Mining Literature for Deeper Meaning
Before you start discussing your summer reading selections, please view this video, and reflect on what you have learned about deeper meaning in literature. Discuss your experiences with thinking and talking about literature - in school, and out of school. I will start the conversation:
Ok. so, I don't remember when it started, this thinking deeper, probably not until college. I took a short story course, a 400 level - grad school level, when I was a sophomore at URI, and it was HARD! But, I loved it! And I remember being asked to analyze the text for deeper meaning. I was clueless. My English teachers in high school were out to lunch - taught like Edgar Allen Poe for four years - and what deeper meaning is there besides his twisted mind? Well, maybe there is, but, anyway - there I was, a reader and I had no clue as to how to delve deeper into a text and then write about it. So what did I do? I looked at how other people did it. I went into the stacks of literary criticism (yes people, stacks of books in the library), and one by one, I took down books that analyzed all different texts, sat on the floor and read. It didn't even matter if I had read the primary texts, I was looking for HOW it was done. I discovered that there were things like patterns, and intertextuality, symbols and motifs, allusions to other texts, and with these things, if I could notice them in a text, I could interpret them myself. I fell in love with the puzzles of a story. It was like problem solving in math, but I got to do it with words, my own preferred genre. I was in love.
Poetry was harder. I didn't get there until I was a grad student, but more about that in September.
-Ms. Feole
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ReplyDeleteEver since I was a young lad, I’ve always fallen in love with stories and characters, whether I encountered them through movies, shows, or books. Even at a young age, I had a tendency to over-analyze and further ponder about these characters and the stories in which they originated from, but most of the time, I was too young to fully grasp everything and my interpretations were rather shallow. As I grew older, my understanding and perception of the world matured (which is still continuing to develop and change), and with it, my ability to analyze and interpret literature matured as well. I remember learning about different styles of writing, different themes, types of grammar, and every other aspect of English that plays a crucial role in the creation and study of literature. However, it wasn’t until around 10th Grade until I fully began “practicing insight and acknowledging complexity.” In my English class that year, I had to read a book called How to Read Literature like a Professor. It was a great read (but the work and tests associated with it were quite torturous. Anyone who was in my class will probably wearily nod in approval…), and really helped show me how there are bigger meanings behind the words on a page and that there are core themes and structures that nearly all forms of literature share. After learning all of that, I began to try and read with a more open-minded and attentive nature, deciphering what connections could be made, and hunting for hidden meanings and small details that hinted towards bigger ideas. While I am certainly no English professor, I think it is safe to say that my ability to think and talk about literature has improved over the years, but I still have a lot of things to learn; things that can only be learned through experience and persistence.
ReplyDeleteThroughout the course of high school, I have learned that there is more to literature than just the basic plot of a novel. Every story, short or long, has much more substance to it, which can be discovered through “deeper thinking,” or looking for evidence of the idea behind the idea. In other words, this can be achieved, according to the video, due to “insight,” in which a collection of clues lead a reader to a general idea, including a character's appearance versus their true intentions; and “complexity,” or the many aspects behind a novel that can impact what is true, such as complicated social forces involved in the novel. During school, I learned to research authors before reading their works. Just by doing so, the reader can get a clearer idea of why the writer chose to write a certain way and what impact this has on the entire work. With this evidence, one can think deeper and better understand the story. Outside of school, I regularly attend church masses and services, in which readings from the Bible are read. I’ve even become interested in Greek and Roman mythology, which I look into in my free time. As a result, when I read, I make an effort to search for allusions, whether it is a key event or even a character from something else I read. As a result, Frankenstein and Jane Eyre, on a deeper level, contain many references. Therefore, books should not be “judged by their covers,” or basic plot, but contemplated more deeply.
ReplyDeleteFor much of my early years in elementary school and middle school we have been encouraged to read, and many times we would be asked to give a synopsis of the book, say what we thought the author's purpose of writing the book was, and give a theme presented in the book. The idea that the author had a reason for writing the book never seemed strange to me, but once I progressed into high school the way I was asked to interpret and analyze books and stories became much more complex. It wasn't until 10th grade with Ms. Del that I truly began to be able to decipher and break down a book, page by page, sentence by sentence. I clearly remember when we were breaking down the summer reading book Fahrenheit 451, and how we looked at each characters name to decipher it and to explain why the author picked that particular name. We then actually read a book that was written for the sole purpose of teaching people how to read between the lines and see the deeper meanings the author includes. After reading How to Read Literature Like a Professor I was able to understand what things like a rain storm or a fire symbolize, and how in many books there is a jesus figure as well as other bible references, and many more interesting things the average reader would never pick up on. This short video echos the idea of the book because the book essentially says to always think deeper, or as the video says, have insight.
