Here is my introduction paragraph and my second paragraph so everyone can get a feel for what I am writing. Tell me what you all think!
Henry Sturges has existed
for five centuries not having aged a second since the moment his life was
stripped away from him forcing him to live vicariously through everyone he
meets and forcing those around him, including the reader, to project their lives,
human and vampire, onto their elder in Seth Grahame-Smith’s The Last American Vampire. Sturges, both
young and old, thrives through the interactions he has with many famous figures
which Smith weaves perfectly to trick the reader into believing the fantasy of
his tale. Particularly the interaction with Abraham Lincoln fuels Sturges fire
to continue living his undead life. The
Last American Vampire presents the Reader-Response theory brilliantly
through the projection of all the characters onto Sturges, including the
reader, and in turn Sturges resting his own immortality onto everyone who
crosses his path while keeping true to the American way and warping history
into fantasy.
The introduction of the novel is presented through the
eyes of Seth-Grahame Smith himself and his interactions with Henry Sturges.
Smith himself is so taken by the mythical figure that is Sturges that he
himself asks to be turned into a vampire. He also possesses the journals of
Henry Sturges. Therefore, he can tell his story. “What follows is the life of
Henry Sturges. What follows is the story of an American life” (Smith, 10). Throughout
the novel the reader projects themselves onto the life of Henry Sturges in
order to relive historical events through the eyes of a man who has seen it
all.
Hey Kayleigh, i'm so sorry for my absence on Monday. I will take the time now to present what may be slightly insignificant as i'm sure you've probably advanced past this point...Judging by your thesis I feel like you have a good understanding of what you want to do, yet--and this may be a little nit-picky and elementary of me to ask--but could you re-remind us in your thesis (or possibly just in the intro in general) what reader-response is ? (Or even, more specifically, just the term "projection"--just a brief definition, possibly). Doing so may also--and I might be wrong--help the paper not delve into the abstract and stay on the academic path of such a fun reading, as it seems to have been. I hope this suggestion isn't redundant, and I especially hope its not counterproductive, as I, personally, suck with reader-response...probably moreso than everyone else..
ReplyDeleteI think the last paragraph in the intro is a great thesis. I'm going to disagree with Mark here (sorry bud), but I feel like since none of the criticisms we read defined the school they belonged too, perhaps we shouldn't either. I feel like with reader response especially, there are so many ways it can happen that it might be better to create your own definition through your paper.
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