3. 1 Reader response
This literary theory emphasises the part the reader has to play as an active agent in interpreting a text. Thus there is no one fixed meaning to a piece of writing, because reading is viewed as a dynamic process where meaning emerges from a transaction between individual readers and the texts they interact with.
An early proponent of this approach to understanding literature was Louise Rosenblatt (1978) who called into question the formalist theories of the New Critics who were influential from the 1930s – 1950s. These theorists held that meaning lay solely within the text which could be objectively evaluated according to certain criteria formulated by experts such as critics and teachers.
Implications for teachers:
The work of Rosenblatt and later theorists such as Fish, Holland and Iser has important implications for the study of literature in schools. Rather than presiding over a rigidly detached analysis of a text (where the ‘correct’ answers reside with the expert), the teacher can encourage students to express and value their individual responses. This is not to foster a laissez-faire approach, however, since meaning is constrained by what is in the text, and ideas which run counter to those in the original work cannot be supported.
Examples and comment:
Rosenblatt herself says that two prime criteria for the validity of responses are “that the reader’s interpretation not be contradicted by any element of the text, and that nothing be projected for which there is no verbal basis.” (1978, p.115). It would be hard to argue, for example, that Hamlet is primarily concerned with the nature of kingship and the rights of kings, unlike Shakespeare’s plays about the Plantagenet dynasty (Richard 11, Henry IV parts 1 & 2 and Henry V). Nevertheless students can be encouraged to state their own initial reactions and ideas, and to test these against the text and the responses of others.