Summary:
A variety of elements in a short story can enable the reader to enjoy reading it, whether it is plot, character, style or structure, or level of familiarity with or vicariousness through the story. The reader can also derive enjoyment from challenges offered by the themes or arguments in a story. Examples that bear this out include two Ray Bradbury short stories, "The Pedestrian" and "The Last Night of the World," as well as in Marjorie Barnard's short story "The Persimmon-tree."
A Enjoyment of reading does not simply come from being challenged by the themes or arguments in a text. There are other elements in texts which may perhaps make reading enjoyable. For instance; plot and character, or the reader may be engaged by the style or structure, or from the reader's familiarity or vicariousness, that is how close or distant the events in the text are from the reader's experience. However being challenged by the themes or arguments in a text, also brings enjoyment to reading.
Primarily, what does enjoyment mean? It means: to take pleasure from or in, have use of or benefit from. Therefore as readers we can also benefit from texts while taking satisfaction in reading them. But how can a reader benefit from a text?
There are short stories to be found which portray a cautionary message to the audience, from which the reader can benefit from by taking a blank at what may happen to the society if we as the society don't do something about the pollution, wars, and other problems that face our generation and generations to come. The short stories "The Pedestrian" by Ray Bradbury and "The Last Night of the World" also by Ray Bradbury deal with the dehumanizing of a society by their reliance on technology. They present a cautionary message about what is coming ahead, and how the society will become dead, that by walking through the streets would be like "walking through a graveyard," a society where "Magazines and books didn't sell anymore. This quote shows how the citizens have lost their individuality and creativity. People in that society don't commit crimes and only one police car is needed which shows that the people have become subservient, and all do is sit like dead in front of their viewing screens while they are being conditioned by the heirachial system.
Bradbury wrote these during the years of the 1950's, which was the time of the rise in the industrial activity, therefore he focused on what may occur as the result of this industrial activity. Today we see that Bradbury was correct about his cautionary/speculative fiction by looking at the facts around us that the ozone layer is being depleted and our water systems are polluted and our food is becoming less eatable. We can benefit from his cautionary tale by doing something about the pollution, loss of individuality and other problems portrayed in the story. However the past generations did not benefit from Bradbury's text, but simply took pleasure in reading it, and we can see that by looking back in time since the 50's, and we can see just how many bombs have been tested only by the French, plus all the other countries that have tested bombs since then, and many more other situations that Bradbury warned us of.
Personally I think that the plot, style, and character development make the stories enjoyable for me, although being challenged by the themes and arguments in a text make the reading more interesting. With style I would also add append symbolism. Symbolism challenges the reader to investigate to dig further into the text to find the connotations for the symbolic meanings. Marjorie Barnard uses symbolism extensively in her short story "The Persimmon-tree," where nearly every second word is a symbolic word for example "spring" means new life, and a lot of the other symbolic words and phrases link back to spring, like the shooting tulips. And regular connotations to Gynocentric images like the persimmons, which connote to the woman's breasts, and Phallosentric images like the bulbs, boat fork and shooting tulips. "My blood ticked like a clock." This symbolises her biological clock that has ticked over and she has realised that she isn't able to have children anymore. The reader would have only known that by investigating and digging right into the story to find meanings hidden between the lines, and this to me makes reading enjoyable and challenging.
Marjorie Barnard has crafted the characters to seem very odd in an odd state thinking about odd things. Only at the end of "The Persimmon-tree" does the reader realise that the first unknown lady in the story has been pondering about sexual intercourse the whole time, which appeals to most young adult readers that are being targeted by Marjorie Barnard.
The reader's familiarity or how close or distant the events in the text are from the reader's experience are also quite important for the reader to enjoy a story, because if a reader cannot apply the story to himself or see something that could apply to him or if the text doesn't remind him of a past experience or something similar, won't make it as much of a good read as it would be to a reader that can apply the story to himself and is familiar to the events in the text.
Therefore I believe that enjoyment of reading does not simply come from being challenged by the themes or arguments in a text, but from many other elements connected to the texts. However being challenged by the themes or arguments in a text, also brings enjoyment to reading.
This is the complete article, containing 865 words
(approx. 3 pages at 300 words per page).
