HOW TO READ LITERATURE LIKE A PROFESSOR

The New York Times–best-selling How to Read Literature Like a Professor is redacted for teachers of young readers.

The premise behind Foster’s works is that there’s a “grammar of literature…a certain set of patterns, codes, and rules that we can learn to use when we’re reading a piece of writing.” If students learn that grammar, they can read better and appreciate more about what’s going on in the books they read. Short essays offer insights into myth, symbols, setting, Shakespeare, the Bible, quests and various themes. The author shares a “big secret: there’s only one story”—all stories grow out of other stories and contribute to the mix, and what students are doing as they learn to read more widely and insightfully is joining a conversation between old books and new. The title and cover, though—actually, the whole premise of this volume—are misleading: This will work best as a guide for teachers of young people, providing many interesting insights into a range of children’s and young-adult literature, from Green Eggs and Ham to Twilight, along with adult literature accessible to younger readers, such as Dracula, A Raisin in the Sun, and The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.

An upbeat and engaging guide to literature for English teachers working with young readers.