In this article, the author redefines "text" and "poem" so that attention will be focused on the reader. The text, she argues, lies inert on the page until the reader comes along and brings it to life in the act of reading, reacting, and reflecting. A poem, then, must be thought of as an event in time. It is not an object or an ideal entity. It is…

In this essay, "Viewpoints: Transaction versus Interaction--A Terminological Rescue Operation," originally published in 1985 ("Research in the Teaching of English," 19, 96-107), Rosenblatt points out that no text can guarantee that the experience it provides will be "literary." A poem might be read for the emotional and intellectual experience it…

Provides the reactions of Louise M. Rosenblatt, a key figure in the field of reader response criticism, to the developments in reading, writing, and critical theory in the 1980s. Gives a brief personal history of Rosenblatt and the field. Describes her transactional theory and interpretations of it by other critics. (HB)

No one seems to think it necessary to explain what is meant by "literature," or the "aesthetic." If one analyzes the use of these terms in their contexts, a variety of tacit assumptions seems to operate. Sometimes, all that is required is that a text already has been designated as "literature." Sometimes, the presence of story, of a narrative, is…

In this article, the author answers specific questions: Just how do I foster an aesthetic stance? What types of activities encourage an efferent stance? She carefully explains her position--that the aesthetic stance in reading is missing in schools--and outlines what teachers must do to balance efferent reading with aesthetic. She also discusses…

This article contains excerpts from the author's two seminal texts: "Literature as Exploration (New York: MLA, 1938) and "The Reader, the Text, the Poem" (Carbondale, IL: Southern Illinois University Press, 1978). In "Literature as Exploration," the author first presented her transactional theory of reading as she explored the personal, social,…

In this essay, the author explains not only how she came to write her classic text "Literature as Exploration," but she also describes the path of her own professional journey. A conviction about the difference between "literary" and other reading led to her writing "Literature as Exploration" in the first place. In this book, she argued that…