Blog prompt

Why is it necessary to understand the historical and cultural context of the novel?

I find it necessary to understand this because it helps you understand more on why the author chooses to write this story. Let me give an example: Animal Farm. This book is written by George Orwell during the time of the Russian Revolution, so if we understand that, we can see that he is writing a satire, which means that he wrote that book to represent the Russian Revolution.

How does it help to understand the author's background? Is it necessary to learn about the author's background?

To me, I find that it is a must to learn about the authors background because there could be certain things that made an impact on the author that inspired him to write the particular book. In addition, their writing style could be derived from other poets that they admire.

Is it possible to appreciate the text without pre-reading about the historical and cultural context of the novel / background of the novel?

Well, it depends. If the author wrote such a good story, it is possible. However, it would still not be as good as compared to having read the historical and cultural context of the novel. As stated in question 1, if we did not read the cultural context of Animal Farm, we would take it as a well written, nicely done story. However, if we knew the cultural context, we would take the same story as a well written satire.