Close Reading

This week’s blog is supposed to be written on the topic of close reading. I never really knew what close reading exactly was until we learned about it this week. I understand that close reading is a way to better understand the text being read and find the deeper meaning in the story. Although this seems like a simple task, I do not think it is. I attempted this close reading on all four of the short stories we read in class this week and I never seemed to get what everyone else did from the text. After listening to everyone’s thoughts on the texts I was able to finally make connections and make sense of the story. Before listening to the class’s thoughts though, I was very lost and had no idea what to think of these texts. My “close readings” consisted of questioning everything in the story and I had a very difficult time being able to put things together in order for the story to make sense.

After working with the idea of close readings this week, I have a much better understanding of what it is and what I need to do in order to complete this task. I do think though, after learning this task I will be prone to “close reading” with all future texts I read. It is a really good habit to have and use with all readings. It not only uses your brain more, but also makes you connect with the text and find the deeper meaning in what you are reading, which is always a good thing to do. Except, now that I know how to close read, I think it is going to get annoying to always read like this since it will take longer to think about and process the ideas of the text.