Wrapping It Up (Ch 7)

The last chapter of the book I felt like really should have been towards the beginning. It's like after you read the whole book asking, just give me a simple definition! I feel like I'm going crazy! The last chapter says, there is no simple definition. In fact Semiotics is such a broad subject that no one can really agree much on anything about it. The only definition is the study of signs. What signs is up to the persons field who is studying it. This chapter explains that regardless the field all signs should be studied, and understood. Once a person learns what codes are getting thrown at them they do not fall for things that the average decoder will. If a person realizes that everything is a code, they are able to decode consciously, unlike most of the population who does all of their decoding unconsciously. At the end of the chapter Chandler states "There is no escape from signs (219)." We must live with them, so we should learn about them.

At the beginning of this book I was worried. I really didn't like semiotics because I didn't get it. It just seemed dense and somewhat useless. Now that I've finished the book though, I'm realizing the importance and enjoyment of knowing about signs, and that regardless of the subject of them they are all important.

Sucking Them In (Ch 6)

I know we didn't have to complete the rest of the chapters with our blogs, but I'm using this as a good way to review the last two chapters I read.
I never thought about how important it is to make people understand codes. It seems that so many of the codes are taught at such a young age that you don't have to worry about making sure things are getting decoded properly. This chapter shows the great depths one takes to have their work decoded. Any writer must know about points of view and how they work, or how they can help your story along. This gives the reader clues to how the work should be read and what tone it should be read in. But I never thought about how TV has to use basically one point of view, and yet they have to try and portray everything like a book does. People know that movies aren't real and that's why it is sometimes disconcerting when a fictional character from a show looks into the camera lens and directs the conversation to you. As a viewer, you know it's not right. Some movies allow a camera to actually be a character such as "District 9". By making it look like a documentary at first, so as a viewer you accept the personal contact.
The other part I liked was the idea of genres and how they are meant to help the reader know exactly what they're getting themselves into. If you pick up a western, or a fantasy that's what your expecting to get. You get what you see is the motto of genre fiction, no surprises.
The most interesting part in this whole chapter I felt like was the last paragraph and the whole idea that life imitates art, and not the other way around. At first this doesn't make much since, but then you realize how true it is. Look throughout history, the things that were once sci-fi are now coming to be, and often times it seems that it is the fiction that inspires the reality.

AHA!!!! (Ch5)

I get it! YES! I feel like I just took several steps forward with this whole Semiotics thing! I even enjoyed reading this chapter as well.
The part I enjoyed reading the most was the Social Codes part. I never thought about how codes actually help form our identity. There are so many codes that we learn how to follow at such a young age that we don't remember not following them. Even just the way we look at people, or don't look at them is learned. It just amazes me, although it does make sense.
The other part I thought was interesting is the part on invisible editing. There's a part that says "Having internalized such codes at a very young age we then cease to be conscious of their existence. Once we know the code, decoding it is almost automatic and the code retreats to invisibility." (167). I have a friend who is a teacher, and she was telling me a few weeks ago that school councilors are having a difficulty with this very thing. She was saying that there are some kids who have grown up with so much t.v. and video games that they cannot distinguish reality from them. If asked what they did, they would list both what they physically did, and what the character they were either controlling or watching did, but in first person and explaining it as though they had done the actions themselves. They can't tell the differences between the editing codes of audio-visual media and reality. So the question is how can someone (especially a child) be taught the differences between reality codes and t.v. codes when they cannot tell the differences between them. Maybe this isn't a job for councilors maybe it's a job for those who study semiotics.

Literally? (Ch 4)

I thought I was understanding things pretty good on the last chapter. I could tell mostly what they were saying, could come up with my own opinions, but this chapter I feel like I slid backwards.
I understand the first part about the four tropes and how sometimes signifiers stand for other signifieds. When reading this chapter again I have this awe for the human mind, and how at a young age we learn to understand and use all of the four tropes. Most people don't even know the name of these tropes and yet they understand and use them everyday. Honestly I couldn't have named them myself until I read them, metaphor and irony are pretty common knowledge, but metonymy and synecdoche are less commonly known.
The part I really didn't get was the denotation and connotation section. The definitions made sense, the idea that denotation deals with the lieteral and connotation deals with the social or personal side of things. What I don't understand is how these are used with semiotics. It felt like I was reading rammbling rather than a simple explanation. I got lost in the words in the end of the chapter, and am still confused with how to properly label things that are denotations and connotations.

