Being Brilliant in English Introduction to ways of reading

This is a box. This is a text.

The text is a safe … containing specific messages for us. ‘The writer’ locked these precious ideas and meanings in the safe, and ‘we – the reader’ have to know how to unlock it. When we do, we too can share in the valuables which the writer locked away. If we can’t get the combination right, we can’t get to the riches within. This is the traditional, English-as-exam-subject experience. Do you recognise it as such? You might be able to think of examples of this approach from your experience of studying English.

1. The text is a mirror … revealing you to yourself as you read. The text – poem, prose fiction, article, play script – reveals to you how you see yourself as you imagine the characters and situations within it. As you read and imagine, you play out for yourself different possible identities, approving of some characters and ideas and shunning others. The text helps you shape your values, giving you a way of seeing what your own values are. Not only that, but the writer is revealing her- or himself to you, too. Even though that artist may be long dead, you can still connect with that person, and they with you, through your act of reading what they wrote. This approach is known sometimes as personalism. Or, if we are more suspicious and sceptical, the text can reveal unconscious aspects of the author’s personality to you. This approach, following Sigmund Freud’s theories of the early 20th century (but not limited to them), is known as Freudian or psychoanalytic criticism.

2. The text is a painting …composed of language arranged artfully in order to imitate life processes and make us reflect on these. Like a painter, a writer has learned to use technique to create effects. These literary techniques mimic the experience of being in the world. Like a connoisseur of visual art, we can think about how the writer has shaped words, ideas, narratives to create an impression on us – and then judge how ‘effective’ that artist has been. We focus only on the words and the effect they have on ‘us’ (or don’t have), seeing the text as a framed piece of art, separated from any other cultural, historical or biographical considerations. This approach is known as practical criticism or close reading, and is still influential. Sometimes, because it only deals with going into the text, it is known as intrinsic criticism. Have you experienced this kind of study in English lessons?

3. The text is a window … giving us a view out of the text into the ‘world outside’ it. This is what we mean by context. There are two main modes of context: the context of production and the context of reception. The context of production is – looking out from the text – what we imagine was going on in the world as the text was written, redrafted and published (if published at all). We’ll be seeing the kinds of human relationships, political structures, historical events and material conditions that were possible (and impossible) at the time the writer wrote. We’ll also see a little of the writer’s biography – what we imagine they experienced, thought and imagined. The context of reception is – looking out from the text – what we imagine readers in the writer’s time would ‘get’ from the text; also, importantly, what we see of our world now, looking out from the text. What’s different? What’s similar? What light does the text – written whenever – shed on my world now? And this links us back to our personal response (the text as a mirror).

Being intelligent with the text: 1. Personal response: This text seems to be affecting my emotions. Which one(s)? telling me what to think. What? making me ‘laugh’ or feel ‘aha...’ What is it that I’m recognising? drawing a picture, setting an atmosphere. Questions to guide group / paired and ultimately independent reading.

Being intelligent with the text: 2. Analysis: how has it produced your responses through the writer’s choices around Language diction figurative language sound and rhythm tone and register and structure narrative voice and viewpoint Sentence-, paragraph-, extract-, whole text level Patterns of repetition and/or contrast Questions to guide group / paired and ultimately independent reading.

Being intelligent with the text: 3. Context: Of production Looking out from the text, what in his/her culture and context is the writer describing? Looking out from the text, what do you think the writer is judging? What does s/he seem to be celebrating? And what does s/he seem to be writing against? Of reception Looking out from the text at your world now, to what extent does it still describe a recognisable world? What links can you make between the world of the text and your own world? How do you judge your culture and context from ‘within’ this text? Questions to guide group / paired and ultimately independent reading.

Hermeneutics A daunting word, but that’s what we’re dealing with. Hermeneutics is the study of interpretation. Just as people make tools that are designed to make other tools (machine tools), hermeneutics allows us to interpret methods of interpretation. The next level – more to follow – but this is where we can get critical about our and other readers’ biases. Necessary for A-Level and desirable for IB Level 7. e.g., ‘What biases do you find in your own personal interpretations?’ ‘What elements of style do you find yourself drawn to, and why?’ ‘Which contextual factors do you find the most decisive and important?’ (Gender? Class? Phenomenology?...) And then give them critical material that allows them to follow and develop their bent (feminist, cultural materialist, historicist, reader-response…)