"Identifying" with fiction

[fuzzyoctopus]

Ok.  You people have read lots and lots, just as I have, and I want to bring up this subject that came up in my contemporary american lit class.

Is identifying with the books you read a bad thing?  My professor says it is.  He says it's "dangerous".  Now just to be clear, (because it took us a while), he's talking about the identifying you do as a kid/teenager.  The example he gave was when he was 12 he read "Catcher in the Rye" and he said it took him 2 weeks to get back to "normal" in his thinking, because he got so caught up in the book.

Identifying- as he defines it- includes such things as putting yourself into the book in your mind.  Now I got kind of upset about this.  I had many happy hours in my childhood imagining I was a character in my favorite books.  And to be honest, I still do it.  The books I love the most, that I ADORE, I think about that way.  Sometimes it might be for just 5 minutes, like with something like Elantris.

So my questions are:
1.) Does anyone else still do this, even for a minute?
2.) Do you agree with my professor that it's dangerous and should not be done?

[JP Dogberry]

If I can't get so into a book I obsess about it and all my thoughts occupy it somehow for days, then I'm dissapointed.

[EUOL]

Obsessing books is a way of life, and a profession, for me.  Generally it's books I'm writing, rather than ones I'm reading, but it's kind of the same thing.

And yes, I obsessed when I was purely a reader, back in high school.  That sense of immersion is part of what turned me into a writer myself.

[stacer]

I think your professor is of the opinion that one of my professors is, as are a couple of my classmates. They tend to distance themselves from the text, and find that they are most effective as reviewers that way. Personally, I agree with Jam--if I can't get into it, I can't enjoy the book. Now that I've been spending so much time analyzing literature, I do find that part of me is detached as I read, analyzing and noting problems. But the other part of me (the bigger part) just reads for enjoyment, making the language a part of me, getting inside the character's head.

[Entsuropi]

*shrugs* I daydream loads about novel settings.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

I don't see what's so bad about identifying with a character and putting yourself into that place. That's what a lot of childhood and adolescence is about -- trying on different social roles. What's the big deal if you get that social role from a book instead of TV or movies (or even real life)?

Anyway, I rarely put myself into the book. While reading I'm often immersed by the plot and images, but I don't imagine myself as a character. More an observer.

[fuzzyoctopus]

I think your professor is of the opinion that one of my professors is, as are a couple of my classmates. They tend to distance themselves from the text, and find that they are most effective as reviewers that way.

Yes- we're supposed to be "resisting readers", not "identifying readers".  We basically told him that yeah- for literature classes that made sense to distance yourself from the text.  But he then said you should do it with everything you read, because identifying is dangerous.  I think the idea was that if you do it ever you're stuck doing it and you wont' be able to read literature 'correctly'.

To which I replied under my breath that he can tell us how to read literature all he wants, but if he's trying to tell us we can *never* do something I've spent my life doing, he's SADLY mistaken.

Which is sad because I really liked this teacher and this makes me like him less.

Part of me wants to write out an argument about how this completely negates the point of Eliot's Objective Correlative, which I personally think is the coolest thing I've learned about (literature-wise) in the last year.  If you're totally distant from the book you dont' feel what they author is wanting you to feel, and you're missing half of the experience.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

more than half. You're supposed to respond to literature. Else it is not art or communication.

[Eagle Prince]

If you get too deep into it, your preception of fantasy and reality will start to blur.  That could be dangerous for some people, like if they had poor parenting or something.  It could also be dangerous to never fantasize, its just one of those things that when taken to the extreme is really bad so I wouldn't worry about it.  If you're aware it could become a problem, it probably won't.  Its just like when your mom told you something like stop playing video games or watching TV and go outside and do something.

[42]

See I would have to disagree with you professor. I see his point that by identifying with what you read can cause you to lose sight of your self-image. However, I'ce often heard that the reason we read is so that we know we are not alone.

I think that the purpose of writing is to communicate with others. Reading can be like having a good conversation with a friend. Trying to see if the writer has felt, wondered, or thought the same things.

Also, I would say that most Aesthetitions would disagree, particularly Edward Bollough who wrote the book on distancing yourself. http://www.csulb.edu/~jvancamp/361_r9.html

[fuzzyoctopus]

1912??

*wonders how her grade would turn out if she wrote about this for her term paper*

I'm totally serious here.  Thanks for the website link. This could be a Very Good Thing, especially if I apply it to the narrative technique of the book, and....  wanders off, talking to herself excitedly

[Mistress of Darkness]

I still get into books. Getting into the story (enough that someone can ask me a question and I won't even notice that they're talking to me) is the definition of enjoyable reading to me.

It took a while to recapture this after college, and I find that there is a part of my mind that has detacted itself and makes little English major comments about why it is a good book technically speaking.

[fuzzyoctopus]

Jeff, that article is the coolest thing I've read in months.  I am so using it.

[Gemm: Rock & Roll Star; Born to Rock]

Now, I know you're all taking pride in the fact that you can immerse yourself into a book. And I'm not saying anything bad about that. In fact, I applaud you. The thing is though, in the past few months I haven't been able to apply that to myself. Even lately. For some reason I can't just sit down and read for hours on end like I used to. Whats my problem...

[fuzzyoctopus]

Good question, Gemm.  I've found it gets harder and harder for me as time goes on.  When I was a kid I could sit and read for hours on end.  Now I'm lucky if I can stay in a book for an hour.  It takes something really extraordinary to keep me up reading all night.  I think the last book I did that with was Wolves of the Calla.  
It makes me feel disillusioned, but at the same time it makes me even MORE defensive about my right to get lost in the books that I still can.