English professors over-emphasize dissecting literature, causing the literature itself to almost eclipse life - or meaning. If every interpretation is valid, what is the point of school, exactly? Could the author possibly have intended to stuff all those conflicting and irrelevant hidden meanings into his or her novel/poem/short story? Doubtful. The literature is dwarfed by what the critics have made it out to be. They pose the question: is literature based on life or do we base our lives on literature? It is a dangerous obsession waiting to engulf the unsuspecting English student.
After all the American literature classes I have taken, I'm beginning to think they are nothing more than a giant multicultural knot of mass confusion, best to be summed up by The Academy Award Winning Movie Trailer. No really, it covers every thematic element of American literature. Period.
Don't ask me how it feels to sum up an entire year of my life in one movie trailer (expletives to follow).
I read this a couple days ago, and I'm still waiting for the expletives.
ReplyDeleteFrankly, I'm fairly sure that the 'any interpretation is valid' idea would annoy the heck out of most of these authors. The whole point of modern literature is to indoctrinate the reader into a new ideology, right? How is that supposed to work when the reader is wandering around, pulling deeper layers and fresh metaphors out of the pages, willy-nilly! Positively sick making. Not to be borne. The dead will rise to put a stop to it. ...and they were pretty morbid when they were alive.
I'd rather just graduate and leave the dead where they're at.
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