On Literature and Teaching

  ‘ The aim of literary study is not to amuse the hours of leisure; it is to awake oneself, it is to be alive, to intensify one’s capacity for pleasure, for sympathy, and for comprehension. It is not to affect one hour, but twenty-four hours. It is to change utterly one’s relations with the world. Not isolated and unconnected parts of life, but all of life’ (Arnold Bennett, 1901).   ‘Those who can, do; those who can’t, teach’. How many times have we heard that old saw? Because, really, can you teach something you can’t do? Well, yes, there is a way: by theorising that very thing you can’t do, or would like to do, or, well, that thing you teach. Or by canonising it, so you don’t have to engage with it. And here it is important to remember what happened to literature as an object of study. Despite arguments about who – and when – was the first, it is clear that there was no English Degree until late in the 19 th Century – that is, a university degree entirely dedicated to English

  Fiction as a safe place The great, late French historian Paul Veyne, having shown that the ancient Greeks both believed and did not believe in their own myths, asks a question: what was the use of those myths for the Greeks then? Why did senators routinely use mythical references and examples in their speech to their fellow politicians? Veyne’s answers is that it enabled them to discuss actual political matters in a roundabout way, so that political sensibilities would not be hurt by hearing a particular problem discussed openly. In other words, senators would use a myth to introduce a question at play in Athens’ society, but which was too sensitive to some to be aired directly: it needed to be metaphorised , in a way – it needed to be about problem A but discussed in terms of Myth B. This Fiction-as-a-safe-place is one of the great advantages of using literature in class to discuss citizenship-related issues. The Council of Europe (2018), among others, breaks down Citizenshi

  What’s your reason for 'doing' literature in your class? What’s your reason for handing out this or that text? For doing this or that project around literature? For example, you have this great project in the bovenbouw, centred around the First World War – a staple of English classes in this country. WW1 saw a school of poetry emerge (the Great War poets, unsurprisingly) that other countries didn’t, or certainly not on the same scale. So out come Wilfried Owens, and Sassoon, and the Poppy Fields, and the sadness of it all. Out come the chronologies, and facts about that war, and tales of battles lost and won, and tales of death. But what, exactly, precisely, are your reasons for this project? Are these reasons to do with Literature-reading, literature-interpreting, literature-as-instrument? Or are the reasons to do with ideas about what learners should know historically and culturally? Is it to say 'War is bad, death is terrible', or do you want to explore the

  It is a remarkable fact of life that we can keep holding on to beliefs while professing we’re not. As Michel Foucault once said, we claim we believe in equality but deep down, we don’t, not really. We believe ourselves when we say it, we certainly do mean it, but there’s a nagging doubt at the back of our minds: is it true? Do I really believe that? It doesn’t have to be about something big, or important, or moral – it can be as general as saying everyone should be free to do what they want while not quite believing that some people should choose to do that . I mean: really? That’s how you spend your time? Well, ok, if that’s what you like… It reminds me of that bit of dialogue in the majestic, out-of-this-world-fantastic Penelope Fitzgerald’s novel ‘ The beginning of spring ’. Two people are talking: Frank, the main character and a woman he’s met through their social circles. They didn’t take to each other, and Frank sees her as a traditionalist living in the past. They’ve j