Theoretical boundaries

[Renee]

No: HPFGUIDX 120357


--- In HPforGrownups at yahoogroups.com, "lupinlore" <bob.oliver at c...> 
wrote:

<SNIP>

> 
> I certainly disagree that emotional responses to plot and 
character 
> are out of place here.  This is not an academic discussion of the 
> mechanics of JKR's writing, nor is it an exercise in applying one 
> literary theory or another, or in arguing which literary theory is 
> most appropriate for analysis of canon, or in constructing formal 
> arguments according to any particular rules of evidence or 
procedure.
> It is a forum for discussing how this piece of fiction affects our 
> human lives.  Now, if you happen to find all those things (theory 
and 
> mechanics and formal rules of evidence) to be powerful and 
> meaningful, then employ them by all means.  However many of us 
aren't 
> particularly impressed with such approaches, as we find 
interacting 
> with this story to be primarily a human response to human 
characters -
> - i.e. an emotional and even, to use an admittedly vague and 
> sometimes maligned word -- a spiritual experience.  Our responses 
> will be emotion based, and we aren't very interested 
in "criticism" 
> as such.  If you are, more power to you!  But don't make the 
mistake 
> of thinking that is the only appropriate way of approaching HP, in 
> this forum or anywhere else, or that the tools and methods and 
> language of the literary critic will impress everyone, or make any 
> dent in the way we approach the sotry.  So we *will* continue to 
> excoriate the Dursleys, and to argue about why Dumbledore allows 
> Snape to be abusive, and to decry any pernicious/morally 
outrageous 
> themes we see.  You are more than welcome to participate in the 
> threads or sail right past them, just as we will likely sail past 
> threads trying to view the Dursleys as a plot element, or arguing 
> about Snape's place in the narrative arc, or relating the 
> moral/ethical structure of Hogwarts to the practices of the 
Edwardian 
> public school.
> 
> Lupinlore

Renee:
Relatively short answer to long post: Why not do both? Are analysis 
and emotional respons really two entirely separate compartments? An 
emotional response can lead to the question: why do we react like we 
do, and this can create a demand for analysis. And the analysis in 
its turn can lead to a better understanding.