Summary Versus Analysis

After watching the lecture on literary analysis and reviewing the various resources provided, my understanding of the difference between summary and analysis is fairly clear, I think.  Summary is a simple task, requiring little from the reader.  It is the easiest concept of the two to grasp and to do.  Summary is a simple recap of a particular story, book or passage.  There are no questions at all involved in summarizing, only a short retelling of what the story is about.  Therefore, all that is required of someone who is writing a summary is to have read the book or passage and to have a basic comprehension of it. 

On the other hand, analysis is all about questions.  Analysis requires the reader to not only have a basic comprehension of a book but to look deeper.  To write a good literary analysis the reader must read a book with a critical eye and a questioning mind.  Analysis is about finding something about a book that grabs your attention, then taking that something and questioning it, forming an opinion about it and finally making a supportable argument about it.  This page provides yet another explanation of literary analysis with some guidelines and several samples of what analysis ultimately looks and reads like.  

I think that the one thing that stuck with me most about summary and analysis is that summary is based on fact, it is either true or not true, and it is not arguable.  Analysis is exactly the opposite; it is based on opinion and inference and must be arguable.  This seems to be the most useful information to me because it provides a simple and easy test to tell whether you are on the right track when writing a literary analysis.

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Introduction

Good Readers

   Vladimir Nabokov, a Russian novelist and author of the short essay Good Readers and Good Writers, states in his essay that ‘the good reader is one who has imagination, memory, a dictionary and some artistic sense.’  He also believes that a good reader is one who brings an open mind to a book and is a ‘rereader’.

   On all of these accounts I agree with Nabokov.  The most important characteristics, in my opinion, are an open mind combined with imagination.  I believe that to truly appreciate a great piece of literature a reader must be open-minded and willing to read without prejudice, personal or otherwise.  Then and only then, can a good reader dive into a book with his imagination and allow the ‘magic’, as Nabokov calls it,  of what has been created by the author to come to life as it was intended.

   As for myself, I consider myself to be a good reader, at least most of the time.  Having an open mind and good imagination are easy for me and make reading very enjoyable, but I find that rereading is something I do often, as well as keeping a dictionary near.  Doing these things allows me to go back and catch the nuances of a novel that are meant to be seen but that I frequently miss when first trying to absorb a good book.

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