By Kennedy Buhere
Some scholars in literature have questioned the usage of long-standing works of literature as setbooks in secondary education and in the Departments of Literature in our universities.
The Daily Nation published an article by a lecturer in a local university some time ago, asking why authorities in Education ‘recycled’ setbooks in high school when there are many other books to choose from as setbooks.
This reasoning has no basis in the study of literature; be it for pleasure or for educational purposes. The crop of students who study the setbooks are never the same. The books are therefore as new to them as they were to students who studied the books a decade or earlier.
In addition, all students approach the setbooks with their own unique impressions, and experiences. And times change. The issues the earlier generation or crop of students faced are different from the later ones.
In their reading, the students get different and equally valid inferences or insights from the books as the earlier crop of students.
A work of art is not recyclable. It is ever new to every new reader who interacts with it. Indeed, a second reading of the book yields different impressions, insights and inferences from the initial reading.
A good teacher will also find new insights and impressions the second or third time they read it for purposes of teaching the setbooks. The wealth of literary experience he or she has had, backed with mature experience makes it possible for the teacher to extract more insights and meanings from the book for the students.
Indeed, students who get taught by a teacher who had taught the book to previous students benefit more from the teacher as they have richer knowledge and inferences than when he taught the book a decade or so earlier.
It is therefore unsubstantiated to claim that reintroduction of setbooks to a new crop of students is recycling the book!
Additionally, good works of art are not dated: they are timeless. Good works of art—any work into which an author has suffused his mind, soul and heart—has multiple layers of meaning.
There is the literal or surface layer of the story and the allegorical or symbolic layer
In his book, ‘Literary Criticism, an Introduction to Theory and Practice’, Charles E. Bressler notes: “A symbolic or allegorical reading of a work of art is kind of reading in which a character, a place, an idea, an event, or an action represents things which are similar or analogous. The characters, events, or places within a text represent meanings independent of the action in the surface or simple story.”
He further argues that these interpretations are most often religious, but may also be moral, political, personal or satiric.
The multiple layers of meaning of a text are best explained by Dante Alighieri, the 13th Century Italian poet in his ‘Letter to Cangrande della Scala’ which serves as a preface to his Paradiso volume of the ‘Divine Comedy’.
“For the clarification of what I am going to say, then, it should be understood that there is not just a single sense in this work: it might rather be called polysemous, that is, having several senses. For the first sense is that which is contained in the letter, while there is another which is contained in what is signified by the letter. The first is called literal, while the second is called allegorical, or moral or anagogical.”
Seen from this perspective, every work of art is of enduring educational value to every reader or learner. It doesn’t matter whether the reader is a student or an adult. It doesn’t matter whether the reader is a student of literature in high school or university. It doesn’t matter a hoot whether the reader is an artist or a scientist. The book will make sense to him or her—so long as he or she reads it with interest, purpose, intelligence and intuition.
What is important is that educational institutions impart in the learners the ability to read any text—simple and complex—and derive sense or meaning from it.
Sustained reading of good texts—fictional and nonfiction—progressively strengthens the reader’s ability to read and understand anything his reading interests and the exigencies of occupation and profession will force him or her to read.
In fact, the greater the appreciation of the world through intelligent reading, observation and listening, the greater one comes to read and appreciate literature. In this context, Literature is any piece of work written with purpose and literary finesse. It can be a novel, a play, a poem, a letter, a speech or an address.
The study of works by authors far removed in time, place and in civilization is not exclusive. It doesn’t prevent students from reading works of recent or contemporary writers.
Carefully chosen, students can study or read a number of classical, modern and contemporary works of art without confusing them. Organisation of programmes in Literature Departments in some universities provides for study of periods, literary movements, regions and even genres. An organisation similar to this can perfectly allow students to study works of acknowledged literary stature across time, movement, civilization and region without neglecting any.
The thrust of this article is that educational institutions should expose students not just to the current generation of writers. They should similarly ensure that the students have contact with the great minds of the past; for in those minds, as immortalized in their works, is knowledge and wisdom to cope with the problems of the troubled world such as ours.
Between twelve years of basic education and four years of university education are thousands of—subject to appropriate contact hours and allocated time in universities, colleges and basic education institutions—pieces of literature that we can ensure successive generations have a bowing acquaintance with the very best across time, literary movements, civilizations, and regions human ingenuity has created.
And the authorities should choose books of compelling literary and aesthetic value. Not frills in literature but books of all time and not books of the hour. All that we need is strong literacy foundations in the early years of learning.
Buhere is a Communications Officer, Ministry of Education.
