Reception and Reader-Response Theory is critical theory that started in 1960 to early 1980s. The Reader-Response Theory is the main theory and Reception theory is an added version of the primary theory. Reader- Response Theory is the reaction against the formal or what was assumed to be the normal approach to understanding text. Reception literary theory is provoked on the reader’s reception of the text. Through the Reception Theory the reader can interpret the reading based on their cultural, life, and social experience. With this theory it illustrations that reading discloses more about the reader’s personality than the text. When focusing on the meaning of text written by the author you can conclude that the author was given the meaning from their stand point. The reader is not the passive receiver and their interpretations will be based off of their experiences. This theory demonstrated how you can have a single text but have multiple meanings. In literature there are unaltered and changeable values. The unaltered values are the plot, characters, and the setting o...
He too quickly dismisses the idea of reading on your own to find meaning and think critically about a book. For him, Graff states that “It was through exposure to such critical reading and discussion over a period of time that I came to catch the literary bug.” (26) While this may have worked for Graff, not all students will “experience a personal reaction” (27) through the use of critical discussion.
12. Many things in literature can be seen in different ways by different people. Usually there will be no distinct meaning, but places, events, and characters have a specific relationship.
I think that the good novelist tries to provide his reader with vivid depictions of certain crucial and abiding patterns of human existence. This he attempts to do by reducing the chaos of human experience to artistic form. And when successful he provides the reader with a fresh vision of reality. For then through the symbolic action of his characters and plot he enables the reader to share forms of experience not immediately his own. And thus the reader is able to recognize the meaning and value of the presented experience as a whole. (Kostelanetz 10)
Joyce Carol Oates' message of life and transitions is best understood when the reader brings his or her interpretation to meet with the author's intention at a middle ground. This type of literary analysis is known as Reader Response. In Reader-Response, the emphasis is placed on "the idea that various readers respond in various ways, and therefore [the] readers as well as authors 'create' meaning" (Barnet, et. al. 1997). In this story of life passages and crucial events, it is imperative that the reader has a solid response to Oates' efforts in order to fully comprehend the message. Literature is a combined meeting between the intentions of the author and the reaction of the reader.
Therefore, the setting, the characters, mainly the protagonist, the symbolic significance, the assents, the narrative perspectives and levels of meanings are all interrelated.
"Any critical reading of a text will be strengthened by a knowledge of how a text is valued by readers in differing contexts."
Of all the literary critical theories yet discussed, I find reception theory by far the most intelligent and rewarding. After all, where does literature become literature, where does it "happen" so to speak, if not in the mind of the reader? Without the reader, literature is inky blobs on paper. This correlates to Berkeley's solipsistic analogy of a tree falling in the woods. Without a listener does it make a sound? Well, technically, it emanates vibrations, but only an ear will interpret those vibrations as sound. Thus with literature. The mind of the reader, operating on the text with it's various literary and extra-textual codes, makes it literature.
In conclusion, it is hard to grasp the true meaning of the story unless the story is read a second time because of the author's style of writing.
One of the constants in life is that there is always meaning. Without meaning, mankind struggles to set itself apart from the beasts, it loses it’s way, and so it creates meaning in every aspect of it’s existence. Whether it’s as momentous as leading a nation, or as simple as a kind word to a friend, man always trusts that there is a reason for it’s actions, that there’s a purpose behind their gestures, and that fuels their drive to live. One of mankind’s proudest achievements, literature, is simply a reflection of it’s world, a massive collection of knowledge and experience that waits to be tapped by both scholars and students alike. Through years of study and analysis, Thomas C. Foster, author of How to Read Literature like a Professor,
generates a complementary model of reading. Once the author becomes a suspicious figure, then the reader’s role needs to alter in response. The reader is invited, required, to become a kind of detective-figure, trying to make sense of the inconsistencies, gaps, and contradictions in the narrative (123).
"Literary Theories: A Sampling of Critical Lenses." microsoft_word_-_literary_theories. N.p., n.d. Web. 27 Nov. 2013. http://www.mpsaz.org/rmhs/staff/rkcupryk/aa_jr/files/microsoft_word_-_literary_theories.pdf.
J. Case Tompkins, Allen Brizee. 2018. Reader-Response Criticism (1960s-present). OWL resource Literary Theory and Schools of Criticism.
The meaning can be different depending on the time it’s read, who reads it, or even the place it’s read. Whether it’s the readers first time reading the narrative, their twentieth time, or they are the author coming back to revisit and edit before finishing the work; each reader when reading a narrative brings his or her own views and understandings to the text. Therefore texts develop intertextuality and can have a new and different meaning for each reader. Intertextuality also causes the meaning taken from a text to change when it is put into contact with other texts the reader has previously read and will eventually encounter. This also causes the texts meaning to constantly change as new texts are encountered. Along with intertextuality, hypertextuality can effect how meaning is found in a text. Hypertextuality refers to any relationship uniting a text to an earlier edition of that text. Because of this intertextuality and hypertextuality, even when an author or creator has finished the work to the best of their abilities, the work will never be “complete” as every new reader will bring a new point of view and ideas of what the meaning of the text truly
One of the best ways to interpret writing is to use the text as a guide. When you use the text as a guide, you are examining the main elements of the story and seeing how they relate to each other to find the meaning and importance of the
Having mastered these skills, readers are viewed as experts who comprehend what they read. Readers are passive recipients of information in the text. Meaning resides in the text and the reader has to reproduce meaning. (Dole et al., 1991)