...The first chapter from How to Read Literature Like a Professor explained how important setting is in a piece of literature. “Geography is setting, but it’s also (or can be) psychology, attitude, finance, industry--anything that place can forge in the people how live there” (174). Some of the readings this week that were impacted greatly by their setting were the Frank X Walker poems. His poems were all about the setting and how different races could be found in Appalachia. His poems would not have held as much power as they did if they were taking place where you expected these races to be. The Appalachian region impacted his life and therefore his writings. “kin tucky beautiful ugly cousin i too am of the hills my folks have corn rowed tobacco...
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...Every Trip Is a Quest (Except When It’s Not) The first chapter Thomas Foster’s of How to Read Literature Like a Professor is about the plot line of a quest. He uses a metaphorical story to show the different parts and pieces to the plot. A few of components include a quester, a place to go, a reason to go there, challenges he/she must face on the road there, and finally the real reason to go there. He also compares a novel, Crying of Lot 49, to the key elements of a quest. Just like the hero’s journey a quest was stemmed from an ancient story and has been readapted for years now and is still used in modern works. The reason quests and hero’s journey work so well is because of the concept of a happy ending and a hero. Readers and watchers...
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...In the ninth chapter of Thomas C. Foster’s How to Read Literature Like a Professor, Foster explores the symbolic and literal significance weather holds in storytelling. Literally speaking, weather has the power to directly affect a character, whether they become soaked from the rain or sweaty from the heat. Symbolically speaking, weather means much more than a few drops of water, or a thermometer reaching one hundred degrees. Overall, Foster discusses three types of weather throughout this chapter: rain, fog and snow. Firstly, rain, “the principal element of spring”, possess transformative qualities and can symbolically cleanse a character (73). Rain, when mixed with a little sunlight can fashion symbolic, “divine promise[s]” and “peace between heaven and earth” (74). These celestial pacts, known as rainbows, are literally very rare, but commonly hard to miss. Symbolically, rainbows represent miracles and are just as important as they are beautiful. Although rain can demonstrate symbolic rebirth, and is capable of creating miraculous rainbows, a downpour can also form mud and induce a character to become...
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...In Thomas C. Foster’s Chapter 11 of How to Read Literature Like a Professor, “...More Than it’s Gonna Hurt You: Concerning Violence,”compares violence in literature to violence in the real world. Violence in literature can mean a lot of things and be a lot of things like “symbolic, thematic, biblical, Shakespearean, Romantic, allegorical, transcendent,” etc. while violence in the real world is exactly as it sounds, aggressive and mean (Foster 95). Joseph Conrad killed off his characters by having them kill each other, but all for absurd reasons. Mr. Jones kills Lena because he has a very strong hatred of women, regarding them as “wriggling vipers” of “horror” (Conrad 64, 65). He also shoots Ricardo, his secretary, because he wants the money that is nonexistent to himself. Wang, Heyst’s servant, kills Pedro, Mr. Jones’ slave,...
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...In the novel “How to Read Literature like a Professor”, Thomas C. Foster begins to expose an entire new way of understanding and analyzing literary works. In chapter thirteen we are explained that most popular writing can be categorized as “political”. Foster goes on to describe his definition of “political writing.” According to him, it is “writing that engages the realities of its world”, in other words, readers are not led to believe something that is not true. This political “factor” is prevalent in Sandra Cisneros’ “The House on Mango Street”, Esperanza comes to terms with the reality of what society is at the time. Cisneros quickly establishes the “societal norm” for not only the time, but also the place. The men of the household were...
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...death on the cross. He has become such a familiar figure that images of him shows up frequently in literature. Thomas Foster, the author of How to Read Literature Like a Professor, outlines a wide range of characteristics common in Christ-like figures. Readers recognize Christ figures consistently in literature, both because of the well-know characteristics Foster lists in his chapter on Christ figures and because readers find them through their own understandings. In Yu...
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...Aslan represents a Christ figure. In How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster, Foster describes a Christ figure as “sacrificing yourself in some way for others” (129). In the movie, Aslan willingly trades his life for Edmund, one of the Pevensie children who betrays his siblings, to appease the White Witch’s claims that Edmund belongs to her because of his traitorous behavior. Aslan’s self-sacrificing actions are similar to those of Jesus Christ whose death was used to atone for all of mankind’s sins. The parallel of their deaths makes Aslan’s altruistic behavior even more sacrificial because it compares his action to the person whose sacrifice is greatly known by most people. Furthermore, Foster explains that as a Christ figure, he should have disciples. Already known by Narnia as the “King of the Woods” or the “Real King of Narnia,” the mere mention of Aslan brings hope to his followers despite him being away for many years. The Pevensie children, well most of them anyway, get baptised. According to the book, Foster describes baptism as “...taking the new believer completely underwater causes him to die out of his...
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...The book “How to Read Literature Like a Professor” by Thomas C. Foster has offered a great to deal of insight to anyone who reads it. He takes the key principles or the foundations to understanding literature, and simplifies them to be understandable to a teenager. He includes many references to pop culture which further entices his readers. The purpose of “How to Read Literature Like a Professor” is to encourage teenagers to take an interest in literature. This book helped me interpret “Araby” written by James Joyce. You can apply the skills from chapter one (Hero’s Journey) to the story “Araby”. The hero’s journey is evident in “Araby” because it helps the reader see the moral of the story, materialistic goals will never fulfill a person, and makes this clear through the stated quest (to buy something from the Araby bazaar), the way the story ends and the slowly revealed true reason of the stated quest....
