This book develops a method called intimate reading to investigate how ordinary readers are deeply moved by what they read, and the transformative impact such experiences have on their sense of self. The book presents unique narratives of such experiences and suggests a theory of transformative affective patterns that may form the basis of an affective literary theory.
Author(s): Thor Magnus Tangerås
Series: (Anthem Studies in Bibliotherapy and Well-Being)
Publisher: Anthem Press
Year: 2020
Language: English
Pages: 238
Cover
Front Matter
Half-title
Title page
Copyright information
Table of Contents
Preface
Acknowledgements
Chapters One-Eight
Chapter One Introduction
Transformative Reading Experiences
Expressive Enactment and Self-Modifying Feelings
Presuppositions: Change, Crisis, Being Moved
Change
Crisis
Being Moved
Chapter Two Intimate Reading: A Narrative Method
The Anteroductive Logic of Inquiry
Reliability and Validity
Research Design Overview
Sampling in Interview-Based Qualitative Research
Recruitment Strategy
Participants Who Met Inclusion Criteria
Bracketing Preconceptions
Interview Method
Biographic-Narrative Interview Method
Shared Reading of Significant Passages
Presentation of Narratives
Philology and the Manuscript Matrix
Critical Selection of Narratives for Interpretation
The Construct of Life-changing Fiction Reading Experience
Analysis of Narrative Structure
Idiographic Interpretations of the Narratives
Chapter Three Veronica’s Bruise
‘And It Frightened Her’
‘Slowly, Slowly the Wound to the Soul Begins to Make Itself Felt, Like a Bruise’
‘She Felt She Was Being Crushed to Death’
‘Weird and Gruesome’
‘But with a Hopeful Heart’
‘The Book Awoke Me and Enabled Me’
‘A Winter’s Tale’
Rereading Lady Chatterley’s Lover
Listening to the Heart
Crisis
Admitting That She Is Trapped and Finding the Strength to Leave
‘Slowly, Slowly, the Wound to the Soul Begins to Make Itself Felt, Like a Bruise’
Transaction with the Literary Work
Connection
Self- Compassion through Discovery of Compassion for Fictional Character
The Bodily Aspects of Reading
The Felt Sense: On the Edge of Awareness
Resolution
Thumos
In the Fullness of Time
The Mother Perspective
Chapter Four Nina’s Life-Long Friend Flicka
Chapter Five Esther’s Episode
Kitchen Sink Drama
Led into the World of Books
Episode
The Language of the Heart: Psychology versus Literature
Emotion-Focused Therapy: The Subtext of ‘Episode’
Literature as Corrective Emotional Experience
From Discord to Concord
Crisis
Bjørneboe versus Børlie
Deleterious Consequences of Inter- Parental Conflict
Transaction with the Literary Work
Metamorphosis
Revelation: Anagnorisis
Comic Katharsis
‘Readerese’
Ascription of Meaning to the Reading Experience
Resolution
The Quest for ‘the Language of Emotions’
The Great Struggle
Sacrificing One’s Self
Ken’s Transformation
Where Does the Need to Hide Come From?
The Innermost Question
Has the Book Saved Your Life?
The Nostos of MySpace
Crisis
The Great Struggle: ‘This Desperate Striving to Alter the Pattern of Thought upon Which His Life Formed Itself ’
Conversion and Apostasy: A Failed Foreclosure Leading to Diffusion
Sacrificing the Source of Strength: Burning the Book
Transaction with the Literary Work
Moratorium
Transmuting Internalisation
Resolution
Nostos and Algos
MySpace: Homecoming
Chapter Six Jane’s Visionary Reading
In Medias Res: The Encounter with the Book
A Very Hungry Person
The Big Dream: Everything Matters
Necessity: Integration of the Vision
Finding the Purpose: Shared Reading
Recognising the Signature
The Big Bang and the View from Above
Crisis
Kairos and Metanoia
Framework
Transaction with the Literary Work
The Hunger for Reading
Feeling as the Deepest Form of Knowing: Mmm, Wow, Huh!
The Great ‘As if ’ and Metaphorical Thinking
The Shocking Recognition of Frightening Truth
Ekpleksis and Awe
Resolution
Spiritual Transformation
The Shape of a Life: Purpose
Chapter Seven Sue’s Buried Life
The Possibility of What Poetry Might Do
The Woman in Prison
Your Whole Body Is Going to Sing with It
A Bolt Is Shot Back Somewhere in Your Breast
Something That I Will Always Carry with Me
Re-membering the Body’s Song
Crisis
What Sue Tells Us about Her Depression
Despair and Despondency
Remission
Transaction with the Literary Work
Impact
To Be on One’s Own Line and the Bolt Shot Back
Synesis: Knowing Together
Resolution
Remembrance
From Disdain to Wonder
Epiphany
Chapter Eight Reading by Heart: Lexithymia and Transformative Affective Patterns
Mode of Engagement
Readerese and Bi- Directional Empathy
Reading as Necessity: Contact and Nourishment
Reading and the Importance of a Sacred Space
Lexithymia: Reading the Heart, Reading by Heart
Realisation through the Experience of Being Moved
The Paradox of Fiction and Being Moved
Alloiosis: Qualitative Change from Crisis to Resolution
Crises
Complex Affective Configurations
Pathemata and Transformative Affective Patterns
Art for Heart’s Sake
End Matter
Bibliography
Index
