Tiny Coop

RIP Maurice Sendak

Photo via Flickr user weebum

An excerpt from Joe Fassler’s Atlantic article:

“Children surviving childhood is my obsessive theme and my life’s concern,” Maurice Sendak told NPR in 1993. His lush visual idiom managed to evoke the strange—and sometimes malign—intensity of real childhood, as fey, unruly protagonists sparred with adversaries (fanged monsters and imperfect parents). All his work demonstrates a strong desire, and uncanny ability, to capture the eerie vividness of youth and its crucibles. “I am trying to draw the way children feel,” Sendak told The New Yorker in an early profile. His ambiguous phrasing is apt—as though “the way children feel” was both what he tried to draw, and how.

academics — No comments
03
May 12

What’s the Purpose of College?

Photo courtesy Flickr user Roel Wijnants

On April 28, 2012, Jonah Lehrer wrote an article for the Wall Street Journal (and now available online) titled “Taking Knowledge Out of College.”

The article proposes that some things need to change in the current model of higher education, given that its current state includes a harrowing trifecta of too much debt, too little time spent on academics, and too much of the wrong kind of learning (e.g. memorizing facts rather than cultivating skills that economist James Heckman calls “noncognitive” such as “self-control and conscientiousness”).

Lehrer begins,

“At first glance, the answers seem obvious. College is about exposure to new kinds of knowledge, classic literature and a bevy of scientific facts. Plus, there’s a lasting payoff: According to the Census Bureau, full-time workers with bachelor’s degrees earn, on average, $20,000 more per year than those with just high-school diplomas. This helps to explain why college remains a largely unquestioned advantage, an investment with a massive payoff.”

Yet, according to the experts Lehrer cites, students are learning facts that anyone can easily reference online, rather than the ability to learn.

His final argument reads as follows:

“Take perseverance. According to a study by the College Board in the early 1980s, a trait known as “follow-through” was one of the best predictors of success in college and beyond. But the modern university teaches follow-through only by accident, forcing students to take tedious classes and then rewarding those who don’t drop out. That’s a mistake. It’s time to give students underlying skills that are not forgotten.”

I asked a few friends what the purpose of college is, and their responses varied.

One said that college prepares you to be a generally skilled worker in terms of analytic abilities, time management, deadlines, responsibilities, etc. It prepares you for the workforce. He stated that it’s not so much what’s in your textbook that matters, as it is the time management and interpersonal skills you need to get your work done on time and well. He thinks the academic facts component is minor, and not why you go to college.

Another asserted that the social learning is as, if not more, important than the academic learning. She mentions that while everyone’s college experience is different, it’s often the chance to try out adulthood, and all the responsibilities it brings (e.g. you are the one making yourself go to class, eat dinner, remember to do your laundry). She also said that college is a unique experience in that you are immersed in a community of hundreds and thousands of young people often in the same life stage. It’s also a good opportunity to “be young” and explore your sense of self.

Your turn: Why go to college these days? Why did you go to college?

Joel Stein: YA Fiction has no value for adults

Photo courtesy Flickr Commons

While reading the NYT Debate about YA Fiction’s Value, I enjoyed a range of perspectives that were on the whole accepting of young adult fiction. It’s not a perfect genre (more diversity in character would be nice, for example), but the overall feel of the debate was that if a book is engaging, it’s engaging to adults and young adults alike. Read on, YA fiction enthusiasts over the age of 18!

However, Joel Stein suggests adults avoid YA fiction because, “Books are one of our few chances to learn.” This attitude troubles me for several reasons. I am concerned that removing the very important idea of enjoying what you read yields an elitism in which only the scholarly read books, because they read the books that “require…of your brains.” For academics, that relegates those of us who read challenging but not necessarily enjoyable literature into an out-of-touch profession, a reputation that we are currently trying to rally against.

A few points of order: enjoying a book does not necessarily make it an easy read. There is also merit in reading something that’s not your particular favorite for the intellectual insights you can gain by doing so. (Making it through all the sonnets in Petrarch’s Rime comes to mind for me as something I didn’t really love, but gained a lot of knowledge of translation by completing.) You can also learn something from a not-so-challenging book: observations about humanity, what your personal aesthetic of writing may be, and what publishing works on certain themes says about a culture’s focus, to name a few such learning opportunities from, even the “worst” of YA books.

