Analysis Of How To Read Literature Like A Professor, By Thomas C. Foster

In “How to Read Literature Like a Professor” John Foster describes methods on how to relate texts to each other. He writes about reoccurring character development, relation to Shakespeare, the Bible and any other reoccurring literary devices commonly used in books. The___ Foster states in his book is seen being used in Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle.

In his book “How to Read Literature Like a Professor,” Thomas C. Foster provides a list of attributes that a fictional character may have if they are a symbolic Christ Figure in their story. The list consists of characteristics such as “very forgiving” and “came to redeem an unworthy world.” In Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s “A Very Old Man with Enormous Wings,” although the Old Man is thought to be an angel by the awe struck people around him, it is possible to claim that he is a Christ Figure. While the Old Man doesn’t turn water into wine, he seems to have something with the odd “miracles” occurring in the town. The Old Man’s ragged appearance is also an attribute that should be accounted for. Foster explains that “he’s dirty and unkempt and bug-ridden,

In the twelfth chapter of Thomas C. Foster’s How to Read Literature Like a Professor, Foster provides various information on how to identify symbols throughout literature. The chapter stressed the individuality of identifying symbols, Foster mentions multiple times that “every reader’s experience of every work is unique, largely because each person will emphasize various elements to different degrees” (110). After learning this and also having read Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer, one thing that stood out was that the main character, Oskar, only has and only wears white clothes. Not only does Oskar often reference his various white clothes, including the white scarf that Grandma knitted

1. In chapter eleven of his book How to Read Literature Like a Professor, Thomas Foster examines violence in literature, and particularly the way violence functions on multiple levels. Foster identifies two different kinds of violence in literature, and discusses how those two different kinds create different literal and literary meanings. By examining Foster's categories of violence in more detail, one can see how violence in literature serves as an important link between the internal events of a story and the story itself.

In “How to Read Literature Like a Professor” by Thomas C. Foster there are three new concepts I took and analyzed at a deeper level when reading “Crime and Punishment” by Fyodor Dostoyevsky. Foster tells us that in stories drownings or deaths that take place in water is serving a purpose whether it is to help the theme development, failure, guilt, or plot complication. In Crime and Punishment after Raskolnikov has committed the murder of his land lady. He begins to have suicidal thoughts of jumping off the bridge into the river. However, this idea does die quickly when a women standing right next to him decides to jump off the bridge. As he sees what has taken place he quickly snaps out of his guilt driven thoughts and the matter never comes up again. The water represents baptism. If ,Rasolnikov would've thrown himself into the river it would symbolize as a baptism to cleanse all his

Think of a work of literature that reflects a fairy tale. Discuss the parallels. How does it create irony or deepen appreciation?

The recognition of patterns makes it much easier to read complicated literature because recognizing patterns will help you relate two or more pieces of literature together, therefore making it easier to understand and analyze the literature you are focused on. Patterns in literature can help the reader understand plots, settings, themes, and other literary elements. I greatly appreciated the novel, Brave New World because of how different the society in the novel was from the one I live in. Using the Signposts from Notice and Note, I was able to see contrast and contradictions that enhanced my understanding of the book. I noticed how I was expecting Bernard, in Brave New World to be just like everybody else in the novel but instead he was a “normal person” that felt normal human emotions, such as the longing for love, that the other characters just did not feel. He also felt isolated and alone. Bernard thinks in a way we were not expecting. Patterns such as this helped me, the reader, to better understand literary elements.

Authors tend to get very political in between the lines of their stories. In “How to Read Literature Like a Professor,” by Thomas C. Foster, there is a chapter that discusses about how almost every author gets political with their writing. “Nearly all writing is political on some level.” (“How to Read Literature Like a Professor” 118.) “Animal Farm,” “Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: An American Slave,” and “Nature” are some examples that’ll be used to prove this point.

Chapter 14 is about how almost everything, in some form, is a Christ figure. The chapter gives a list to relate characters to. The list is 1. crucified, wounds in the hands, feet, side, and head 2. in agony 3. self-sacrificing 4. good with children 5.good with loaves, fishes, water, wine 6. thirty-three years of age when last seen 7. employed as a carpenter 8. known to use humble modes of transportation, feet or donkeys preferred 9. believed to have walked on water 10. often portrayed with arms outstretched 11.

In chapter one of “How to Read Literature like a Professor” by Foster, we learn the key elements of a quest. Structurally a quest consists of (a) a quester, (b) a place to go, (c) a stated reason to go there, (d) challenges and trials experienced on the way, and (e) a real reason to go there. According to Foster (pg 3), “The real reason for a quest never involves the stated reason”. The real reason for a quest is self-knowledge, which is why most questers are sheltered, immature, inexperienced, and young. We find this to be true in “Varjak Paw” by S.F Said and Dave McKean. Varjak Paw is a young Mesopotamian dark blue cat who is forced from his home into the streets in order to find a dog to aid him in saving his family. However in literature

A book is like a puzzle, it contains many different pieces to make it into a whole. Thomas Foster, in his book “How to Read Literature Like a Professor, discusses the many aspects to decoding a book. There are many aspects included in the book, including the importance of weather and Foster incorporated lots of content in his book, but the two that stand out are irony and symbolism.

In the skillful novel, "How To Read Literature Like A Professor" by Thomas C. Foster, there is neither a protagonist nor antagonist. As a whole, the novel gives insights on how to pick up signs of symbolism, irony, and many other hidden details that are buried within the words of literature. Foster refers to many classis novels by classic authors to demonstrate the use of logic in writing. The novel is extremely educational, leaving many insightful questions and interpretations to the reader's opinion.

-Flight is freedom. When a character has the ability to fly they are free from the burdens of everyday life.

Foster breaks down the aspects of a journey to describe the quester, the destination, the stated reason, the challenges, and the real reason. The character who embarks on the journey, also known as the quester, has a defined reason to do so, whether it is to obtain an object, save one from the lurking dangers, or acquire life-saving knowledge. Along their way to reach their destination, they may encounter various challenges such as a physical barrier, a challenger/defender, or a personal obstacle they must face. Through whatever form it takes, these barriers force the quester to challenge their abilities and beliefs, which ultimately leads to them discovering personal knowledge previously unknown about themselves. Though the quester may have accomplished their stated goal of their journey, they return from their voyage often as a changed person as the real reason for their quest was to gain self-knowledge. After they finish their conquest, the quester realizes that the journey was more important than the destination whether they built upon their relationships with another, conquered a personal fear, or gained new found knowledge about themselves, altering their personality and their identity. Foster believes that every trip is a quest, and the quest is a revelation about one’s

he five aspects of QUEST are a) the quester, b) a place to go, c) the stated reason to go, d) the challenges and trials along the way, and e) the real reason to go. Many literary works follow this pattern, though some vary. The literary work I chose is Arthur Golden’s novel Memoirs of a Geisha. Though the connection to a quest may be harder to find in this novel, it is very much there.