If you believe literature can make a difference in people's lives, the evidence from one's own life seems an obvious place to turn. But at some point such exercises become simply personal essays rather than literary criticism, and again my own history of both writing and reading critical essays tells me it is entirely possible to convey personality and perspective without crossing this line. Close reading or analysis does not require a turgid prose style, nor does it necessarily entail endless quotations and an eye-glazing analytic detachment. The goal should be to be communicate the critic's most concentrated experience of the work, and this ought to motivate his/her most discerning and dynamic writing, not the most pedantic.
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