ReplyDeleteIt would be incorrect for me to claim that I have always loved to look deeper into poetry and literature, because for the entirety of elementary and middle school, I chose to only read the plot of the story. I was frustrated when authors didn’t just come right out and say what they meant if they wanted people to understand their writing. For me, I think I really started to appreciate diving in to deeper meanings when we started studying poems in 9th or 10th grade. I remember reading “Mending Wall” by Robert Frost, and being amazed that I had this bittersweet feeling that I couldn’t really describe because of the imagery in the poem. After that, every poem and piece of literature became a puzzle to me. I love trying to figure out what the author is getting at, especially if I don’t understand it at first. I loved reading “How to Read Literature Like a Professor” by Thomas C Foster because it was like I was being handed all these great tools I could use to become better at decoding works of literature. I definitely still have a lot to learn, but it will be a very cool and interesting journey.
ReplyDeleteAll through elementary school we did more context and summaries than analytical work. The closest we got to diving deeper into the text was probably author’s purpose and the occasional question on theme. Throughout middle and high school I never really understood how to dive deeper into a text. What didn’t help was that few of my teachers explained how to do it, and what they wanted from me. Other teachers just assigned the essay on the book, and handed it back with a grade on it and no corrections. It wasn’t until tenth grade with Ms. Del when I had a teacher who began to give examples of what she was looking for from the text. We read Thomas C Foster’s How to Read Literature Like a Professor, which helped me to understand what type of analytical connections I was supposed to make in the text, and also helped me to start to understand how to make those connections. For example, the first chapter was about quests. While quite literally, a quest is going somewhere to accomplish something, that isn’t always the case in literature. A quest has to have a person, a desired location to go (which doesn’t have to be a physical place, it could be a mental state of mind), a reason to go, a challenge to overcome, and a gain in self knowledge after. I was able to connect this to a multitude of books that I had never considered to be filled with quests. Over time, I began to see how deep I was expected to go into a novel. I still had difficulty actually doing it myself though. Once I was given an example I could connect the dots from the novel, but I had trouble connecting the dots myself. Last year I got a little better at it, and I am still working on it entering this year.
ReplyDeleteBeing crucially honest I didn't pay any attention to finding deeper meaning in literature. However, my best class was Spanish. I thought that it was an easy class, but most of my classmates expressed the opposite. I never really understand why this was much more easy for me than them. Eventually my teacher told me why, she saw that in class I had a better understanding of texts and stories. That was my first surprise in this class. Not really an un expected one, as I started to think about it. I've spend my whole life, since a young age, surrounded by stories, books and literature. Since a kid I changed the end of my bed time stories and later read many books, not school assigned. This was a habit that I adapted form my mother but it helped me for many things unconsciously. But here was not when my thirst for literature actually started, I just had acknowledge that I was good at it. Later with the same teacher, now a sophomore, I had to write a short story. After writing and handing in my work the same day I receive a feedback that my story was of great quality. So I read it for the first time. Here I saw that I had a new "thing". Since that moment I've been paying attention to every single piece of literature just to see how that can help me on my writing. As it is something that teachers don't really teach I feel as if the knowledge from school has been my tools for my self teaching. In conclusion, this one of the reasons which I took this class. As it will give me some of those tools and reenforce my knowledge on English poetry. My main goal is to find a way to see the English language as explosive as I see my mother language to be.
ReplyDeleteThat is a gift.
DeleteI think I really started to look deeper into the meaning of literature in sophomore year. Up until that point, I had always read novels for what they were on the surface. The description of the weather in a novel was nothing more than part of the setting, and there were no real symbols that I looked at closely to try to find some hidden meaning. I had never really been taught anything about symbolism and looking more closely at writing to determine different meanings that the author might be trying to get across to the reader. However, my entire view of literature changed when I had to read How to Read Literature as a Professor in tenth grade. The whole class read the book, and then throughout the year, we would use what we learned from it to delve deeper into whatever novel we were reading at the time. Then, we would have class discussions about the different ideas we had about various symbols and their meanings in the novel. The discussions were extremely helpful to me because they allowed me to voice my opinions and hear other views that I might not have thought about while reading. It was difficult at first to read and look at books in such a different way, but I have gotten better at it and look forward to learning even more.
ReplyDeleteIn literature, there is always more than what meets the eye. I have always been able to understand literature on the surface for the most part, however going deeper into the text has always been a little difficult. The book How to Read Literature Like a Professor helped me understand that bad weather was not just bad weather. Bad weather meant ominous things were coming soon. This book also helped me analyze other parts of literature that normally, I would have disregarded. However, what helped me the most to dig deeper into literature was reading more novels. By reading more, I try to see similarities and differences between the characters, how each novel was written, various symbols, and what messages the authors are trying to send. I find I am better able, with experience, to dig for that deeper meaning.
