Description: This latest book from the well-known literary critic Robert Scholes presents his thoughtful exploration of the craft of reading. He deals with reading not as an art or performance given by a virtuoso reader, but as a craft that can be studied, taught, & learned. Those who master the craft of reading, Scholes contends, will justifiably take responsibility for the readings they produce & the texts they choose to read. Scholes begins with a critique of the New Critical way of reading ("bad for poets & poetry & really terrible for students & teachers of poetry"), using examples of poems by various writers, in particular Edna St. Vincent Millay. He concludes with a consideration of the strengths & weaknesses of the fundamentalist way of reading texts regarded as sacred. To explain & clarify the approach of the crafty reader, the author analyzes a wide-ranging selection of texts by figures at the margins of the literary & cultural canon, including Norman Rockwell, Anais Nin, Dashiell Hammett, & J. K. Rowling. Throughout his discussion Scholes emphasizes how concepts of genre affect the reading process & how they may work to exclude certain texts from the cultural canon & curriculum.

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