ENG125
Instructor Benjamin Daw
Jennifer Roberts
April 17, 2011
Reading Reflection The reader-response appeal to literature relies on the reader’s ability to process the information being shared rather than the author or the text itself. With the reader-response, a person reads text and then relates to automatic explanations about life that are triggered moment by moment as they continue to read. The literature uses triggers that the reader’s nervous system spontaneously responds to. This type of approach to reading allows people to imagine and be creative within them. It allows the reader to hear, feel and smell what they are reading as if it were happening right now in front of them.
The reader-response approach with “the Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost offered a common understanding for situations in which I had to choose between two decisions. There was a visceral vision of a dilemma to make a choice that would eliminate the other option from ever becoming a possibility when Frost submitted that there was remorse for not being able to travel down the paths for both decisions. Every decision we make causes a difference in some sort of way. Since Frosts’ dilemma was not clear and concise I was able to implement my own choices to make a decision on. The key linguistic that triggered the process was use of the term ‘path’.
I was able to relate the poem to a difficult decision of whether or not I was going to move across the country for a job offer. When Frost wrote “because it was grassy and wanted wear” I was able to relate to the yearning to want to move to Florida (grassy), but not leave the support of his family behind in Michigan (wanted wear). My fiancée and I had to sort through the mutual acknowledgement of each others concerns, have common understandings, and act with the other persons concerns in mind. Both ideas were individually acceptable and understanding by themselves, however; the path “to where
References: (Clugston R W 2010 Journey into Literature)Clugston, R. W. (2010). Journey into Literature. San Diego, California: Bridgepoint Education, Inc.