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...Thomas Foster explains in his novel, How to Read Literature Like a Professor, that symbolism is used by authors to convey multiple messages. One symbol will not be demoted to just one meaning. This is because as authors, they must take into account that they have a wide variety of readers, so they need something that can involve everyone. Take for example, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. In this novel, one of her themes is light. As such a vague topic, it can be interpreted many different ways. Light is the thing that allows one to see and find their way. Light is seen as heavenly. Light is seen as a good quality. All possible and valid topics. Shelley decided to use the opposite of light, to make the light more visible. "It was on a dreary night...
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...Thomas C. Foster’s How to Read Literature Like a Professor is the perfect handbook to help students understand literature. It is meant to help you see past the story and into what the story means. It also helps in understanding what different symbols stand for and finding common themes and patterns across different works of literature. One of the most helpful ideas in his book is “Every trip is a Quest (Except when it’s Not)”. This chapter focuses on how to recognize when a character goes on a quest and what a quest actually consists of. One of the most important rules of a quest is that whatever reason the character says they are going on a quest for, is never actually what ends up happening and “the real reason for a quest is always self-knowledge” (Foster, 3). The reason “questers” are usually so young and naïve is because the whole point of the quest is to become wiser and more mature. A second note-worthy idea from Fosters book is “Don’t Read with Your Eyes” (Foster 232). What he means by this...
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..."Fiction reveals truths that reality obscures,” as quoted by Ralph Waldo Emerson. In Thomas C. Foster's How to Read Literature Like a Professor, Foster gives insight to the reader about how there is always more to a story than meets the eye. Foster covers an abundance of topics for instance, how some pieces of literature have in depth political apprehension. Foster distinguishes between overtly political writing which includes literature whose main intent is to influence the prevailing political ideology and “political” writing that is more subtle and possibly more effective. Political writing offers a perspective into the realities of the world and in doing so touches upon themes and problems that are collectively shared and thus relatable. In Park Tae Jun’s Lookism, a webcomic, regarding a teenage boy by the name of Hyung Suk who has repeatedly been the victim of bullying because of his appearance at his old school finally comes to his breaking point. Hyung Suk later convinces his mother to buy him a bus ticket to a new school somewhere in Korea for...
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...reader? Then I suggest that you read the book called How to Read Literature Like a Professor(Foster). How to Read Literature Like a Professor breaks down the important skills of analyzing texts that you read. How to Read Literature Like a Professor helps struggling readers to understand what they are reading about. The main idea in “chapter 4” of How to Read Literature Like a Professor is about how “there is no such thing as a wholly work of literature”(Foster 24). This means that one book will always be similar to another book. An example is, Beatrice and how she rebels in Divergent. In the book the Hunger Games, Katniss did the same thing. This chapter can better help us to understand and analyze the deeper meanings of literature, because it helps me to think beyond what is going on in the book or books that I am reading. This main idea in “chapter 4” applies to Divergent because books tell similar stories. I understand the deeper meaning because every book will always tie into another one. So if I am having trouble reading a book, I will try and find a similar book that is easier to read. The main idea in “chapter 11” of How to Read Literature Like a Professor is a about “violence in literature, though, while it is literal, is usually also something else”(Foster 95). This means that violence is everywhere literature and has different meanings. An example that I had noticed was that, how the dauntless kill innocent people in Divergent and how in the Hunger Games you have...
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...The first element that I compared from How To Read Literature Like a Professor for Kids found in Victoria Aveyard’s Red Queen, is Chapter 11, “Is That a Symbol ?”. The narrator explains how Gisa and Mare have earrings that represent their brothers fighting for them. Readers can clearly see that the earrings are the only symbol they have of their brothers. From Fosters How To Read Literature Like a Professor for Kids, we can identify that this action is a sign and a character that has a story. With Foster's element of symbolism, there is always a tale and every symbol stands for something. In the Red Queen, the two sisters reveal the symbols they held and that “now Gisa and I have one ear each set with three tiny stones to remind us of our brothers...
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...“A” The Scarlet Letter is a prime example of how people interpret things differently based on personal experiences and mind sets. As Thomas Foster, discussed in chapter 12 of How to Read Literature Like a Professor, symbols don’t have a set clarification and can represent different things for different people. Throughout The Scarlet Letter, various characters goes through experiences that allow them to look at things differently than the rest of the town and therefore, changes their whole outlook on life. This is shown from the beginning of The Scarlet Letter with the embroidered “A” on Hester Prynne’s chest. The town folks view this symbol as a mark of shame, having grown up puritan, and lacking sympathy since they have never personally...
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...In the book How To Read Literature Like a Professor, the author interprets communion in an unlikely manner. He states, “…whenever people eat or drink together, it’s communion.”(Foster 8). That means even if you’re eating as a family or with a group of people, you’re all taking place in communion. One generally thinks communion is a practice that takes place only in churches. In the book The Things They Carried, O’Brien writes about communion as Foster defines. In one instance, they were sitting around in the hot sun and they were all taking salt tabs just to stay alive (O'Brien 185). O'Brien also says, "Late in the afternoon, just before dusk, Kiowa came up and asked if he could sit at my foxhole for a minute. He offered me a Christmas cookie...
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