Uses student reactions to Cordelia's death in "King Lear" to demonstrate how students can be made aware of what they are bringing to a literary experience. (DD)

The author discusses a visit Saul Bellow paid to his class on the contemporary American novel. (MM)

Explores the relationship and transaction between a reader and literature. Discusses the implications of this relationship on literature text choice and curriculum, as well as the feasibility of heuristics in a curriculum. (HTH)

A replication of I. A. Richards' study of students' reactions to thirteen poems in the 1920s. (DD)

A study of students' reactions to four of the thirteen poems used in I. A. Richards' study in the 1920s. (DD)

Discusses how students' strained metaphors and odd juxtapositions in writing literary analysis papers can reveal fresh perspectives on the literature being studied. (DD)

An exercise in which students chose between a computer-made poem and a poem with a human voice produced disconcerting results for two college teachers and revealed that the teachers made unwitting assumptions about taste, perception, values, and truth. (RL)

Describes a teacher's unsuccessful attempt to introduce the poetry of Tu Fu, a wayward bureaucrat of the T'ang dynasty, to a class of part-time students. Uses his students' resistance to this poetry as an occasion to discuss the importance of personal responses to poetry, as opposed to "correct" academic responses. (TB)

Presents a criticism of Evan Carton's description of a writing assignment, noting the contradiction between the assignment's real purpose and the rigid writing restrictions inherent in the assignment that preclude the purpose. Presents Carton's response. (HTH)

A paper presented at convention of National Council of Teachers of English (Washington, D.C., November 28, 1969) and a shortened version of the final chapter of With Respect to Readers." (Author/RD)

Discusses reader-response theory and forces that mitigate against a reading-centered classroom. Asserts that the issues of authority and freedom are crucial but advises against demanding too much at this stage. Focuses on current practice, and suggests beginning with the routines, the "business as usual," of the literature classroom.…

In judging poetry, even trained readers are influenced by the name and reputation of the poet. (JH)

Explores the particular maneuvers students in a class on writing about film make as they encounter and attempt to absorb the languages of the academy. Examines the discourse of the class as a whole and the formal writing of a student who resisted academic discourse. Argues for the value of an incomplete conversion to the academic style. (RS)

Shows how some key postmodern ideas about texts forced a teacher and her students to rethink typical writing assignments and typical student responses. Describes the assignments and considers how they invite postmodern critique. Suggests giving up grandiose, romantic notions that Freshman Composition can fix students either personally or…