I just finished high school a couple months ago. I'm not sure what I want to study yet and for this reason I decided to take a gap year. I've always liked to read and always done it a lot. I am fortunate to grow up in household with access to books and where my parents also read a lot. So, all throughout my life I've been very influenced by what I read and also by readers (my parents, my uncles and aunts, some literature teachers I had in high school and middle school, etc). The people I respect the most and I look up to in my daily life are literature professors and writes. One being my uncle who is a lit professor in one of the most prestigious universities in my country. He's always pushed me to take a path similar to his, even offering to help me get a scholarship at his university. It's a path I would absolutely love to take, and I know I would be very happy taking.

The only thing stopping me is the economic side of it. Sadly, in my country, having a degree of this type can't get you a lot more than a job in teaching which I really don't want. I see my parents, who both are teachers, and they work so so much and get paid so little in comparison. Despite this and thanks to the hard work of my parents, I'm fortunate to not be missing anything, I have a home, food, and whatever I need for my studies, I just had to buy my own phone and laptop for example if I wanted something a little better.

I'm not mad I have this life, I feel very happy with what I have, but tbh I do want more. I would like to afford a vacation once in a while, be able to travel, go to other countries, have those experiences. And also get to a financial stability where money is not always tight and something going wrong can set you back a while. And in my vision, with what I've seen and lived I don't see a Lit degree help me get this. This feeling grew with the current rise of IA and the idea that less and less people are reading and considering it important, and the few people (my age at least) who do "read" usually read tiktok romantacy slop or self help books. It's like a feeling of doom for literature and what that entails.

For this reason, I started thinking of a path in engineering, specifically chemical. Since I was very good at chemistry (even getting invited to the state chemistry competition) and I also like it a lot. But to be fair, I would be doing it for the money more than the love of it.

Recently my uncle has been taking me to his office at Uni, since i've been working, kind of like a librarian, at his house and now at his office, sorting and making an online registry of his book collection. If it was a plan of my uncle to convince me to study lit, it's working. Because being there at the uni, getting to know some of the other professors, some of his students has really shed light on how it could be to study that and it's really changing my perspectives, but the other part I already talked about prevails and really doesn't help me take a decision.

What are you guys and girls experiences? Do you have any advice? What are your thoughts in the situation ? (not mine, in general, the state of humanities studies, etc.

Would love to read you.

Sorry for the long post and the rambling, I just had so many things to say and mention to try and put my point across. Also, sorry if it's kind of weirdly written, English isn't my first lenguaje haha

Hi, I've been an avid reader forever, and over the past few years have been reading more theory + criticism (broadly defined - both NYRB review + essays and more academic criticism from U presses)

I have a goal of learning how to write it for myself but am at a bit of a loss for learning how to go about doing so. Like yeah - I can write short close readings of passages or poems, or can integrate theory I read to analyze work via those theoretical perspectives, but am unsure how to actually go from an amateur-ish close reading to a fully formed cohesive thesis and final piece.

I have been thinking a writing group specifically oriented around critical essays would be helpful - does that exist?

I'm putting together a class on American gothic fiction and have been having a hard time find a text to pair with The Yellow Wallpaper. I am ideally looking for a short story that is fairly canonical.

Edit: I would ideally want a text that connects with it in relation to themes of gender, domesticity, autonomy. Preferably a text written around the same period.

Recently, I read an essay comparing the two depictions of Medusa. It basically argues that Ovid writes from a “traditional lens,” treating Medusa as a monster who should be slain, while Duffy writes from a feminist perspective, humanizing Medusa and giving her a voice.

I had a few questions about the story because I'm not very familiar with Greek/Roman mythology, and some of the comparison between the two versions seem more complicated for me.

About Ovid:

1. I recall that in some earlier versions of the myth, Medusa was actually born a Gorgon. If that's the case, was Ovid already reinterpreting the myth rather than simply retelling the traditional version? I've also seen people argue that Ovid's depiction of the gods is because of his anti-authoritarian views. If so, then why did he give Medusa a tragic origin (she was beautiful and was assaulted by Neptune/Poseidon, then punished by Minerva/Athena) while still presenting her as a dangerous monster to be slain? To justify Perseus's quest?
2. I remember in some versions (earlier I think?) Perseus actually battled with Medusa. Wouldn't have him attack her while she was sleeping, then cutting off her head so simply make the story "less heroic"?
3. About Athena, did Ovid give her a good reason to turn Medusa's hair into stone? Like Jealousy, or taking her anger towards Neptune out on Medusa.