My Brain Hurts (Ch 3)

This chapter was long to say the least, there was so much information in it that by the time I got to the end I had forgotten how the chapter started. Most of these structures seemed pretty useless when looking at literature, although there were a few that could help with studying.
First I'll got through the ones that made sense to me in the literature world. The ones that worked with the idea of narrative themselves seemed helpful. Figuring out the mode of narrative or the repetitive structures of the work would be helpful while studying large groups of works. The use of unmarked and marked could also be helpful when studying texts, especially when used with theories such as gender studies.
I found no usefulness in The Semiotic Square. The examples made sense in the book, the idea that just because something is not black doesn't mean it's white, but where do we go from there? The idea of how to use this with literature doesn't make sense to me. Frederic Jameson's idea is for the analyst to "begin by provisionally listing all the entities to be coordinated and that even apparently marginal entities should be on the initial list." (Chandler 120). So after you list all of these entities, and place them into the square, then what? How does this help you understand the text more? Knowing something isn't something else only helps you along so far, so after the initial gathering of information what do you do with it? This just seems extremely time consuming with little reward to me.
The other structure that doesn't seem as helpful is the Horizontal and Vertical Axes. It makes sense to me that certain words can be interchangeable, and that sometimes authors purposefully chose one word over the other. That part is obvious, but I know for a fact that authors don't hand pick and examine every word before they use them. So why must the theorist question every single word that the author uses? These would be more helpful with the study of language and words themselves rather than texts or literature.
Throughout this book I keep seeing the reoccurring theme of the lack of something is just as important than the objects that are there. The third chapter is no different, the absent is just as important as the present, the hardest part is sometimes not getting caught up in what is present and being able to spot the things that are absent.

A Word Isn't an Object (Ch 2)

The word isn't the object. This is a weird concept, but a true one. Ever since we are little we are taught to make objects and their names interchangeable. Words make no sense unless they are standing in the place of some grander thing, either an object or an idea. The truth is though that not only are words not just the naming of objects but words are a way to explain things that are abstract. The more I look at semiotics, the more I appreciate the human mind. We can learn so much, and so many concepts that aren't concrete. We are taught at a young age to accept things that we can't see or even understand that well.
One of the main things that is pointed out in this chapter is that basically everything seems to be representing something else. Like the idea of the painting of the pipe and and the words "This is not a pipe" under it. Although the word pipe paints a picture of the object pipe in your head the word doesn't make the thing a pipe. The word is not a pipe but also the painting itself is not a pipe. I still have a hard time wrapping my brain around this idea because for so long I've been taught that really all of these things (the word, the picture, and the object) are interchangeable, granted you can't smoke a picture or a word, but they all have the same connotation although different values. Chapter 2 points out though that this is a mistake. Even if the signifier is realistic it cannot be mistaken for the signified. Only when we separate all of the signifiers from the signifieds can we truly understand the meanings of, well, anything.

It's all a bit arbitrary if I do say so myself (Ch 1)

I was glad to see that this first chapter did explain things a lot better than the introduction, although I was a little disappointed how inconsistent the whole idea of semiotics is. Throughout the chapter it continually reminded the reader of how arbitrary the study of semiotics is, in fact the use of the word arbitrary drove me to distraction at times, they could have at least used some synonyms.
The idea that each sign must have both a signified and a signifier to be a sign makes sense. It's amazing to think that our minds create meaning in everything; we can learn a word and the concept that is behind that word. Only with this knowledge can we speak fluently in a language. The other thing that is amazing to me, is how the signified and signifier have nothing in common with each other except that someone somewhere decided to join those two things together. The tradition of words is the only thing that has created the meanings of our language, so each language has a different way of categorizing itself. That means people have to agree on the meanings and be willing to use them in the right manner. I have witnessed people using words either out of context or that they don't know the meaning. This can create confusion and teach others to use a word in an improper place, or with the wrong meaning. The question is, is it this very thing that creates dual meanings to words? Can someone who creates their own meaning of a known word, if they get enough people to agree with them on their meaning change the language they speak?

