How To Read Literature Like A Professor Summary

-As readers we come across many details in literature that hole significance, however the common reader usually misses the deeper

Analysis: Compare chapter 20 :How to Read Literature Like a Professor-“…So Does Season” to part four (chapter 1) of The Fountainhead.

In chapter 5 of Thomas Foster’s How to Read Novels Like a Professor, the concept of a writer's voice is explored. Foster refers to the voice as being in a way the author's identity. The words they choose and the order in which they say them determine how the writer is viewed. Their voice is a part of them and gives a personality that can be seen throughout the novel. It is according to Foster, what makes novels worth reading.

In How to Read Literature Like a Professor, Thomas Foster presents a guide to help readers further understand the novels they read. In chapter one, he claims that every trip is a quest, and every quest has five main components. Each journey consists of a “quester”, or a journeying character that lacks self-knowledge. This character has a desired destination and a stated purpose of going there. Throughout this journey, the character experiences challenges and obstacles, eventually learning something new about him or her self. Thus, we learn that a simple trip has a deeper meaning and purpose.

This Side of Paradise by F. Scott Fitzgerald is an extremely renowned coming of age novel. It portrays life in the roaring 20’s, following the life of a young Amory Blaine. Amory faces obstacles from devastation by wealthy women to fighting in World War I and losing some of his closest friends. Reading How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster emphasized the main ideas throughout Amory’s life. The two main ideas that stood out in Fitzgerald’s book, was the quest taken by Amory Blaine and what Foster calls “baptisms” throughout the story.

In the book “How To Read Literature Like A Professor” by Thomas C. Foster, many elements are brought to the reader’s attention. Three of these elements, happen to connect with the novel, “the curious incident of the dog in the night-time” written by Mark Haddon.

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.

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.

How to Read Literature Like a Professor: A Lively and Entertaining Guide to Reading Between the Lines by Thomas C. Foster is a book that explains there is more to literature than just a few words on a paper or a few pages in a book. Thomas Foster’s book portrays a relatable message to a wide based audience. This book is relatable for two reasons, the way it is written and the examples it uses. The book is written in a conversational manner, as if the reader was in a group discussion about books and writing. As for the examples, they are informative, descriptive, relative, and entertaining.

In Thomas Foster’s How to Read Literature Like a Professor and John Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men, both authors demonstrate the use of violence between characters in multiple ways. In Chapter 12 of How to Read Literature Like a Professor, Foster describes two different ways that violence is used in literature, both of which can be found in Steinbeck’s Of Mice and Men. In addition, both books also explore how each type of violence has a different effect on the plot and the characters. These two books are related because of their exploration of a deeper meaning of violence between two or more characters in literature and the different effects each type has.

* Communion is a way of saying, “I’m with you, I like you, and we form a community together.” People would only eat dinner with someone that they are comfortable with. That’s the importance about food. Any meal would represent sharing and peace. But at times, it could be considered a bad thing. An example I can come up with is when Snow White ate the apple a strange looking old woman just decided to give to her.

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.

-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 to Read Literature Like a Professor is a book Thomas C. Foster uses to expose his thoughts and feelings of many literary terms and devices. Such ideas can be found in James Joyce’s short story, “The Dead”.