ReplyDeleteI’m not exactly the type to pick up Hemingway, make a cup of black coffee, and sit on my balcony overlooking Paris while I pick his works apart. That is who I wish I could be at 3 AM, while I eat Pringles and browse Tumblr. As a result, I didn’t exactly figure out how to read deeper into LITERATURE until fairly recently. I could read into the symbols pretty easily. Water is rebirth-type observations. I could get those easy little symbols and motifs! But when it came to the deeper stuff, I found myself using a spoon to dig out the coffin of metaphors, analogies, and more. On another, completely unrelated (or so I thought) note, I am a pro at tearing song lyrics apart and picking out every little reference. But that…didn’t have anything to do with literature, right? It just didn’t work that way for books. None of my teachers ever made that connection for me, and I didn’t myself. It actually started with a poem. I’m sitting at Coffeeshop a couple years ago, I’m listening to someone read, and then it hits me— “A song is just a poem with accompaniment,” as my choir director once said. Songs are just poems…poems are literature…literature is also comprised of books. How To Read Literature Like A Professor really helped me to start seeing the deeper layers of literature as well, even past the more simplistic concepts he teaches, such as direct symbolism. My English class absorbed that entire book, and we spent the year applying it to everything we read. But even after that, I’m still not great at analyzing! My deeper understanding can sometimes get very muddled with pre-conceived notions and a mass of surface-level symbolism that masks something even deeper. But that’s why I took AP English. I really want to challenge myself as a writer, to grow, to see what others can see with so much ease. I want to push my understanding to the limit and probably a bit past that.
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ReplyDeletePersonally, I feel like my breakthrough in actually learning how to read, not simply reading, was during the summer before my sophomore year of high school. We were assigned the book How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster, and were to use it to analyze a series of books throughout the year. To be quite frank, I wasn’t at all thrilled to have to read what I thought was going to be a boring, informative book, a book telling me how to read, nonetheless. I couldn’t have been more wrong- How to Read Literature Like a Professor felt to me, like a literary revival in itself. It was as if I had unlocked a new door, a new world of hidden meanings, symbols, references, ideas and themes, just by learning how to think from a different perspective. Before I was able to decipher and interpret texts as I do now, I feel like books must have been so two- dimensional, so plain and straightforward, even dry. Sometimes I think back on how I read through elementary and middle school, and I honestly wonder how I didn’t become bored with my simple interpretations. Throughout that sophomore year, with Ms. Del Fiore, I had so much fun digging deeper into books, picking them apart and reveling in the new found meanings we would think of in our discussions. I remember the times where we would get caught up for the whole class period analyzing one paragraph of The Book Thief, or Fahrenheit 451. I couldn’t be more thankful for my experience that year, and how it has pushed me to become a better reader. My goal is to improve myself even further this year, and I cannot wait to take in all that this class has to offer.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I feel like my breakthrough in actually learning how to read, not simply reading, was during the summer before my sophomore year of high school. We were assigned the book How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster, and were to use it to analyze a series of books throughout the year. To be quite frank, I wasn’t at all thrilled to have to read what I thought was going to be a boring, informative book, a book telling me how to read, nonetheless. I couldn’t have been more wrong- How to Read Literature Like a Professor felt to me, like a literary revival in itself. It was as if I had unlocked a new door, a new world of hidden meanings, symbols, references, ideas and themes, just by learning how to think from a different perspective. Before I was able to decipher and interpret texts as I do now, I feel like books must have been so two- dimensional, so plain and straightforward, even dry. Sometimes I think back on how I read through elementary and middle school, and I honestly wonder how I didn’t become bored with my simple interpretations. Throughout that sophomore year, with Ms. Del Fiore, I had so much fun digging deeper into books, picking them apart and reveling in the new found meanings we would think of in our discussions. I remember the times where we would get caught up for the whole class period analyzing one paragraph of The Book Thief, or Fahrenheit 451. I couldn’t be more thankful for my experience that year, and how it has pushed me to become a better reader. My goal is to improve myself even further this year, and I cannot wait to take in all that this class has to offer.
