From: zatavu-AT-excite.com Date: Sun, 27 Aug 2000 09:37:25 -0700 (PDT) Subject: Re: PLC: Poetry, prose, fiction as meaningful > > Well, I certainly disagree with his attitude toward women - as well as many > > other things. The thing that makes this book interesting is that you like > > the man despite the fact that he's an asshole. > > So, then, say you were going to teach this book to a class, or write an > article on Miller. Would liking the man in spite of the fact that he's an > asshole be your thesis? And if so, how would you contextualize your comments > and deal with the substance of the text? Well, were I to teach the text, I wouldn't give a lecture or anything on it anyway, butask the students how they engaged the text. What did they think about it? What did they like or dislike about it? Or him? If there were any contradictory feelings, I would ask the students to explain them, ask why they felt that way about him, how they thought he was able to accomplish making us feel that way about him. I would try to guide discussion of his novel, but I wouldn't lecture on it - which is the quickest way to make students bored. Now, if I were to write a scholarly article about the text, I likely wouldn't write one that dealt with something so subjective as my personal feelings toward the narrator, but would discuss how Miller deals with this or that issue or uses this or that method or style of writing. For example, I might discuss how Miller uses the surrealists' method of automatic writing. > > Your view doesn't seem to hold, and > > > certainly does not explain its own contradictions. Having them > explained > > > > > might be helpful, for me at least. > > > > He wasn't writing with that goal in mind, though. He was telling a story > > first and foremost. > > How can you tell the difference? How can you explain the difference to me? > Say I'm a student in your class and you put Miller and O'Connor in front of > me and say, "He's telling a story first; She's developing a moral message > first," just for an example. How would you point to the texts to show me how > to see this difference? Would you teach one and not the other, and if so > what would your justification be for that decision? (And if the answer > circles back to this assertion that he's telling a story first and foremost, > that will not do.) And if, I, as a student, tried to argue that O'Connor was > the more interesting writer to me because I'm Catholic or because I like her > use of symbolism more than Miller's tendency to talk at his readers (none of > which statements are actually true about me) , would I be wrong, would I be > told I was wrong because my taste differed from yours? Well, first of all, I wouldn't make that quote. I think both were telling a story first and foremost. I really can't say, in all honesty, how I would approach O'Connor, tho, since I haven't read her. Now, as for which you prefered, and for what reasons, your choice as to which you prefered wouldn't make you wrong. LIking one book or author over another is purely subjective. Taste can be neither right nor wrong (though some is better than others - someone who prefers romance novels over literature does not have as good a taste,I don't think). > > I'm not trying to be thick headed or argumentative, Troy, with these > questions. I just want to get beyond vague phrases like "story first and > foremost" and "likable asshole" and "good" and "garbage" to see what in the > world they mean to you, to how you want to teach, and how you wanted to be > taught. Until I really understand the meaning of such mantras, I can't > respond to you in any substantial way. When talking about "garbage," I was talking about what amateur writers write, based on their notions of why one should write a story. I say Miller is a "likeable asshole" because he is a bit of a jerk, but he is very charismatic, and you become convinced that you would like himand like to be around him - though you might at the same time keep a tight hold on your wallet if you were around him. WHen I say someone should be concerned with "story first and foremost" when they write, I mean that they should think first about the characters, then the story and is to develop around them. THe themes and "morals" of the story will then arise through the natural interactions of the characters and the way the author portrays them or comments about them. In rewriting, an author then pays special attention to language and internal logic of the story (even to consider if it is supposed to have one) first. If you go out of your way to make sure it is "saying something," then you are going against what it is that the novel is meant to do: emphasize ambiguity. Any time an author has people arguing over what he "really meant," he is only then truly successful - because then he has engaged his readers' subjectivity. > > > > > Besides, as I have tried to point out over and over and which people just > > keep ignoring, is that this started out as an argument about why students > > should read literature. > > So, what is or would be (I don't know if you teach or not) your approach to > teaching literature? New Critical, New Historicist, Marxist, Feminist, > Reader Response, etc....? Is there for you a split between teaching with an > approach and a 'goal' that would also be incompatible with enjoying the > literature? Given your views on what is good and bad in literature, I'm > guessing that you would accept such a split, but I want to check. Well, I would ask the students to do what I said above. That would be my approach. Sort of a postmodern, pluralist approach. I think that there can be several "right" readings of a text - though I also think there are also "wrong" readings of a text. I would ask them to pay attention to what the text says - and suggest that if it's not in the text, then that is what makes for a "wrong" reading of it. Now, I think emphasizing those various approaches could make the discussion more interesting, so long as one was not amphasized over another, and alternative views from the students was encouraged. I want the students to enjoy their discovery of what is in the text. Imposing meaning is what drives students away. Troy Camplin _______________________________________________________ Say Bye to Slow Internet! http://www.home.com/xinbox/signup.html --- from list phillitcrit-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
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