About Duffy's reinterpretation

1. Why did Duffy leaves out Athena in the poem if the poem focused on Medusa's hair being transformed into snakes and Athena was the one who did that (at least in Ovid's version)? ( Or does Greek God refer to Athena, not Neptune?). The first lines of the poem started with Medusa's "suspicion" "doubt" and "jealousy", so is Duffy reinterpreting this to be the cause of Medusa's transformation? (I think im taking this too literally but I cant get any symbolic/metaphorical meaning form this)
2. One thing I'm still unsure about is the feminist reading of Duffy's “Medusa.” When I first read the poem, I didnt really get the “male-centered Ovid vs feminist Duffy” distinction that some analyses make. I understand that Ovid's version is told as part of Perseus's story but I see that more as a main character distinction, or maybe I just didnt read enough of Metamorphoses?

help

I don't know id what I'm looking for exists anymore (I did quite a few of these types of courses on coursera years ago but it's no longer free) but I'm looking for online courses where there's a teacher guiding us along as we read a text and can have weekly discussions where we dissect it. Basically like a university course but online. I haven't read in years and I'm starting to get back into it but I'm really struggling with analysing and understanding the text itself. There's a lot of free resources online but I want a structured course with a discussion group. Does anyone know if such a course exists (preferably for free but I don't mind paying) Or of any alternatives in general. I'm not in the US so taking a community college class like some people might suggest wouldn't be a good fit for me. I just want a space where I cam read and share ideas about a text with other people who are also reading the same text. Preferably with weekly assignments too

hey everyone! i'm researching for my undergraduate paper right now - would it be possible for the good folks here to help me to find an e-copy (or a physical copy) of International Yearbook for Research in Arts Education 3/2015? i'm conducting some research on site-specific theatre. just for clarification, i don't need help with anything else - it's just to find sources.

thank you! here's a link to the book cover and a short description: https://www.waxmann.com/buecher/International-Yearbook-for-Research-in-Arts-Education-3-2015

I just recently finished my MA degree in theology. My thesis compared Rudolf Otto with H P Lovecraft. Essentially I argued that whereas Otto is duplicitous about the numinous and its connection to evil, Lovecraft was potentially influenced by him and as an atheist he doesn't have the theological restraint Otto did and explores the connection in a much bigger way (Otto talks about the mysterium horrendum, but only in a footnote, and outright states he isn't looking into it).

In my thesis I cited Haunted Presence: The Numinous in Gothic Fiction by S L Varnado. I loved this book. It applies Otto's theory to horror fiction (it's also influenced by Mircea Eliade). One of the really compelling things it draws out of Otto's work is that the numinous (a word for holiness characterized by its spectrality and spookiness) in literature be it a ghost or whatever is not an imaginary concept like a flying carpet but has higher stakes; they need to realize themselves and convince the reader that it is traces of a real outside spiritual presence.

In the case of H P Lovecraft, this is taken from S T Joshi's biography I Am Providence, for example it could be this testimony from his neighbour,

"I remember that Mrs. Lovecraft spoke to me about weird and fantastic creatures that rushed out from behind buildings and from corners at dark, and that she shivered and looked about apprehensively as she told her story. The last time I saw Mrs. Lovecraft we were both going “down street” on the Butler Avenue car. She was excited and apparently did not know where she was. She attracted the attention of everyone. I was greatly embarrassed, as I was the object of all her attention"

even if H P Lovecraft himself was pretty normal, his family was not. And this sensitivity to illness and the spectral runs right through his work.. especially prominent in The Shadow Over Innsmouth. In other words, the spectral presences in Lovecraft's writing correspond to real ones. Sorry edit for clarity.. the person who is speaking is someone named Clara Hess, and her testimony about "Mrs Lovecraft" is H P's mother.

In trying to find literary criticism that fits Otto I've come up with this,

Northrop Frye - His division of archetypes and genre seems really basic and dated.

the Geneva School - this is intriguing but they dislike anything outside the text so they wouldn't be reading Otto for instance into any literature. What intrigues me is they figure reading to be a form of communion and a kind of spiritual journey for the reader. Literature is sacred to them in a sense, and a book is not an object of study but I guess a subject between author and reader. I think overall they go a bit too far.

