How To Read Literature Like A Professor

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

A body of story that matters

Foster offers one last piece of advice:

Own the books you read.

"Is That A Symbol?" What is Foster's short and immediate answer to the question posed by this chapter's title?

Of course it is

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

"The Garden Party" by Katherine Mansfield

What is Foster's main point in this chapter? (...Or the Bible)

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

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

Freud

"It's Never Just Heart Disease... And Rarely Just Illness" To what modern-day illness does Foster devote a couple of pages near the end of this chapter?

HIV/AIDS

"If She Comes Up, It's Baptism" Which of these most closely summarizes Foster's overall main point in this chapter?

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

In this chapter, 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

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.

"It's All About Sex..." Which of these is closest to Foster's overall main point in this chapter?

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

"...Except Sex" Which of these most closely summarizes Foster's main overall point in this chapter?

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

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

"It's My Symbol and I'll Cry If I Want To" 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

Obviously, Foster's point in this chapter 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

The main argument for this chapter is this: __________. 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.

don't read with your eyes

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

In this chapter, 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

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

familiarity

When literal blindness, sight, darkness, and light are introduced into a story, it is nearly always the case that...

figurative seeing or blindness at work

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

flight is freedom

Writers tend to be men and women who are.....

interested in the world around them.

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

Characters are not

people

_________ by their very nature call attention to themselves and signify some psychological or thematic point the writer wants to make.

physical markings

Sex can symbolize...

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

In this chapter, 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 the chapter discussing?

rain

In this chapter 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

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

the connections and allusions apparent in their works.

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

to achieve self-knowledge

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

violence

There's no such thing as a....

wholly original work of literature

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 (among other things from the list in the text)

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

writers