Its all political. What does that mean and why?
Chapter 12: Its all political describes how almost everything in novels and literature is related to one political idea or another. At this point most may be thinking that this means almost every novel and piece of literature out there has a connection with John Key or Obama, or even a large german man who spends a lot of time on the internet. This is not the case.
What this chapter is trying to tell us is that the authors are in general, a very socially and politically aware group. This means that they tend to interwork some social or political views into their writing. An example used by the author of How To Read Literature Like A Professor For Kids, Thomas C. Foster, is the one of the character "Scrooge" in Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. At first glance, Scrooge is just a selfish and mean old man, but upon closer inspection it is revealed that he does not only despise the poor people, but he also thinks that they should die quietly! Scrooge says "by golly, they'd better do it and decrease the surplus population." When he says this he means that they (the poor, hungry people) had better hurry up and starve so that the population of the world would go down. Charles Dickens wrote this because at the time, this was the view of many people in society, that is what gave the cruelness of Scrooges behaviour so much meaning.
Most books and pieces of literature have some sort of similar trend to the deeper meaning. This isn't saying that every piece of literature on earth has a deeper political meaning but it is fair to say that a good amount will. It may be harder to find in some cases, depending on the subtlety of the author.
Chapter 12: Its all political describes how almost everything in novels and literature is related to one political idea or another. At this point most may be thinking that this means almost every novel and piece of literature out there has a connection with John Key or Obama, or even a large german man who spends a lot of time on the internet. This is not the case.
What this chapter is trying to tell us is that the authors are in general, a very socially and politically aware group. This means that they tend to interwork some social or political views into their writing. An example used by the author of How To Read Literature Like A Professor For Kids, Thomas C. Foster, is the one of the character "Scrooge" in Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol. At first glance, Scrooge is just a selfish and mean old man, but upon closer inspection it is revealed that he does not only despise the poor people, but he also thinks that they should die quietly! Scrooge says "by golly, they'd better do it and decrease the surplus population." When he says this he means that they (the poor, hungry people) had better hurry up and starve so that the population of the world would go down. Charles Dickens wrote this because at the time, this was the view of many people in society, that is what gave the cruelness of Scrooges behaviour so much meaning.
Most books and pieces of literature have some sort of similar trend to the deeper meaning. This isn't saying that every piece of literature on earth has a deeper political meaning but it is fair to say that a good amount will. It may be harder to find in some cases, depending on the subtlety of the author.