<!doctype html public «-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en»> http-equiv=content-type> The theory and practice of literary studies has long been characterized by a virtually unnoticed asymmetry: the striking contrast between an intense effort to create a scientific foundation for the discipline and the equally striking paucity of efforts to systematically incorporate the reader models arising from these positions. This study attempts to develop a systematic approach to reader models and theories of readership.
