Reader-Response Criticism
Readers Response criticism is hilarious. I love it. Sign me up. I had previously thought that Reader's Response criticism was a kind of barely academic free-for-all, where any response is as valid as any other regardless of academic merit. And I was right, but only sort of. Bad Reader's Response is kind of like that. Good Reader's Response has back up plans that make certain that any old yahoo can't read Hamlet and throw out something about the importance of sherbet in American culture, and expect to have it taken seriously. (No offense to sherbet lovers. I know how important it is. Please stop writing to me about it.)
Most reader-response theorists, and indeed , most literary critics, would point and laugh at someone who would submit a sherbet flavored reading of Hamlet, as they should, because the very idea is ludicrous. (I can't believe you won't drop this sherbet thing.) There are, however, some theories within the realm of reader-response criticism, that don't acknowledge any reading to be deficient or even silly. Before we all rush willy-nilly to this nonjudging paradise, know this: after we kick out our meaningless response, we're expected to analyze it. And that analysis is judged. So we won't be made fun of because of the sherbet thing, but rather our defense of the sherbet thing. It's a cruel world. There's no such thing as a free ride. Feel free to insert any other fitting cliche here.
Short History Lesson:
In the forties and fifties and even some of the sixties, the most popular form of literary criticism was called new criticism. Because of it, people started reading the text closely to support their claims. This is good. It also replaced the biographical style of lit crit, which dominated the early part of the century. In effect, it killed authorial intent (If you hear literary types referring to "The Death of the Author," unless they're talking about a specific author, this is most likely what they're talking about). New criticism claimed that there was one best analysis of a text. A text is timeless, cried the new critics. The text is what matters. It doesn't matter what was the intent upon creation. Nor does it matter what is the response upon reading the text, for the reader can bring to the text preconceptions, psychological predispositions or even just a bad attitude. These are not important. The TEXT is important. This, according to the reader-response crowd, is not so good. But it's no good arguing with the new critics. They're mostly dead. It's unclear if they died with their theory, or if foul play was a factor. The authorities are looking into it.
Here ends the history lesson.
Reader-response theorists believe that the reader and the process of reading a given text cannot be separated from an analysis of a text. They also believe that a text does not contain a meaning which is given to the reader; rather the reader creates the meaning of a piece of literature as it is read. It's a good thing that the new critics are nearly extinct, else there would be huge rumbles in the halls of academia that would rival anything the Bloods and Crips have produced.
Within the area of reader-response criticism there are several dominating theories. They agree about the main things, like readers being the most important part about creating meaning in literature, but they go about thinking about things in different ways. So let's go over the main camps.
Transactional
The text exists! The reader exists! The reader is stimulated by the text and reacts and responds to the text. Those reactions and personal responses shape how the rest of the text is read. The transactional theory hangs on to the text and introduces the reader into the equation. In doing this, it attempts to slightly correct new criticism, instead of roughing it up and throwing it out in the street.
Affective Stylistics
The text doesn't exist. It only becomes something when it is read. Literary text is an instance, not a thing. Affective stylisticians read the text very closely, even moreso than most new critics used to, and invariably find, by what the text does to us, how the text is about the experience of reading. They'll look at what Tom Sawyer does to them, and to others, and show what kind of reading experience the text is about. Affective stylistics gives me a headache.
Subjective
The text exists, but only in your mind. When we read a story, it exists inside our mind, and when we analyse a text, we do not analyse the text in the book, but the text in our brains. All knowledge is subjective; nothing is absolute. Knowledge is produced by groups of people who decide to believe the same thing. (Ever seen "In the Mouth of Madness?" It's kind of like that, only more scary and with a higher production value.)
Conclusion
One of the classier things reader-response criticism pulls off is its claim that every analysis of a text is a reader-response analysis. Whether you're a marxist or a feminist, or a deconstructionist, you are also a reader-response critic. The reader creates the meaning of a text. If the meaning you created has a marxist or feminist angle, congratulations, that's just fine with us. It's like a big party that everyone's at whether they want to be there or not. So have a piece of cake and enjoy yourself. And no, you don't have to talk to the deconstructionist. He creeps everybody out.
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12.29.2003