The Study of Signs (Intro)

This introduction was dense to say the least. I'm really hoping that the other chapters are more clear and to the point. There seems to be no easy explanation of semiotics. There are as many definitions as there are those who study semiotics. There are also countless signs to study, but all seem to agree that language is important. The hardest thing about language is it's constantly changing, also there are so many different languages.
To use semiotics as a theory of literature one must distinguish signs within the text. Finding meanings and things that represent something greater than what they seem to be is important when reading a text. Not mention it's fun finding hidden meanings that sometimes the author doesn't even realize are there.
Like I said before I'm hoping that with the next chapters everything will become clearer.

A Marxist approach to The Secret Life of Walter Mitty

When I started this assignment I knew right away that I wanted to do James Thurber’s short story The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. I enjoyed the whole idea of this story and how this man is living mainly in his imagination. The problem was what criticism I should use. Like I said before I naturally use Deconstruction, that’s just how I look at things, so I wanted to do something else. So, by going through them I figured out I wanted to do a Marxist analysis.

The Secret Life of Walter Mitty was written in 1941. The Second World War had been going on for two years, and although America did not get involved until December of 1941, Americans as individuals were already getting involved. American society at this time is gearing up for war. America had heroes that had fought in World War I and heroes leaving for World War II. Society is looking for the young, strong, and courageous, and here is where the character Walter Mitty sits. Mitty (in real life) is described as “not a young man any longer” (229) by his wife. His wife is constantly nagging him; everything he does is not good enough for her. He never can seem to do anything right. On the first page Mitty’s wife is telling him he is driving too fast, after he drops his wife off a police officer tells him to drive faster, then when he gets to the garage the parking lot attendant yells at him for almost hitting another car and being a bad driver. In this story it is clear that Walter Mitty is not the strong, able, young man that society is looking for and honoring.
This is the part where it gets interesting, because Walter Mitty is unable to be all these things society is striving for; he recreates himself in his head. Mitty day dreams about being strong, courageous, and needed. Within this five page story he has five separate imaginings. The first he is a commander of a ship, he is fearless and all of his men respect him following his every command. The second he is a surgeon and apparently the only one who can save a millionaire banker who is good friends with President Roosevelt. The third he is a murderer who is knowledgeable about guns and a crack shot. In this dream there is also a “lovely dark-haired girl” (230) who jumps on his lap in the end. The fourth he is an air captain in the military and is flying alone because his copilot is sick, not only is he heroic by flying alone to do this ammunition drop off, but it is also mentioned that he can hold his liquor. Then in the fifth dream he is bravely standing in front of a firing squad ready to die without a blindfold. All of these dreams encompass the strength and masculinity that society holds important, and that Mitty longs for, but cannot grasp.
Walter Mitty cannot ever be happy because he can never be what society, at this time, has prescribed as good, and admirable. The story ends with Mitty waiting for his wife in front of the drugstore, which soon turns to Mitty in front of the firing squad awaiting his death. Mitty will never be the hero he dreams himself to be. Therefore it is easier for Mitty to live in a world that does not exist than in the real world with a society that does not except him.

Got It! Wait... What? (ch11)

Honestly it feels like I've been reading the same thing for the last few chapters. This Cultural Studies isn't any different. It appears to me that in the '50s and '60s a whole bunch of critics wanted to come up with their own theories. So instead of looking at everything together and creating one good strong criticism, they did their own thing and used a lot of each other's ideas. We, as modern day critics, are forced to shuffle through them all and try to figure out the differences rather than the similarities, because the similarities are too many.
Back to Cultural Studies.
So, the first part basically sets up what post colonialism is; the study of culture's that have become the "Other" which is basically anyone who has been colonized by the British. The first part of this chapter forgets to mention that there are many other countries that have colonized and are still colonizing other countries. For example when the British came over to North America the Spanish, French, Scandinavians, Japanese, Chinese, and Russians, were already there. They were already teaching their culture and pushing their beliefs on the Native Americans. Granted yes, some of these cultures would be considered "white" but some of them would not, and they all have different philosophies and cultures. Bressler says that the main concern of Cultural Studies/Post Colonialism is "highlighting the struggle that occurs when one culture is dominated by another"(201). This can be any culture though, and shouldn't be stereotyped down to only the white male can colonize.
Basically what I got out of chapter 11 is this. When reading texts that were written by post colonials one should not judge their culture but learn from it. One must often switch up their approach with each individual text because it's such a broad subject. And like the previous few chapters; one can use pretty much any of the other criticisms to do the task of critiquing these texts.