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ReplyDeleteFor as long as I can remember I’ve always had a book in my hand, and a few extras stashed in my bag just in case I finished the first one. I think I like reading so much because I like trying to find that true deeper meaning to what the author wrote. Beginning in elementary school we always had to find the “author’s purpose” something that didn’t make much sense to me. Almost as if there could be three possible reasons for the author to write but nothing exciting: to entertain, to inform, or to persuade. It is easy to find these reasons but I didn’t realize there could be a deeper meaning to the author’s word choice, analogies, and tone of voice until English sophomore year with Ms. Houck. We focused on dystopias that year, a genre which I found myself reading more and more after that year. She helped us throughout the year to see the real reasoning behind George Orwell’s 1984 and Animal Farm. Originally I was confused, how could Animal Farm be anything more than a story about animals? She showed us that in many pieces there are real world connections and deeper meanings, something I had never really considered. Last year in English, with more experience finding a deeper meaning to what I was reading I enjoyed English more than I ever had before. I got to look into the motives and possible reasons for many of Edgar Allan Poe’s pieces such as The Fall of the House of Usher, The Cask of Amontillado, and The Raven. Through extensive research I found that you can often find a deeper meaning to the author’s writing by looking at their life, the time period in which the piece was written, and by finding a common theme throughout their works. So, I look to this year and getting to further my experience with search for the meanings behind many known works.
ReplyDeleteThroughout my education, I have grown to comprehend and appreciate literature in a much deeper way. I have always loved to read. As an elementary school student, I would carry multiple books with me to school on any given day to ensure that I would not be without one. As time progressed, my skills improved due to numerous experiences in and outside of school. In school, I have gradually learned how to analyze texts in order to discover their deeper meanings. I would say that my first major encounter with this skill was when I read To Kill A Mockingbird in eighth grade english class. This book opened my eyes to the ability literature has to transform readers into an ulterior society and allow them to experience life from opposing perspectives. In 10th grade english class, I read Julius Caesar and was fascinated by the means of translating the Shakespearean language and finding the many hidden complexities within the text. Lastly, I believe that my literary skills reached a new height in 11th grade english class through assignments regarding The Scarlet Letter, The Crucible, and The Great Gatsby. Outside of school, I have been able to expand my knowledge through conversations with family members regarding literature. We are always able to discuss our opinions with one another which grants me opportunities to learn from others’ perspectives. All in all, I feel as though my skills have significantly improved since I was the little girl luging children’s books to school each day, however I am certain there is much more for me to learn and I cannot wait to do so.
ReplyDeleteLearning about the deeper meaning in literature has opened my eyes and allowed me to view each novel differently. I have always been a hopeless romantic and in each book I read I tend to pay more attention to the character's emotions because I always found that to be the most important part. I felt that it was through the characters emotions that I could better understand a novel. However, as I have progressed I realized that that is just a part of it. As a reader there is so much more you have to focus on such as the setting, the era, the actions, the behavior, etc. All those aspects make the novel whole. When you are watching a movie you don't have to be as concerned with the other "stuff" because it's all right there in front of you on a screen. However, in a novel if you miss one of those other aspects the text might not make the most sense. These aspects of the novel also allow you to discover the deeper meaning. I have learned that unveiling the deeper meaning of a book is a process and that I am not going to get it in the first chapter or it's not going to be in big bold print. It involves different details and aspects of the text. I like to relate the unveiling of a deeper meaning in a novel is the process of completing a puzzle. At the beginning you have all these pieces jumbled into one big pile. The pieces don't show you a picture when they are all jumbled up like that. You also can't tell what the picture is by one individual piece. As you begin to put the pieces together the picture becomes more clear. Finding the deeper meaning is like finding the "bigger picture" and it certainly is an eye opener.
ReplyDeleteLearning about the deeper meaning in literature has opened my eyes and allowed me to view each novel differently. I have always been a hopeless romantic and in each book I read I tend to pay more attention to the character's emotions because I always found that to be the most important part. I felt that it was through the characters emotions that I could better understand a novel. However, as I have progressed I realized that that is just a part of it. As a reader there is so much more you have to focus on such as the setting, the era, the actions, the behavior, etc. All those aspects make the novel whole. When you are watching a movie you don't have to be as concerned with the other "stuff" because it's all right there in front of you on a screen. However, in a novel if you miss one of those other aspects the text might not make the most sense. These aspects of the novel also allow you to discover the deeper meaning. I have learned that unveiling the deeper meaning of a book is a process and that I am not going to get it in the first chapter or it's not going to be in big bold print. It involves different details and aspects of the text. I like to relate the unveiling of a deeper meaning in a novel is the process of completing a puzzle. At the beginning you have all these pieces jumbled into one big pile. The pieces don't show you a picture when they are all jumbled up like that. You also can't tell what the picture is by one individual piece. As you begin to put the pieces together the picture becomes more clear. Finding the deeper meaning is like finding the "bigger picture" and it certainly is an eye opener.
ReplyDeleteIn this video, it shows that you have to use insight and acknowledge complexity to help find the deeper meaning in literature. However, when reading books for the first time, I don’t usually purposely try to find the deeper meaning. Usually, I have to actually “dig deep” and reread parts of the book again to try to find the deeper meaning. Throughout elementary school and middle school, we would usually just have to read literature to understand the overall plot and theme. So far in high school, I remember having to analyze and discover the deeper meaning of the text through symbolism and literary devices. When I read books now, I try to think of how any part could have a different meaning or be symbolic of something else. I try not to think of the text just literally, but to be open minded to all the different meanings it could possibly have.
