How To Read Literature Like A Professor

In Thomas Foster’s book, How to Read Literature Like a Professor, it is written that there are five aspects of a quest: “the quester; a place to go; a stated reason to go there; challenges and trials en route; a real reason to go there” (Foster 3). In the book The Poisonwood Bible, the Price family were the questers going to the Congo to bring Christianity to the villagers. During their stay at the Congo, they faced hate, disease, violence, and even the death of Ruth May. Although the whole family was attempting to bring Christianity to the villagers, Nathan Price’s real goal was to baptize all the villagers.

In the sixth chapter of Thomas C. Foster’s How to Read Literature Like a Professor, Foster examines the Bible and its importance throughout stories, poetry and film. The Bible is one of the most commonly known pieces of literature and is even “nonsectarian” in Foster’s eyes (44). Because stories from the Bible are so well known, the Bible is a tremendously easy for authors to reference when constructing a new composition. Especially “prior to sometime in the middle of the twentieth century” writers were “solidly instructed in religion” and could count on the public being very well acquainted with Biblical stories (47). This widespread knowledge of the Bible lead to greater understandings throughout literature, and the recognized allusions helped

Nice To Eat With You: Acts of Communion (Chapter Two) from How to Read Literature Like A Professor expressed that literary communion is always written deliberately to show an act between friends and can be used as a way to bring characters together or to tear them apart. The chapter talked about how everyone shares at least one thing in common, which is death, and how once you recognize that it's smooth sailing. That next to mortality all of our differences are tiny details that play a big factor in how different all of our lives our when compared next to each other.

Memory is the quality that allows the readers to personally connect with a work of art. Relatable works tend to have more of an emotional impact on the reader. Symbols are used to connect the tangible to something intangible. Through this connection, readers will associate the aspects of the thing being symbolized to the symbol. For example, if a character is used to symbolize the devil in a work of art, the audience will associate the aspects of the devil to the character. Patterns allow readers to parallel one work of art to another work of art.

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.

Life of Pi, written by Yann Martel, is a novel about a young boy, Pi, trapped with a 450-pound Bengal tiger named Richard Parker who survive together in the Pacific Ocean for 227 days. The central theme of the novel is Pi’s faith in God, which proves to be a crucial part of his survival during the extreme situation. In the book, How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas Foster, the author talks about the importance of literary elements such as symbols, geography, and stories to a literary piece. These elements are used in Life of Pi to develop its compelling story about growing up.

Literature is affected by memory, symbols, and patterns though the connections made between the reader and the novels. By understanding the symbols and patterns of a novel, the reader can better connect to the story being told. In The Great Gatsby, Jay Gatsby is obsessed with looking at a green light. Realizing that the green light symbolizes Gatsby’s longing for Daisy, the reader can better acknowledge the greater theme of the story. Symbols and patterns provide better interpretation of a story to the reader.

There has to be a compelling reason to include a meal scene in the story because they’re typically boring.

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

In Thomas Foster’s book, “How to Read Literature Like a Professor,” readers learn how to look past the surface of a literary work to find a deeper or hidden meaning. Writers use devices, such as symbolism, imagery, foreshadowing, irony and allusion to reveal these meanings. If these are overlooked, important aspects of the story can be lost. One literary device that Foster emphasizes in his book is allusion. Every story has elements of another story, and Foster devotes Chapters Four through Seven explaining the meaning of allusion in works by Shakespeare, the Bible, and fairy tales.

How do memory, symbol, and pattern affect the reading of literature? How does the recognition of patterns make it easier to read complicated literature? Discuss a time when your appreciation of a literary work was enhanced by understanding symbol or pattern.

Every character that travels down a path, that encounters obstacles on their journey, that makes sacrificial decisions faces each of these components as they undertake a life-altering quest. Often times the hero ventures out to save someone or solve a problem, but in fact, their true journey is a search for self-knowledge. Through every obstacle and road-block along the way, the character discovers more about themselves and their true identity. Though they may have journeyed across great lands to accomplish their mission, the thing they were searching for was inside of them all along; the journey and challenges only helped to reveal their real character. As explained in Thomas C. Foster’s literary criticism, How to Read Literature Like a Professor,

Memory affects the reading of literature because it allows you make connections and will assist in recognize patterns in the novel. Patterns, in turn, can reveal hidden meanings in the text, for instance, if something is mentioned repeatedly through out the novel that is a large clue that it is of extreme importance to completely comprehending the piece of literature. Symbols reveal to you what text can 't and guide you to a more complex and complete understanding of the underlying point the author is trying to make.

In the beginning, Katniss is living the hard life of her district. She goes to school and hunts so that her family has food. She has a younger sister named Prim and a mother, however it is time for the reaping which is when the Capitol picks names out of a bucket for one boy and one girl from each of the 12 districts to participate in the Hunger Games, a fight to the death tournament where the winner gets fame and fortune. Prim gets chosen to participate in the games, but Katniss volunteers to take her place(22). A boy from their district named Peeta also gets chosen and Katniss realizes that he had given her bread when she didn’t have food for her family. They go to the Capitol and meet their mentor, Haymitch(56), who helps them train, then they go into the arena and battle. Peeta joins up with some Careers, children that trained for the Hunger Games all their lives, and tries to win but then he betrays them. The Gamemakers make a rule change and say that two tributes from the same district can win together so Katniss finds Peeta and helps him because he has been injured. After they are the only two people left the Gamemakers change the rule back to force Katniss and Peeta to fight each other, rather than fight, Katniss takes some poisonous berries, called Nightlock, she found in the arena and gives half of

The Hunger Games are literally a fight to the death in which each of the 12 districts sends too tributes, one male and one female. Being entered into the Games means either fortune and fame or unavoidable death. Katniss Everdeen volunteered for her little sister Prim when she got chosen. And the male tribute was Peeta Mellark, for district 12. Katniss knew Petta when he trew a piece of bread to her when it was raining.