A long time gone…

Not really gone, I’m still here – just trudging through another school year! I think often of things I should write, but just cannot seem to find the time. Hopefully over the break I will be able to put some coherent thoughts together and post at least once.

Open Shakespeare Posting

Well, without further ado, here it is!

You can access my post on Open Shakespeare by using this link.

From an early age, I’ve always loved books. In my pre-adolescent years, I loved devouring series novels and waiting for the next one to come out so I could get the next piece of the story. Now, as an adult, I love the sight of them on my shelf, I love the smell of the old book glue in the antique books I collect; I love reading them and not only learning things about myself, but so many things about the world around me.

Lately, though, as anyone would notice, the world around me is changing; no longer are books things one must lug about, or wet one’s fingers to turn the pages. Books are available everywhere in our new virtual world, via the world wide web or various e-readers. With the increased availability of books, that means there is an increased availability of knowledge; never before has a society been able to be so autodidactic. Not only can one read all forms of literature online, but summaries, analyses, and criticism of that literature. The increased access to knowledge has created a proverbial vortex in which our lives can mix up with the literature we love to read.

One of my literary loves is Jane Austen. I love her wit, irony, intrusion into her characters’ thoughts, and just the absolute faithfulness with which she presented the society in which she lived. Now, I don’t have just her novels lining my shelves; I have a hyper-concordance wherein – should I be absent from my shelf or just simply not want to flip through the book – I can search for one name or word in any one of her novels. Not only that, but there is also the Republic of Pemberley, a site that provides rather exhaustive information about Jane, her life and times, and her works. All at the stroke of a key. What ever did we do before the advent of this sweeping cornucopia of potential knowledge?

And then there’s Shakespeare. Oh, Will. I’ve loved him ever since I discovered in high school that I could just understand his writing without help. Unlike so many of my classmates, I got it. That doesn’t mean, though, that I’ve ever settled for my own perspective on his works. After my high school introduction, I took one class at university that lumped him in with Milton and Chaucer, another specifically focused on his tragedies. Then, after earning my degree, I went on to take a continuing education course at a different university that focused on other plays. Point being, varied perspectives enhance our understanding of all literary works. Again, we cue the world wide web with all its latent intellectual bounty. Housed within sites like Open Shakespeare, that not only present his works in their entirety, but that offer critical introductions, a Will-ophile like myself can find virtually anything necessary to learn more about Shakespeare – or to use when presenting his works to my ever virtually-evolving students.

So, what’s the point? Well, first, there is no reason to not take advantage of the virtual yet bounteous wealth of information at our very real fingertips. Second, if one is, as Lin Yutang said, to be wise and “read both books and life itself,” then we – bibliophiles and literary types, as a microcosm of a greater society – must be prepared for a paradigm shift. No longer are all of us wetting fingers nor staining fingers with ink in order to push through to that paper or submission deadline; we are callousing fingertips and crouching over a screen that leads us all to a whole “brave new world, / That has such people in’t!”

New Year, New Students, New Curriculum

How mind-blowing! I mentioned in a previous post I am now teaching the International Baccalaureate Diploma Programme. I have four sections: two of C (Seniors) and two of A (Juniors). They’re wonderfully bright students, and it’s a joy to be able to really reach without being constrained by the typical “curriculum guides” now mandated by districts. I’m up to my ears in grading and reading, but I’m keeping my head above water enough to be able to read. I’ve not totally abandoned my examination of Jane Austen’s novels (as I took the class on them through Oxford University), but my posts regarding them will be a bit more rare as I’m attempting to keep up with the work load this school year.

I did have the pleasure of being asked by James Harriman-Smith to contribute to his blog series “Shakespeare and the Internet,” and my post is set for publication on the 19th of September. I was quite surprised – and very happy – to receive the invitation!

I hope to have more posts soon – though they may be updating on my progress through the school year rather than literary study! However, for those interested, our first two books are The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood for the seniors, and Austen’s Pride and Prejudice for the juniors. I’m looking forward to a great year of literary adventures!

