in which the audience knows something that the character doesn’t. I.e. Oedipus not realizing it was he who committed the crimes and how Romeo doesn’t know that Juliet really is still alive. I think that its important that sometimes the audience knows more than the characters do at times, otherwise some stories aren’t any fun. It seems to me like it is almost a sort of God complex. When you as the reader know what's going on and the main character doesn’t, you could get a sense of empowerment. I don’t know exactly of course, but that’s just my opinion at least.
Brent, you say that now that you are able to understand symbols that one thing you like about them is the infinite interpretations that they can have? That is one of the things that I like the least about symbols! I am fine with an author using something to symbolize something else, but only when he or she makes it obvious that it was on purpose and that he or she emphasizes what the goal was. When some college professors find a symbol 100 years after the book was written and uses their feelings to determine what it was intended to mean, that bothers me. I would love to be able to talk with some of the famous authors of long ago and ask them about all of the symbols we have found in their works, and actually find out how many of them they meant to include when they were writing the story.
I enjoyed reading the chapter on Christ Figures a lot and most of what I read wasn’t new information. I liked that Foster gave a list of the features of Christ because most of them I knew were overtly recognizable christ-like features, but some of them I wouldn’t have recognized in a character and thought of it being christ-like. This chapter reminded me of a book I just read recently by Jodi Picoult called A Change of Heart. One of the main characters is extremely christ-like in what seems to be an ironic way because he is in jail and is looked at as this evil murderer, and yet he displays many characteristics of Christ and some people even begin to wonder if he actually IS Jesus Christ. This man, Shay Bourne, is self-sacrificing, good with children, he is suspected of turning water into wine and using one piece of gum to feed a large amount of people (such as with the bread Christ used), he is employed at the beginning as a carpenter, he presumably healed things and brought a dead bird back to life, he is portrayed in one scene with his arms outstretched, he announced that he would return on the 3rd after his execution, and his story is one of redemption and grace. Now, if THAT is not a Christ-like figure, than I don’t know what is.
“Flights of Fancy” was kind of boring. It was all stuff I basically already knew about the symbolism of flight, how it means freedom, spirituality, escape, and all these things. However, I never recognized that flight was the temptation of Christ, or that interrupted flight is generally a bad thing (except in the case of Icarus it was quite obvious when he fell to his death that that case of interrupted flight was a bad thing). I also was aware before I read this section that things such as birds or images of flying rather than the characters literally flying themselves can also be used to portray the same symbolic meanings, but it was nice to have that fact reinforced.
It never occurred to me how many sex symbols in literature come from Freud, but after taking Psych last year and learning all about Freud and his wacky ideas, it does make more sense to me and I recognize it more often. These two sections about sex were extremely interesting in that I learned that virtually anything can represent sex or sexuality, whereas the act of sex itself has nothing to do with sex but instead it can symbolize a large variety of different things such as submission, rebellion. Domination, etc.
I really loved the whole idea of “If She Comes up, It’s Baptism” a lot. While reading this chapter I realized that everything he said made perfect sense, but none of it would have occurred to me before. I thought it was interesting to learn that the way a character falls into the water can have symbolic meaning as well. It was also interesting to learn how many different things can mean rebirthing, like a character coming up out of the water, traveling on water to a new place, and even being rained on. I absolutely love the quote that Foster uses by Heraclitus that states “one cannot step into the same river twice.” It was a great quote for this chapter and also a great quote just in general because it really sums up how everything in life is constantly changing during every second of every day and it never stops.
“Geography Matters” was also a fairly interesting chapter. This chapter reminded me of My Antonia because the novel is rich with description of the setting and the geography plays a large role in the story. I agree with Foster’s statement that “geography can also define or even develop characters” (167) because it’s true from what I’ve seen in various works of literature I’ve read in the past. Foster’s statements on authors sending characters south to run amok, and about the different symbolism in low versus high places, were really interesting to me and something that I would never have picked up on before reading this book.
“…So Does Season” was a really good chapter, I thought, and when I first started reading it I made a quick mental list of what I think of when I think of each season, in terms of symbolism, and my list was fairly close to Foster’s list. I love the idea that each season has come to represent different things, and that the representations, for the most part, are fairly universal. This chapter, like the chapter that talked about weather, reminded me a lot of Ethan Frome because the story is set in the winter time and in the novel that had a lot of negative connotations.
Flight, the one thing that almost every culture has dreamed of at one time or another. The Greeks had Icarus, the Aztecs their flying snake god, Quetzalcoatl, and the African flying myth. Foster makes it plain and simple, flying is freedom, even when its imprisonment. The imprisonment was referring to Carter's Fevvers, a woman with wings who is incarcerated and put on display, but allowed to break female stereotypes because of her wings. Irony and social criticism, again. Foster seems to love his irony, which is rather annoying because it's the second or third to last chapter, anyway, back to flight. The man with wings, an interesting parallel was used because he was not as he seemed, welcome to literature, when he flew he resembled a vulture, not an angel. Foster uses this to parallel to how Jesus Christ was not acknowledged as his true position because he was not the form some expected him to come in. Anyway, I found that a very fitting parallel, or even if it was obviously fitting, I liked it.
Its all about sex, of course, what part of life ISN'T based upon some sexual tendency, even very mildly. I love that line "Blame it on Freud", after psychology, I DO blame Freud. Wow, I never thought of the Holy Grail as sexual, honestly, just of the cup of Christ, I really need to think a bit deeper into these things. The keys and the bowl, an interesting sex symbol, though, not very hidden if viewed in the right light. Sex in not sex scenes, what a concept, but not thoroughly surprising. Something Foster mentioned about "coded sex" appealed to me, not because it was sex, but because it was humorous how the man and wife could get a chuckle, and the children could remain innocent. Such a shame that style has died of in newer media.
