Hey guys, It’s your friendly nugget here. Kaelyn is out today, so I will be talking on her behalf about a book that she was reading the other day while enjoying a nice nugget meal. The book is called How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster. Now, I have to admit, at first I was confused as to why she was reading a book about how to read, but as the book went along I understood how Foster takes a different approach to reading. He is more analytical when he reads whereas Kaelyn reads solely for pleasure, so she never focuses on the symbolical or metaphorical aspects of the text. Early on, Foster claims that the three key elements in the language of reading are memory, symbol, and pattern. Of course this made sense to Kaelyn, but it wasn’t until she kept on reading that she fully understood what Foster meant.

One of the easiest of the three elements to comprehend is pattern. Foster explains it thoroughly in his first chapter, Every Trip is a Quest. He explains how the simple story line of someone going on a mission to a place, ultimately for self-knowledge, is used and re-used all of the time in stories everywhere. This is just one example of patterns within literature. Authors will take a simple story, add their own embellishments, and voila, it’s a “new” story. Or at least a new version. In light of this, Kaelyn learned that it’s important to be able to make connections with the text while reading, which is what makes memory another important elements of literature. But, I think reading for pleasure is much more enjoyable than having to put so much focus into story patterns.

Anyway, the reader must be able to use their own background knowledge to further understand what they are reading. There are a few chapters where Foster describes common archetypes and references that authors use in their writing. One of the most common things that are referenced is the bible and other religious archetypes. The other most common writing to reference is Shakespeare’s because his plays and poems have been studied and taught for centuries. But as times are changing, so is common knowledge. In this day and age, it is becoming more and more rare for people to have the same knowledge about the bible or shakespearean text. These days, it is much easier to elude to stories that every one knows and learned during their childhood. Fairytales. Both Kaelyn and I agreed that finding references to kids stories is much easier than trying to understand ancient references that we barely have knowledge of.

A more difficult concept to grasp is symbolism. Sure, anything can be a symbol, but not every symbol means one specific thing. This is where it gets confusing and you have to use your background knowledge as well as context clues. From what I’ve gathered as Kaelyn read Foster’s book, the best way to recognize symbols is to take an analytical approach to your reading. And that is essentially what the entire book was about. Foster provided an excess of examples to help the reader learn and train themselves to read like a professor. Like anything else in life, learning to read critically takes practice. And, get this! In one of the last chapters Foster gives us the opportunity to practice what we learned from the book. Kaelyn said it was exciting to be able to read past the surface of the text, but I think that having an analytical reading mentality makes reading and comprehension more difficult (after all, I’m only a chicken nugget). Don’t get me wrong, it’s great to fully grasp what you’re reading, but when it’s all said and done, you can never completely be sure of something unless you ask the author.

Works Cited:

Foster, Thomas C. How to Read Literature Like a Professor Revised: A Lively and Entertaining Guide to Reading Between the Lines. 2nd ed., HarperCollins, 2014.

Hello, world! I am Kaelyn Gurrola, your typical nugget enthusiast. I am also a student at Frank L. Madla Early College High School at Palo Alto College. I enjoy binge watching various TV series, having a good laugh, and reading a good book from time to time. I am most interested in music because it is my favorite form of art. I am also an impatient person with a horrible memory who gets bored very fast. My goofiness comes out every now and then, but that’s just me!

This is going to be a literary blog where I come to share my thoughts on various pieces of writing. This blog will be written from the perspective of the many chicken nuggets I eat while reading. So, bear with me these next few months and I will do my best to be as intriguing as possible.

Thanks for joining me!

Can you remember who you were, before the world told you who you should be? — Danielle LaPorte