Yesterday, I responded to an observation by Susan Gallagher and Roger Lundin about our obsession with origins as opposed to ends. This prompts the question: what are the proper ends of reading literature?
Gallagher and Lundin advocate for three:
- Cultivation: the active ordering and structuring of the creation God has given us
- Delight: joy found in the
- Love: committed and humbling service to God and our neighbors
My courses tend to get atomistic after the first class. We pick up different works and interpret them as specifically as we can for the purposes of developing particular writing / analytical skills, but the ends or purposes of all those readings get lost. As I try to give students a paradigm for interpretation that glorifies God and helps them enjoy him better, these ends will be good hooks for the reading and writing we do.