Benefits of Multiple Analysis

What is the point of analyzing literature? This author has been asking that question for the past seven weeks and has come to the conclusion that there is an enormous benefit in the analysis of literature. This essay will explore this benefit through the different types of analysis. These forms include new criticism, political analysis, reader response, deconstructionist criticism, feminist/ gender analysis, psychoanalytical analysis, and new historian analysis. At least three of the previously mentioned forms of analysis will be used on the following short stories: The Birthmark by Nathaniel Hawthorne (2004, pp. 168-180), A&P by John Updike (2004, pp.164-168), and Nairobi by Joyce Carol Oates (2004, pp. 515-519). This author has discovered that a piece of literature should not be analyzed by using only one form of analysis, but rather by using many different forms. Literature should be analyzed with many different forms, because it benefits the reader with a richer understanding of the text read, deeper understanding of the characters, and greater appreciation of literature itself.

Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story The Birthmark (2004, pp. 168-180) will deepen a reader’s understanding by using the first type of analysis, new criticism. To analyze the short story using new criticism, a reader must “focus on the work itself, and not the author’s intention (the intentional fallacy) or the reader’s response (the affective fallacy)” (Lynn, 2004, p. 1174). Through the use of new criticism, it can be surmised that the line, “He,” speaking of the main character Aylmer, “had devoted himself, however, too unreservedly to scientific studies ever to be weaned from them by any second passion” (Lynn, 2004, p. 169) will lead to either Aylmer finding another love besides science, or holding true to the statement that he could never have another first love. The second case proves to be true. He repeatedly attempts to use science to cure the birthmark from his wife’s cheek shortly after the marriage. Science wins in the end by curing his Georgiana’s birthmark, but it kills her in the process. Georgiana’s last words, “Do not repent that with so high and pure a feeling, you have rejected the best the earth could offer” (Lynn, 2004, p. 179). The earth’s goodness, including his wife, was not what Aylmer loved, but science itself was Aylmer’s true love. This is the interpretation using new criticism, but political analysis would look at the same story in a different way.

Political analysis is “Any interpretation of literature and culture that has a political agenda to advance may be said to be a specimen of political criticism” (Kennedy, 2009, p. 119). It uses literature as a form of social change, and argues that the story would reflect the negative impact of the obsession of science on society. In Hawthorn’s preface to The Scarlet Letter, he had to deny this very accusation of a political agenda. “As an enmity, or ill-feeling of any kind, personal or political, he utterly disclaims such motives,” (Hawthorne, 1850, p. 1). However, even though Hawthorn urges readers to believe there is not any political motive in his writing, political analysis critics would disagree. The fact that he uses society’s habits proves his intention to provoke social change. “In those days when the comparatively recent discovery of electricity and other kindred mysteries of Nature seemed to open paths into a region of miracle, it was not unusual for the love of science to rival the love of woman in its depth and absorbing energy” (Lynn, 2009, p. 169). Because it was a political agenda to advance science, Hawthorne must have had a political agenda as well. Reader response would take a different view from either new criticism or political analysis.

Reader response is, “The process of analyzing a literary work by describing what happens in the reader’s mind as he or she assimilates the text. Reader response criticism invokes common experience to back up its premises” (Kennedy, 2009, 128). After analyzing with new criticism and political analysis, this reader can see both points of view as possibly being accurate to a certain extent. This reader hoped that the scientist would look past the birthmark on his wife’s face and once again feel the love he had felt for her before the marriage, but instead suffered disappointment as the political motives, the increase in the knowledge of science, overpowered those of love. By using more than one approach to analyze this text, this reader has a larger understanding of the possibilities and deep meanings of the characters involved in the story.

A deeper understanding of literature increases with the use of additional forms of analysis. John Updike’s short story A&P (Lynn, 2004, pp.164-168) can be easily analyzed using deconstructionist criticism. Professor Gerald Browning defined deconstructionism best when he described it as the study of binary relationships in literature. One of the binary themes represented in the story is the point of view of the working class, the cashier, versus the middle class, the customers. A second contradictory relationship, in the development of the story, is the struggle within the cashier to see the girls, who are walking around the grocery store in their bathing suits, in a moral rather than an immoral manner. And a third conflicting relationship that develops near the end of the story is that of impulse versus rational thought. The cashier impulsively quits his job, runs out of the store after the girls, but then immediately regrets the decision as he rethinks his actions. These binary relationships could also be looked at through the use of gender analysis.

Gender analysis, or feminine criticism, is “A way of approaching texts, including but not limited to literary texts, in which the representation and participation of women is focused upon” (Lynn, 2004, 1167). This text can be looked at differently from the male and female perspectives. Popular viewpoints discussed in class are that the cashier was “a pig” by looking at the girls in the way he did, or that the girls purposely dressed nearly naked to get that kind of attention from the men working in the store. This analysis makes the reader wonder if this was intended by the author. Updike has been described as, “arguably the most significant transcriber, or creator rather, of “middleness” in American writing since William Dean Howells (about whom he has written appreciatively)” (Baym, 2008, p. 2659). This response invites the reader, regardless of gender, to respond freely to the text as well.

