"The Reading Process: A Phenomenological Approach" by Wolfgang Iser - Article Summary

Iser, Wolfgang. "The Reading Process: A Phenomenological Approach." The Implied Reader: Patterns of Communication in Prose Fiction from Bunyan to Beckett. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins UP, 1974. 274-94. Print.

From Wikipedia: Phenomenology, in Husserl's conception, is primarily concerned with the systematic reflection on and analysis of the structures of consciousness, and the phenomena which appear in acts of consciousness. Such reflection was to take place from a highly modified "first person" viewpoint, studying phenomena not as they appear to "my" consciousness, but to any consciousness whatsoever. Husserl believed that phenomenology could thus provide a firm basis for all human knowledge, including scientific knowledge, and could establish philosophy as a "rigorous science" of measurable perception.

SUMMARY

I – The work of literature is text and the reader's response

According to phenomenology, when considering a literary work one must examine not only the text but the response it evokes in the reader. A text has the artistic pole, which is the text as created by the author, and the aesthetic pole- the text as realized, or responded to, by the reader. The literary work then is more than just the text- it is something abstract that is between the text and the readers' response to it.

A work of literature is thus inherently dynamic. It changes depending on the reader. The text allows the reader to imagine for himself some of the components of the narrative. This is important in holding the attention of the reader.

II – The text changes during reading as the reader modifies his expectations of it

A text is comprised of sentences. These serve to create the world within a work of fiction. All sentences offer ambiguity, or fluidity, a meaning beyond the obvious literal one and it is through these that the reader may become an active participant in the reading process. It is through these lenient sentences that the content of the text comes across. The sentences serve as foreshadowers of future events to the reader. The reader thus actively predicts what is to come, modifying his expectations as he encounters new sentences. These sentences also have retrospective importance to the reader (he modifies his views of prior events based on new ones). A text in which the reader is easily able to predict the plot (where the reader doesn't modify his expectations) is considered inferior. It becomes boring.

The same text creates different worlds for different readers. It engages the imagination and creativity of the reader. This attribute is the virtual ability of the text- the "coming together of text and imagination". Virtuality is created by anticipation and retrospect on the readers' part.

When consecutive sentences easily thread together the reading is fluid. But when a sentence doesn't make sense in the context of the previous one the reader is forced to stop and consider it, and make sense of it for the fluid reading to continue. This blockage of sense in a story, this interruption of flow is an opportunity for the reader to be active, and make sense of the sentence by "filling in the gaps left by the text itself". No one reading will ever fulfill the potential of a text because of the variability in different readers' reactions to the same text. This is true also to the same reader reading a text twice. This difference in reactions is attributed to the changes that occur in the reader over time- but the text must inherently allow for such difference.

The inherent interactivity of a text and the difference between readings demands that the reader contribute from his own experience to the reading of the text. Paradoxically, he must contribute from his own experience in order to comprehend a reality different from his (that of the story).

III – The reader writes part of the story in his head

The author sets guidelines for the reader but the reader fills in the blanks with his imagination. By definition, one can only imagine things that are not there. The reader may imagine a set of possibilities as opposed to one particular thing. A literary work is thus the sum of the text and the sum of the text that is not there (which enlists the reader's imagination).

IV – The reader seeks unity in a text

A text offers much potential. The reader must reconcile all the possibilities to get a clear unified sense of the text. The reader compares different parts of the texts to gain achieve this consistency. He does this through the illusions that the text creates. Again this unity is not inherent in the text but lies somewhere between the text and the consciousness of the reader. Here too there is modification of the illusion, and throughout the reading the "gestalt" (sense of wholeness of the text) changes- otherwise the reader loses interest.

V – The literary work induces change in the reader

A literary text is effective when it creates expectations rooted in familiarity and negates them in the text, creating for the reader something unfamiliar. The reader is forced to modify his preconceptions to keep up with the illusion that the text creates. This induces a change in the reader.

The division between reader and writer becomes blurred while reading a text, because the reader takes someone else's ideas and immerses himself in them. The reader shuts out his own sense of self and becomes someone he is not. "As we read, there occurs an artificial division of our personality because we take as a theme for ourselves something that we are not". There is the personality of the reader which is immersed in the story and is subject to the author's thoughts and there is the previously existing self.

"You have learnt something. That always feels at first as if you had lost something"- George Bernard Shaw. Iser expounds:

1. You lost the inability to do that thing (or the lack of knowledge of the thing)- any change causes pangs of nostalgia, of fear of that change

2. It implies relearning. You lost the wrong way to do it by learning the right way, or the old way by learning the new way. In accordance with 1, you will never do anything according to the old way- now your new way dominates your behavior.