ISOLATING NARRATIVE / THEMATIC PATTERNS ACROSS CANONICAL TEXTS

As you think about themes and plot lines from important canonical texts, see if you can discover examples of “texts” within popular culture that repeat, reinterpret, or modernize these same themes or narrative structures.  For example, you might compare Romeo and Juliet with West Side Story; Emma with Clueless; or The Odyssey with Oh Brother, Where Art Thou.

Consider each comparison by answering these questions:

• How does the text change to accommodate the needs of a contemporary audience?
• What features of the original text seem to be preserved, and why?
• What features or themes of the story seem to have changed most, and why?
• What accounts for the distinction that we make between “high art” (as exemplified by the canonical text) and “pop culture” (as exemplified by its modernized counterpart)?

 

Finally, speculate as to why you think the original text was chosen as the basis for a modern retelling.  If you think that the reinterpretation of the classic theme was accidental and not intentional, say how you think this might have happened.

ANALYZING THE LANGUAGE AND STYLE OF CANONICAL TEXTS

One particular challenge posed by classic and canonical literature is a difference in language and style from more contemporary and popular texts.  Less experienced readers can struggle with unfamiliar vocabulary, intricate and unusual syntax (including syntactic inversions, embedded phrases and clauses, and long sequences of modifiers that need to be held in memory until the sentence concludes), and variances in meaning. 

Choose a passage (about a paragraph) from a literary text that is at least 150 years old and that required you to do multiple readings before you felt confident about its meaning. 

• What specific elements of the text presented the greatest challenge to your understanding?

• For each of these elements, what strategies did you use to decode the text? How might you group or label these strategies?

• How might the strategies that you used be generalized into a few [rules of practice] that you could present to high school readers?

STUDYING NARRATIVE RELIABILITY 

Any number of literary texts confront their readers with issues of narrative reliability and indeterminacy.  As you think about the narrative style of a frequently taught author like Nathaniel Hawthorne, you become aware of subtle phrasing that throws the truth of story into question. 

Consider the following passages from Hawthorne’s “Young Goodman Brown,” each of which confounds the readers’ ability to say with certainty what has happened within the story:

“he could have sworn, were such a thing possible. . .”
“He could have well-nigh sworn. . .”
“The listener fancied he could distinguish. . .”
“so indistinct were the sounds, he doubted whether he had heard. . .”
“Did it contain water, reddened by the lurid light? or was it blood? or, perchance, a liquid flame?
“Had Goodman Brown fallen asleep in the forest and only dreamed a wild dream of a witch-meeting.  Be it so if you will. . .”

• How do you reconcile the uncertainty of the narrative with your need to create meaning from it? 

• What meaning do you attribute to the uncertainty itself?

• How does readers develop confidence in their ability to construct a coherent story from the incomplete, ambiguous, and sometimes contradictory information that the story presents?

HISTORICISM AND HISTORICAL CONTEXT 

In one sense literature is always the product of the historical period that produced it.  In another sense, our awareness of history influences our understanding of literary works associated with historical events or movements.  Consider a work such as The Red Badge of Courage, In Our Time, or The Things They Carried.  Then consider the following questions about the relationship between the historical setting of the work and meaning that you create for the work as you read it.

• What central concepts does the narrative build upon, and how would these concepts be understood at the time the author was writing?  (For the examples above, think about war, heroism, patriotism, duty, or valor, and the ways in which they were understood within differing historical contexts.)

• What actual historical events of which you are aware do you see reflected, directly or indirectly, in the literary work, and how does your knowledge of these events shape your interpretation of the work?

• In what ways might the historical location of a literary text influence your understanding of that historical period?

CULTURAL CONSIDERATIONS IN STUDYING CANONICAL TEXTS

“Culture” is a large concept. The term is frequently used without clear distinction as to its meaning, and it is even used incorrectly (cultures and societies are distinct, and thus the work culture does not apply to a group of people directly).  In order to examine works of literature for their cultural implications, then, several points of distinction need to be made.  Review the following list of questions, and then illustrate your answer by making reference to a specific work of literature.

• What is culture in the sense that that we use this word to refer to a potential source of meaning derived from a work of literature?

• How is a culture manifested in the actions of characters within a literary work? (Think about a story like Shirley Jackson’s “The Lottery.”  What is the most significant event of the story, and how does this reflect some aspect of the culture practiced by the characters?)

• How does a particular cultural practice create either positive or negative outcomes for the society that the story depicts?

• How are cultural differences among social groups depicted, and what do you see as potential outcomes of these contrastive depictions?

   

COMPARING CANONS

Comparing canons. After reading several texts from different cultural canons (e.g. Native American, English, African), have students compare the canons to which these texts belong. Students should answer questions such as, what types of literature are valued in each canon? What types of characters are most frequently portrayed in the texts of each canon?