This reader does not agree with the feminist view that was popular in the classroom discussions, the cashier being a pig; nor does she agree with the opposite male perspective, that the girls asked for it with their style of dress. Rather, this reader sees the balance of the two views as more accurate. While it is true that the cashier did look at the girls in lust, “Darling, I said, Hold me tight,” (Lynn, 2004, p. 165), it is also true that the girls knew the impact they were having on the cashier, "She must have felt in the corner of her eye me and over my shoulder Stokesie in the second slot watching, but she didn’t tip. Not this queen. She kept her eyes moving across the racks, and stopped, and turned so slow it made my stomach rub the inside of my apron," (Lynn, 2004, p. 165). There are two different sides that make a coin, and in A&P both points of view work together to create one scene, one story. These varying viewpoints could be argued not only through deconstructionism, gender analysis, or reader response, but also through the use of psychoanalytical analysis.

Joyce Carol Oates’ short story Nairobi (Lynn, 2004, pp. 515-519) will be analyzed using psychoanalytical analysis. Psychoanalytical analysis is, "The practice of analyzing literature in terms of the nature of literary genius, the psyche of a particular artist, and the psychic content of fictional elements, especially characters. Such approaches, proponents argue, disclose the underlying motivations and meanings of a literary work and lay bare the process of its creation” (Kennedy, 2009, p. 125). This approach will suggest that the theme of story was imagined because the author felt at one time or another like a call girl, even though it does not necessarily mean that she ever was one. The lines, “In fact she had had a number of questions to ask, then. But the answers had invariably disappointed. The answers had contained so much less substance than her own questions, she had learned, by degrees, not to ask,” (Lynn, 2004, p. 517) according to psychoanalytical analysis, would propose that the author had difficulty with finding meaning in her own life therefore Oates’ character, Ginny, found no reason to expect a purpose as great as her own.

The life of Oates, the time period, and the location where the story was written will all have a direct impact on the purpose of the story according to the new historian analysis. The life of Joyce Carol Oates alone can justify the use of this type of analysis.
Oates was born in Millerport, New York. This rural area of upstate New York is the setting of many of her nineteen novels and numerous short stories. Her early novels reflect her parents' experiences in the Depression, which in her early work is depicted as the source of subsequent anomalies in American culture, (Friedman, 2001, para. 1). The fact that Oates wrote frequently about her parents experiences and her home in upstate New York proves that the new historian belief that literature if influenced by the time period, the life, and the location of the author.

This author can see the parallel between the two forms of analysis. The new historical analysis justifies the analysis of the psychoanalytical approach. Though this reader may not agree that the author was possibly a call girl, she can admit the relationship between the short story and life experiences of the author. This type of analysis, however, does not take into consideration the style of the short story. The style of Nairobi (Lynn, 2004, pp. 515-519) distracts from the story line. It is difficult to follow who is speaking or where the speaking stops and thought starts. Even if this undefined separation between speech and thought is the intention of the author, this reader finds it distracting and believes it to hinder the overall effect of the story.

Not only is there a purpose to studying literature, but there is a purpose in analyzing literature using all different forms of analysis. There are different views of a person in real life, and the different views in literature are equally as important. In life there are many dimensions to people, places, and things, but since literature has different dimensions as well, it should be analyzed using different forms of analysis. Evaluating a piece of literature with many different forms benefits the reader with a better understanding of the text, a deeper understanding of the characters, and a greater appreciation of literature itself.
 
References
Baym, N.(Ed.) (2008). The Norton anthology: American literature. Seventh Ed. New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc.
Carver, R. (2004). Cathedral. In S. Lynn (Ed.), Literature: Reading and writing with critical strategies. (pp. 408-418). New York, NY: Pierson Education, Inc.
Friedman, E. G. (1991). Oates, Joyce Carol (1938- ). Benet's Reader's Encyclopedia of American Literature. George B. Perkins, Barbara Perkins, and Phillip Leininger. Vol. 1. New York: HarperCollins, 1991. 795. Literature Resource Center. Doi: A16853603
Hawthorne, N. (1850). The scarlet letter. New York: Bantam Books.
Hawthorne, N. (2004). The birthmark. In S. Lynn (Ed.), Literature: Reading and writing with critical strategies. (pp. 168-180). New York, NY: Pierson Education, Inc.
Kennedy, X.J, Gioia, D. & Bauerlein, M. (2009). Handbook of literary terms: Literature, language, theory. Second Ed. New York: Pierson Education, Inc.
Oates, J.C. (2004). Nairobi. In S. Lynn (Ed.), Literature: Reading and writing with critical strategies. (pp. 515-519). New York, NY: Pierson Education, Inc.
Updike, J. (2004). A&P. In S. Lynn (Ed.), Literature: Reading and writing with critical strategies. (pp. 164-168). New York, NY: Pierson Education, Inc.