Summary Of How To Read Literature Like A Professor Foster

As a reader has one ever thought about what Fosters key idea is for this chapter “Don’t Read with Your Eyes” well here it is from How To Read Literature Like A Professor Foster emphasizes on “The formula I generally offer is this: don’t read with your eyes. What I really mean is don’t read only from your own fixed position in the Year of Our Lord two thousand and some. Instead try to find a reading perspective that allows for sympathy with the historical moment of the story, that understands the text as having been written against its own social, historical, cultural, and personal background” (234). Foster uses the example of the teacher whose brother is a drug addict from one’s perspective he might be considered a bad person and gross. But

Till now Buck had avoided trouble with his enemy, but this was too much. The beast in him roared. He sprang upon Spitz with a fury which surprised them both, and Spitz particularly, for his whole experience with Buck had gone to teach him that his rival was an unusually timid dog, who managed to hold his own only because of his great weight and size” (London 14). Remember how Foster said to“find a reading perspective that allows for sympathy with the historical moment” (234) so one might want to change their mind on is Spitz being mean. Could he just have been mean because he does not know how to be nice because someone could have been mean and hurt him: “... though he did see beaten dogs that fawned upon the man, and wagged their tails, and licked his hand. Also he saw one dog, that would neither conciliate nor obey, finally killed in the struggle for mastery” (London 6). London is telling the reader that if any of the dogs do anything wrong then they are beaten or even killed so Spitz may not know how he is supposed to act. Or it could be because Spitz has had a hard life because he has gone through many owners, but so have the other dogs so if he is mean then should the other dogs be allowed to act the same way that Spitz does. Is Spitz actually mean or is he not because if one did not read from another perspective than their mind may

Buck stood and looked on, the successful champion, the dominant primordial beast who had made his kill and found it good” (London 21). One’s perspective on Buck should have changed by now because he has gone from being an innocent dog to becoming a dog that kills to get what he wants. Has Buck become the bad guy now and Spitz is the good guy or are they both the same? How did Buck win one might be wondering could Spitz have let him win because early in the chapter Spitz was described as a “... practiced fighter. From Spitzenberg through the Arctic, and across Canada and the Barrens, he had held his own with all manner of the dogs and achieved mastery over them. Bitter rage was his, but never blind rage. In passion to rend and destroy, he never forgot that his enemy was in like passion to rend and destroy. He never rushed till he was prepared to receive a rush; never attacked till he had first defended that attack” (London 20). As one can see Spitz was a very good fighter so may he did let Buck win because Buck was not a fighter he was the type of dog that did stuff with his owners like going hunting and playing with the children. Even though he is described as strong and a hunting dog that does not mean that he has as much experience like Spitz did. The death of Spitz is supposed