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Literature

This may be a difficult subject for many of you. Fortunately, it is one of my areas of expertise. I majored in 'Modern European Studies' and 'German Studies for my undergrad, so I took a lot of Literature classes. In fact, I nearly attended grad school to study Literature. I'm glad I didn't, but I still love to read.

Let's talk about two popular stories: Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter. These stories have some important similarities and structures that are common in books and movies.

The Hero's Journey

Many stories, whether a movie or a book, have a single main character. This character will likely change throughout the story. That is what we call the character's "arch".

Think about Frodo in 'Lord of the Rings' or Harry in 'Harry Potter'. By the end of their stories, they have changed.

These stories follow a similar pattern.

1. The main character starts out in regular life. Life is a daily routine. The hero may be happy, or bored, or sad in his life. Usually, if he is happy, there is actually a dangerous world that he doesn't know about.

2. Something changes. The hero's life is forced to change. Someone dies, or there is a call to adventure and the hero must choose to leave his home.

3. The hero meets new people and fights enemies and goes through some major challenge or conflict.

4. Finally the hero returns home a new and changed person.

Does this sound familiar?

Maybe you've read a similar story? Or seen a movie like that: the Matrix, Star Wars, and even Toy Story are examples of the hero's journey.

Some people dislike these stories because they are predictable, but at the same time it makes the story more captivating (interesting) to us because we imagine that we are that character.

You may have noticed that I said the hero was 'he'. But that's only because there is also a 'heroine's journey'!

A heroine's Journey

But do all books follow this structure?

No, of course not.

And many of the greatest books do not follow this structure!

George Orwell's 1984 definitely did not. Frankenstein didn't either! In fact, both those books have awful endings!

Anything by Kafka? No way!

Many of these stories deal with very complex issues that we face.

Frankenstein was a warning for those who were highly ambitious in science.

Kafka deals with many of the issues in society related to the bureaucratic nature of our countries' organisations: law, school, police.

The Great Gatsby is a story about the death of the 'American Dream'.

But there are so many different ways to interpret a book!

Let's take a look. I'll give some examples of how different people read different books.


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  • Writing
    • IELTS Task 1 Academic
    • Essay Writing
  • Speaking
    • Writing/Speaking Ideas >
      • Who are you?
      • Health
      • The Environment
      • Your Stories
      • Architecture
      • Crime and Justice
      • Film
      • Politics
      • Urban Design
      • Agriculture
      • Building Communities
      • Space Travel
      • History
      • Technology
      • Literature
      • Science
      • Video Games
    • IELTS Preparation >
      • IELTS >
        • writing videos >
          • Writing Task 2
        • Grammar/Vocabulary
      • Teaching Methods >
        • Speaking practice
        • Improve your reading today
        • Using Films to Learn
  • Reading
  • Listening