I’m Still Here…

No, I did not fall off the face of the planet over summer. I’ve just been enjoying my first “real” summer since becoming a teacher. Every summer leading up to this one, I’ve worked a second job so that I could pay off various bills and all of that business. This summer, though, I made it a point to 1) enjoy my family as much as possible, and 2) do nothing as much as possible (other than read). Also, I had that Oxford Jane Austen class to finish, which required rather a lot of reading of Jane Austen novels, and well, let’s face it – after reading three of her novels in a row, I needed a break. Not only that, but I had to read the books I’ll be teaching this fall in the International Baccalaureate Programme, a new adventure for me. So, when it’s all said and done, here are the books I’ve read this summer, listed even if they’re a second reading:

1. Persuasion – Jane Austen
2. Northanger Abbey – Jane Austen
3. Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen
4. Like Water for Chocolate – Laura Esquivel
5. Women of Sand and Myrrh – Hanan al-Shaykh
6. How to Read Literature Like a Professor – Thomas C. Foster
7. Kitchen – Banana Yoshimoto
8. The Handmaid’s Tale – Margaret Atwood (a re-read, the third time, made me love it more!)
9. Pride and Prejudice – Jane Austen (a re-read, who knows how many times this is, reading it to teach it to my IB juniors)

So, there you have it. Really it’s not my most stellar reading summer, I admit. But I think my brain needed a break after a particularly stressful school year. After all, last summer in Mexico I read six books in two weeks. That was a fun time.

I’ll be back to posting about Austen novels here shortly, though I’ll likely be switching to Pride and Prejudice as I’m compelled to read it for teaching purposes.

Happy summer, and cheers

Mansfield Park and Religion

For my Oxford course, one of our option activities was to look at the different ways religion is mentioned in the novel. My response is below, and I’ll post more as I can!

I would have to return to the Sotherton Chapel, and Mary Crawford’s speech against organized religion:

“At any rate is safer to leave people to their own devices on such subjects. Every body likes to go their own way – to chuse their own time and manner of devotion. The obligation of attendance, the formality, the restraint, the length of time – altogether it is a formidable thing and what nobody likes…” (81-82)

Naturally, given the fact that Mary Crawford, in all her forwardness, is the one to speak against religion is, in my estimation, more a criticism of her character than the religion of the time. However, her point of view does give some insight into how more, well, shall we say, liberal members of society viewed their religious obligations.

Edmund, of course, has a response for her: “Do you think the minds which are suffered, which are indulged in wanderings in a chapel, would be more collected in a closet?” (82)

Edmund’s controlled, careful response, which even for his mild temperament “required a little recollection” makes a well-argued case against people choosing their own forms of devotion and for people engaging in religious experiences within the community of the church.

Cambridge Companion Chapter

Here is a posting I just made to my blog for my Oxford class. As it contains some interesting information, I thought it appropriate to publish it here as well.

I read the chapter “Money” in The Cambridge Companion to Jane Austen. I read the entire chapter rather than reading only portions of it, and was happy to finally have an explanation for the different incomes provided (what can a family do with £100 or £2000 a year, as incomes are always referenced in Austen novels. I suppose I could have looked it up before, but I appreciated the fact that all of the information presented in the chapter allowed me a better insight into the world of incomes in Austen’s novels.

Also, I was interested to find that there is a different monetary ‘focus,’ so to speak, in each of Austen’s novels. In the first three novels, “money…exists for the most part as a set of restrictive anxieties attached to the romance plot by the narrowest definition of domestic economy” (134). In the last three novels, though, the relationship between the plot of the romance and money is much more intricate: the question of “income” in Mansfield Park (134), “consumer signs” in Emma (136), or “credit” in Persuasion (138).

I found the above information interesting in that it opened my eyes to a new depth of information within Austen’s novels – and now I think I’ll need to re-read them all yet again! There’s always something new.

Citation for the Cambridge Companion follows:

Copeland, Edward, and Juliet McMaster. The Cambridge Companion to Jane Austen. 2nd. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. 127-143. Print.

An Oxford Class? Really? Oxford University?

I am taking a class on Jane Austen via Oxford University online, specifically Trinity College.

Typing that sentence makes me: completely geek out, giggle, feel a sense of pride, and anticipate the next class I get to take. Also, it reminds me that, in addition to finishing out a semester, I’ve got homework that needs finishing!

Posting that information here helps me explain why I’ve not posted anything in a while. The course requires us to read several books, some of which I have read, some of which I have not, so I had to switch from reading Mansfield Park to reading Northanger Abbey, which of course I don’t mind at all, but it did throw a slight kink in my progression of writing on my blog.

All that being said, there is the update. I will return to posting shortly, most likely in the next week, because my seniors are done and I’ll have afternoons actually at school to finish grading and planning work, and therefore time at home to work on my homework/prepare posts for my blog.