Stein goes on,

“I have no idea what “The Hunger Games” is like. Maybe there are complicated shades of good and evil in each character. Maybe there are Pynchonesque turns of phrase. Maybe it delves into issues of identity, self-justification and anomie that would make David Foster Wallace proud. I don’t know because it’s a book for kids. I’ll read “The Hunger Games” when I finish the previous 3,000 years of fiction written for adults. “

I take issue with the idea that only literature with they lyrical dexterity of Pynchon or the Foster-esque complex inner workings of characters is literature of quality. (By the way, I have a Masters in English, am working towards a PhD, I focus on contemporary American literature, and I still didn’t care to finish Against The Day). If the modern reader picks up “something from the last 3,000 years,” say, Henry Fielding’s “The Tragedy of Tragedies; or, the Life and Death of Tom Thumb the Great,” it is not because it is a. Pynchon-like, b. Foster-like, or c. particularly instructive. In fact, its satire and overwrought silliness is precisely why people read it now, and saw it as a play in the late 18th century. It also bothers me that the only examples Stein considers great literature are books by white men.

There’s no age limit on well-written books. Universal themes, such as the feeling of alienation, tend to be addressed in both Kafka and YA novels. These are human issues of interest, and you don’t “outgrow” that. Moreover, to disrespect YA lit is to disrespect young people, especially young women, who tend to purchase and read the majority of young adult literature. To dismiss what they read and think about is to dismiss their experiences and opinions, which should matter, even before they are 18 and can move on to Stein’s “books they can learn from” requirement.

It’s not like reading YA at any age precludes you from reading any kind other kind of book. Last time I checked out a biography of Pablo Neruda at the library, no one stamped my library card with “CORBALAP” (which everyone knows means “Can only ready biographies about Latin American poets”). I ran a YA book club for only members over 18, and somehow all these people managed to be smart engaged humans who held down jobs and also read Zadie Smith and Joyce Carol Oates from time to time–all while being adults who enjoyed reading YA lit.

academics / poetry — No comments
26
Apr 12

Joseph Campana Addresses Fear of Poetry

Photo courtesy Katya Horner, via Rice University Website

In his April 24 Houston Chronicle article, Campana reminds us that, “Poetry, after all, is for everyone.”

In honor of National Poetry Month, he offers a few tips to help people overcome their tremendous fear that poetry is unintelligible, too elitist, too emotional, or just not for them. (Remember my new friend who skips the New Yorker poems?)

His tips are:

1. Relax

2. Enjoy

3. Listen

4. Slow Down

5. Read and Reread

6. Make Poetry a Daily Habit

Perhaps my favorite is tip 2, “Enjoy.” Campana states, “Often people assume we either comprehend or we enjoy. On the contrary, literary pleasure makes possible a form of background thinking. You may not notice it happening, but enjoyment makes you understand the world more deeply.”

I agree with this point. I think there is an awful lot of literary snobbishness in the world, where people who are trying to start loving literature, and particularly poetry, feel as though they aren’t good enough based on their own tastes. Just because you like Robert Frost doesn’t mean you’re somehow still stuck at the same intellectual level you were when you read “The Road Not Taken” in eighth grade. Although he is a dead white guy, there is a reason his poetry hasn’t gone out of style. It’s good! Or maybe you like Philip Larkin’s “This Be the Verse” (come on, no matter how functional your family, you can’t help but enjoy “The fuck you up, your mum and dad. / They may not mean to, but they do.”). Do you go running to Jay-Z’s “In Paris?” Whatever you like is okay. It’s also okay if you don’t know what you like. Just gently peruse a few poems, responding to your own enjoyment, and reading accordingly.

I also agree with tip 3, “Listen.” There is something wonderful that happens when we listen to poetry read aloud. I think it is a direct route to enjoyment, tip 2.

Make sure you read the article when you get a chance.

What are your tips for being less afraid of poetry? The tip I give is to YouTube every contemporary poet you read so you can hear him/her read aloud.

poetry — No comments
25
Apr 12

A Tribute to Philip Larkin

My photo of the event program (forgive the blurriness)

Last night I had the pleasure of attending the Poetry Society of America and The Cooper Union’s A Tribute to Philip Larkin event.

Fiction and poetry writers and lovers read Larkin’s poems aloud. Every four readings or so, we listened to a jazz interlude of Louis Armstrong songs (Larkin’s favorite). I wouldn’t consider myself an Anglophile, but it was fun to hear so many different British accents reading aloud the poems. I imagined Larkin was there, pronouncing the words with his own particular diction.

The most special moment for me was at the end, as the lights dimmed, and a recording of Larkin came on the speakers. We all sat there, haunted by his ghost in a lovely way. Some people had gotten up to beat traffic, thinking the reading was over. Others had been standing, about to leave as well. Everyone froze in a sort of tableau as we listened to “Lines on a Young Lady’s Photograph Album” in his voice. Lights dimmed, I saw people’s reactions more clearly. The readers onstage smiled to themselves, chuckled at parts, and nodded at others, their faces relaxed. The ladies sitting next to me sighed, did the “poetry murmur” of “mmmm” immediately after.