Except sex, I had to see this coming, but he chose an interesting opening line "Have you ever tried to write a sex scene?". No, nor do I care to, usually they do very little to further the story and bore me in the meantime. It seems blatantly obvious to me that sex is almost always a symbol for something else. Which reminds me, Matt, I'm odd like that, I like having the chance to stretch my imagination and see how many things I can tweak to fit for a symbol, sometimes it helps me understand things a little better, other times it may not. Either way, its fun for me, masochistic as it may sound.
If she come's up it's baptism, here I thought this to be just another zany chapter name, but seems to make sense after reading a bit more. So essentially every time a character avoids death by drowning has been reborn, even if not literally, but mentally because of the change in his mental state. Note to self, look for water, water equals death, or rebirth, at least, for the most part. Yet again I run into the problem of not having constants.
Geography seems to be almost deeper rooted to Foster than ironies, almost. So far geography seems to be almost like the puppeteer of literature, making or influencing the different elements of characters' lives and nature, just to further the plot or make a point. So, if writers send characters south to cause trouble, does that explain why spring break college students go to Florida or Mexico? Anyway, up and down, and interesting view of them. Yes, I can easily associate down with slums, people, and unpleasantness. Though, I had not really thought about heights as much more than a challenge, a goal, or maybe an occasional epiphany after a character "climbs" through their ordeal.
Seasons, so far this is an odd chapter, anyone can tell you if a novel has a bleak winter day as a setting, it probably isn't going to have anything humorous or lively in it, unless the author likes irony. Also Foster mentions how the seasons can be used for character description, and basis for character interactions.
One story, as we've heard before there's only one story, and no matter how it may grow, there will only be one, ever. Yet more embellishment on the single fact that there is no such thing as a purely original work. Finally, a definition for archetype, pattern. Something that had been bothering me for a bit now, mostly caused by my laziness and not looking it up in a dictionary. An interesting point of view is placed in our heads for consideration at the end of this novel, stories are just plucked out of the air, and how you do so depicts the story in some way. I could agree, or disagree, inspiration has often been personified as a wisp or something equally as elusive.
When I just read the TITLE “Marked For Greatness” I was immediately reminded of Harry Potter, as lame as that might sounds, because with his scar and the whole storyline, he was definitely marked for greatness. Needless to say, when Foster mentions Harry Potter for a brief moment of time I was quite pleased. It was interesting to learn that landmarks as well as people can be marked, thus giving them more of a deeper and symbolic meaning. This chapter made me think of the book The Birthmark by Nathaniel Hawthorne, which is a good representation of society’s obsession with perfection. Hawthorne also uses the death of Georgiana to show that perfection is not attainable until death, and therefore not actually reachable at all.
“He’s blind for a reason you know” made me think of what everyone else probably thought of which was The Chosen by Chaim Potok. Foster summed up the book fairly well when he said “clearly the author wants to emphasize other levels of sight and blindness beyond the physical”(202). Danny’s temporary blindness allowed him to see the world in a different way and look beyond superficial appearances, and the things that he was blind to before the accident. There was also irony in that Danny, who could see, was blind to many of the things around him that mattered most, whereas Billy, who had been blinded in a car accident, could see past what Danny focused on through to what really mattered.
I liked the chapter “It’s Never Just Heart Disease” because I was reminded of quite a few different novels, and reading this chapter allowed me to analyze them deeper. The Scarlet Letter, by Nathaniel Hawthorne, is a really good example for this chapter. Dimmesdale develops a heart condition stemming from the sin he’s committed, but that heart condition represents other things such as disloyalty, sin, guilty, etc. Another example is from a book I mentioned earlier called Change of Heart, in which a young girl has heart problems and needs a transplant. Even though this girl, Claire, is the one who has the heart problem, it’s her mothers issues that the heart condition is used to symbolize. The mother must wrestle with her issues of the heart if she wants to save her daughter’s heart, and by extension, her life.
In "Marked for Greatness" Foster points out how physical features are used to tell us something about characters, Shakespeare's Richard III, for example. Richard III was not truly a hunchback as Quasimodo was, but his morals were twisted enough that his back bore the consequences. Foster points out that scars or deformities are placed upon characters of importance.
"He's Blind for a Reason..." has the clear intent of bringing the importance of blind characters to a heightened state of importance. Foster makes a point of how bringing a blind character into the plot almost does more harm than good for the author, as they now have to write around the character's blindness, but the physical blindness is often used to show different levels of sight besides the physical. Literary blindness, odd, but understandable, not using the adjective as an adjective, but almost as foreshadowing for many different parts of the work.
"It's Never Just Heart Disease..." speaks more how the author can use heart disease to represent different situations such as: bad love, loneliness, cruelty, etc. Authors have used the heart as the center of all emotion many times, and any afflictions to it may represent a straying from morality or humanity. Heart trouble, or emotional relationship trouble like to go hand in hand, never again will I be surprised when a heartbroken character dies of heart failure.
"...And Rarely Just Illness" brings up some interesting points, even a set of principles about disease I find mildly fascinating, the way authors must choose their disease to fit their victims. The disease has to be perfect, picturesque, mysterious, and symbolic (as Foster states). I can barely imagine the amount of lateral thought put into each such death. An interesting aspect for me was how authors use plagues without the focus on the human loss, but of loss of communal and philosophical possibilities.AIDS, TB, and fever, three things I never thought would have much more in common than an illness/cause of death. These three culprits are responsible for countless deaths, drama, and of course plot conflicts. What better way to get rid of a character?
"Don't Read with Your Eyes" makes a point I've been waiting for quite a while to encounter, never just take things for what they seem. As we know, one must take a different perspective than your own, one with the characters' backgrounds, not your own. Perfect, the term I've been searching that embodies the careful and skeptical analysis of a work, deconstruction. An interesting point with the idea of taking on others eyes, that we do not have to take on their morals and ideals, such an example would be The Iliad.
Irony, well, the chapter on it, we've been almost drowning on it in the meantime. Irony is the trump card of literature, whether it be the mother dying during birth, a death while creating life. Something interesting, more correctly, a different but uncannily accurate definition. Irony is a deflection from expectation.
