“Once you allow yourself to identify with the people in a story, then you might begin to see yourself in that story even if on the surface it’s far removed from your situation. This is what I try to tell my students: this is one great thing that literature can do – it can make us identify with situations and people far away.”                                   ~ Chinua Achebe

This is one reason I like to read and teach literature. As we read and comprehend complex texts, we can experience empathy – a vicarious, spontaneous sharing of affect. Whether a true story or fiction, a connection to a narrator can build our ability to understand and share the feelings of another. This is part of the human experience. Empathy leads to love and respect for one another as I like to encourage my students to focus on the fact that we have more in common with another than we are different.