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| Consider Questions of
Theory
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Why should I read literary theory? Perhaps the question should not be why should the apprentice to literary study, study theory. Perhaps it should be, why would anyone continue to read literature without an attempt to understand what is happening while we read, both to us and to our culture? What, after all, are we after? That is a double headed question. What are we in search of when we read, and what do we become as we read? If one reads to put oneself to sleep, literally or figuratively, then we can answer both ends of the question with that fact. But if one reads for any other reason, and especially for escape or pleasure, then one wants to know at least how that works, if not to increase and augment that pleasure, at least how to have it again. That requires a metacognitive awareness of what gave the pleasure to begin with. Now, if one suspects that reading also can transform individuals and societies, then all the more reason to devise theories of its power to both mystify and demystify as well. Read this student's sincere inquiry into this question. This is a comment to a class Bulletin Board on the question, "literary theory, what is it good for?" The student's struggle with this question is both intelligent and honest. The question he or she addresses obviously arises from the class reading of Terry Eagleton's book, Literary Theory: An Introduction (1983). The student comments in the above on the book's final chapter, "Conclusion: Political Criticism" which happens to be available online (as of July 15, 2002) <http://personal.wofford.edu/~hitchmoughsa/Terry.html> You might also read that chapter for it lays out in stark criticism an argument against literary theory but for a more powerful discourse of another sort. When one reads Eagleton and then the student, one understands both the insights and the oversimplifications which grip the student:
But of course, "it" is there and whatever Eagleton would prefer to call it, perhaps a strategic critical discourse analyzing cultural rhetorics rather than literary theory, he certainly advocates such a discourse. After reading Eagleton, we cannot enter into that discourse, either reading it or writing, without some acknowledgement of our own politics of reading. To acknowledge and develop that individual voice of political discourse should be the goal of studying the history and varieties of literary theory. How should one begin? Begin with attempting to develop a reflective process of reading. To do this we can examine different theories of the ways people make meaning from texts. How does reading literature differ from reading anything else, if contrary to Eagleton's ideas, it does? Why do people frequently read the same works, especially literary works, differently from the way others read them, or differently in each subsequent reading? How do our styles, backgrounds, value systems, and beliefs, help create different ideas about the meaning of what we read? And given these differences, what accounts for the astonishing fact that we can arrive at agreement about meaning even more frequently? Most of us agree that not just anything goes in reading and that not all readings are of the same weight. We resist the idea that meaning is merely a "matter of opinion." And we tend to agree there are powerful readings--insightful ones that make us gasp and say to ourselves, "Of course! Why didn't I see that?" But we also insist on keeping open the possibility of new insights and angles on meaning. We want to understand these things and many others: and we want to strengthen our process of reading. We want to become more aware of what about us and our circumstance constructs our readings and makes them differ from the readings of others.
Teaching Literary Theory
Theories about Readers and Reading Processes
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