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1. The context of McCarthy’s argument was discussed on the first page.

On page 425: “But


I now discover that this attitude is quite general, that the readers and students all over the
country are in a state of apprehension, lest they read a book or story literally and miss the
presence of a symbol. And, like everything in America, this search for meanings has
become a socially competitive enterprise; the best reader is one who detects the most
symbols in a given stretch of prose. And the benighted reader who fails to find any
symbols humble assets when they are pointed out to him; he accepts his mortification.”

She first gave this as a talk which is directed to writers, which not only establishes her
credibility, but also shows how severe the misguided curriculum is and how prevalent the
problem is even in places where the teachers are well-read.

2. We learn what a literary symbol is: But the art of abridgment and condensation, which is
familiar to anyone who tries to relate an anecdote, or give a direction, the art of natural
symbolism, which is at the basis of speech and all representation, has at bottom a
centripetal intention. it hovers over an object, an event, or series of events and rules to
declare what it is. literary symbolism is centrifugal and flees from the object, event, into
incorporeal distance, where concepts are taken for substance and floating ideas and
archetypes assume a hierarchic authority.

obtruse interpretation : one which leads the reader away from what the author wad actually
trying to get the reader to pay attention to
transubstantiation: (theological view, deeply complex) bread is transformed into body of Christ
adhawk: symbols purposefully created for the situation
natural symbolism: meaning should come from the set of events (pg. 429,431) → ex: food they

ordered, symbols came from natural sources

3. McCarthy’s argument is that people look too deeply into things that do not contain any
significant meaning. For example, there is a joke about students analyzing the blue
curtains as a symbol of someone’s depression, however, the author simply wanted to
color the curtains blue. In the same way, students are driven to find meanings that things
do not carry. The letters sent to McCarthy especially show this relationship; the
symbolism that the characters in the experience lacks scares students.

- calls an end to symbol hunting


- no surprise in the writer nor reader, symbols should be unplanned
- should incorporate own experiences
- symbols do not come from artificial places

4. Perrine tells us to read with our heart and mind-- our spine. Through this, if we do this
and separate ourselves from the story, the. we could see clearly that there possibly is no
symbolism, that life in itself is enough. In the same sense, Nabokov says to enter the
world of the author. By doing this, maybe the students will see that there is nothing that
the author is trying to use as symbolism, but simply show an experience that is
happening. He never explicitly says anything, however, lets people interpret using an
impressive amount of figurative language.
- frost - naturalness is essential to writing
- nabokov - in your own world
- hawthorne - pin in the butterfly
- O’connor - using naturalness, not forcing any symbols
5. How will we, as students, distinguish between no symbolism and symbolism? McCarthy
says that it is technically true that there is underlying symbolism that could be
interpreted, but how do we find the author’s true intentions and whether they meant to
incorporate symbolism or not?
_ what does the title mean?
- Title possibly means the simply answering the questions posed at her story; establishing
what the hash really means: hash
- Title could also be a “trick” in the sense that we would try to find an extra meaning
behind the title when it truly is simply what it is
-

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