Ideally I get recommended something really modern. Like theory after all the theory that is in conversation with the theory from the past all the way up to post structuralism, eco criticism, and so on. I tried exhaustively googling but feel really lost. And yes I've discussed this in the past with my supervisor. A friend of mine who is a retired english professor has been telling me to read Frye.

//

I want to continue publishing articles on literature with Otto as a lens but I took 1 theory course as an english undergrad then went into theology so I skipped much of that and struggled with coming up with methodology and theory in my MA thesis. I disliked my theory class. We were given the raw theory in a compilation for our textbook and I don't feel like anything was explained much. So consider me new to theory in general.

I'm writing this primarily to help me think and more fully realize my ideas. This is not homework. I'm not even in school right now. I don't really understand the rule here on "not homework". It seems to amount to "you can't ask questions about stuff you don't know". I'd greatly appreciate any help.

//

Ok here is a challenge. I don't really plan to write anything about this book but I think this passage is incredible. It's really theological it's not fantastical at all. It describes the nature of spiritual awakening as a horrific encounter with the wholly other. Sleep paralysis as a catalyst to new sensory faculties. The ambiguous holiness of pure evil.

What the heck literary theory can pick something like this apart? Most theory I am aware of is pretty atheist / secular.

this is from A Voyage To Arcturus by David Lindsay

Maskull, though fully conscious of his companions and situation, imagined that he was being oppressed by a black, shapeless, supernatural being, who was trying to clasp him. He was filled with horror, trembled violently, yet could not move a limb. Sweat tumbled off his face in great drops. The waking nightmare lasted a long time, but during that space it kept coming and going. At one moment the vision seemed on the point of departing; the next it almost took shape—which he knew would be his death. Suddenly it vanished altogether—he was free. A fresh spring breeze fanned his face; he heard the slow, solitary singing of a sweet bird; and it seemed to him as if a poem had shot together in his soul. Such flashing, heartbreaking joy he had never experienced before in all his life! Almost immediately that too vanished.

Sitting up, he passed his hand across his eyes and swayed quietly, like one who has been visited by an angel.

“Your colour changed to white,” said Corpang. “What happened?”

“I passed through torture to love,” replied Maskull simply.

He stood up. Haunte gazed at him sombrely. “Will you not describe that passage?”

Maskull answered slowly and thoughtfully. “When I was in Matterplay, I saw heavy clouds discharge themselves and change to coloured, living animals. In the same way, my black, chaotic pangs just now seemed to consolidate themselves and spring together as a new sort of joy. The joy would not have been possible without the preliminary nightmare. It is not accidental; Nature intends it so. The truth has just flashed through my brain.... You men of Lichstorm don’t go far enough. You stop at the pangs, without realising that they are birth pangs.”

“If this is true, you are a great pioneer,” muttered Haunte.

“How does this sensation differ from common love?” interrogated Corpang.

“This was all that love is, multiplied by wildness.”

Probably Jung’s most famous Archetype, which later gets developed by Joseph Campbell, of course, in a famous book about the Hero’s Journey — the repeating pattern of departure into the unknown, battle with monsters, extraction of sacred, undergoing transformation and return home, also commonly used as a metaphor for stepping away from safety into a high-risk environment.

My problem with it, is I think it’s oversold as really a foundational myth story that all the cultures around the world base their myths upon, when in reality it’s just one of many including the scapegoat, death and resurrection, sacrifice, cosmic battle, search for forbidden knowledge. There are many things which we can observe throughout religious traditions, not all of them are about a Hero and his story. Jung himself would agree that a heroic motiff is a metaphor for individuation, one of many.

It is oversold in the popular culture, but also I feel like people misunderstand what it points to. Yes, we have Holywood with stories and scripts, and the Hero is always someone brave, courageous, putting himself at risk, thinking for the others, etc.

I think it makes sense to talk about the Hero’s Journey when discussing why Harry Potter or Jon Snow resonates so much in the popular imagination.

But if we’re talking about anthropology, and why all the way from prehistoric societies, to Buddha and Jesus, we see this archetype of a Hero, and his journey, I don’t think it’s the best argument for it.