"A Test Case" is just that, a mild assessment of how well the skills we gained or at the least exercised while reading this book. Foster seems to leave us some advice with his parting pages, deal with the obvious and not so obvious first, as the easiest way to fail a reading, is to stray from the facts of the work. All I can say about Foster's interpretation of the story is wow, not that it is incomprehensible, but how it is, just requiring yet another light, but we have no blindness here, except our own (to all that apply).
As soon as I read the title to Chapter 25 “Don’t Read with Your Eyes”, I was instantly confused. How else is one supposed to read a book? However, I understood later that the emphasis was not on the eyes but rather “your” was the key word in that phrase. That bit of advice is very helpful when reading books written a long time ago. For example, I read Catcher in the Rye this summer just for fun and it’s a book that takes place just after the end of WWII and was written in 1951. The language that was used was very different than what we use nowadays. I was constantly using my phone to figure out archaic definitions of words to help me just understand what Salinger was trying to say. However, the more I read into the story, the easier it became to understand what the times where like back then and how circumstances would be different had they happened last year as supposed to 50+ years ago.
I understand what Foster means when he says that “irony trumps everything”, my biggest question though, is recognizing when the author is intending for it to be ironic. His last sentence of the chapter is to listen for the irony. How?! Irony, along with symbolism, is definitely the most challenging literature device for me to understand when it is being used, and how to use it in my own works.
I believe that every author attempts to make his or her work of literature realistic enough to allow the reader to connect with characters, events, and other elements of literature so that it becomes more meaningful to the reader. That’s why I believe Foster’s chapter titled “Don’t Read with Your Eyes” was a very important one. It tells the reader to not just take things for what they are worth, and instead to try and fully understand the situation that the characters are in, and to try and find the importance and significance of the events and time periods. What Foster is really trying to say is that a reader should put themselves into the characters’ shoes and to try and understand a
situation from their vantage point.
I think that it is extremely advantageous for the reader to put themselves in a situation where they can feel like they are the character and feel like they are inside of the character’s shoes. It makes the reading much more interesting and meaningful. In the chapter, Foster talks about taking everything into account when reading. By this, he means a reader should “find a reading perspective that allows for sympathy with the historical moment of the story, that understands the text as having been written against its own social, historical, cultural, and personal background” (Foster 228-229). I liked Foster’s examples early in the chapter, especially one that dealt with a special meal in the past in Dublin, Ireland. The meal might not mean so much to people today, but when a reader puts themselves into the shoes of one of those characters, they see just how special the meal really is. The aunts in the story have provided an expensive meal, as Foster notes, with celery that is out of season and fruit, coming from America, which is very expensive. The meal also takes place on Epiphany, Foster again notes, the day in which the Christ child was revealed to the wise men. Fully understanding the situation and putting one’s self into the situation puts more meaning into it than just reading it for what it’s worth.
This chapter taught me to fully appreciate literature and understand each situation that the characters find themselves in.
I thought that the two chapters on sex were quite hilarious! First of all, in "It's all about sex" I thought it was funny that somebody would want to stretch all of these hidden symbols to mean those kinds of things. I understood that sexual talk in literature was not acceptable in older times, but people found ways to include it anyways. How readers could catch all those stretched symbols is beyond me. While reading My Antonia, I noticed that when I had a hunch that something sexual may be implied, the writing was very vaugue or not really sexual at all. In Jim's teenage years nothing having to do with him and his sexuality is ever really mentioned, besides the dream that he has about Lena. He describes, "She sat down beside me, turned to me with a soft sigh and said, 'Now they are all gone, and I can kiss you as much as I like.'" (Cather 179) While I'm guessing this is meant to be a version of some sort of sexual fantasy (and Spark Notes says so also), it is very mildly written. Without reading the "It's all about sex" chapter, I wouldn't have thought anything really about Jim's dream of Lena.
I was surprised at how much I got out of My Antonia after reading How to Read Literature Like a Professor. For example, The chapter "Geography Matters" really forced me to pay attention to the different places and landscapes that the book takes place in. Jim Burden moves from Virginia to Black Hawk Nebraska in his early childhood, and then from the countryside to the town of Black Hawk in his teens. As an adult he makes a living in New York City. A few very different geographic locations, all of which affected Jim's character greatly. He makes a strong connection to the Nebraska farming landscape, as it is vividly described in the book. It affects his emoitions, and he ties many childhood memories to specific landmarks and places. Like Jim, Antonia associates herself with her physical surroundings even more. In the end of the book she explains that she couldn't live anywhere else but the Nebraska farm, the place which she is most familiar with and cut out for. She tells Jim, "I like to be where I know every stack and tree, and where the ground is friendly." (Cather 250)To Antonia, her happiness is all about the geography.
To these characters, Geography symbolizes their link to their childhood joy, and memories of happiness. Like Foster says, "Never perhaps have landscape.. Merged as neatly with mood and tone to set a story in motion." (166) In the story My Antonia, the mood of the story constantly revolves around the geography and the affect that it has on the characters.
Thomas Foster's book, How to Read Literature Like a Professor has traveled with me all summer, sitting on my bedside table waiting to be read. I too, like Chelsey and Quinn, believed this book would be quite the bore. I put off reading the book through my travels and instead read Harry Potter, which is far more interesting. When I finally started reading Foster's book I realized it wasn't so bad. Foster's fun way of writing kept the tone light. He talked about how professors read literaure by finding parallels to other works and by analyzing patterns that details reveal; this is something I really should work on. As I am writing this blog, I am trying to recall previous works I have read to make connections with the topics I will address from Foster's book. By connecting previous books I have read with an other book, I will be able to figure out the author's point of a certain character or the plot.
Understanding the chapter about the quests was quite easy, now, finding it in a story might be a little more difficult. By keeping the five aspects of a quest in mind, I should be able to find it easily. Foster's use of an example of a quest helped me understand what he meant.
When I hear the word communion I instantly think of a biblical reference not people eating or drinking together. Foster's method of describing acts of communion helped me understand that it does not always have to be holy. Communion takes place whenever people eat or drink together.
