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Read Literature Like A Professor Summary

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How to Read Literature Like a Professor ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- A summary for each chapter ---------------------------------------------- 1. Every Trip is a Quest (except when it's not): To be a quest there are five things the story needs to have. a. A quester. To be a quest the story needs to have a person that is the quester. b. A place to go. For the story to have a quest or a trip, the story needs to have a place that the quester is going, a place to go. c. A stated reason to go there. So far there is a quester and a place to go, but why are you going to that place? A stated reason to go there. d. Challenges and trials. There will always be a bump in the road, and every …show more content…

Now, Where Have I Seen Her Before: In this chapter the author talks about how books are never totally original. They overlap. They always use similar traits of the character or they have the same personality. Authors use other authors to guide them with their story. 6. When in Doubt, It's from Shakespeare: Chapter six is all Shakespeare. The author, in this chapter, thinks that all work of stories were somehow influenced by a sonnet or play written by William Shakespeare. Even the most famous stories ever written, were somehow associated with William Shakespeare. 7. Biblical Illusion: The bible is a piece of literature that has been re-written many times, and in the bible there are tremendous amounts of illusions. There are illusions in the bible, but not all of them can be recognized easily, they are not all straight forwards in other words. 8. : Situational Archetypes/Patterns: In this chapter it talks about how all literature comes from other literature. An example of an archetype is children's books, or teenage fiction. 9: Greek Mythology: A myth is described as a traditional or legendary story. Common types of myths, Shakespearian, Biblical, and Folk/ Fairy tale. 10: Setting/ …show more content…

This chapter talks about allegories, an allegory is using different elements to represent different things. All allegories are supposed to be interpreted the same way, where as symbolism can be different to every person. 13: Political Angles: Political writing “can be one-dimensional, simplistic, reductionist, preachy, dull” (110). Political works generally engage the reality of the world and examines humans problems. 14: Archetype/ Christ figures: All literature is influenced by its main cultural religious beliefs. No archetype is an exact match to characters in literary work. 15: Flight: Flight is freedom. Flight symbolism many things such as escape or freedom. Interrupted flight signifies negative. 16: Sex: Female symbols: chalice, Holy Grail, bowls, rolling landscape, empty vessels waiting to be filled, tunnels and images of fertility. Male symbols: blades and tall buildings. Other symbols: locks, keys, stairs, wrestling, trains entering tunnels and waves. 17: Sex isn't sex: Sex in literature is often included to represent something metaphysical. Sex often is included due to the author's freedom. The French Lieutenant's Woman is an example of using sex to demonstrate the characteristics of both characters and setting. 18:

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