How To Read Literature Like A Professor Essay

498 Words2 Pages

How to Read Literature like a Professor Literature has been a widely debated topic throughout centuries all over the world. In addition, reading literature properly is an emulated skill within the English community. Once the trade of understanding literature is mastered, reading become a beautiful experience. How to Read Literature like a Professor is a guide that shortens the pathway through reading and understanding. This meritorious literary selection provokes an aesthetic response because it challenges the reader to remember novels are not original, meaning, and structure. The novel begins with Foster speaking about quests. He points out that there is no difference between the tale of Lancelot and a young boy traveling to the supermarket, they are …show more content…

This section of the novel was powerful because it connected all of literature’s history. Instead of viewing literature as a mass collection of novels, it can now be viewed as one story. By viewing literature as one story “you begin to pick up on some of these other elements, these parallels and analogies, however, you’ll find your understanding of the novel deepens and becomes more meaningful, more complex” (Foster 31). Consequentially, literary works are based on other literary works which solidify their eternal connection. Reading a novel about novels is a hidden pleasure that many people, especially within the English community, indulge in. A novel such as How to Read Literature like a Professor brings joy to the reader because it awakens the senses he or she has become numb to in reading. This novel brings fun and irony back into reading literature and makes the reader remember why literature is important. In the eyes of non-professors, books are just a way to keep records and entertain the few. This is true, however, in reality, books serve the eternal purpose to expand communication between humans and bring