Tracing the weave: reading and interpreting young adult fiction

This dissertation demonstrates how the study of young adult fiction can be illuminated by a working knowledge of contemporary literary theories, viewing these theories as strategies, approaches to interpretation. The text reflects the author’s education in theory, his belief that a basic knowledge of theory provides a rich repertoire of new ways of reading, and his consideration of the ways in which theory can be used by both teachers and students in secondary and university classrooms. The text introduces literary theory to those who have little or no experience with it, explaining how theory establishes and explores relationships among author, reader, text, and cultural contexts. Its conversational style encourages readers to explore the practical applications of theory in their work. Each chapter discusses one theory and demonstrates its application in a close reading of one young adult text: Formalism (Virginia Hamilton’s M. C. Higgins, the Great); archetypal theory (Gary Paulsen’s Dogsong); structuralism/semiotics (Bruce Brooks’ The Moves Make the Man); poststructuralism/deconstruction (Lois Lowry’s The Giver); reader-response theories (Walter Dean Myers’ Fallen Angels); feminism (Budge Wilson’s short story collection The Leaving); black aesthetics (Ernest Gaines’ A Lesson Before Dying); cultural studies (M. E. Kerr’s Night Kites); and the application of several theories to Katherine Patterson’s Jacob Have I Loved. The concluding chapter sets the voices of theorists and teachers into conversations about the implications for theory in the English classroom.