Of course, when I read the chapter about vampires I instantly thought of the Cullens! (As did most people, I'm sure) But the Cullens were not the kind of vampires that Foster was trying to explain. Instead he explained how scary characters such as ghosts and vampires are used to symbolize sex or sexuality, not to scare people. Foster used the term social vampirism which is the exploitation of young, innocent women. When social vampirism is happening there doesn't have to be a vampire just someone who is acting in sinful, evil ways and selfishly exploiting women.
While reading Foster's book I took notes on each topic, so I can reference them when reading books. This way if I need to annotate and find out what in the world the author is talking about, my notes might come in handy. The notes I took on the sonnets could come in handy if I every come across a story that is fourteen lines long and written in iambic pentameter.
The chapter about Shakespeare made me realize that I should really read more Shakespeare. Foster wrote that writers can utilize Shakespeare's stories and struggle against him through their own characters.
It seems that a writer cannot write a book without a biblical reference in the work at least once. Most people can recognize a biblical reference, but Foster's small list of common relations to the bible definitely can help. Adding a biblical reference into a story can add more depth to the story.
Fairy tales can be used in a story as a reference to create irony. Most fairy tales are well known stories that are engraved into peoples' minds. Since readers know the stories well, writers can reference a fairy tale to get a point across that will make sense to readers.
Other myths such as Greek myths can be used in pretty much every story because the Greeks thought of something to explain everything! I was so proud of myself while reading Catch-22 after reading Foster's that I found a reference to Oedipus.
The chapter about rain and other weather was quite eye opening. I mean, think about it, when one is watching a movie the rain usually starts after someone is having a horrible day and BAM they have an idea that will make everything better. I remember in Great Expectations when Dickens is talking about the storms are brewing which foreshadowed that trouble was on its way. Different types or weather can be used to foreshadow or create different moods that the author wants to describe.
Writers can use their characters to represent their idea of a great leader. In the chapter, It's All Political, Foster describes how to understand the political point the author is trying to make one must understand the history of the time the author is writing. The author could use his book to rant about social classes, racial issues, and womens' rights, just to name a few.
The chapter about flight was easy for me to understand. Usually, flight symbolizes freedom, breaking from chains. Sometimes, as Foster mentioned, flight can be used as irony; someone is cagged because they can fly and therefore are not free. This chapter made me think of The Secret Life of Bees. Lily feels chained down by her father and wants to leave, this can be related to August's bees in the story; even though they aren't free they are given love so they don't want to fly away. Lily doesn't want to be free from August and June because she feels loved. Another reference about flying would be Voldemort in Harry Potter. He can fly and its a symbol of power. Each time he kills someone new he becomes less and less human. His flight symbolizes power gained by evil means. Ah, I love Harry Potter so be ready for me to reference it throughout the year.
The chapter about baptism was totally eye opening; I had never really thought of it that way. When someone comes back out of the water they usually are rejuvenated and have a new mindset about life.
Geography definitely matters, it gives insight about what the story will be about. I mean if Huck Finn and Jim went down the Hudson river instead of the Mississippi, we wouldn't have the issue of slavery and "going down river". Geography and setting of a story helps define the characters.
Scars and different physical deformities give characters a mark that seperates them from other characters. Rather it be a lightning bolt scar or a person with bright, fiery red hair (no I do not mean a Weasley). If a character has something that sets them apart, it ultimately means that they will do something extraordinary rather it be evil or good.
If someone has a disease, they have it for another reason other than getting sick. Heart disease could signify loneliness or love and liver disease could signify an alcoholic.
Foster made the point that to truly understand a piece of literature one most read through another person's perspective. The reader must read through a character' eyes or through someone else of the time period that the book is taking place. Reading How to Read Literature Like a Professor helped me understand how to read literature better. I will definitely reference this book throughout the year and later on whenever I find myself reading a book.
I agree with you natalie, about definetly referencing the book when reading other pieces of literature. I've already found myself doing this in "My Antonia" and "Catch-22." How To Read Literature Like A Professor is a great book that so many can learn from and it's easy to catch on quickly.
Connecting to Ella's last comment- I too realized so much more than I ever would have after reading "How To Read Literature Like A Professor" and then "My Antonia." I probably would have just passed all of the beautiful landscapes and geography by if I hadn't read Foster's book right before. "My Antonia" is the perfect example of the chapter "Geography Matters" because what other reason would a writer use Nebraska other than to emphasize it's isolation but also the swaying grass, wild animals like buffalo, and farm land.
When I first read the title of this book I was amused. How on Earth could I identify with an author who prided himself on writing an instruction manual for reading literature? It seemed impossible. However, as I began to read, I noticed that reading between the lines was not as difficult as it was made to seem. In accordance to our rubric I have questions, connection and comments. The first of which: In the "Introduction" why did the author chose to begin his novel with a discussion of bargains with the Devil? Is it perhaps because they "go back a long way in Western culture" (xii), or maybe it's a tiny bit of social commentary?
While reading the introduction I came upon the name Grendel. I had never heard this name before, but the description of its symbolic meaning piqued my interest. Foster wrote that he believed that Grendel represented "the hostility of the universe to human existence...and a darkness in human nature that only some higher aspect of ourselves...can conquer"(xvi). As I finished those few sentences my brain instantly made a connection to none other than Darth Veder; a classic, and widely known, allusion to "the dark side". At this point my "inner nerd" emerged and I began to meditate about how else Darth Veder and Grendel could be connected. That question will remain unanswered; however, I realized that Darth Veder represented all of humanity's constant struggle to find balance between right and wrong. In the movie, Veder gains his power from a pact with another dark lord. This then reminded me of Foster's first topic, Faustian bargains (deals with the Devil). The hero was given something he wanted in exchange for his soul.
Like so many of my other classmates I associated "Every Trip Is a Quest (Except When It's Not)" with the Harry Potter saga.
The novels contain:
1) a quester (Harry)
2)a place to go ( all over the wizard world... most notably Hogwarts)
3) a stated reason to go there (to find the sorcerer's stone, slay a basilisk, etc.)
