Norman N. Holland Herbert Simon suggests cognitive science can improve literary critics' theories about reading and meaning. Those theories address, I think, two questions.
Literary theorists offer three explanations-models, really.
The text defines the response. This model underlies much postmodern talk about the text dominating the individual, discourse replacing the subject, the text subverting its own meanings, and so on. Readers make meaning, indeed, construct the whole experience by exploring a passive text with schemas. These range from simple codes, widely shared, about letter shapes, word forms, word meanings, syntax, grammar, on up to complex, individual ideas about character, plot, genre, themes, or values. The feedback from these hypotheses equals the experience and interpretation of the text.