Old Pop Quiz Found in the Wolfgang Iser Papers at UC Irvine

Pop Quiz
Introduction to Reader Response

Instructions: Read each response carefully. Engage with the quiz. Fill in the gaps, the blanks. Make meaning. Bond. See the quiz as your companion. You're in this together.

1. Reader Response Theory values:
a. where the book has landed on the New York Times bestseller list
b. whether the author sells movie rights at a wicked high cost
c. how the reader interprets and finds meaning in the text

2. According to Reader Response Theory, which two elements cannot be separated?
a. what a text is and what it does
b. a reader and his/her book: books must be finished in one sitting
c. infinitives: "to" and its verb—as in "to boldly go"; sucky syntax is a deal breaker

3. The implied reader is
a. a reader who lies about having read a work
b. a reader whom the author had in mind when writing the book
c. the author's mom, because she is likely to be the only one to actually buy and read the book

4. Reader-Response communities
a. are basically like your mother's book groups
b. perform ceremonial dances as ways of interpreting the text
c. share interpretative strategies

5. You know Reader Response is "happening" when the reader
a. weeps
b. co-produces meaning with the text
c. begins to resent the protagonist on a creepily personal level

6. A Reader-Response critic's worst nightmare is
a. a reader who feels a deep and profound connection to the text
b. a reader who always reads a biography of the author before reading a text
c. a reader who enjoys nothing more than exchanging ideas with other like-minded readers

7. One guaranteed way to make a Reader-Response critic cry is to accuse him/her of
a. being judgmental about a text
b. falling asleep while reading
c. being a slow reader

8. What famous line from the movies best embodies Reader Response Theory?
a. "You complete me."
b. "I'll be back."
c. "Here's Johnny…"