I love teaching upper-level courses. I don’t hate lower-level courses either but upper-level is a different world. In the Intro to Literary Theory course, students stare at me with big, curious eyes, mesmerized by everything I say.
I started this course by saying, “People who don’t like to read don’t exist.”
And everybody gasped. It’s too cute for words: these kids are so young and so eager to learn things that my heart almost explodes when I look at them.
“People who say don’t like to read simply haven’t learned to see movies in their heads when they read,” I explained. “Whenever I open a book, I begin to watch a movie inside my head, a movie that I create myself, with some help from the book’s author.”
And everybody gasped again.
“It happens to me, too,” one student shared.
“Wow. . . I want to be able to do that, too,” another student said.
Then I told them about 1st-person narrators and omniscient narrators, and they were completely amazed.
Clarissa's Blog 
I can see the cartoon hearts exploding from their eyes. And now I’m convinced their faces squeak because they’re shiny and new. (I feel old now, btw).
People don’t learn about first person narrators in high school? I remember learning about dramatic structure in high school and sniggering because well, I was all of sixteen.
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I’ve learned just to assume that nobody learned anything in high school. That’s safer than assuming otherwise.
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When I imagine stuff, I’m very prone to tangents. When I try to read, I end up staring into space thinking about a point the author made and very rarely get any actual reading done. If my imagination worked by providing me with a coherent narrative from start to finish, I’d assume it was broken. 😛
That’s why I’m not really convinced by the idea that books allow you to imagine. I’m very capable of imagining stuff on my own. It’s not that I doubt the ability of professional authors to give you more interesting stuff to imagine, it’s just that thoughts inspired by someone else’s ideas are never as vivid as the thoughts you come across by yourself. I hope that doesn’t sound naive, but as a daydreaming teenager, it’s what I’ve come to believe.
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I just get kind of bored with my own one-track imaginings, you know? 🙂
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I shall supply you with some eight-track imaginings that involve rustic truckers and the occasional bowl of chili that’s been harbouring alien life.
Oh, wait, wasn’t that a movie with Dennis Hopper in it?
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I love your explanation, but what about people who are not fond of movies either? I love reading non-fiction but struggle with fiction. Maybe all the love of it went to you? 😉
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But do they love television?
If not, then I could make a case for reading critically being similar to playing a video game. A one-person shooter. 🙂 🙂
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I never visually imagine what I am reading about, or not paying attention to it, at least. Don’t know how the main hero looks like, unless have seen a movie, and then an actor takes the place.
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I am SO NOT worried about you not reading enough. 🙂
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I like being an unreliable omniscient narrator — that way I can play God with my readers’ hearts in the most profane and irresponsible manner possible.
Now I shall go forth and wrap my Hero Protagonist in cheese and flour tortillas before smothering him in a brown sauce made with molé and seventy-five percent cane rum. OH, I wasn’t supposed to take those comments about his “nearly being edible” seriously?
I know my target audience, and they like booze and food porn along with their violence, but today I shall mock them by setting my main character ablaze for their degustation … 🙂
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