Help! I need a reference for a paper I am about to submit and can't find one because the concept is one I've been aware of for a decade and have no idea where it comes from!
Can anyone give me a reference for the literary theory concept of the 'Ideal Reader' NOT the 'implied reader' (I have heaps for that!)? I think there's a subtle difference between the two and that's all I'm wanting to say but without a reference I'll be in big trouble!! Alas none of my literary theory books seem to mention it. Pah!
Thank you kind people.
Comments
This is off the web from a teacher at a Christian college, so I don't know if clever people are allowed to use it... but just in case:
http://web.cn.edu/kwheeler/lit_terms_I.html
I once did a literary criticism piece on the story of Jacob and Esau for a biblical studies tutor we both know and love. It was based on stuff I'd learned at A level. He commented that it was good but didn't appear to have any references. It's tough when you just know stuff, isn't it!
Thanks Andy. Alas I think it needs to be a book if possible (I'm already citing a whole heap of notes from past management courses which the academy struggles with!).
Among my gripes with the academy are the fact that you aren't allowed 'just to know stuff', you have to have got it from a book, nor are you allowed to say 'I worked this out for myself' when the marker only discovered it by reading a big dusty tome ten years earlier.
I fully appreciate the business over plagiarism but find it a bit galling when my grey matter has mulled over and spat out something to be told I need a reference for it! Good job nobody made the biblical authors use references... :-)
... or quote their sources accurately! :0)