Olivia (Lulu) Sieling
Amiee Fountain
ENL 3
23 January 2017
Word Count: 514
Blog Post 1: Before the Law
When reading a piece of literature, a person can interpret and critique the context in various ways. These criticisms, theories, and studies provide a base to the thought process and allow multiple approaches to the meaning of the piece of literature. In my group’s interpretation of “Before the Law” by Franz Kafka, the reader response theory was initially the way we viewed the story. After more thought, the psychological theory is the more apt approach to the story.
While initially discussing “Before the Law,” each member in my group had a different interpretation than the other. This obviously pointed towards the reader response theory. I took the story’s meaning in more of a literal analysis compared to my group’s analysis. I though of the story as being a symbol of law, including aspects of society and government. The gatekeeper continues to take time and money from the man who just wants answers. Although giving the gatekeeper these things may seem to help the man in his goal of understanding what lies behind the gate, nothing is achieved in doing so. Another person in my group though of the symbols in the story to be related to religion. The presence of “light” related to the holiness of God while the “gates” were a symbol of the gates in heaven. The money aspect in the story showed a connection to a church receiving money from its members. These different approaches to the story prove the reader response theory to be a viable criticism of the story.
Once I reevaluated the story, I found the psychological approach to be extremely useful in critiquing the story. This analysis of the story expresses repressed thoughts relating to life’s purpose. The story is based around the interpretation of conscious thoughts of the man in the story. The man is trying to find his purpose in life and spends all of his time and money doing so, but at the end, the man’s purpose was never revealed. The author is trying to teach a lesson about people wasting their lives trying to achieve a goal or trying to find their purpose. The gatekeeper is a symbol of society which is constantly taking time and money from people, pretending to help but in reality, it’s not. As humans, we want to understand life but the Franz Kafka is teaching us that life doesn’t have to have a known purpose to be well-lived, so we shouldn’t waste our time or money trying to figure it out.
I believe the psychological approach is more convincing due to the solid meaning behind the story. It is a straightforward approach to the story that includes all aspects of the story without leaving any pieces out. It is a more useful approach because it is relating to each person reading the story. Kafka uses the man in the story to teach people a valuable lesson about finding one’s purpose in life and the harm it can do.
I agree with you on that the reading has to deal with society and government. I felt as if people were being kept from being able to reach the government, which signifies that the weak have no say. I disagree with you on that the author wanted people to accept their fate because if we all accepted our fate then their will be no progress in society. I feel as if it were more of a way of waking us up and show us that we need to defeat those that keep us from getting ahead and to not accept our fate like the man did in a sense.
ReplyDeleteOverall, your analysis is very well written! You included a different response than what Karina and I wrote about, which made it interesting to read. I would possibly expand the final explanation of why the psychological approach is more significant because it was a little confusing. The introduction paragraph is a great addition and creates a clear and concise message of what your post will be about. Keep up the good work!
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