When is a story not a story?

[BadBoy]

How about the Japanese people?? They are much more innovative than Americans esp in the telecommunications and car industry, right ?? :unsure:

I know in their curriculum, English-A is not a part of it too!

I know in my part of the world, English-A is taught just not called the same as you guys call it. Then in college, depends on one's line of study is when a more in-depth study of English is reiterated in their curriculum!

You can't be more innovative than the people who actually invented cars and telecommunications. So much easier to take an idea and make it better than to actually "innovate". What's the last thing the Japanese actually invented?

I think the reason people look for hidden meanings in stories is because a lot of the great authors had hidden meanings in their works. They almost always reflected the times that they wrote in. Its human nature to do so.

 

[Zorak]

You can't be more innovative than the people who actually invented cars and telecommunications.

The Germans and the English? Cheers!

 

[JoeCool10]

I hate when people try to analyze something when there really isn't anything to analyze.

 

[HK]

However, there are plenty of books out there that are just 'stories', take Harry Potter for example; incredibly popular but, few can deny, a very poor series of books. The plots and characters arcs are formulaic, the writing sloppy and there is nothing beyond the text as you see it on the page.

Now you say that, but there's plenty of people out there who are all too happy to read more into even something very simple like the Harry Potter books. I'm pretty sure there was something going round a while back about how it's actually about how it's okay to be gay or something.

Here we go, I googled 'harry potter hidden meanings' and this is an extract of what came up:

The story is about a boy who lives in a cupboard ("in the closet"). His Aunt and Uncle are ashamed of him because his parents were quite eccentric ("flaming") and they are deeply concerned and afraid that he will turn out just like them. On his 11th birthday (i.e. roughly at the onset of puberty), the boy discovers that he is actually a "wizard", different in both style and substance from straight people, or "muggles" (breeders).

The boy is groomed into his new existence by a large, hairy bear of a man who shows Harry a hidden underground community of "wizards"(the gay subculture) living right under the noses of the general population . Harry's first visit to this subculture involves traveling through "Diagon Alley", a play on the word diagonally (not straight).

That's the kind of crazy I mean

 

[QaratNet]

People are deferent, readers are deferent.. so authors are deferent also

There are some people like to read books like these, so they need authors like those

It makes our tastes balanced.

 

[purpledove]

You can't be more innovative than the people who actually invented cars and telecommunications. So much easier to take an idea and make it better than to actually "innovate". What's the last thing the Japanese actually invented?

That post was in reference to the other post re: Chinese lacking creativity due to their educational curriculum lacking English or Literature. The point of the matter is it doesn't just have anything to do with that to generalize such hence I was just citing abt the Japanese. Creativity is encompassed not just in the learning abt English per se but many other factors too to consider! If you read the previous posts, you'll get the drift!

 

[Dana]

When it ends?