Understanding Wolfgang Iser's Phenomenological Approach to Reading

This essay discusses Wolfgang Iser's phenomenological approach to reading and its significance in understanding the interrelation between reader, writer, and text. It explores the five aspects of the reading process according to Iser and how they contribute to the reader's experience. The essay also provides an overview of Iser's background and contributions to literary theory.

Running head: WOLFGANG ISER
WOLFGANG ISER
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One of the critical theory that provide the method through which a text can be understood
through reading is the study of Wolfgang Iser. It includes language, signs, discourse and units of
sentences which are most prominent aspects that we notice while reading the text. The entire
process has to deal with the reading process of the reader as well as the text’s methodological
and critical explanation given by Wolfgang. Wolfgang Iser has provided the world with “The
reading process: A phenomenological Approach” that helps in understanding the interrelation of
reader-writer text. This essay aims to discuss “The reading process: A phenomenological
approach” of Wolfgang Iser and discuss the significance of it.
Born in Marienberg, Germany, Wolfgang stands among the most prominent literary
theorist of the twentieth century. Wolfgang has his own unique way of contributing in various
field of study that exploring the ways literature function in the human experience. Beginning
from his involvement in founding the late innovative University of California at Irvine, Iser have
innovated and explored ways to regarding human experience. Few of his major works involves
Shakespeare, Pater and Bekett which are widely known for the sensitive commentary as well as
original application. His recent works are on literary anthropology involving insights of thirty
years of critical work asking the largest questions. What it meant to be human was the largest
question of Iser. Iser as a scholar have contributed in an exceptional level in term of global
respect, and he is one of the vital personality who determined the future direction of humanities.
Phenomenology is a philosophical movement that originated in the 20th century. The
prime objective of phenomenology is the direct description and investigation of phenomena as
consciously experienced without inclusive of theories regarding their casual explanation. It is
also to be remained as free as possible from presumptions and preconceptions. Although the
word is very old going back to the 18th centuryduring the time when the Swiss German

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philosopher and mathematician Johann Heinrich Lambert implemented it to a part of his theory
of knowledge that deals with truth, illusion and error. The word has been used often by other
scholars as well however, in the contemporary the term has its association with Edmund Husserl.
Edmund Husserl is widely recognized as the founder of the modern phenomenology that was a
highly influential movement during the 20th century. The movement inspired thinkers from
various fields of study. The reason Edmund Husserl is considered as the founder of
phenomenology is for it was him who developed it in more systematic philosophical approach
and method along with definite goal. In the phenomenological field, all the major contributions
are from Edmund making it a philosophy as well as a method (Farber, 2017).
According to Husserl, phenomenology is conceived in three important ways. Firstly, as
the science of sciences, secondly as a first philosophy and thirdly as a transcendental idealism. In
his conception, phenomenology is primarily concerned with the systematic reflection on and
analysis of the structures of consciousness. As a philosophy phenomenology initiates a break
from many traditional concerns and develops a new way of thinking (Sloan & Bowe, 2014).
According to “the reading process: A phenomenological approach”, the reading process
has several aspects by following them one can understand the reading literary in better ways. Iser
have divided into five parts. Firstly, the literature’s work is text and it is a response to the reader.
As per phenomenology, the times a literary work is considered, an individual not only examine
the text but also the response of the text that evokes in the reader (Padilla-Díaz, 2015). There is
an artistic pole in text that is the text fashioned according to the author and it is the aesthetic pole
the reader respond to when it is realized or recognized. The literary work becomes much more
than a mere text when the aesthetic aspect is realized. It is abstract by its nature which lies
between the reader’s response to the text and the text. Therefore, the work of literature is

