Francis G.

Flores

2015-13693

English 11 WFU 9/2/16

Reflection Paper: What is Literature? And how reading makes.....

The question what is literature can be defined in many ways
according to the perceptions especially of the great writers like
Terry Eagleton, Anthony Burgess, and Arthur Krystal. These three,
has their own distinct conception about literature. People may
agree, but they may not. And this is what I think about each of
their perspective.
First is about what Eagleton thinks about literature,that
regards literature being subjective. It means, there is no way we
can give the word literature a definite meaning, because the
definition itself depends on how different people see it. He also
come up on the Formalist definition of literature as an
organized violence committed on ordinary speech. He implied
that literature has no essence because of different contexts
and how the reader relates to the writer to make it become
literary. It could be said that sometimes a type of reader might
not understand the text because the language and the style of how
it was written hides the meaning or the essence of the text.
But for me, I dont agree with Eagleton at all. Not because
his perceptions can be viewed in a very negative way, but in the
modern context were living in, his thoughts make no sense. Well,

Im pretty sure that he did not intentionally wants to destroy

the literature himself, but he has some points somehow. The only
problem was, he did not consider all the other ideas of other
writers, and I think he did not meet the standards of literature
as it seems.
Now, what about Burgess think about this, he emphasized the
difference between the field of science and arts, truth and
beauty. While science deals with finding the truth, arts seeks
for beauty. Literature is the way of expressing emotions
creatively through words, and theres the beauty in it. And he
said that this can be the highest kind of artistic experience
of a person. The beauty in literature creates something special
that leads to the discovery of pattern/order of life.
I agree with Burgess, because after all, it was true that
beauty has always been the peak of literature. Its always the
beauty that matters, not on how it was created, but the sense of
life it gives. Everyone has the right to create something
beautiful and to experience the beauty it gives.
Another point was from Arthur Krystal and his defense of the
canon, he said literary is not only what is written but what is
voiced, what is expressed, what is invented, in whatever form.
This could be one of the finest way of defining literature I
think, because it was clear that literature is not bounded in a

such limit, that in any other way it can diverge. And I really do
agree to his statements in his defense of the canon that he did
not only looked at a particular context, but rather in a modern
sense considering what other great writers and experts also
think about it.
The second part would be answering the question How reading
makes me a better persson?. Personally, reading is my world,
like evrything I need to know to grow as a human cannot be all
said and taught. Thats the essential part, but what I love more
about reading, is making impossible, possible. Of course it makes
no sense because its the real life matters, right? But sometimes
we just dont know that reading is what makes a person who he is,
to build an ideal self, and to make something out of nothing.
Yes, I like reading for being given such a wonderful opportunity
to be imaginative as much as you can, for the purpose of being
yourself. I never thought that reading could be for worse, its
always for the better. Whether what you read and how you read it,
it reflects what personality you have, and if you think you have
a bad personality, dont ever blame reading, because it is you
and your imagination that moves through it. I believe that the
ability to read and to imagine are the two most wonderful things
a human can have, making him above all other creations.