![]() Constantly, the reader is actively reading any work of literature in an attempt to extract the meaning from the text he/she does not passively absorb the meaning presented to them. She explained that a poem cannot be fully understood apart from its psychological effects on the individuals since “the meaning has no effective existence outside of its realization in the mind of a reader.” The extent to which the reader plays a role in interpreting the literary meanings of the text, the attitudes of the authors towards their readers, and the status of the reader concerning the reading process are all questions that come to mind when discussing the reader’s response theory.ĭifferent readers may read the same text very differently. Jane Tomkins wrote about the Reader’s Response criticism in her book Reader-response criticism: from formalism to post-structuralism. This is one of the basic beliefs of the Reader’s Response theory, which acknowledges that the role of the reader cannot be disregarded from our understanding of any literary work, and stresses the importance of the individual reader’s subjective interpretation of the text. There exists a complimentary role between the text and the reader and the relationship that arises between them. In this paper, I will present the book The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks written by Rebecca Skloot as an illustration that “the meaning comes into existence not when the text is written, but when it is read and responded to.” ![]() I have to disagree with the scholars mentioned above and disregard the idea that only the text is the “primary focus” of literature. Since the first book we read in “Facing the Fact: An Exploration of Non-fictional Prose” class, from our conversations and discussions, postings we have made and questions we have put forward, I have come to realize that the reader has a big role in giving meaning to the text. ![]() The reading process as a whole was also examined, and scholars such as Stanley Fish, Wayne Booth, and Louise Rosenblatt dismissed the idea that the reader’s response was relevant in interpreting the meaning of a text, and thus only the text is the primary focus of any literary work. The prevalent idea was the importance of the text, and the text only in creating meaning. ![]() The relationship between the reader and the text has been studied by many scholars since the 1930s. The reality of the work of literature is not governed by the external world, the text, but it greatly depends on the mental perception of the externals, in this case, the readers. The reader is a necessary third party in the relationship that constitutes any literary work. The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks in the light of the Reader's Response Theory ![]()
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