10.  How do various contexts shape the process of making, interpreting, and experiencing literature?

  • In what way is the process a religious one?
  • Is this act of reading one of worship?
  • Is it intended for meditation? Ethical training? Catechism? Apologetics?
  • Does it challenge or question accepted beliefs in any way?
  • Is it intended for self-examination? Discernment?
  • How do politics shape the creation, distribution, or reading of literature?
  • Are certain works censored?
  • Are some state-sponsored?
  • Are certain interpretations more acceptable to those in power?
  • How do economic forces shape the process?
  • How much does it cost to produce the work? To distribute and market it? Who can afford it? Who can't? Why?
  • Do differing ethnic or national experiences shape the way it is read?
  • What institutions control the publication of literary works?
  • Which ones control the interpretation/ criticism of such works?
  • Which ones also control the teaching of them?
  • What traditions lay behind the process of literature?
  • What interpretive communities influence the way we read?
  • Are authors, publishers, or readers trying to solve certain issues or generating problems?
  • Do certain cultural practices influence any of the above?

"All manner of thing shall be well/ When the tongues of flame are in-folded/ Into the crowned knot of fire/ And the fire and the rose are one." -- T.S. Eliot, Little Gidding