HTRLLAP Test

In chapter 19 Foster spends a lot of time discussing the many possible meanings, roles, and implications of geography upon a literary work. He gives one rule (in bold). It says, "When writers send characters south, it's ____

...so they can run amok.

How does Foster define his use of the term "myth"?

A body of story that matters.

What is Foster's main point in chapter 6?

Allusions to humble, familiar texts are as effective as those to the Bible or Shakespeare.

In chapter 20, Foster spends a lot of time explaining how associations readers have with seasons can affect the meaning and impact of a piece of writing. Which season does he spend the most time (and pages) specifically discussing?

Fall

In chapter 15, Foster asserts that when a character flies, it is always heavily symbolic. What does he say flight is symbolic of?

Flight is freedom.

Who does Foster say is to blame for sexuality issues being explored in literary analysis?

Freud

Which of these most closely summarizes Foster's overall main point in chapter 18?

If a writer has a character get wet somehow, it probably means something symbolic.

In this "interlude," Foster asserts that true originality in writing is impossible because, "There's only one story." What idea from an earlier chapter does this "interlude" invoke?

Intertextuality

____ trumps everything.

Irony

In chapter 26, Foster is careful to explain what he means by the statement "irony trumps everything." He says, "Every chapter in this book goes out the window when irony comes in the door." In other words, if a reader detects that a writer is using something ironically, that reader can no longer rely on what he or she knows about conventional symbolism. The reader will have to figure out what is meant by the ironic use, instead. According to Foster, what is the difficulty or problem with this?

Not every reader gets irony; irony doesn't work for everyone.

What psychological phenomenon does Foster suggest was discovered using the same combination of "symbolic mind, pattern observer, and powerful memory" that literary analysis requires?

Oedipal Complex

What is Foster's short and immediate answer to the question posed by the 12th chapter's title?

Of course it is.

In his parting words to the reader, Foster admits that his discussion of symbolism in literature has not been exhaustive. In particular, he laments not getting to a discussion of the potential meanings of fire in literature. But then he concedes that the reader does not NEED him to explore every possible code/symbol/pattern in literature. What is the reason he gives?

Once the reader practices looking for patterns/codes/symbols, it becomes second nature.

Foster offers one last piece of advice: ___ the books you read.

Own

In chapter 9, Foster discusses the implications of weather in literature. He discusses several different types of weather phenomena and their possible implications. Which does he spend most of chapter 9 discussing?

Rain

Which of these is closest to Foster's overall main point in chapter 16?

Sex and sexuality are often not overtly mentioned in literature, but symbolically instead.

Which of these most closely summarizes Foster's main overall point in chapter 17?

Sex scenes in literature are rarely about the actual sex; they are generally about something more profound and symbolic.

What short-short story does Foster use as the basis for the "test case" in chapter 27?

The Garden Party by Katherine Mansfield

According to Foster, why is the heart symbolically important in literature?

The heart is the symbolic repository of emotion.

Foster suggests that there is a "language of reading" made up of a "set of conventions, patterns, codes, and rules that we learn to employ" when analyzing literature. What answer does Foster use to tell students how they can get better at understanding this "language of reading"?

The same way you get to Carnegie Hall. Practice.

What does Foster say is always the "real reason for a quest"?

To achieve self-knowledge

Foster offers these strategies:

Use what you know. & Every work teaches us how to read it as we go along. & You know more than you think you do.

_____ is everywhere in literature. There is no option for us but to accept it and figure out what it means.

Violence

We generally recognize these features that make Christ who he is:

Wounds in the hands, in agony, self-sacrificing, good with children, forgiving & thirty-three years of age, humble, a carpenter, spent time alone in the wilderness

Obviously, Foster's point in chapter 5 is that Shakespeare's works are quoted, copied, and alluded to on a regular and frequent basis in Western literature. Why?

[Shakespeare's] stories are great, the characters compelling, the language fabulous.

In this "interlude," Foster asserts that it is possible to prove that all professional "literary" writers always intend, and indeed pre-plan, the ____ apparent in their works.

connections and allusions

According to Foster, vampirism in literature has to do mostly with...

exploitation

According to Foster, eating scenes in literature are generally the author's way of...

exploring characters and relationships between the characters.

The main argument for chapter 24 is this: don't read with your ____. What [Foster] really means is, don't read only from your own fixed position... 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.

eyes

We want strangeness in our stories, but we want ____ , too.

familiarity

To what modern-day illness does Foster devote a couple of pages near the end of chapter 23?

hiv/aids

Writers tend to be men and women who are ____ in the world around them.

interested

When ____ blindness, sight, darkness, and light are introduced into a story, it is nearly always the case that figurative seeing or blindness at work.

literal

There's no such thing as a wholly _____ work of literature.

original

Characters are not ____.

people

Sex can symbolize...

pleasure, sacrifice, submission, rebellion & resignation, supplication, domination, enlightenment.

Physical markings by their very nature call attention to themselves and signify some ____ point the writer wants to make.

psychological

He [Shakespeare] means something to us as readers in part because he means so much to our _____.

writers