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ReplyDeleteI have always been an avid reader. Specifically, I enjoy the Captain Underpants series as well as anything by Dr. Seuss P.H.D. Understandably, these types of classic literature are not accepted nor expected for a twelfth Grade AP student to read. Though I may have my disappointments and disagreements with various literature experts such as Ernest Hemingway, Mark Twain, and Nathaniel Hawthorne, I have the upmost respect for authors and writers who can create works of literature that are so magnificent that every twelfth grader and their mother is reading it. Throughout my High School education, my english classes seemed to be focused on different topics year to year. Freshman year english consisted of reading every single Shakespearean sonnet and reading Romeo and Juliet six or seven times. Sophomore year consisted of paranoia towards the government and reading every dystopian novel that can be found on this side of the Mississippi River. Which brings me to eleventh grade english class where we talked about Huckleberry Finn, Mrs. Federman’s significant other Richard, and Nathaniel Hawthorne. It’s no secret that I do not read for recreation very often unless it’s a book I thoroughly enjoy. I’m the type of person that can’t even sit through two hours of a movie without getting bored never mind an entire novel. That being said, I love poetry and analyzing it. I may not be good at it at all but I love how different people can have different interpretations of the same poem and the author could have a completely different meaning. poetry is the reason that I look for the deeper meaning in most literature whether it be Shakespeare or Dr. Seuss. I was taught that EVERYTHING the author writes, from adjectives to the use of contractions, has a specific purpose. I use this mentality to read most Literature. Theresa will probably say something like "I think you're looking too deeply into it" like when we were reading 1984 and I mentioned that a woman threw a newspeak dictionary at the tv during the two minutes hate and I said that implied that they wanted to use their language to fight back when the Party consistently tries to downsize their dictionary. Was I wrong? yeah probably sometimes I say random things that make like a little bit of sense and then sometimes I say the right thing
ReplyDeleteI have always been an avid reader. Specifically, I enjoy the Captain Underpants series as well as anything by Dr. Seuss P.H.D. Understandably, these types of classic literature are not accepted nor expected for a twelfth Grade AP student to read. Though I may have my disappointments and disagreements with various literature experts such as Ernest Hemingway, Mark Twain, and Nathaniel Hawthorne, I have the upmost respect for authors and writers who can create works of literature that are so magnificent that every twelfth grader and their mother is reading it. Throughout my High School education, my english classes seemed to be focused on different topics year to year. Freshman year english consisted of reading every single Shakespearean sonnet and reading Romeo and Juliet six or seven times. Sophomore year consisted of paranoia towards the government and reading every dystopian novel that can be found on this side of the Mississippi River. Which brings me to eleventh grade english class where we talked about Huckleberry Finn, Mrs. Federman’s significant other Richard, and Nathaniel Hawthorne. It’s no secret that I do not read for recreation very often unless it’s a book I thoroughly enjoy. I’m the type of person that can’t even sit through two hours of a movie without getting bored never mind an entire novel. That being said, I love poetry and analyzing it. I may not be good at it at all but I love how different people can have different interpretations of the same poem and the author could have a completely different meaning. poetry is the reason that I look for the deeper meaning in most literature whether it be Shakespeare or Dr. Seuss. I was taught that EVERYTHING the author writes, from adjectives to the use of contractions, has a specific purpose. I use this mentality to read most Literature. Theresa will probably say something like "I think you're looking too deeply into it" like when we were reading 1984 and I mentioned that a woman threw a newspeak dictionary at the tv during the two minutes hate and I said that implied that they wanted to use their language to fight back when the Party consistently tries to downsize their dictionary. Was I wrong? yeah probably sometimes I say random things that make like a little bit of sense and then sometimes I say the right thing
ReplyDeleteI have loved reading since I was in elementary school. At that age, of course, no one expects you to take a deeper meaning out of what you are reading. As a child, we read for enjoyment. The books I often chose were books with an exciting plot, not necessarily ones where you dissect every detail to find a deeper meaning. I do not think I was fully aware of how many meanings a simple detail in a story could have until I got to high school. An example that stands out to me is George Orwell’s Animal Farm. I read this story in school when I was in 8th grade as well as 10th grade. As an 8th grader, the only thing I took out of the story was that the animals were rebelling because the humans treated them poorly. In 10th grade, my first thoughts about Animal Farm were completely altered. We learned about the fact that the entire novel is a satire on Communism and the Soviet Union. As a huge fan of history, this added so much depth to the story, especially since it represents my favorite point in history. After learning about this new dimension to the novel, I found myself picking up on so many more nuances, allusions and deeper meanings while reading both in school and out of school. When I read now, I am always thinking about why characters do what they do and what background information could have led me to predict something like that. I love reading and seeing allusions to books and movies that I have seen or read. Learning about reading between the lines and digging deeper to find deeper meaning paved the path for the type of reading I do now.
