CS Lewis: Everyone stands up. Famous professor of literature, brilliant religious essayist, cartographer of pain for the death of his wife (“Punishment under observation”), fantastic narrator of the novel “”.Narnia Diaries”, knowledgeable and innovative literary critic. From this last aspect comes the “Reading experience”, a short, long-term work that has become a classic since its publication in 1961 and that Alba’s editorial now saves in its collection”transitionswith the translation ” Dear Dieguez. A work loaded with fluency and wisdom that remains relevant and perfectly applicable to contemporary literature.
Lewis (Belfast, 1898-Ovens, 1963) proposes an experiment: “Normally and by tradition, literary criticism is devoted to judging books. Your opinion of the way or ways readers read a particular book is nothing more than a corollary of your judgment of that book. Therefore, almost by definition, it has bad taste. to love bad literature would be the same as to love bad literature, and the author reverses the process: “Let the distinction between readers or ways of reading be our starting point, and let the distinction between books be its corollary.” Purpose: to explore How logical is it to describe a good book? because it is read a certain way and it is a bad book because it is read very differently”.
Majority and minority. remote areas. “First of all, most don’t read anything twice.” On the other hand, “in his lifetime, admirers of great works can make them ten, twenty, and even thirty times.” Many “do not place great value on reading. He sees it more as a last resort. As soon as an alternative hobby comes along, he happily leaves it.” “Written” people, on the other hand, “always seek a moment of silence and calmness to read and be able to do it with full attention.” And those who enjoy literature may find the first reading of a work an intense experience. What happens to other passing readers? “Literary” people always keep in mind what they read.
Numbers do not count: “The important thing is that some don’t read the same as others. There are critics, the majority of whom belittled: illiterate, vulgar, barbaric with rude and vulgar responses. “A permanent danger to civilization.” As if reading popular literature was a “moral disgrace.” Lewis denies this: “In this majority, there are certain individuals who are equal to or superior to some members of the minority in sanity, moral virtue, practical prudence, manners, and adaptability.” And be careful: “All literary lovers are aware that the percentage of ignorant and despicable, vile, perverted and violent people among us is not small.” It is better to forget those who practice this apartheid.
And snobs? what danger: “They are completely under the influence of fashion.” The devotee of culture is “more valuable as a person than a snob.” Let’s go to university. Lewis writes, “The sad consequence of making English literature a ‘course’ in both colleges and universities is that in the minds of these obedient and conscientious children and youth, from the very first lessons, the readings of great writers are linked to the concept of ‘merit’.
Attention: “The true reader always takes his reading seriously, because he reads with dedication and devotion, and as objectively as he can. However, precisely for this reason, it is not possible for him to seriously read all the books he reads. You will read them in the same spirit in which the author wrote them.
This is where the Puritans failed miserably.: “They’re too serious to take the reading with the seriousness it deserves.” Lewis delves into the differences in reading habits and the biases that derive from them, the different ways of reading, and the different satisfactions each receives from this experience. There are readers who criticize the slowness, there are those who seek the facts of life like a fist, and there are not a few people who read to give themselves a polish of prestige. Everything goes, everything gives news. As expected of a writer who shuns harshness and seriousness, the work exudes humor, takes a precise and elegant approach to the word, and reveals his thoughts with playful clarity.
Literary experience, says Lewis, “heals the wound of individuality without undermining its privileges. There are also collective feelings that heal that wound but destroy privilege.” In literature, “as in faith, love, moral action, and knowledge, I transcend myself, and when I do, I can never be more than myself.” A complete statement of the great principles inherent in a great creator.