Matthew Martinez Prompt#1

New Historicism: I chose this lens because I am fascinated by history! This lens interested me more than others because I wanted to explore the historical context of the book. My previous experience with this lens is very limited but I am excited to dive into the critical lens and explain the historical politics that were shaping the novel. I wanted to see specifically with The Scarlet Letter how the well-known Puritan society influenced the novel. Also the setting of the novel being taken in new-found America. This period in time is very interesting to me and I would like to know more about how this time influenced the novel. I am hoping to learn how the context of the time of this book influenced the society in the book, for example maybe in new-found America the laws were very conservative and mainly based on Religion so they tend to have harsh punishments for small crimes. I hope this book makes me reflect on the rich history it has to offer.

Lens Selection - Eddie

Critical lenses help us analyze motives and influences on a story by looking at certain aspects of the writing in a very critical way, depending on the type of lens. There were many critical lenses to choose from when selecting which one I wanted to use for the novel: Lolita, by Vladimir Nabokov. They included: The psychoanalytical lens, the feminist lens, the reader-response lens, the new historicism lens, and the postmodernism lens. Overall, I decided to go with the feminist lens when analyzing the writing in the story. This means that I would use this lens to analyze and compare relationships between male and female characters, the power of male characters versus female characters, and how reinforced gender stereotypes influence the story and the author's decisions. I chose to analyze in this way for various reasons.

First of all, I know that Lolita is about an older man who is interested in much younger girls. Because of this, I can analyze how much power is distributed between the genders of the characters in the story, and look at how ideas that men have more power than women influence the story and reinforce gender stereotypes. In addition, the story was written by a man, so his view of women will be somehow present in the story. How he presents women may be analyzed to see if he includes stereotypes of women characters acting or behaving in a "womanly" manner.

Secondly, this story is set in the past. In the past, society had much more stringent standards for women, that required them to act, dress, and behave in a more strict manner than men. I predict that the gender roles and requirements present in the time period the book was written greatly affected the actions and thoughts of the characters, so it would be a very well-fitting lens to analyze how these thoughts and actions were decided on by the author.

Lastly, I am a male, and don't often think about how societal standards that are applied to women affect gender roles and stereotypes. Using this lens will push me out of my comfort zone and the analysis of this text will help me gain a new perspective and grow as a person.

I also considered using the psychoanalytical lens. This lens is used to analyze how the author's hidden motives might have influenced the writing and the characters' thoughts and actions in the story. Because the story is about an older man who is sexually obsessed with nymphets, and how this story is written in the perspective of a pedophile, we can see how the author portrays this character to reveal the author's potential thoughts on pedophilia. We can also use the analysis to assess the author's mental state. 

The psychoanalytical lens came as a close second to the feminist lens, but I really wanted to push myself to think in a new perspective. So, this lens doesn't offer the same change of perspective that analyzing in the feminist lens could give me. I really look forward to analyzing in the feminist lens!!