PROFESSING LITERATURE.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1599, 16 November 1912, Page 9

PROFESSING LITERATURE.

_ The vague but persistent feeling on the part of students-and tub general public : .' that tlie teaching of-literature at the pre- ■ sent time- is no better than it should be . lias'found voice again in an address of Sir '. Gilbert Parker before the Imperial Con- - ference of Teachers' Associations. ' Pos6ibly out of courtesy to his audience, the speaker conceded that modern .methods of ' instruction havo improved,, but the burden of his messago'was a somewhat bitter /charge that the prevailing,system is hos- '■ tile to the originality,and independence of the student. When the professor of literature and the, literary man fall out, iis not infrequently happens, the public, which has its-own grievances, is likely to eido with the; man of letters as probably tho more valuable, and' certainly the more entertaining,' member of the commonwealth.' .- Commenting sympathetically . upon the. speech of tile novelist,' the Man- • Chester "Guardian" diagnosed the case as follows:— ■ . The trouble is that a sort of mandarin learning tends to settle on English literature -wh§n it/is badly . taught, and turns itinto^a' subject about as :stimulatjpgito th'e.,ilii4il'.as the collection of pi stage stamp? or ciga'rette Badly, taught, it a'cciimultftes a niinute bre of small facts ani;allusibns, : and, worse still, i 'it has settled exactly the,/.relationship, of •: every writer to eyery v .other.-. writer,, his indeotedness to every influence,, and exactly what the student .'ought to think pf him. The whole thing coiildt.b.eiearned. by heart by anyofto,. a _ good . . memory without reading. single line of English except the illustrative quotations. This is doubtless crediting tho professor of literature with considerably more than he claims for himself; this perfect science of literary history is not his present state, ' but the far-off divine event towards which his whole creation moves. If he were actually there, he would probably confront Sir Gilbert Parker and the "Gunrdian" with tho bewildered question, "What else do you expect of me and. what more do you want?" And they, exactly as dissatisfied as before, would pause and ' mope for a reply, as most of us jiro. doing la advance. Thar might hastily retort

that he. had defrauded them, that they had come to study with him the great monuments of English literature,, and that ho had lured aud enticed them into the pursuit of a purely academic aud antiquarian science of his own. They might —more prudently—admit that accumulated small, allusions ■• and relations and influences constitute a considerable part of 'the subject matter of literature which£|is directly teachable; And yet they woulil .protest, with deep earnestness thAtthe one thing needful was" forgot. precisely what the-great teacher, gives to ,*Jiis?,students.. which cannot' be gained from a test-book or even from the "Cambridge History of-English Literature" is. ! not so.Clear.' If.you interrogate men who have read-'"Don,Quixote" with Lowell, or Dante, with tho,late Professor .Norton, , you are likely J, to-be put off with'obscure phrases: it was something in their "brilliant digressions'';-it was the "amenity of i their personal atmosphere"; it was an indefinable "illuniiriii.tipn." Most 'witnesses testify to a certain-inner commotion and change which helped, th'em to find themselves. Tho gift. that, we are .seeking is what the ingenuous Boswell found in himself after a talk- at the Mitre with Johnson. It is the virtue that William Hazlitt discovered in his own breast when ho touched the hem of the mystical robes of Coleridge; It is the quickened drumbeat that Fronde heard in his own pulses 'when the river of Carlyle's talk" ilowed over him. To return to the class-room, it is the gift that the 'young woman sought when she said to her teacher .of Shakespeare, "This' is all very interesting, but when- do wo come to the deep things?" The mere professor in the teacher's chair regards such' a question as.- an .indication of most culpable callousness, and he seeks to draw, the questioner's attention to more wholesome topics,.'siich as the' authenticity of the signatures or tho. chronology of the , three parts ofHenry VI." But the anointed teacher, right reverence for the personality of. his students, looks upon such a qUery as a token of spiritual grace and a hint of the improvable greatness inour natures! He knows that the simple-hearted hunger: of these young and plastic souls for the •magnificent-and consolatory things ...with which he is presumably conversant is his appointed opportunity; .-Himself primarily .concerned' with the -, "deep things," -he conceives highly .' of the function."' ■of .literature and its interpreters, and presses constantly , forward through grammars ''and lexicons and libraries towards Via, clearer apprehension of ;those>" profound: currents of feeling :and .-these' master,'-ideas which produce world-literature and ;from tion to generation- shape the- destinies of men. Hey does, not iueet his. students always with) ;a philological journal- iu his hands, but with. a. fine idea in his head. He -dares from time, to tim». to let them forget the sands of the.Wilderness and dream ,of the grapes of Esh'col.' Ho is great , enough to imagine -the bare possibility of. greatness in.them,"and he is pleased when they aspire. He perceives, at any rate, that they are seeking what he is seeking, and, instead of dictating, to them., like stenographers,- lie communicates with them and encourages ; them like disciples and fellow-pilgrims' ■' ; " For your true teacher, as ..distinguished from your popular trifler' and- your cataloguer. and your antiquarian and ' your descriptive .historian, is by necessity what Carlyle called a-"believing soul," and he does not shirk' the responsibilities of leadership. -His colleagues live • in .a' desperate, and ill-grounded 'fear, of turning the beam by. throwing into, the scale the weight of their own judgment; they do net wish to "bias" the minds -of their, pupils. He, on the other- liaiid, believes that tho. first step toward intellectual independence is the recognition .of intellectual constraint. He believes in giving his pupils something to reiict against. He is aware, that most are intellectually shapeless and inarticulate, incoherent,:and purposeless. They are full of miscellaneous information aiid. vague appetites' andi -undirected potentialities. > They: cannot'understand French arid the Rus; sians quarrel about their literary gospels as. seriously as they quarrel about tneir -politics and their, religion. They are'-in. •need of what"'the' leader of a literary movement give^ r to his.followers-and. .what a timid' professorial, ethics proscribes—a definite point of .view and tho rudiments of a literary platform. .He leads them-to a [position from can :. see for 'alliance^■'between • literawreVotfter living 'issues of the .day.- and.'age. '■. He: does not compel -.them"'to 'side with -him,' but he compels them .'to . take sides,; .and..'so strengthens and-clarifies' the faith, of. his adversaries 'as well as of bis friends.' - He' gives, iii short, the one thing .needful that was not in. the test-book: -the kindling touch to thejndgment and tho will* which' -persuddes-a man tliat.-literature contains important ideas of truth, and beauty that .-concern him. The teacher of literature who has . not this ; gift, though he i chart the course from-Gaedmon to :Corelli j ; is a; failure. - Ho • will 'kindle no, torch, The trouble withjour System-is' that ; wo try : to put the divine fire ill a green'-youth by the 'obsolete!^method ofviubbing together two- v ilry/sticks.—Npw. York "Na•tfcm.".*' ■■■;' .- ■.... ;■' -.j-v-;■'' ■' '