As a European I had quite the opposite experience in (high) school: my literature classes (English, French, German) consisted entirely of close readings and goi

As a European I had quite the opposite experience in (high) school: my literature classes (English, French, German) consisted entirely of close readings and going meticulously through every rhetoric device/figure of speech (german: "analysieren"). At one time we had a teacher who insisted that we had to learn and exclusively use the latin/greek/french schemes.[0] An interpretation of a given text (usally after (or mixed with) the analysis) effectivley had to be aligned with the views of the teacher otherwise you had to fight an uphill battle in convincing a given teacher of your train of thought. I once had the audacity to use the Nietzschian concept of "Apollonian and Dionysian" in my interpretation of a literary text (after the "thorough" analysis of course). Even after I had illustrated the concept on some examples in the text, my teacher insisted it was rubbish (in hindsight I can now understand his "aesthetic" objection). My classmates looked at me: why you are taking up such a fight, it is Mister/Misses "xyz" and his/her views are clearly "such and such", are you out of your mind? I've never tried something out of the "expected and accepted" after that and was "rewarded" with good grades. I think most students (in puberty at least when occupied with other things) are trying to read the "teacher" and do not bother to really read the text for themselves, that's why a general question gets a broad general randomly generated emotional answer, they are trying to decipher the biases of the teacher by taking shots. If the bias then is to go read "closley" and name "figure of speeches" they will learn/parrot quickly for good grades. I never forget how one teacher was so proud of one student's interpretation, he let her read all of it (10+ pages) aloud for all of us to hear; for anyone who even bothered to listen it was a perfect rendition of his (aesthetic/ideological) views - a mirror he narcistically viewed himself - an insightful cartoon for me. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Figure_of_speech#Types https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Figure_of_speech#Types