In this article, the authors discuss how Louise Rosenblatt's work influenced many teachers' teaching and learning practices. Rosenblatt was known for helping readers find their rightful place in the act of reading. Louise argued in the 1930s (and steadfastly maintained until her recent death) that the act of reading was a dynamic transaction between reader and text, and that the meaning of a text is situated in a context. Her transactional theory of reading was at odds with the prevailing view of the time. The proponents of the more popular view--the school of New Criticism--insisted that the meaning of a literary text resided in the text and that reading was the act of discovering or revealing this objectively held truth. For the New Critic, the approach was about autonomous texts; for Rosenblatt, the approach was about students--their conversations, their exchange of ideas, and their growing awareness of themselves in the larger context of society. The authors are confident that future educators will come to know, embrace, and extend Rosenblatt's theories and practices. They will see the necessity for classrooms in which the reader, the text, and the interpretive community are valued--not simply because it is a better way to teach. They will embrace her ideas because these ideas are essential in a democratic society.