Thomas Foster's How To Read Literature Like A Professor

( Chapter 3) Naked in the warm June sunshine, six or seven hundred little boys and girls were running with shrill yells over the lawns, or playing ball games, or squatting silently in twos and threes among the flowering shrubs. The roses were in bloom, two nightingales soliloquized in the boskage, a cuckoo was just going out of tune among the lime trees.The air was drowsy with the murmur of bees and helicopters (Huxley 30).

1. In chapter eleven of his book How to Read Literature Like a Professor, Thomas Foster examines violence in literature, and particularly the way violence functions on multiple levels. Foster identifies two different kinds of violence in literature, and discusses how those two different kinds create different literal and literary meanings. By examining Foster's categories of violence in more detail, one can see how violence in literature serves as an important link between the internal events of a story and the story itself.

From this chapter, In learned that the truth behind all quests is to find self-knowledge. Most of the time, the people on the quest are young and inexperienced, but by the end of their adventure, they’ve found their niche, and completed their mission. There is always a quester, a place to go, a reason to go, challenges and trials en route, and the real reason to go.

“Sometimes the really scary bloodsuckers are entirely human” (Foster 18). In How To Read Literature Like a Professor, Foster argues that vampires in literature are not always actual vampires, but can be figurative as well: “Using other people to get what we want. Placing our desires above the needs of others...as long as people act toward their fellows in exploitative and selfish ways, the vampire will be” (Foster 22). In essence, Foster illustrates that the act of using others to attain one’s personal goal is analogous to a vampire sucking the blood out of it’s victim. Foer’s protagonist in Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, Oskar, also shows these vampiric tendencies in his goal of learning about his father’s key. “‘Actually, I’m diabetic

In the twelfth chapter of Thomas C. Foster’s How to Read Literature Like a Professor, Foster provides various information on how to identify symbols throughout literature. The chapter stressed the individuality of identifying symbols, Foster mentions multiple times that “every reader’s experience of every work is unique, largely because each person will emphasize various elements to different degrees” (110). After learning this and also having read Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer, one thing that stood out was that the main character, Oskar, only has and only wears white clothes. Not only does Oskar often reference his various white clothes, including the white scarf that Grandma knitted

Foster breaks down the aspects of a journey to describe the quester, the destination, the stated reason, the challenges, and the real reason. The character who embarks on the journey, also known as the quester, has a defined reason to do so, whether it is to obtain an object, save one from the lurking dangers, or acquire life-saving knowledge. Along their way to reach their destination, they may encounter various challenges such as a physical barrier, a challenger/defender, or a personal obstacle they must face. Through whatever form it takes, these barriers force the quester to challenge their abilities and beliefs, which ultimately leads to them discovering personal knowledge previously unknown about themselves. Though the quester may have accomplished their stated goal of their journey, they return from their voyage often as a changed person as the real reason for their quest was to gain self-knowledge. After they finish their conquest, the quester realizes that the journey was more important than the destination whether they built upon their relationships with another, conquered a personal fear, or gained new found knowledge about themselves, altering their personality and their identity. Foster believes that every trip is a quest, and the quest is a revelation about one’s

In the skillful novel, "How To Read Literature Like A Professor" by Thomas C. Foster, there is neither a protagonist nor antagonist. As a whole, the novel gives insights on how to pick up signs of symbolism, irony, and many other hidden details that are buried within the words of literature. Foster refers to many classis novels by classic authors to demonstrate the use of logic in writing. The novel is extremely educational, leaving many insightful questions and interpretations to the reader's opinion.

"Rule your mind or it will rule you..." This quote means to be aware of the value of your mind and don’t lose it to the ambushes of the world. In the novel "Siddhartha" by Herman Hesse, the 3 most influential things that impacted his life are : Leaving home, The Ferryman, Change in character traits. throughout this journey Siddhartha encounters these main thing that cause change in him.

After such a complicated search of Siddhartha trying to truly understand what he was really looking for, we read the quote that unlocks the answers in terms of what Siddhartha longs for all along. All the thirst for knowledge Siddhartha had previously was cloudy, nothing was ever good enough for him, but at the same time, he didn’t fully understand what he actually wanted. Parts of the long journey were beneficial to Siddhartha, but not beneficial to finding his main questions. In Chapter 4, we read that what Siddhartha wanted was the answers to himself. He realized that the reason why he didn’t know what he wanted, or where he wanted to go, was because he simply did not know himself, his strengths, his weaknesses, and his passions. The spontaneous

To begin, much of Siddhartha’s young adult life was spent with the Shramanas in the forest that would teach him their way of life in order to be enlightened. It was Siddhartha’s goal to be completely pure in the mind and essentially become one with the universe. “Siddhartha had a single goal before him… to become empty, empty of thirst, empty of desire, empty of dreams, empty of joy and pain.” (Pg. 13). The

In many acclaimed pieces of literature, the characters and events are not completely fictional. Many elements in the story are based off of authentic people, ideas, and experiences. Using this common technique easilys paints a realistic picture for the reader. This style is often used in Siddhartha, a story about a man’s multi-step journey to find inner peace: a man named Siddhartha decides to leave his home in order to search for Nirvana, and endeavors through many stages in his life, making many new friends and experiences along the way. Throughout the chapters, Siddhartha becomes a gentle Samana with his friend Govinda, a ravenous merchant with his partner Kamala, and a ferryman with his wise companion Vasudeva. Many of the characters and

The characters in a novel can make or break a story. In fact, some of the plot details, symbols, or themes will appear confusing or thoughtless solely if the characters are not properly worked into the novel. However, characters, when well thought-out, can also enhance a work of literature, pushing it beyond the realm of generic plots and simple, noncomplex themes and symbols. In the novel Siddhartha, by Hermann Hesse, the development of Characters such as Siddhartha, Govinda, and Vasudeva help the reader to better understand the central message that the author is trying to portray.

His call to adventure is learning the way of the Brahmin. Siddhartha crosses the threshold when he realizes that the way to Enlightenment wasn’t through the teaching of the Brahmin. Siddhartha knows that he must seek to find his own way to Nirvana. Siddhartha’s tests are going against his father’s wishes, joining the Samanas for 3 years, trying to learn from Buddha, losing Govinda’s companionship, experiencing an awakening in nature, meeting Kamala, learning how to be a merchant from Kamaswami, becoming almost suicidal, switching to a journey of spirit, learning from the ferryman, and dealing with fatherhood. Siddhartha’s helpers are Govinda, Vasudeva, Kamala, and the river.

Every individual’s life is a journey. There are different stages in life that one goes through and by experiencing these different stages of life one becomes wiser. In the novel, Siddhartha and The Alchemist the protagonist Siddhartha and Santiago both go through man different stages in life which made them grow, learn and transform into wiser people. Both protagonists go on a journey which is eventually the same but the purpose of journey is different. Similarly, both protagonist struggles through their journey to become a wiser people. However, the end result for both protagonists was the same which is

The book Siddhartha is told in chronological order. The reader follows him from his wealthy childhood to a time of spiritual and an unworldly journey until he accomplished his goal of peace and understanding. The form is biographical, but it is also a symbol because the characters portray the attributes that their names indicate. Many events that Siddhartha goes through could also be understood as a figurative internal quest. From one chapter to another Siddhartha has also been compared with the tales of well-known heroes. The book is divided into two uneven parts of four chapters in Part One and eight in Part Two. Part one takes Siddhartha from his father's home, through the years with the Samanas and the chance meeting with the Buddha,