4) challenges and trials en route (Lord Voldemort)
5) a real reason to go there (to find out how he is connected to Lord Voldemort...basically self discovery). As silly as it seems these connection to Harry Potter put the chapter into perspective for me and allowed me to put this knowledge to use in other novels and films.
In the middle of chapter two I stumbled upon a sentence that perplexed me. Foster wrote, "...the only reason to give a character a serious hang-up is to give him the chance to get over it" (10). Now that is something to think about. The point of this assignment was to make connection with other work of literature, but I've never been one to pass up a solid connection to a movie. The character's name is Rachel and she is the driving force behind the film "Georgia Rule". The entire premise of the movie is (and I can't stress this enough) how she overcomes her enormous laundry list of problems.
Like Allig8rr, Molly, and numerous others I quickly connected chapter three to the Twilight series. However, upon completion of the chapter I created a new link between vampires and some of the characters from Ethan Frome. I saw how Zena appeared to "suck the life" out of her husband and all who were near. She had little regard for others' wishes and her relationship with Ethan forced him to change his lifestyle. This then, along with a questionable relationship to his wife's cousin, led to Ethan's destruction.
Chapter five was perhaps one of my favorite chapters. It breached the familiar topic of "intertextuality". For as long as I can remember we have been encouraged to connected our previous knowledge to what we are currently learning. This propelled me to make yet another connection between fiction in film. The tale of Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" is widely known and commonly used. This is exactly the case in the film "Troy". The characters , Achilles and Briseis, are quite similar to Romeo and Juliet. However, when taken into chronological context, it would appear that Shakespeare borrowed this sticky situation for Homer.
Skip ahead a few chapters, to "It's More Than Just Rain or Snow" to be exact, and one will find the next topic that captured my interest. Within the pages of chapter 10 Foster stated, "the water has been trying to reclaim us" (75). This thought struck a chord within me. It brought to mind another novel called The Wanderer by Sharon Creech. Throughout the novel the main character, Sophie, constantly dreams of being drowned by a rouge wave. Her fear then becomes her obsession. The realistic storms force all of the crew members to get along below deck. The habitual rainstorms are used as a plot device and as a way to create atmosphere (portraying the characters' feeling of doubt, fear, and loneliness).
Before I read the book I took a look at the test story. I gave it a read through just to get a basis for how much just reading the book would help me out. I have to admit, when I read the story after reading the rest of the book I was much better at picking out important things. Granted, part of it may have been just the fact I had read the story already, but I thought I really had improved just from reading all of Foster’s tips. It was quite the interesting story and was a pretty good representation of the strains between classes; this story included the rich and the working. I was confused as to whether the story was an excerpt from a novel, or if it was a short story in itself. I think it was a short story, but I'm not entirely sure.
It was pretty depressing to look at the extremely intensive list of stories that he thought would give us a good basis for literature. I had only read ten of the listed, and only had heard of ten more. I usually had thought of myself as pretty well read, but I guess I read more novels that were recently written. Not the classics, but I'm sure that will change by the end of this year!
As Natalie and Lauren have already mentioned, I find myself constantly making references to this novel while reading the others. I find that I am constantly drawing connections to other novels I have read. I'll admit that this sort of thought process is distracting and it's difficult to get through the material without filling the entire thing with sticky notes.
Irony, I realize, totally just throws off everything we just learned about symbolism reading this book. After reading "Is He Serious? And Other Ironies" I know that one can know anything and everything about symbols that authors intend to portray, but can take them to a whole new meaning once irony comes into play. Foster describes irony as "taking our expectations and upending them, making them work against us." (238) That is exactly what it does; totally reverses and breaks rules of what any symbol is supposed to mean.
Foster’s example of Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms made a lot of sense to me, since I read that novel as my outside reading book last year! I didn’t even come close to catching all the ironic features, in the ending, or even in the title! Now that it is brought to my attention, a mother and baby ending up killing each other is one of the most ironic situations that can happen in literature, because the two are expected to live for each other (like Foster said).
Another ironic book that I’ve recently read is A Prayer for Owen Meany. The whole plot of the book is ironic in the sense of the character Owen Meany. He is a boy who nobody, including the teacher at his school and the priest at his church think can do much good in the world. He is small, physically weak, and because of his appearance he is rarely taken seriously. Owen’s faith in himself and God is what makes him a hero in the end, and an ironic one. No one expects him to be capable of much good, but he ends up saving a life and changing many lives in the process; doing more good than the average person accomplishes in a lifetime.
There were many chapters that struck me throughout this book. However, there were three consecutive chapters that were quite easy for me to understand and meant a lot to me in terms of looking for them the next time I read through a work of literature. The chapters, “He’s Blind for a Reason, You Know”, “It’s never just Heart Disease…”, and “And Rarely just Illness”, really stuck out to me as I read them and I understood the connections that Foster was making with them.
Of course, a character can be blind if the author wants them to be, but it often means much more than that as Foster notes, saying that there “are a lot of things that have to happen when a writer introduces a blind character into a story, and even more in a play” (Foster 202). Blindness can be the inability to see something both literally and metaphorically, and authors often use this to their advantage. It can signify the inability for characters to look past flaws in others, or even their own flaws. It could be the ignorance of a character or the inability to see things clearly, again both literally and metaphorically. Blindness in literature often has many symbolic meanings to go along with its one troubling literal meaning.
The next two chapters were also very meaningful to me and also very important in literature. Heart disease, a terrible illness in itself, has yet many other symbolical meanings. Foster says that the heart, aside from being “the pump that keeps us alive, is also, and has been since ancient times, the symbolic repository of emotion. A character with heart disease may have a broken heart, or suffer from not finding or holding onto their true love. These emotions, much like the disease itself, bring much pain to the character experiencing it. Illness in literature can be the illness itself and much more. It can be the metaphorical pain a character feels as much as it is the literal pain. A disease can be mysterious, and this can shroud a character in mystery. An author can do multiple things with disease and illness in literature.