ReplyDeleteDiscussing and studying literature since this point in high school has consisted of learning to identify literary elements and analyze writing techniques. The way I have been taught to analyze literature differs from the video slightly. The video explains how to use "insight and complexity" to further piece together small events to make sense of a larger meaning. I have always been cautious and doubtful about how I dissect a literary piece–never knowing if I was truly correct in my assumptions. Similar to you, I discovered what I could be looking for in texts when I study how other readers processed literature. Books like "How to Read Literature Like a Professor" aided in my understanding of using symbols, allusions and other events to discover a deeper meaning.
ReplyDeleteThroughout my childhood, I loved to read. I could have spent my whole day just sitting in the bookstore reading anything I could get my hands on. Back then, I read literature purely for enjoyment and it was not until high school that I actually began to look into the deeper meaning of novels. I had not realized that such little details could signify something greater. A book is like a puzzle; the characters and their experiences are the pieces and once you put it all together, you get this powerful message/lesson. I have a very straightforward, scientific way of thinking. Therefore, I read things for their literal meaning and struggle to analyze literature and recognize symbolism. This started to improve during my 10th grade English class where we tore apart Fahrenheit 451. I specifically remember reading one scene where the main character was walking through a river. In my mind, I thought that was exactly what was happening. However, it was more than that. I learned that water usually signifies rebirth so figuratively, the protagonist was cleansing himself and was being reborn as a new person. It was difficult to decipher but when I got the answer, it all began to fall into place and make sense. My analytical skills have surely improved throughout my high school career but as anything else, there is room for improvement. I hope that this class will educate me on how to think deeper and properly analyze a novel.
ReplyDeleteIn middle school, one of my teachers had us read a book every two weeks. I enjoyed reading a I loved this assignment since it meant I could read a lot of books throughout the year. I read a lot of books such as 1984, Lord of the Flies, and Of Mice and Men. I enjoyed reading all those books that year, however I was only reading them superficially. It was not until high school when I was assigned to read many of the novels I read before, where I learned that there were deeper meanings behind everything. Many times, there was more than one meaning and it took a while to piece together all of the symbols, allusions, and other attributes before I could form my own opinion about the message of a novel. It was because of classes in high school where I learned to develop that skill.
ReplyDeleteI liked reading from an early age and would do it on my own for fun, but this didn't surpass simple enjoyment as (these were my elementary school years) I didn't yet have any idea how literature was meant to be analyzed. Although I liked to write, and actually always considered English to be one of my favorite subjects, much of my younger literary career consisted of learning about literary devices like similes and metaphors, author's purpose, and more plot-related questions. I suppose this more surface-level thinking was appropriate for my grade level, though. It wasn't until tenth grade that I began to genuinely understand how to "dig deeper". My class read a couple novels together and our teacher routinely assigned us "double-sided journals". Though these were among the most difficult assignments I faced that year, in hindsight I realize that they forced me to think critically and out of habit I began to look for things - and see things - that I wouldn't have thought to before. The book "How to Read Literature Like a Professor" also armed me with much newfound knowledge about symbolism that I still recall. Now, I find it greatly rewarding to use the analytical skills I've learned in school and see a text "unfold" in front of my eyes. More and more, it all makes sense.
ReplyDeleteEver since I started reading, I had always felt this inner connection to the characters in the story and was always intrigued by the way they (the author) expressed their inner thoughts by just manipulating the words in order for readers to understand. It allowed me to see the world through different pairs of eyes. It allowed me to forget myself and to discover a new reality. One teacher had told me, and I will never forget it, was that there is a reason for every thing an author will put into their story. This caused me to look deeper into the text, as well as causing me to overanalyze at times. Yet, it gave me a new way of reading. It allowed me to go inside the author’s mind and figure out the meaning behind why they chose to put specific details in the piece, and what their cause was for it. That's the thing...there is always going to be some lesson or deeper meaning involved when reading. It is up to the reader to investigate and figure out what that true meaning is. It starts with “gray skies” and leads to “the character was lost within himself and was ignorant to the joys of life”. It is putting the pieces together and noticing patterns. Whether that be character’s actions, behavior, moods, change of scenery, etc. That’s why reading a book a second time will reveal things you never quite realized the first time you read it. Becoming better at this will also make you a better writer. I have noticed the more I have read and analyzed other people’s work, I have put more thought into what I put in my own work and how I can manipulate my words in order to hint at a deeper meaning. Most people will say that they don’t like reading, but that is only because they only read what is on the surface and not in between the lines.