The poems read were:

“Going”

“After drinking Glenfiddich”

“At Grass”

“Money”

“To the Sea”

“Talking in Bed”

“Poetry of Departures”

“For Sidney Bechet”

“The Explosion”

“First Sight”

“High Windows”

“Aubade”

“Sad Steps”

“Home is so Sad”

“Dockery and Son”

“MCMXIV”

“Church Going”

“The Mower”

“The Old Fools”

“The Whitsun Weddings”

“Lines on a Young Lady’s Photograph Album”

My favorite is probably “High Windows,” and I was so pleased to be there to see Mary Karr reading it. Other readers included Billy Collins, Zadie Smith, Paul Simon, Saskia Hamilton, Meena Alexander—an overwhelming quantity of smart, creative people.

If you’d like to hear Larkin’s voice, listen to him read “Aubade” via YouTube:

academics / feminism — 2 comments
24
Apr 12

Literary canon still dominated by white men, not-so-great study confirms

Photo courtesy Flickr user Angela Radulescu

Thank goodness for Toni Morrison (I’m not being sarcastic).

I’m a little late to the game, but I just finished reading this March 30, 2012 Jezebel article “The Literary Canon is Still One Big Sausage Fest.” This article is an analysis of Commentary Magazine‘s “Literary Commentary” section article by D. G. Myers on the MLA rankings of American Writers that came out March 26.

The most salient excerpt from Doug Barry’s Jezebel blog posting follows:

“What Myers’ list (with which the MLA has no official connection) shows is that, of 25 lionized, aggrandized, perpetuated American scribblers, only five — or a good tip on a small lunch check — are women. They are:

8. Toni Morrison
9. Emily Dickinson
13. Willa Cather
16. Edith Wharton
19. Flannery O’Connor”

Myers claims to have conducted independent research to answer this question: “What actually is the American literary canon, as determined by what literary scholars actually work on?” I will for the moment set aside my follow-up questions on his study (although it’s pretty easy for me to believe that the majority of scholarship the past 25 years focus on men authors), and point out some observations I noted about Myers’ tone.

“Poor William Dean Howells has fallen out of the top 25 altogether (to be replaced by Richard Wright).” Poor Howells, being replaced by a writer of color? I assume Myers is trying to be funny here, but I think he leaves himself open for criticism.

“Vladimir Nabokov has become of the five most talked-about American writers, and Toni Morrison (whose Beloved will be 25 years old in September) has jumped from far back into the top ten.” Apparently Toni Morrison’s Beloved becoming more popular in publication is the only example Myers could find of a woman author whose work increased in notoriety in American literary discourse, though her work is tacked on as an afterthought to singing the praises of Nabokov.

“Has the literary scholars’ 25-year worship at the holy shrine of race, class, and gender brought about major changes in the canon? You be the judge.” I’m really confused by this statement. Does this mean that by paying attention to issues of representation that include race, class, and gender hasn’t changed the canon much, and thus this attention is a futile endeavor? Or does he mean that scholars are are focusing only one one type of class, race, and gender (i.e. white men), which clearly wouldn’t change the canon? I want to believe this is a really confusing call to arms, but alas, I think it’s just a criticism against diversifying the canon.

Back to Barry’s article. He notes that Myers’ list is so insidious because it accepts the cultural norm of overlooking women writers.

“A grandiose 2009 list of the ‘100 Greatest Writers of All Time’ on This Recording included just fourteen women. Out of a hundred. Only two of those women — Virginia Woolf (14) and Gertrude Stein (5) — made the top 25, and the Brontë sisters, probably because they have the same name, so, like they count as the same person, got to share the 58th spot so they could do sisterly things like brush each other’s hair and talk about how if Anne didn’t start taking care of her own cat, they’d take it to the SPCA and find it a good home.”

Perhaps Myers is just reporting “how things are.” I wish he would go a step further and examine the issues inherent in this report, rather than merely noting which authors go up and down in popularity. Did he notice the paucity of non-white, non-upper-and-middle-class, non-men? Bueller?

What are your thoughts?

translation — No comments
20
Apr 12

The Voice: Translating the King James Bible

Photo courtesy Flickr user knowhimonline

I’m fascinated by issues of translation in literature, and one such recent example is The Voice.

CNN covers Professor David Capes’ (and his team’s) new translation of the King James Bible, which does not include words such as “angel” or “Christ.”

Here’s an excerpt from The Washington Post‘s Bob Smeitana’s April 17, 2012 article:

The title for “The Voice” came from the New Testament Gospel of John and from the Greek word logos. It’s usually translated as “word” in verses such as John 1:1, which reads: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God,” in the New International Version, one of the most popular English translations.

In “The Voice,” that passage reads: “Before time itself was measured, the Voice was speaking. The Voice was and is God.” Frank Couch, the executive editor and publisher of “The Voice,” said that translation better captures what logos means.