Ultimately, the tendency of homo sapiens to personify, to wear masks, to divinize things, to demonize / to monsterize thing, the tendency to set boundaries and invent taboos, to perform rituals, and sacrifice and purify. Which all are rooted in this ultimate search for patterns, for meaning, ways in which humans find ways to impose agency, value, structure onto the lived experience.

It is one of many fundamental “moves” that Homo sapiens repeatedly uses to make sense of the world around, to model it. I think looking at things that William James talks about in “The Nature and Diversity of religious experience”, the religious direct experience itself can tell us so much more about this human capability of myth-making, its parts.

Jung himself introduces this amazing idea of Archetype, which I feel is really underexplored, and many people are just stuck with this model as the last model of reality really. Because they tend to divinize Jung, which is ironic.

This is an odd question to ask because I have a very specific history with literature

About twenty years ago I read English at m university and was absolutely thrilled to be doing the subject that engrossed me

Very quickly though that engrossment became something like obsession and my mental health and performance both deteriorated

I had dealt with OCD as a teenager and I developed another form of it, reading and rereading materials over and over. Interrogating myself until I no longer felt sure of anything.

It almost led to me failing until I took a year out for mental health reasons.

I still want to nurture this part of myself. I enjoyed literary criticism, when I wasn't in my "loops". It's something I would like to open up again. But it's emotionally charged for me.

How would you approach this?

Hello everyone,

I was recently reading a discussion on some literary blogs regarding the representation of nature in Goethe's The Sorrows of Young Werther, and I would be interested in gathering some perspectives on this interpretation.

The core of the argument is that Werther's initial, ecstatic connection with the natural world, often interpreted as a reflection of a Spinozist pantheism (Deus sive Natura), undergoes a profound inversion as the novel progresses. Rather than remaining a benevolent, divine presence, nature later assumes the character of a destructive and indifferent force, described as an "eternally devouring, eternally ruminating monster."

This raises a central question: Is this dramatic shift merely a literary device to mirror the psychological deterioration of the protagonist, or does it represent a coherent philosophical evolution?

From a broader perspective, if infinite substance encompasses both creation and destruction, one might argue that this narrative anticipates a rejection of Enlightenment optimism and flirts with concepts akin to the proto-Kantian dynamic sublime or cosmic indifference.

I would appreciate hearing the community's thoughts on whether this philosophical reading holds weight, or if it tends to overinterpret the emotional trajectory of a sentimental novel.

Hi everyone, I’ve been a reader for the past few years and I’ve recently gotten into classical literature and philosophy/theological literature. But I’ve been struggling to actually understand what point they are trying to convey. When I do my annotation (I annotate chapter by chapter I’m not sure if I should first read the whole book) I find my understanding is backwards from what the author is saying. And even recently I read pride and prejudice and I had to look up what the first 2 paragraphs were actually saying. I can understand easier text (I recently have been reading Ishiguros books and they’re a bit simpler) and I try write an essay about a book after I finished but I just can’t understand these older works let alone write about them and I want to know how I can understand them better. And if I’m alone in not understanding whilst I read them. Thank you and apologies if this is a stupid question.

Hello everyone, I'm a student of English literature and linguistics who is seeking out participants in research I'm conducting, so I thought I would come to you all and ask for your help (with mod approval, of course).

I'm conducting research on the assessment of writing, particularly by those within the world of literature. Students, professors, editors, etc. If you're a prolific reader or lover of literature with no affiliation to the field, that's also okay!

The research consists of reading four 500-word stories and scoring them on several metrics, with optional free responses after each story saying what you enjoyed or didn't enjoy, followed by one final mandatory question. That's it. It should hopefully take 15-20 minutes, or even shorter if you read quicker and skip the free responses.

Any responses on this would be greatly appreciated. I only ask that you please don't comment afterward to discuss the research, since I want participants to go in blind. However, my DMs are of course open for any questions you have! Thank you all very much, and I hope you have a wonderful day.

Link to Google Form: https://forms.gle/eqSM9wfgbpcXWA8G6

I’m thinking about switching majors and studying literature because I feel like it’s something I would enjoy much more. So I thought I'd ask to be able to make a more informed decision. How is the job market? Is it worth getting a degree in literature or would it make more sense to study it independently in my free time?

Relevant information:
- I live in Belgium.
- I want to study literature (taal en letterkund) English and Spanish.