I found these three elements very crucial and interesting in literature, and Foster’s interpretation of them taught me a lot about them.
As Steven said, I too had quite an easy time relating to the chapters about blindness, heart disease, and illness. I think it's easy for us to comprehend these chapters because we see these sort of things in our own lives. Like if someone in the family gets sick or you're watching a movie and the character goes blind. Strangely, in real life I've always asked myself if illnesses mean something more in the terms of God and Heaven. I've always lived by the saying that "everything happens for a reason."
In “…And Rarely Just Illness” I thought it was weird how Foster had a list on what makes a good illness for a work of literature, like it being picturesque, mysterious in origin, etc. This chapter reminded me of My Antonia because in the novel one of the Russian characters, Pavel, gets sick with some mysterious illness and then dies. His illness is not just some illness, but rather a symbol of the memories that were eating him up inside. The memory of what happened to the wedding party and a large pack of wolves has been haunting him ever since, and once he finally told someone about it, he was free, and a few days later proceeded to die.
“Don’t Read with You Eyes” was an essential chapter while reading My Antonia as well as Catch 22 because both books are set in different time periods from the one I’m living in now. While reading both books I had to “enter the reality of the book” and read it from the character’s perspective rather than my own if I wanted to get the full experience of what the characters were going through and the emotions they felt.
The Test Case was really interesting and all throughout the book I was hoping that he would have one at the end because I was sure I was going to need a good story filled with lots of the things Foster talked about if I wanted to practice. I got most of the symbolism like the birds and usage of flight and all that, but I didn’t get any of the parallels to Greek mythology that Foster talked about, and I didn’t expect that I would. I guess that’s one part of reading literature like a professor that I’m really going to need to practice.
Alright. Just like everyone else, I found that this book is quite entertaining, although I didn't think it had that potential initially. I never thought of writing as a “…set of conventions and patterns, codes and rules…” before (Foster xiii). I like this because it almost has a puzzle or challenge aspect to it then. And yes, I do agree with Chelsea that sometimes it is difficult to follow Foster when he uses so many examples of books that I have not yet read. However, most of the time I'm finding the book very informational and I can see how it is going to help my reading analysis skills.
Beginning with the Introduction and Foster's explanation of how Mr. Lindler represents the devil in A Raisin in the Sun, I tried to think of a book that I've read that seems to make sense in the scenarios that Foster gives. For this first one I came up with The Crucible. The idea that Walter Lee’s identity would be “bought” reminding me of the decision the John Proctor had to make when given the opportunity to save his own life if he confessed to doing witchcraft. If Proctor had chosen that route he would have had his name posted on the church door, which would ultimately ruin his reputation, the respect his friends had for him, and the example he had wanted to set for his children. So, if I’m not way off the mark here, (please tell me if I am!) this would have been in a sense “losing his identity”. Therefore, Reverend John Hale represented the devil, since he was the one who tried to convince Proctor to admit to participating in the witchcraft even though he knew he was innocent. Could that be right? Or is there already too much “selling of souls” supposedly going on the novel for it to be an incorrect point?
I really liked the first chapter about quests because the more I thought back to books that I’ve recently read the more I recognized them. I think the five things a quest must have that Foster lays out on page 3 helped me to determine if they really were quests. Here’s one I’m sure about… In The Poisonwood Bible the mother of four daughters takes a trip with her husband to Africa so that he can bring the word of God to the “lost” people. One day she, Orleanna, is walking through the market space with her daughters for most likely food because her daughter is carrying a basket. She is worried because with all the people she has lost track of three of her children. When she tries to call over the daughter she can see, her daughter trips over a stack of oranges. The people around are very angry and stare at the two of them. Orleanna then realizes that her family had assumed they are in charge here, when really they have so very much to learn. She also realizes that because of the relationship she has with her husband she cannot learn to fit in and be her husband’s wife at the same time, which is quite a struggle throughout the story.
Chapter 2 was new to me. I never thought that eating was so important. And I just wanted to say to Alligrr8 that the example from Ethan Frome is a great one and I never did think of that when I read it, so great job picking that up! This reminds me of another example from The Poisonwood Bible. When the family arrives in Africa they are invited to a big celebration meal with all of the villagers they will be with for the next year. When the father makes his speech to introduce and prove himself, as a pastor, he judges the villagers horribly and points out their nakedness and sinful ways. Foster explains that eating is communion and sharing peace. Here it is definitely not a nice form of it, which makes the meal very important. The food tastes horrible to the daughters and they have a difficult time not complaining about it. Also, the way their father talks to the people foreshadows just how difficult their trip is going to be and how the people will feel they should be treating them.
I think that this book is very helpful in many ways, but I feel like I can give myself a little more credit in some areas. Because it seems like I knew that the meal was important and I knew that that wasn’t an ordinary trip to the market, but now I will just know ahead of time to keep my eyes wide open right when a meal is about to take place, or a kid needs to go to the store to get some flour. So each chapter is so helpful to tell me when these times are, when I need to pay close attention.
From Chapter 4, about sonnets, I still don’t understand how form matters. Why does the poem being a square make it very important? Obviously it isn’t easy to write a sonnet and yes if the last stanza only has 2 lines there is a reason, but what about if it is just normal and with a rhyme scheme? Does that mean it being a sonnet is still important to the meaning of the poem? I think if the answer is “yes, sometimes” then I need an example.
I found Chapters 5 and 6 to be very neat. I like how writers pick apart other works and include specific things in their own pieces to add meaning. And I learned what intertextuality means, which is the relationship between texts. I’m just a little worried though, that I won’t always pick up on it, especially the Shakespeare stuff, since I haven’t read much of it. Also the whole just going with your gut that there is something more to it than what is literally happening. I think I’m going to have a lot more questions than answers.
