the id, the ego, & the single misfiring brain cell

Last night, I read through the course director's syllabus and decided that I had some comments I wanted to make that didn't appear on his. He had some good stuff, but I wanted to elaborate a bit. After his basic, "Welcome to English 211, Literature and Intermediate Composition," he outlined the course objectives, then wrote the following:

The significance of the course. Literary interpretation is a discipline of the mind with its own way of observing, analyzing, and solving problems in the world. It is particularly concerned with problems of meaning in the midst of ambiguous environments. These are the kinds of environments we live in every day as human beings, and they are also the kinds of environments you will be tasked to provide leadership within as an officer. If you can learn to engage a literary text, notice the most significant aspects, analyze the concrete details of its contents, and argue for its importance in changing the way we think about the world around us—you will be better prepared to lead effectively and with flexibility. You may also find that you enjoy reading great literature.

It's a nice blurb, isn't it?

One of the obstacles we face here is selling our cadets on humanities courses. They simply do not see how reading, talking, and writing about literature will help them be better officers. This flabbergasts me, frankly, because I can't see how it couldn't.

So here is how I began my syllabus:

“With poetry we have to return to the reading habits of a more primitive age than our own. Poetry has no use for the kind of speed-reading techniques we are encouraged to practice with informational materials. In speed-reading, we are told not to fixate on any one word, not to backtrack over what we have already read, and not to subvocalize by half pronouncing the words or by moving our lips. But in reading poetry we have to dwell on the words to savor their implications and relationships; we have to glance back and re-read whenever we have a mind to; and we have to feel the words alive in our mouths, even if we move our lips to do so. We may have to read a poem several times to feel we know it—and then (as with a favorite recording) return to it as many times as we want for further pleasure. In a world increasingly sophisticated, poetry is one of the few ways in which we can still afford to be primitive.” – David Mason and John Frederick Nims, Western Wind

In the above quote, replace “poetry” with “literature,” and you will understand what I expect from you in this class.

You won’t like everything you read. That’s ok. Welcome to being human. But you should, at the very least, open your minds and try to understand what you read. Look for nuances. Read with a pen in hand. Make notes of interesting passages and any questions you might have as you go. Go ahead—deface your book. Interact with it. That is why it was written.

Don’t be passive, either. Come to class with observations and questions about what you have read. Be interested, and you will be interesting.

Some of the texts in this course may offend or anger you. That’s ok, too. If that happens, ask yourself why you’re offended or angry, then go back to the literature and read some more. You are adults and will—sooner than you can imagine—be leaders in the US Air Force. Life, like literature, will offend and upset and anger you. It doesn’t play by your rules. It’s your job as an adult to learn from these experiences. Start now.

Also, it’s crucial to understand that literature isn’t doing its job unless it gets you out of your comfort zone. It should take you into the soft and fuzzy world of ambiguity, because life is not black and white, an equation to be solved; life is grey, it is chaos, it has few easy answers. Literature teaches you to move through it with, if not ease, competence. So do not fear ambiguity; embrace it.

Literature takes you places you wouldn’t otherwise go, it opens the door to unlimited virtual experiences, and it explores philosophical questions through its imitation of life. It is the lie that tells the truth.

We'll see soon enough if it has the desired effect.

d