Jack of All Trades (ch10)

The important thing you have to know about Cultural Poetics is basically you have to know everything. In order to look at a text one must be able to understand the historical context, the author's view point and the social context of a work. In order to be a good Cultural Poet you need to pretty much know a little bit about all of the humanities. The importance of society and how it affects both the authors and the readers is a large part of it. You also need to know about politics of the time and the historical eras.
I like the idea of the anthropology approach, although I am sure it is harder to follow than it sounds. It is true though that every critic puts their own spin or ideals into the texts they read, and so that should be removed in order to have a non bias opinion. This would be hard because when we put ourselves into the text it is then that we can truly connect with the work. I think it would be hard to critic something that I am not connected to.
When reading this chapter a lot of it sounded like the Marxist approach to criticism, especially the importance of society. The thing I've learned about all of these chapters is the links between all of them. Although they may have different major points they highlight there are many parts that are borrowed and used from each other.

Vive Le Revolution!!

It's sad that Karl Marx's solution to the world's problems created the very things he hated, and strives to get away from. When Marx asks the working class to head towards Communism he is asking them to be slaves to society, trapped in their class. Marx never seemed to figure out that rich and powerful people will always find a way to be rich and powerful regardless of political views.
When looking at the Marxism Criticism there's a call to revolution. We must read a text in order to know the bourgeoisie so that we can rally the people against it and towards Communism. It makes sense that texts will show the state of the society the writers are living in. Writing can also show or warn a society where they might be heading. This has been used in many different ways. Works like Fahrenheit 451 show what could happen if books are outlawed if people stop thinking critically, Ray Bradbury shows even people's emotions are affected. New movies are coming out like Gamer, and Surrogate with a clear message of what could happen if we keep pushing technology to its limits. These warn society that this could happen if we don't change our ways soon. But are these written by the bourgeoisie for a purpose to push everyone in the direction they want to go? That's the job of the critics.
The critics have a very heavy load to bear. They must read texts and figure out what exact message the bourgeoisie is saying so that they can tell the working class to do the opposite. My problem with that though is what critics can the working class trust? Would the critics be part of the working class or the bourgeoisie? It seems to me that most likely it would be a more lucrative state to work for society itself and not the lower class.
For me this way of criticism gives more questions than answers. Although it's called Marxism, as critics, we have to leave that side behind (at least I hope no critics are pushing Communism). Basically this form of criticism is looking at a work with all of the author's society in context to the work. What are our texts saying about us and how should we change after we find out the truth.

The Significant Woman (ch8)

I did read the whole of chapter 8 but I did get caught up in the introduction. I am a great fan of fairy tales always have been always will be so this stuck out to me the most. I do agree that fairy tales do tell you that if you are beautiful, young, and strong your happiness will come. The thing I really don't agree with is the whole Feminist look at fairy tales and that the women are brainless and weak. Bressler talks about Cinderella and how Feminists should look at the story on page 144 he states: "In sum, they must reject the idea that women (like the traditional Cinderella) are mindless, weepy, passive, helpless creatures who must wait for a man to come and make their lives meaningful." The problem with this statement is it's not true. The prince, granted, does take Cinderella out of the bad situation but he doesn't even know she exists until she comes to the ball. The true savior of the story is the Fairy Godmother (who is a woman) without her, Cinderella would be still stuck at home.
Rumpelstiltskin is another example of a strong woman. It is the girl who is cunning enough to both agree to ask for help from Rumpelstiltskin and to find out his name to save her child. Rapunzel, she is the one who has to find the Prince in the end and she saves his eyes with her tears. When looking at Fairy Tales it is always the women who suffer the most but they also use their own strength and love to overcome and persevere.
Granted these women do not have political power but they are not "mindless, weepy, passive, helpless creatures." I could go on and on but I'll stop with these three examples.
Often times in Fairy Tales it is the men who are pawns. Like in Cinderella, the Prince just shows up at the very end to sweep her off her feet. In Rumpelstiltskin the Prince is the object of the girl's desire and what she is striving for. In Rapunzel the Witch flicks the Prince off the tower and he falls and goes blind until Rapunzel finds him again.
Not only are the heroines strong women but more often than not the oppressor is a strong woman as well. Fairy Tales are dominated by women and their struggles, they are filled with cunning and smart women. Just because these heroic women in Fairy Tales are selfless, doesn't mean they are weak.