I really enjoyed reading Chapter 7, “…Or the Bible” because as I learn more about the Bible and it’s stories in the small groups I’m in I think I’ll begin to see more and more similarities between other works of literature and the Bible. And I think that because I’m learning to know Genesis better, especially the first chapter, I’ll be able to pick out mare “falls” in other stories. One question I do have with this though is, aren’t there tons of examples losses of innocence? Couldn’t authors who really aren’t trying to connect their work to the Bible do it since this is such a common thing in everyone’s life? Foster gives us the example of Araby whose fall is quite simple and missing a snake, an apple, and a garden, so could most falls in literature not be purposely borrowing from the Bible? It kind of seems that way to me because I can pick out a few losses of innocence in my own life, for example, finding out about Santa Clause. Isn’t that a loss of innocence or just like the Fall by Foster’s definition?
Another thing that got me thinking in Chapter 7 was on page 51 Foster says, “Grendel, the monster, is descended from the line of Cain, we’re told. Aren’t all villains?”. I don’t think I understand what Foster is getting at here. Is he just saying that because Cain seems to be our first example in the Bible of a sort of villain, then every other villain idea essentially came from learning about Cain somewhere down the line?
I have one more question from Chapter 7. Foster is telling us about Song of Solomon on pages 53 and 54. He tells us that there is a girl named Pilate, whose name was picked by flipping open the Bible and pointing to a name. He then tells us that her father chose for this to happen because he has so much faith in the value of, “…a book he cannot read…”. So does this mean that he knew the stories of the Bible and found it to be valuable so he chose for his daughter to be named that way? Or is it that his society has so much value for it, and even though he doesn’t know the stories, he still wanted Pilate to be named this way? I think I’m missing what Foster is saying about the society in which they live in because I don’t know the answer to my questions.
Kate Koslowski… from your post on August 9th on the Bible… I think it’s a great question, asking how come other religious books aren’t so important to literature. And I see that Ella has already answered your question with her insights, but I just wanted to add one quick fact about the Bible that you may not already know, which may be a bit helpful… it is the world’s most popular book! Yes there are other religions as well as other well known books, but that has got to say something for how great it’s literary worth is, right? Here is a quote from the British TIMES newspaper, “Forget modern British novelists and TV tie-ins, the Bible is the best-selling book every year. If sales of the Bible were included in best-seller lists, it would be a rare week when anything else would achieve a look in. It is wonderful, weird ... that in this godless age... this one book should go on selling, every month". Also, just something that someone brought up to me, the Bible has tons of analogies in it to teach not only who God is but also lessons, and isn’t that one of the best ways that human beings remember and learn things?
From Chapter 8, the word “canonical” comes up. I didn’t know what it means, but my dictionary tells me it means, “recognized, authoritative, authorized, accepted, sanctioned, approved, established, orthodox”. So basically, now I just understand what Foster was talking about a lot better. ☺
Also from Chapter 8, when Foster says on page 63, “Here’s what I think we do…” it really struck a chord for me. I just found his insights to be very true. He says that we want strangeness or something new, yet if there wasn’t something familiar about it we wouldn’t really be able connect to it.
I, unlike Ella and a few others, have not taken the Mythology class at school. So chapter 9 was a bit difficult for me. I understand that myths are not necessarily untrue, but I seem to not be able to get that to stick in my mind. So I looked up the definition of myth, but all it mentioned were fables and legends and folktales. It didn’t really help me to understand. I began to reread the chapter and Foster says, “Whether one believes that the story of Adam and Eve is true, literally or figuratively, matters, but not in this context”. This is very helpful, because it basically says, hey we aren’t trying to tell you this is untrue, but we’re just relating to it as a story.
At first reading Chapter 10 I had a lot of questions about the “Intentionalists”. I was wondering if they have to use the whole story that they want to make a connection to, like do they need to include all of Ulysses’ stops in the Odyssey in order for it to be borrowing or an important part of the story. I decided, that they just have to use enough for it to be clear, because if it wasn’t then it could be by accident that the reader picked up on similarities between works. Foster does say that if they want you to pick up on it, they’ll make it obvious.
Chapter 11 surprised me when it says that violence can me intimate. I guess I never thought of it that way before. I was also wondering why Foster says, “…as the product of the sort of terrible choice that only characters in our great mythic stories… are driven to make,” because why couldn’t it happen in another type of story? Maybe it is just because it would only make sense here in a story that is made to remind us of something else and have mythic characters. I’m not sure if that is correct though.
Hey sbuss! Your post on August 11th struck my interest. I really enjoyed Chapter 12 too, and I agree with you that I’m always looking for symbolism, even when it really isn’t there or I just can’t figure it out. And I it also stuck out to me that Foster says that symbolism can be of more than one thing and could mean something totally different to another person. I at first thought this was neat, as you did, but now I’m not so sure. I kind of like a definite answer, and isn’t this just too broad then for studying purposes? I feel like I’m just going to get frustrated when my interpretation is different from someone else’s, and they can’t understand where I’m coming from. I do think discovering something you missed with the help of others, or figuring it out a symbol on your own because of something you can relate to your own life is enjoyable, but doesn’t it seem like there could be a lot of wrong answers too that the author really didn’t mean for anyone to think of? Foster says this is a good thing, but what if we’re missing the main point then?
I loved Chapter 15 about flying. Something just struck a chord of mine here. I’m not sure why though. Anyway, it reminded me of the book October Sky, but I never finished reading it, I just saw the movie. The main character, Homer, flies rockets, or at least launches them. It is literally going to get him out of his small mining town and to a university, but also symbolically freeing him of the life that his father wants for him. I didn’t pick up on that before I read this chapter. So thanks Foster!
I really enjoyed reading about water again. It is a bit like the rain and snow chapter, but a bit different too. I know that a lot of books use weather for different points to be made, and I know now to pay attention much better when water is noted. I liked how Foster used Huck Finn because we talked about some of those same things that he suggests about the Mississippi River, in class. Unfortunately I would not have picked up on this without our class discussion so I know I still have a ways to go. And even though Foster points this out clearly I know I may find that something must be significant, but I can’t quite figure out why.