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integrally dynamic. It has the potential of changing as per the reader and it highly depends on the
reader. The text lets the reader to enter in an entire world of imagination for himself or herself,
where some of the major components are narrative. This is one of the vital part of literary works
that helps in order to hold the attention of the reader.
According to Kukkonen (2014),second, the text changes while it is being read as the
reader modifies his expectations from the text. According to Iser, a text is comprised of several
sentences. This helps and serves as it lets the creator get into a world of fiction. Every sentences
offer various components such as fluidity, ambiguity and meanings that are beyond the literal
meaning. Thus, it is by these components that the reader becomes the lively participant in the
process of reading. Through the lenient sentences the contents of the text become able to come
across. The reader through theses sentences become aware of the foreshadowers of the future
events. Then, the readers, therefore, become capable of predicting the things that are about to
come, adjusting his or her expectations when he encounters the new sentences. The sentences
have retrospective significance to the reader. A kind of text that lets the readers easily able to
predict the plot is considered to be inferior as it becomes monotonous (Selden, 2016).
The same text also createsdifferent worlds for different readers. The reader’s creativity
and imagination is involved and engaged. This specific characteristic is the virtual capability of
the text that lets the text to come together in combination of text andimagination. Through the
anticipation and retrospect, the virtuality of the text is created on the reader’s part.
According to Björninen (2017), the reading becomes fluid when consecutive sentences
easily thread together. However when a sentence fails to make sense in the context of the
previous one, it forces the reader to stop and consider it and try to make sense of it in order to
create the fluid reading again. This blockage of sense in a story is an interruption to the flow of

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the story. The blockage is considered as an extraordinary chance for the reader to become
conscious and create sense of it that is left by the text itself through filling the gaps. The potential
of a text will never be fulfilled by anyone reading due to the chances of changeability in different
reader’s responses to the same text. Also, the fact is true for anyone who is reading the text for
the second time. The difference in reactions can be due to the alterations that take place in the
reader’s mind over time however, it is important that the text is capable of providing such
differences (Bennett, 2014).
The inherent interactivity of a text and the differences existing between readings have a
place for demands of reader’s contribution of his own experiences. In a paradoxical manner, the
reader needs to contribute his own experiences in order to comprehend a reality that is different
from his story.
Third, the reader writes a part of the story in his own head. According to Iser, the author
of the text sets guidelines for the readers however the blanks are filled by the reader with his or
her imaginations. According to Caracciolo and Van Duuren (2015), by definition, a person can
imagine only those things that are not there. Various possibilities may be imagined by the readers
as opposed to one specific thing. Thus, a literary work is sum total of the text and also the texts
that are no in the text involving the imagination of the reader.
Fourth, the reader of the text seek out for unity in a text. A text is capable of offering
much potential. The reader must resolve every possibility in order to get a comprehending
meaning of the text. The reader tries to compare various parts of the text to attain the
consistency. Through the illusion the reader creates of the text the task is performed. Also, again
this text the particular unity is not inbuilt however it remains somewhere between the reader’s
conscious part of the head and the text. In this place, there is alteration of the illusion and during

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the reading when the wholeness of the text changes, the reader loses his or her curiosity (Iser,
2014).
Fifth, the literary work brings changes in reader’s perception. A literary text becomes
impactful only when it has the potential of creating expectations that is engrained in familiarity
and refutes them in the text by making unfamiliarity to the reader. The reader is compelled to
alter the preconceptions, in order to sustain the illusions created by the text. This is a factor that
encourages change in the reader. While reading the text, the division between the reader and the
writer becomes indistinct as the reader gets involved in someone else’s ideas and immerse
himself into it (Selden, Widdowson& Brooker, 2016).

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References:
Bennett, A. (2014). Readers and reading. Routledge.
Björninen, S. (2017). Roles of interpretation in Wolfgang Iser’s theory of reading and in
systematic poetics.
Caracciolo, M., & Van Duuren, T. (2015). Changed by Literature? A Critical Review of
Psychological Research on the Effects of Reading Fiction. Interdisciplinary Literary
Studies, 17(4), 517-539.
Farber, M. (2017). The foundation of phenomenology: Edmund Husserl and the quest for a
rigorous science of philosophy. Routledge.
Iser, W. (2014). The Imaginary. Oxford Encyclopedia of Aesthetics, 426-427.
Kukkonen, K. (2014). Presence and prediction: the embodied reader's cascades of
cognition. Style, 48(3), 367-384.
Padilla-Díaz, M. (2015). Phenomenology in educational qualitative research: Philosophy as
science or philosophical science. International Journal of Educational Excellence, 1(2),
101-110.
Selden, R. (2016). Practising theory and reading literature: an introduction. Routledge.
Selden, R., Widdowson, P., & Brooker, P. (2016). A reader's guide to contemporary literary
theory. Routledge.

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Sloan, A., & Bowe, B. (2014). Phenomenology and hermeneutic phenomenology: The
philosophy, the methodologies, and using hermeneutic phenomenology to investigate
lecturers’ experiences of curriculum design. Quality & Quantity, 48(3), 1291-1303.