ReplyDeleteFor as long as I can remember, I have always had a love and an appreciation for reading. From since I was young, I could pick up a novel and finish it within less than a few days. Once I pick an interesting piece of literature up, I have trouble putting it down. I have also been one to grow attached to certain books. For example, I have read many novels where I have found that I can deeply connect with a specific character in the novel. Therefore, I chose to read that same book over and over. At a young age, I never quite found myself analyzing a reading with hopes of discovering different uses of symbolism and creating a deeper meaning of the novel for myself. During my years of elementary and even middle school, I basically read for the enjoyment. This is what children are expected to do, pick up a book and predict what the story will be about by just simply staring at the front cover. It was not until high school when I first started analyzing different pieces of literature by breaking up the text to discover a deeper meaning of the author´s words. I could not breeze through a novel any longer without pondering on the character´s actions and wondering why that character ahs the motive he or she has. In high school, mainly tenth grade, I took a deep interest in finding a deeper meaning of novels. A great example of my growth in reading is with the novel, ¨Frankenstein¨ by Mary Shelley. When I first entered high school, I was given the assignment of reading this novel during my freshman year. While reading it, I understood how Victor created this being and then abandoned him. I also understood how the being now wanted revenge on his creator for abandoning him. Although I comprehended all of this, I never understood the fact that each event that occurs in this novel means something. Each color mentioned by the author represents something. The weather each night could foreshadow an event. Now that I am a senior in high school and I have been assigned to read “Frankenstein” once again, I have become aware of so many signs of symbolism and I am able to analyze this text in such a deeper way. I have so much more appreciation for this work of literature than I did my freshman year and I am so thankful for that.
ReplyDeleteEver since I could remember, the act of reading a book was heavily enforced in school. There was always an extensive amount of books to read in a specific amount of time, which essentially took a majority of the enjoyment out of reading because it was almost like a frantic race. Not until high school, it was only just a requirement to finish the book and exhibit just enough knowledge about it, either through a summary or maybe what we thought the message of the text signified; but what solid conclusions could my young and inexperienced mind really piece together about a complex piece of literature? At the beginning of my freshman year, my ideas pertaining to literature drastically changed. We would read a piece of literature, whether it be a novel, an article, or even a poem, and would be expected to communicate our thoughts about symbols, hidden meanings, and eventually “the big picture.” In order to familiarize the students with the face-to-face conjecture of their different ideas, English teachers have exercised Socratic seminars. I was quite opposed to the idea of sharing my conclusions about works of literature because I didn’t want to be wrong, but what I have come to realize is that everyone interprets a story in their own unique way. Now, as a senior, I actually find it interesting to hear how the minds of other individuals manipulated the information of a story to formulate their own opinion. Even at home, while reading for pleasure or for school, I find myself piecing together important occurrences and the actions of essential characters in order to predict what the end result will be. Once I read the final words of a book, I process the story in my mind and eventually understand the addition of each precise detail, and how they attribute to a concealed meaning that connects with the realities of life.
ReplyDeleteEver since I could remember, the act of reading a book was heavily enforced in school. There was always an extensive amount of books to read in a specific amount of time, which essentially took a majority of the enjoyment out of reading because it was almost like a frantic race. Not until high school, it was only just a requirement to finish the book and exhibit just enough knowledge about it, either through a summary or maybe what we thought the message of the text signified; but what solid conclusions could my young and inexperienced mind really piece together about a complex piece of literature? At the beginning of my freshman year, my ideas pertaining to literature drastically changed. We would read a piece of literature, whether it be a novel, an article, or even a poem, and would be expected to communicate our thoughts about symbols, hidden meanings, and eventually “the big picture.” In order to familiarize the students with the face-to-face conjecture of their different ideas, English teachers have exercised Socratic seminars. I was quite opposed to the idea of sharing my conclusions about works of literature because I didn’t want to be wrong, but what I have come to realize is that everyone interprets a story in their own unique way. Now, as a senior, I actually find it interesting to hear how the minds of other individuals manipulated the information of a story to formulate their own opinion. Even at home, while reading for pleasure or for school, I find myself piecing together important occurrences and the actions of essential characters in order to predict what the end result will be. Once I read the final words of a book, I process the story in my mind and eventually understand the addition of each precise detail, and how they attribute to a concealed meaning that connects with the realities of life.