Chapter 20 is just so true. Seasons do have this great effect on everyone. Before summer starts, my mom always says she notices people’s moods, like they know summer is coming so they’re a lot happier and excited. That does seem to be true I think, especially in Wisconsin, where we do have a cold winter. The chapter also reminded me of the poem Molly and I had to analyze at the end of last year. It was an E. E. Cummings poem called “what if a much of a which of a wind”. The narrator takes us through all four seasons in two stanzas and in the last, expands everything out to the whole universe. We weren’t entirely sure why the narrator used the seasons, but we figured out that the wind was used to bring on different changes or ideas. It also seemed that because the narrator only used the seasons in the first two stanzas that they were only a part of a bigger picture of change or time. Let’s just say the poem was very difficult, but I know that seasons changing was important to it’s meaning.
“Marked for Greatness” was a very enlightening chapter. I really think that I never have paid much attention to disabilities or marks. However, reading “The Birthmark” sophomore year, we did analyze what exactly a mark meant in that situation, which was that it was a very meek imperfection and quite unique, yet the husband of the story could not seem to see past it. Also important to the mark was how the colors it changed represented life and then death. Another example of an important imperfection that I came up with was again from The Poisonwood Bible, which is by Barbara Kingsolver, by the way. One of the four daughters, named Adah, has a disabled leg. It is basically dragged behind the rest of her body and it has always held her back from being as active and athletic as her twin sister, Leah. Because of this disability, Adah refers to her personal rhythm as sounding like “left behind” because she always trails last in the line of sisters. It is important to her, because she is left behind by her mother in an ant attack, but is chosen later on another journey. This changes her a lot and she begins to see that she is important to her family. A doctor also informs her that had she not always favored her other leg, she could have made it just as strong as the other, so she has to work on it to make it as strong. It’s almost like her and her sister. Leah, the twin is strong and always leading, and Adah stays behind and is weak. Her legs are just the same, but she is able to even them out eventually. Adah not talking to anyone is also another “mark” that has significance.
Chapter 23, called “It’s Never Just Heart Disease…” was really neat. I think the heart does have all of these ties to it and in literature they are so very important. I was reminded of the Wizard of Oz. ☺ I never read the book, but from the movie I know that the Tin Man does not have a heart. However, throughout the story he is the most caring and personal character, besides Dorothy, of course. I know that then there is a bit of irony here, but I still think that it ends up being important details that the Scarecrow has no brain, but thinks of the plans, and the Lion has no courage, but leads the way sometimes. I know that is a really simple example and not very deep, but it’s what I came up with!
Like Chelsey Beese says in her post on August 16th, the chapter called “Don’t Read with Your Eyes” seemed really confusing because of its title. Once Foster explained that you need to put yourself in the time period that the work takes place it became a lot clearer to me what exactly he was getting at. What I immediately thought of was a nooma video I watched. Nooma videos of a guy named Rob Bell who basically has a message in each video, but mostly just gets you to think. In the video I thought of, called “Dust,” he explains why a particular story in the Bible seems to be weird or far-fetched because of how things are today. He looks at the story where Peter and Andrew are fishing in their boat. Jesus walks up to them and says, “Come, follow me”. And they do; they drip what they’re doing and follow him. Now in today’s world, would you do that if a stranger just came up to you and was like “hey dude! Come with me!” would you go? More than likely, you wouldn’t. So how does this make any sense to us? Well in that time those were the words a rabbi would say if he wanted a kid to become his disciple and carry on his yoke. A rabbi’s yoke was his interpretation of the scriptures at that time. So rabbis at that time were the most highly looked upon people. They were top notch. And almost every kid would go to learn and try to memorize the Torah first, then the rest of the scriptures at school, because if they could do it they would be able to maybe one day become a rabbi. So if you learned to do it, that was awesome and if your rabbi said, “Come. Follow me.” you would leave everything and everyone behind and learn to do what he does and know what he knows. If you couldn’t do it then you would go back and learn your family trade. So when Jesus approaches Peter and Andrew they were the ones who were not good enough to become rabbis. They were doing their family trade. So when Jesus says, “Come. Follow me,” he’s essentially saying, “hey you are so good enough. You can learn my yoke. Come be my student,” which at that time would be crazy and of course you wouldn’t miss that opportunity. But would you have taken all of that from the story if you didn’t know the Jewish culture of that time? No, probably not. I certainly didn’t. (by the way… you can check out the video on youtube by searching “nooma dust” (it’s in 2 parts))
And I agree with many of you that the Test Case was a great thing to practice with. I can tell I didn’t pick up on enough though. I think I’m trying to hard to look beyond the literal things before I try to analyze the whole picture and what is symbolism. Hopefully I can get better at that. Also, the characters had a lot of the same names as the characters in Little Women, but Foster doesn’t mention this. So I think maybe Little Women was written after that short story. The characters whose names are the same, are quite different though, so it is either by accident, or irony that I never was able to pick up on in Little Women because I haden’t read this story yet.
**** I tried to make my book titles italicized but it didn't work :( so I'm sorry about that!
I enjoyed most of the material in this book and found most of the chapters and information very informative and extremely useful. The book has helped me immensely with my other summer reading projects for this class, and I’m sure it will help me with all of my other future readings for the class and other classes as well. However, there were a few chapters that just didn’t strike me as very interesting or I didn’t understand them very well. I still read them of course, but the material within didn’t strike home as much as some of the other chapters.
A few of the chapters just didn’t click with me. A couple of the more notable ones were “If It’s Square, It’s a Sonnet” and “It’s All Political”. Right away, I wasn’t looking forward to the “sonnet” chapter. I’ve never been a big fan of poetry, so I figured the chapter would be a little rough for me to get through. It wasn’t as bad as I thought, and I found it interesting that if a poem is square in figure, it is most likely a sonnet. However, there were many other chapters in the book that I found much more interesting than this one. Another chapter that didn’t really intrigue me was “It’s All Political”. Much like poetry, I’ve never been a huge fan of politics and this chapter was also a little tough for me to get through. I never really looked for political symbols and connections in literature, but I will probably pay a little bit more attention to it now.
I really did enjoy this book, even though a couple of the chapters I did not want to deal with at all.
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