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Reged: Feb 16 2004
Posts: 1056
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This thread is for comments about Failing to Teach the Hobbit, by Christina Socorro Yovovich
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Matt Cheney
New user
Reged: Feb 07 2005
Posts: 9
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This is a wonderful piece, Christine. I was laughing and almost crying because the experience is so familiar and you expressed it wonderfully.
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Anonymous
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This article fascinated and horrified me at the same time. Oh my God, never try to teach a work of literature that you secretly despise (shades of the sleazy English professor in "Animal House"!). Always teach something that you love, or at least respect.
But the best thing about this article, for me, is the question of how to "teach" a novel or story at all. (I also am an English teacher.) I have always found a work of literature to be essential unteachable. You can go around the periphery -- clarify obscure vocabulary and sentence structure, etc,; or find symbols (real or imagined); look at figurative language; examine structure; do the abominable examination of sexism, racism, etc. (no matter whether that had anything to do with what the author was trying to express); or conduct a vague discussion on "what the story means" to the class, have you ever felt that way or acted that way or do you think Billy Budd should have been hanged or any number of things... and yet the experience of a story is essentially a solitary and personal experience... it always seems to me that the most I can do is clarify a student's understanding, i.e., give them the key to the secret garden. But they have to turn the key and go inside, walk around, pull the weeds, and look and enjoy.
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Anonymous
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Thanks to both of you for sharing your thoughts! Anon, I think you make some good points about what it means to teach a book.
--Christina
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Hel
Regular reader
Reged: Dec 09 2004
Posts: 41
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Wow... this was great. And very helpful to me (I'm a first year Grad Assistant myself this year, teaching Freshman Comp). Thanks for sharing.
~Hel
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Hel
Regular reader
Reged: Dec 09 2004
Posts: 41
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I also wanted to say that your summation of LotR was hilarious. I liked the trilogy when I first read it, then when I watched the movies I realized that Peter Jackson and his script writers were just much better storytellers. Can't stand the books now.
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Anonymous
Unregistered
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Ack. It is to be hoped that you will continue to progress and realize that Jackson turned an amazing & masterful story into schlock.
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