Lens: Reader Response
Prompt: Critical Lens Close Reading
So for chapters 1-4, I read the story from a much closer distance than I'm used to, and I must say, it was rather strenuous on the eyes. I don't recommend Critical Lens Close Reading to the faint of heart.
Alright, so apparently what I'm actually supposed to do is pick a paragraph from the chapters I read, and analyze it. Here's a paragraph:
" Could it be true? She clutched the child so fiercely to her breast, that it sent forth a cry; she turned her eyes downward at the scarlet letter, and even touched it with her finger, to assure herself that the infant and the shame were real. Yes!- these were her realities,- all else had vanished!" (53).
This may be a short paragraph, but as they say, a word is worth a thousand pictures. This being true, this paragraph contains 55 thousand pictures! That's enough for almost 40 minutes of film in a single paragraph. It's a wonder that people are ever able to condense entire novels into a two hour movie.
Ok, now to analyze the paragraph itself. Hester asking herself, "Could it be true?" shows that she still hasn't come to terms with her child, which she has known about for at least a few months now. She's quite slow when it comes to this kind of thing. Then she goes and squeezed the child until it cries, like its the baby's fault. It's not the baby's fault that Hester went around sleeping with the pastor (spoilers). She's a jerk, end of discussion. The moose is nicer.
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