I believe the reader’s literary theory gave me the most insight into the novel. While the archetype theory and the feminist theory were intuitive and thought-provoking, they asked questions that related to constructed systems outside of my relatability. For example, the feminist theory begged questions about the perspective of women and their treatment, and I am not a woman. The archetypal theory asked me to recognize preconceived cliches in the text, which requires intuition outside of oneself and one’s real and lived experiences. The reader’s literary theory was the most insightful because it demanded that I connect to the text by using my experiences and my feelings to draw different conclusions about the story and its characters. Making connections between my experience and the characters made the novel a very impactful read. The main character was a wonder to me. Baby is a very interesting character, albeit a very jaded one. To connect with her I imagined that she was my younger sibling. I already have a younger brother her age (twelve to thirteen years old), so this imagined person was not hard to conceive. My brother and Baby have many things in common. They are both terribly naive, unexpectedly observant, and malleable. Baby’s naivete is evident in how she deals with explicit themes like drugs and sex, and how she uses them as a means for love and connection. Her innocence seeps through even when she does what she does, because she does it for pure reasons. She is observant in the way that she interacts with others, and is capable of understanding what type of person they are. She analyzes her father in this way, and all of his drug-addled friends. She is malleable because of her desire for love - she gets looped into dangerous schemes by a pimp and different friends because she craves attention and connection. Imagining my brother involved in a fraction of what Baby was involved in made me overcome with pain. By relating to Baby as a character, the novel became an emotional experience for me, and therefore a more relevant read than it otherwise would have been. The themes highlighted in the novel were another powerful impact on me while observing the story through the lens of reader literary theory. As a reader trying to relate to the text, I constantly asked myself questions while reading. The flagrant display of brazen sexuality, drug activity, and criminality in the novel was shocking. Such a dark reality being painted through the eyes of a young girl made the story horrific. From the first chapter, these ideas were made explicit. Baby lived with a heroin-addicted father, she was completely aware of prostitutes and where they worked, and she understood that her father constantly stole things to get them by. As someone living in a stable home, with law-abiding people, and friends significantly older than Baby, this reality is unbelievably grim. She is introduced as a pubescent girl, and reading this particular story while imagining that a child is telling me how her father leaves her occasionally to go score with his buddies is nothing less than horrifying. By trying to relate to the story, its themes were made very obvious and they left a genuine impression on me. In conclusion, the reader’s literary theory was the most meaningful to me as a reader. I asked myself questions while reading and tried to connect to the text. My questions after reading this story are as follows:
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January 2018
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