Synopses & Reviews
Of all the literary forms, the novel is arguably the most discussed . . . and fretted over. From Miguel de Cervantes's
Don Quixote to the works of Jane Austen, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, and today's masters, the novel has grown with and adapted to changing societies and technologies, mixing tradition and innovation in every age throughout history.
Thomas C. Foster—the sage and scholar who ingeniously led readers through the fascinating symbolic codes of great literature in his first book, How to Read Literature Like a Professor—now examines the grammar of the popular novel. Exploring how authors' choices about structure—point of view, narrative voice, first page, chapter construction, character emblems, and narrative (dis)continuity—create meaning and a special literary language, How to Read Novels Like a Professor shares the keys to this language with readers who want to get more insight, more understanding, and more pleasure from their reading.
Synopsis
How to Read Novels Like a Professor is a lively and entertaining guide to understanding and dissecting novels, making reading more enriching and satisfying. In the follow up to his wildly popular How to Read Literature Like a Professor, Thomas C. Foster provides students with tried-and-true techniques to use in analyzing some of the most important works in literary history. How to Read Novels Like a Professor shows readers how to consider and a novel's historical fine points as well as major themes, literary models (the Bible, Shakespeare, Greek mythology, and fairy tales), and narrative devices like irony, plot, and symbol.
"By bringing his eminent scholarship to bear in doses measured for the common reader or occasional student, Professor Foster has done us all a generous turn. The trained eye, the tuned ear, the intellect possesed of simple cyphers brings the literary arts alive."-Thomas Lynch, author of The Undertaking
Synopsis
The follow-up and companion volume to the New York Times bestselling How to Read Literature Like a Professor--a lively and entertaining guide to understanding and dissecting novels to make everyday reading more enriching, satisfying, and fun
Of all the literary forms, the novel is arguably the most discussed . . . and fretted over. From Miguel de Cervantes's Don Quixote to the works of Jane Austen, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ernest Hemingway, and today's masters, the novel has grown with and adapted to changing societies and technologies, mixing tradition and innovation in every age throughout history.
Thomas C. Foster--the sage and scholar who ingeniously led readers through the fascinating symbolic codes of great literature in his first book, How to Read Literature Like a Professor--now examines the grammar of the popular novel. Exploring how authors' choices about structure--point of view, narrative voice, first page, chapter construction, character emblems, and narrative (dis)continuity--create meaning and a special literary language, How to Read Novels Like a Professor shares the keys to this language with readers who want to get more insight, more understanding, and more pleasure from their reading.
Synopsis
In his first book, "How to Read Literature Like a Professor," Foster led readers through the symbolic codes of literature. Now he presents this lively and entertaining guide to understanding and dissecting novels to make everyday reading more enriching, satisfying, and fun.
About the Author
Thomas C. Foster studied English at Dartmouth College and then Michigan State University. He has been a professor of literature and writing since 1975, the last twenty-one years at the University of Michigan-Flint. In that time, he's learned more about literature from his students than in all the classes he's taken over the years. He is the author of the New York Times bestselling How to Read Novels Like a Professor and How to Read Literature Like a Professor.