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The Implied Reader

Patterns of Communication in Prose Fiction from Bunyan to Beckett

Wolfgang Iser
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Like no other art form, the novel confronts its readers with circumstances aring from their own environment of social and historical norms and stimulates them to assess and criticize their surroundings. By Analyzing major works of English fiction ranging from Bunyan, Fielding, Scott, and Thackery to Joyce and Beckett, renowned critic Wolfgang Iser here provides a framework for a theory of such literary effects and aesthetic responses.

Iser's focus is on the theme of discovery, whereby the reader is given the chance to recognize the deficiencies of his own existence and the suggested solutions...

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Like no other art form, the novel confronts its readers with circumstances aring from their own environment of social and historical norms and stimulates them to assess and criticize their surroundings. By Analyzing major works of English fiction ranging from Bunyan, Fielding, Scott, and Thackery to Joyce and Beckett, renowned critic Wolfgang Iser here provides a framework for a theory of such literary effects and aesthetic responses.

Iser's focus is on the theme of discovery, whereby the reader is given the chance to recognize the deficiencies of his own existence and the suggested solutions to counterbalance them. The content and form of this discovery is the calculated response of the reader—the implied reader. In discovering the expectations and presuppositions that underlie all the perceptions, the reader learns to "read" himself as he does the text.

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Reviews

When the present flurry of works on theory of narrative fiction comes to an end... this seems likely to be one of the survivors.

— Frank Kermode, Times Literary Supplement

Well-written, scholarly, perceptive... A basic framework for a rational theory of literary effects and responses based on the novel.

— Library Journal
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Available
Trim Size
6
x
9
Pages
318
ISBN
9780801821509
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Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter 1. Bunyan's Pilgram's Progress: The Doctrime of Predestination and the Shaping of the Novel
Chapter 2. The Role of the Reader in Fielding's Joseph Andrews and Tom

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Acknowledgments
Introduction
Chapter 1. Bunyan's Pilgram's Progress: The Doctrime of Predestination and the Shaping of the Novel
Chapter 2. The Role of the Reader in Fielding's Joseph Andrews and Tom Jones
Chapter 3. The Generic Control of the Esthetic Response: An Examination of Smollett's Humphry Clinker
Chapter 4. Fiction—The Filter of History: A Study of Sir Walter Scott's Waverley
Chapter 5. The Reader as a Component Part of the Realistic novek: Esthetic Effects in Thackery's Vanity Fair
Chapter 6. Self-Reduction
Chapter 7. Doing Things in Style: An Interpretation of "The Oxen of the Sun: in James joyce's Ulysses
Chapter 8. Patterns of Communication in Joyce's Ulysses
Chapter 9. Dialogue of the Unspeakable: Ivy Compton-Burnett: A Heritage and Its History
Chapter 10. When is the End Not the End? The Idea of Fiction in Beckett
Chapter 11. The Reading Process: A Phenomenological Approach
Name Index
Subject Index

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Wolfgang Iser

Wolfgang Iser, who has taught at leading universities in the United States and Europe, is currently professor of English and comparative literature at the University of Constance.
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