Get Your Mind Out Of The Gutter!! (ch7)

I have never been a fan of Sigmund Freud. I know he made great leaps in Psychology with his ideas of the unconscious but I get sick of reading words like erotic and incest which always seem to come quickly after his name. Like the whole Oedipus story, has Freud never read the end? Doesn't he realize that Oedipus doesn't know he married his own mother, and when he finds out he gouges his eyes out?
Honestly, I believe Psychoanalytic Criticism has done a lot of damage to the old stories. Beowulf has suffered greatly from this form, which is demonstrated in the somewhat new movie Holly Wood did. Grendel's Mother looks nothing like Angelina Jolie, in the poem she is disgusting and needs to be killed not sexually satisfied. This story is a grand tale of heroism and brutal masculinity not sexuality. When all you are looking for is sex you will find it, but you can also lose track of everything else the story is saying.
I did like the part in the chapter when it talks about characters and how the author describes the character and the reader recreates it. Often times just by explaining the personality of a character it gives a physical picture of that person in the minds-eye of the reader. When people can make a book character their own is when a book comes alive. There can only be an attachment between a character and a reader if there is a strong personality and enough left up to the imagination to create someone that is likable to each reader.

"I do no think that word means what you think it means"

When reading this chapter I kept thinking of "Princes Bride" and the line Inigo Montoya says, hence the tittle of this blog.
The first part of this chapter felt like Bressler was saying a whole bunch of things and yet he didn't even know what he was talking about. I will give an example. On page 107 when he is talking about Derrida changing the way one looks at binary operations he says "Such a reversal is possible because truth is ever elusive, for we can always de-center the center if any be found." If that's not someone just trying to sound smart I don't know what is. Frankly I was worried that this chapter was going to be a repeat of the confusion I felt in the last chapter especially since there were a few pages that were taken straight from chapter 5.
Thankfully, in the last few pages of this chapter Bressler actually goes into what it takes to do a Deconstructional analysis of a text. I realized that I tend to read with a deconstruction point of view. I like to find new ways of looking at texts and Deconstruction allows a reader to come up with new ways of looking at a text that has been read and re-read.
Deconstruction is fun because it puts so much emphasis on the reader. It can become like a game finding new meanings by putting importance on things that the writer hasn't stressed.

Words! Words! Words! (ch5)

I'm not going to lie, I was lost at least 3/4 of the time in chapter 5. I could comprehend the words but not what each sentence as a whole was saying.
This is what I got from it though.
Structuralism.
It's not what the text is saying but how it is being said. What a reader should be studying is more of the word choice of the author and less of the meaning behind those words. The reader has to know both the definition of words and also the idioms of phrases in order to understand a text thoroughly. A native speaker doesn't usually have to think and cipher out the meanings of idioms because they are such a part of culture. I can also see that when using a structuralist approach to reading one has to look at the text within the context of the whole genre that it is in. Basically the purpose of reading is breaking the text's code and only when that code is broken can one find the true meaning.
Structuralists are interested in why and how people create symbols in literature; such as darkness equaling evil, or light equalling good, and where these ideas come from. Structuralists are interested in where words come from more than the art of the text itself.
That is all I could glean from this chapter. Please correct me if I'm wrong and I hope you both can shed some light on the chapter for me with your blogs. :)

Beware of those who read horror, they just might kill you... (ch4)

We all know that texts can impact a reader, but how much do readers impact the text? It makes sense that authors are writing for a specific audience, and it is often obvious to the reader when they are not the intended audience for a work. When a reader doesn't understand the signs and symbols in a work it just becomes confusing and tiresome, but often one can create their own meaning within a work although it doesn't necessarily agree with already established ideas.
The best thing I have learned from taking so many lit. classes and reading so much different theory is that you don't necessarily have to be the perfect audience for a text in order to find the art in it.
The problem with interpreting text is the idea that every reader has their own interpretation and often times that interpretation can be proved within the text. Often times there is no concrete answers and if the author never cares to explain it, us as readers are in the dark. I have a personal experience with this, I wrote a paper showing that the narrator of Edgar Allen Poe's short story "A Tell-Tale Heart" is a woman, I could back it up with different points in the text, yet this character cannot be proven concretely as either male or female. It is simple to create a theory with a text and often times it can be proven within that text, although it is up to each individual to agree with this theory.
Another example is Don McLean's song "American Pie" tons of critics have tried to explain what the song means but when McLean was asked, he refused to tell them the meaning because he liked hearing everybody else's interpretations.
Readers will always add their own ideas into a text and like David Bleich believed these interpretations and ideas are challenged by ones own peers and if the idea passes the test then they will be accepted as truth, and if they are not accepted it's back to the drawing board for the reader.

