Henry Jenkin's "Get a Life"

In the article “Get a Life”, Henry Jenkins makes a reference to textual poaching which he states that Michel de Certeau defines as “an impertinent raid on the literacy preserve takes away only those things that are useful or pleasurable to the reader.” Jenkins goes on to state that “De Certeau’s ‘poaching’ analogy characterizes the relationship between readers and writers as an ongoing struggle for possession of the text and for control over its meanings.” This quote very much reminded me of the novel Misery, by Stephen King. In the novel author Paul Sheldon crashes his car on a snowy road. He is found by Annie Wilkes, his "number one fan" who is obsessed with Paul’s novel heroine Misery Chastaine. Annie is “helping” Paul back to recovery when she discovers that the author has killed off her favorite character. She becomes very upset then forces Paul to write another book bringing Misery Chastaine back to life, while she watches over him.

Misery is an example of textual poaching. Annie Wilkes is such a fan of Paul Sheldon’s novels that she has become obsessed with the characters and almost cannot survive when she finds out her favorite character has been killed off. She then forces Paul to write another book even though he wants to finish the Misery series so he can go on to write different novels. This shows the relationship between Annie as the reader and Paul as the writer and their struggle for possession of the text.

Annie shows the strong differences that can occur between the authors meaning for a text and what meaning the "fanatic" wants to get out of the text. Annie as the "fanatic" wants Paul to continue writing his Misery novels even though his meaning was for Misery Chastaine to die in the last book and for the series to end.

Although, in Misery the misinterpretation of the authors meaning is almost deadly for Paul Sheldon that is rarely the case. In most instances readers can interpret the meaning of the authors text anyway they want making for a more interesting read for the "fanatics".