What do you think? Does exploring issues of translation in the Bible urge you to connect in a new way with the text, or does it make you cranky to “change” familiar wording?

poetry — 2 comments
19
Apr 12

“But honestly, where is poetry, besides the New Yorker?”

Screen shot courtesy Casa KCD.

I was at an alumni reunion of a school I never attended. While making small talk, it came up that I plan to get my PhD in literature, specifically focusing on poetry. A man said to me, “But honestly, where is poetry, besides the New Yorker?” He went on to let me know that those aren’t “his type of poems,” and that he typically skips them anyways.

I responded the way I often do when asked this question: poetry is everywhere. He asked me to define “everywhere.” I asked if he ever heard rap music blaring from someone’s car on the street, at the gym, or while shopping at a trendy clothing store.

Or perhaps, did he ever read the newspaper or listen to the radio? I mentioned how W. H. Auden’s “September 1, 1939″ was read on NPR and republished widely following the September 11, 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center. I read business and financial news–The Wall Street Journal–and a couple weeks ago they, like other news outlets, featured the Associated Press coverage of German poet Günter Grass’ controversial comparison of Iran and Israel in the poem “What Must be Said.”

Ask a person who doesn’t consider him or herself a literary person who is the greatest poet of all time. Most of them will probably mention Shakespeare. Most people who’ve made it through school have encountered Shakespeare, giving us a common exposure to at least the sonnet form. Isn’t that exciting? That so many people around the world all have a common background in at least one type of poetry?

I asked this man if he ever took public transit. I mentioned how Cole Haan’s latest ad campaign included poems to describe each of New York’s subway lines, which were posted in various trains throughout the city.

We agreed to disagree, and he left the conversation still convinced poetry is an elitist art only noticed by myopic academics and weirdo poets. I left frustrated that I felt like poetry is everywhere, and hadn’t been able to prove my point.

On April 4, 2012, The San Antonio Current’s Veronica Salinas interviewed Carmen Tafolla, the city’s first Poet Laureate.

Salinas asks, “Can you describe any common misconceptions about poetry you’ve experienced?”

It felt like Tafolla was talking to me in her response:

“You know a lot of people have been told that poetry is some disconnected form of weird speech spoken by little old ladies and crazy beatniks who pull together sickeningly sweet images of butterflies and flowers to recite at formal events. Things like, “Oh for the purple butterfly of my loneliness,” you know? When in reality the very best poetry is that which honestly speaks the feelings and the most meaningful experiences in a person’s life. And it puts it in a way that reaches us and expresses what we really feel. And that’s why poetry becomes so important to the intellectual life of a city, or of a people, because it’s expressing what is most important to them in life.”

poetry — No comments
17
Apr 12

Tracy K. Smith wins Pulitzer Prize for Poetry

Tracy K. Smith was awarded the Pulitzer Prize in poetry yesterday, April 16, 2012. (There was no award for fiction this year, interestingly enough.)

Smith is quoted in the New York Daily News on her recent habit of writing in coffee shops: “Brooklyn is kind of my writer’s retreat.”

Read and listen to Smith read “Duende” from Gulf Coast.

Here is the poet reading at UC Berkeley:

academics — No comments
19
Oct 11

Why does it take you so long to graduate?

Photo courtesy Meathead Movers via Flickr

Today I read an article in the Chronicle of Higher Ed. by Leonard Cassuto titled, “The Time-to-Degree Conundrum” (originally published Oct. 16, 2011).

This particular topic is near to my heart as a graduate student when I’m asked by non-academics at all turns, something along the lines of, “Not to be rude, but what do you do for 7 years?” or “You’re only studying literature for 7 years? Not anything else?” The answer is that by year 7, 8, or 9, you’re done with the work of your degree, but often still aren’t employed, thus delaying your “finishing.”

Cassuto asks, “What does it mean for an institution to advertise an entry-level position and then place new Ph.D.’s on the same playing field with applicants who have years’ more experience?”

That is to say, someone on the job market fresh out of a Ph.D. program (after, say, 7 years) with a degree will often find himself in competition with postdoctoral candidates and those who are still technically part of a program despite having essentially finished years ago (after, say, 10-12 years of work). As you go through multiple job application cycles, you tend to become a stronger candidate with increased publications and experience. Cassuto points out that this de-incentivizes finishing a Ph.D. program “early.”

I agree with Cassuto’s point that if we want the Ph.D. process to take less time to complete, we must hire promising candidates who haven’t had the time to build a portfolio that rivals a tenure-track assistant professor’s, rather than always choosing the years-of-experience candidates.

He states, “Choosing experience over possibility can result from the lure of achievement—and the achievements of today’s graduate students are indeed considerable. But it can also result from a certain complacency. An emphasis on attainments over potential further implies that an applicant needs to have experience in order to get experience: a classic Catch-22 that is bridged by the willingness of departments to employ their student apprentices far past the point of simply training them.”

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