New Criticism (Ch 3)

The idea of New Criticism at the base line seems like a dream come true for students. You just have to read the text and nothing else, no studying history, and biographies, all you need is a good dictionary (or Internet access) and your set.
The question is, can you come to the right interpretation of a text without knowing its historical context or anything about the author. I think you can find relevance in a piece without knowing about the author or histroy. You don't need to be a Shakespeare expert to see the importants of works like Hamlet and how it deals with the struggles of human nature.
How many people though can actually be good New Critics. If you know about these theories and criticisms, most likely, you know about the works you are reading about, and the time periods these people were writing in. The question comes back to the "innocent reader" you can find meaning within works you know nothing about the history or the author, but how many critcs know nothing, and how can you forget about the details you do know when looking at a text?
I have read works that I know nothing about the context it is written in, and have come up with meanings and felt their power. I found though that often when I do find out more about what the author was going through at the time the text was written it adds more meaning and understanding to the work.

So 'n' So Begot So 'n' So Begot... (ch 2)

When I read the second chapter of Charles Bressler's book I couldn't help but feel like I was reading a family history of theory. Plato, who is, lets face it the father of a lot of things, starts us off with this idea that poetry must be the ideal. I can't help but wonder what it would be like to live in a place where poetry is helping to form the lives people. They must have been doing a pretty good job with it too, if Plato wanted all poetry to be honorable and good. It would be interesting to know how much our own lives are shaped by art,(of any medium)and how much we are unaware of it.
Just like families, Aristotle comes around and has his own ideas. He feels like poetry doesn't have to be about history at all, but should be more about human nature in general. He believed this is where the truth lies not in history but in what could have been. Throughout this chapter you see how these men built their own ideas on each other's theories. Horace believed that good poetry was imitation. Longinus by reading the others figured out how to spot a "classic", and the idea that we can be moved by a literary work. Dante wanted to bring this high art down to the level of the people and fill it with symbols. Sidney takes Aristotle's idea and makes it his own pushing harder that poetry IS truth, not just a way to get closer to it. Dryden brings back the idea of imitation. Pope came along and brought his ideas of how to criticize poetry. Wordsworth takes Dante's idea and makes poetry even more for the average person by using everyday language. The list keeps going on.
The one thing that is very clear is how you must know the ideas in order to create your own. Bressler in Chapter 1 said we bring every experience with us when we read. When we read we gain experience, and that is how literary criticism was created by knowing what was created before and seeing the patterns. When reading about these men in literary history there is always the thread of the importance of poetry. So many believed that poetry is the greatest of the creations of the human race. Arnold said that it is poetry that keeps things held together and makes the world understandable.
Like life in general you must know your past before you can move on to new things. We must know what our literary ancestors said, before we can come up with our own way of criticism.

The Joys of Reading

When I first started reading the first chapter of Charles Bressler's book Literary Criticism, honestly I was worried. The first two pages were on what people say in lit class, this was nothing new to me. I have been witnessing opposing views of students for the past 5 years and often times came up with my own arguments. I figured if Bressler is spending this much time on this, what else will he explain thoroughly. The first chapter though was a great reminder of what literary criticism and theory is all about. When reading we must interact with the text, ask questions, and become involved. Our own personal beliefs play a big part in how we take in a text and understand its meaning. Bressler also explains how the already established theories, and criticisms help us as readers define what we have read. The main theories are a good way to articulate ideas, but they shouldn't stifle the creativity of the reader. When reading a text there is room to interpret, there is room to place our own views within it, that is why it touches and moves us. The interesting and fun thing about reading is the opposing opinions that can be brought up when a group of people read the same story. Each reader connects to the story in a different way because of the filters their own experiences have created. We cannot help but bring our own world views and philosophies to everything we read, and there are so many different theories to help us as readers express these views.