TEACHING ENGLISH LITERATURE.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XLII, Issue XLII, 14 September 1908, Page 1

TEACHING ENGLISH LITERATURE.

Many of us know, from our own cases or those nf others, in how many bad ways the. Btady bt English literature can be taught at school. With some of us Shakespeare fell into early discredit ' throiigii'.tife exclusive use of his words as pegs.r.P-i- which to hang disconnected, unstSggostivo notes on odds and ends *Bt Tact, philological, archaeological,, tistorical, and geographical. Others bay__ never quite got out of their mouths tjie. ni^wkish taste left by some teacher tylioi'w&hi', to "the- other extreme and gpreh'ed sloppily about the unique pathoS'iotjthis'Bassage and the ineffable, statiHaq^ " ;s_reek beauty of that. A third;spe6£es~of- the mistaught is exemplified in<tne,fyoiing' "man or woman who has neve?''rea'-jy. read anything with enjoyment and/abfflrj)tionj but who can plunge off at a moment's notice into the most ambitious .generalisations 'about literary schools _ana;tjen.deiicies.in literary history, about 'primS^V j-'and secondary influences, reactipri^ahotaunter-reaetions, contra] currency. bSckw%ters, aftermaths, and all the rest 1 of jt'.. There is a yet worse prtduct (tf had' teaching — the illiterate expert .iij. literature, tha person who has picked'^vip quite correctly a great " mass of eonimuh._ea.ble facts, and' even of sound judgments, about lit jrary history and relative litorHiy. vitlues. without being so much influenced by the material he has worked in. as rib acqhira the slightest personal sense of literary form or to feel any shame at.;£ormles^ness ih his own writing ; he vrijl express what seem to be intelligent anA,i__stritcted views bn the -inexact and characterless jargon of sejondrate "popular science. ' Of course there_ has ahvays 'been soine firstrate teaching of English literature in secondary schools ; there 'is liow a good deal, and there is promise of much more in the clearness with .which the best secondary teachers ses what is to be sought after and what shunned. An excellent brief statement of tho fight way and of the ■rhief pitfalls by^ ;Mr J. H. Fowler, of Clifton, has just been published- by the •rigorous English Association as asir- , penny pamphlet. ' ;'!> ■ .; "Coo-ec," th£ Australian writer who has published several'books iii Australia, has a novel in the press entitled, "The | Silver Queen,". whicH -Mr John Ousely wil publish. !. .' ./,"._ Sir Gilbert Barker f is at work on a new novel— or, rather, He is planning its subjects and charabterferand he hopes to writs most of it af tec. Parliament rises. The New Yort " ."Nation" says that Meredith is superseding .Browning as. an object of curiosity;'-' ''To the makers of rlubs, to the housewives who dangle at ii.>ir waists tWk^yalof the' uhiverßß, ta tka lovers of esoteric thrills, to tne fashion leaders of, the mind, a -word of idvice: 'Close ..ytfnr Browninf anff open your Meredith,'. An 3 to otners a word of caution : 'The Meredithians are upon ns.' " ■. . yyy; That insistence on personality which, -is the note of the -most vigorous modern ■ philosophy is . exemplified in a book which Me^w. Constable announce "Personalism.", „jt» Atiihor is Professor Borden Parker J^rn.e. well-known in . America and England- Tby his book on "The Immanegjie df'.God." The new work is briefly : jlej_fifib>d as "a plea for a common-sen_ie;phjj^pphy." It discusses the relation qf/pfijfogbpjiy to science, and upholds atheojty of idealism and the possibility of an enlightened orthodoxy in r&igloB. y

The Southland, Education Board expended over ;£IQO on letter postage last year, so/tiat it _lrill be readily understood that an enormous amount of correspondence flowa . through the Board's offices. : It r is calculated that abont 24,000 letters were written and despatched during the year, and, of course, about the same number were received. It has boen decided, states the report of the Marine Department, that when proceedings are taken againsc shipmasters for going to" sea shorthanded, and when their doing so has been caused through men deserting or being absent without leave, prosecutions are also to be instituted again* t the men.

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