ReplyDeleteBooks are more than just words on a paper. Each story carries an unseen weight,a lesson that goes beyond initial understanding. This was a concept I failed to comprehend until the 9th grade. Before this, a story was as deep as the author wrote it. For as long as I can remember I loved reading. It was a way to escape reality and step into another world. I would spend my days flipping through the pages of a book watching the story play out in my mind as if it were a film. It was my 9th grade teacher, Mrs. DiCicco, who taught me to read the untold stories that were strategically placed between the lines. With my new understanding of terms such as imagery and symbols, I would not only see the story in my head but be apart of it and learn from it. At times I would over analyze texts and dive much deeper than what the author intended but with time and practice it became second nature. Now as a high school senior (woah), I find myself no longer just reading books and other forms of texts but analyzing and learning from them. Comprehending how to dive deeper into reading has also allowed me to dive deeper into my writing. The many texts assigned through literature classes exposed me to many different writing styles. The exposure led me to find my own style and create my own unseen stories between the lines. Every story has a deeper meaning, one just has to know where to look.
ReplyDeleteI have always loved to read, when I was little I could read up to three books in one week. However, to be honest I never looked past the surface while I was reading those books. I did not really start looking for more depth in literature until sophomore year. I had realized that the little details signify something greater in the story. That those little bits make the story so much more powerful. What really helped me was that I read the book How to Read Literature Like a Professor in the tenth grade. I had never really been taught anything about symbolism and looking more closely at writing to determine different meanings. This book was very helpful for me to analyze literature. Even though I have learned somethings on how to look deeper into literature I looking forward to learning even more.
ReplyDeleteWhen I entered high school, I hadn't yet started to read into the deeper meaning of literature. However, in 10th grade, I had Ms. DelFiore as my English teacher. We only read two novels while I was in her class (The Kite Runner and the Book Thief; both are amazing books), but she taught me so much through just those two books. I remember spending just a half an hour analyzing half of the first page. This just showed me how deep literature can really get! We also read How to Read Literature Like a Professor, which also heightened my ability to read deeper into a novel. Though last year, English class mainly focused on essay writing and more reading comprehension quizzes, so I focused less on reading into the text on a deeper level. And when I did read, I was reading mainly for fun and just on the surface of what I was reading. So, I'm going into this year with a whole year's worth of knowledge on reading literature on a deeper level, though I fear that I might be rusty after having been away from it for about a year.
ReplyDeleteWhen I entered high school, I hadn't yet started to read into the deeper meaning of literature. However, in 10th grade, I had Ms. DelFiore as my English teacher. We only read two novels while I was in her class (The Kite Runner and the Book Thief; both are amazing books), but she taught me so much through just those two books. I remember spending just a half an hour analyzing half of the first page. This just showed me how deep literature can really get! We also read How to Read Literature Like a Professor, which also heightened my ability to read deeper into a novel. Though last year, English class mainly focused on essay writing and more reading comprehension quizzes, so I focused less on reading into the text on a deeper level. And when I did read, I was reading mainly for fun and just on the surface of what I was reading. So, I'm going into this year with a whole year's worth of knowledge on reading literature on a deeper level, though I fear that I might be rusty after having been away from it for about a year.
ReplyDeleteUp until high school, I rarely did anything with evaluating a text for its "deeper meaning". Because of this, my freshman year English class was like a slap to the face. I failed quiz after quiz first quarter since I had no idea how to explain my literature on a deeper level, and then my teacher took a leave of absence for three quarters of the year so my incompetence only got worse. The following year I still barely did anything with literary analysis on my own, but my teacher did teach me how to look for it in books. We read a lot of George Orwell, "Animal Farm" specifically striking out to me for it being an allusion to the Russian Revolution. My teacher explained all of the deeper meanings of the texts, but I myself was never able to grasp how to do it on my own. Last year was fairly life changing though in terms of the literary world. My teacher was a tough grader so I knew I would have to work extra hard to please her, and thus I forced myself to learn how to analyze books properly. I looked at the deeper meaning of many Nathaniel Hawthorne works and now can probably identify any of his religious viewpoints after reading any of his texts. We worked on Hawthorne the majority of the year so I can see how he encodes his deeper meanings in his works, but I am concerned that when it comes to new authors and different books with different themes I won't be able to identify this as easily since I am not used to it. I just hope that by taking this class you can teach me to make literal analysis my second nature so I can understand and enjoy any works that I read that much better.
ReplyDeleteI remember my first year at west as a freshman. I had been placed in an honors english class. I remember thinking to myself that my teacher over analyzed texts, especially poetry. I was always good at picking out symbols or discussing imagery because that's what we were trained to do in middle school. I realized that english would be challenging for me when my teacher had asked about punctuation. She had asked why we thought the author chose to insert a coma where she did and I remembered thinking to myself that my teacher was crazy. "Why does it matter where?", I thought. But once she had explained that an author may do so to emphasize the idea or concept written in a line, I remembered thinking about how I never thought about it in that way before. I was very much appreciative. After that I started trying to look for deeper meaning behind anything I could. During my junior year of highschool, I can also say that I noticed myself gaining nore insight and becoming a much better writer because of it.
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