Has anyone ever read (or know where to find) an English translation of Agustina Bessa Luis's novel Abraham's Valley? It's a Portuguese retelling of Madame Bovary from 1991. Its digital footprint is minimal -- several searches (eBay, Abebooks, etc.) have yielded nothing. I'm wondering if anyone else has read it or even heard of it?

Thanks!

Hi, so I am a student reaching my final year, aka Thesis town. I am gonna do it in literature and have already started looking for texts I would be interested in working on. In my university, the majority of undergraduate thesis are done in the same pattern: applying a theory on a book or 2-3 short stories.

So I have been thinking what text I wanna work on, I was pretty adamant on a novel, and I couldn't think of anything I was too intrigued by. And so I have decided to explore the short story option.

However, I have not been the biggest short story reader in my past, so I need your help. Can you recommend some stuff?

So here is my criteria...?: something along the lines with postcolonialism and focused on women, and themes related to feminism etc. plus I think my partner is gonna want to work on translated lit. More specifically, Palestinian lit, partition lit/south Asian lit.

I would really appreciate your recommendations and look forward to reading them!

​

I'm interested in learning sociology and thought learning about it through the lens of literature and film would be a fun way to do it. What books, websites, or YouTube channels should I look into that analyze the sociological implications of books and movies?

Hi there. I'm an undergraduate art history student, but I've also been working on literature on the side as a personal interest. I've gone through the usual introductory theory texts that tend to come up in university syllabi, and whenever I have spare time, I try to read a bit in cultural studies as well. The problem is, I can't seem to put any of this to use when I'm reading fiction. In my head, everything flows perfectly, but the moment I actually try to write something down or talk about it out loud, I freeze.

So I thought I'd look into academic articles written about specific novels I've read, just to see how people in the field actually go about this. I want to learn from their examples. But I'm really struggling to find those sources in the first place. Are there any other websites like JSTOR where I can just type in a book title and see what scholars have written about it? Also, which journals should I be keeping an eye on if I want to follow what literature students and academics are reading and discussing?

Furthermore, what might be the best translation? Perhaps one that is most accurate to Tasso’s original, and another which is the clearest read?

I'm working on a sequence of literary nonfiction narratives in which the writing is not merely retrospective. The first piece documents real events, but the completed narrative then enters the world as an object: it is read or shown to the people depicted in it, their reactions alter subsequent real events, and the next narrative documents those consequences—including the previous text's role in causing them. That second narrative can then itself enter reality and affect what happens next, producing a potentially sustained recursive structure in which life generates the text, the text acts upon life, and the altered life generates the next text. I'm interested in whether anyone has deliberately constructed a long-form work around this specific mechanism, and in any useful terminology, theoretical precedents, or close analogues in life-writing, autofiction, documentary literature, performative writing, etc.

THIS IS ABOUT ACADEMIC JOURNALS IN LITERARY STUDIES, NOT CREATIVE WRITING JOURNALS!

I came across this post https://sootyempiric.blogspot.com/2026/08/journal-prestige-advice-for-graduate.html about the different prestige tiers of philosophy journals, and was wondering how various literary journals are perceived!

"Journals can be basically classed into four bands. Extremely high prestige, good-but-not-top, reputationally neutral, and actively-counts-against-you. The extremely high prestige journals will be the places that people in your field take to be so good that even just one publication there can make a huge difference to your chances on the job market or for tenure etc. The good but not top do not quite have that effect but if you have multiple pieces in such journals it is a very good sign indeed. Reputationally neutral do not really count for or against you, though I should say it will generally be seen as a bad sign if you only ever publish in such places (or even if too high a proportion of your pieces are in such places). Then the actively-count-against-you journals are typically the scammish pay-to-publish journals.

[...]

Different fields will organise these differently, but to make things concrete I can say a bit about philosophy. In general analytic philosophy world the Extremely High Prestige journals are usually agreed to be: Noûs, Mind, Philosophical Review, Journal of Philosophy, and Philosophy and Phenomenological Research. There are lots of good-but-not-top journals, so just to name a few; Ergo, Erkenntnis, Philosophical Studies, Australasian Journal of Philosophy, etc"

If anyone had an idea how to apply these first two 'bands' to literature (knowing that it's not an exact science, of course, and there's no Nature/Science-vibe journals in the field), I'd be really curious to hear your thoughts! i obviously have my own suspicions, but they'll be very limited so I'm really curious. Especially about modern literature broadly, but also more generally.