In 1961 a professor of English sent a letter to the author Flannery O'Connor (an author famous for the grotesque characters who populate her brilliant short stories).
He presents her with a somewhat fantastical interpretation of one of her stories on behalf of the class he was teaching. He receives a simultaneously curt and coruscating response which contains a wonderful line about interpreting literature:
If teachers are in the habit of approaching a story as if it were a research problem for which any answer is believable so long as it is not obvious, then I think students will never learn to enjoy fiction.
You can read the full letter here.
No comments:
Post a Comment