This assumption is illustrated in censorship controversies and even court cases where the prosecution is likely to argue the affective line that the work in question, in its language or the actions it portrays, has a harmful effect on its audience, while the defense may respond with the mimetic argument that the work gives an accurate picture of reality (Keesey 205).
Sounds to me like the prosecution may be reader response; audience as context. Keesey talks about many aspects of this theory and details the history and their ties to other forms of critism. The one idea that I thought he tried to hammer home was that these mimetic critics want the truth. Truth about life, about the reality of the time(s)-time being when the author was writing whatever work it is t4hats being studied. Truth. But to that I ask, what is truth. ~What is true to me, surly might not be true to you, or to whomever is reading. I feel like each and every new critism idea that I read continues to bounce around ideas of truth, but are searching for these truths from a censored perspective. Its like tunnell vision, and how do we open up to the whole picture. Is there a whole picture, or are we stuck choosing which view is best served for our own intentions. I don't know.