TEXT D
In a reaction against a too - rigid, overrefined classical curriculum, some educational philosophers have swung sharply to an espousal of "life experience" as the sole source of learning. Using their narrow interpretation of John Dewey’s theories as a base for support, they conclude that only throught" doing, can learning take place. Spouting such phrases as," Teach the child, not the subject," they demand, without sensing its absurdity, and end to rigorous study as a means of opening the way to learning. While not all adherents to this approach would totally eliminate a study of great books, the influence of this philosophy has been felt in the public school curricula, as evidenced by the gradual subordination of great literature.
What is the purpose of literature7 Why read, if life alone is to be our teacher James Joyce states that
the artist reveals the human situation by re -creating life out of life; Aristotle states that art presents universal truth because its form is taken from nature. Thus, consciously or otherwise, the great writer reveals the human situation most tellingly, -*extending our understanding of ourselves to our world.
We can soar with the writer to the heights of man’s aspirations, or plumment with him to tragic despair. The works of Steinbeck, Anderson, and Salinger; the poetry of Whitman, Sandburg, and Forst; the plays of Ibsen, Miller and O’Neill: all present starkly realistic portrayals of life’s problems, Really Yes! But how much wider is the understanding we gain than that attained by viewing life through the keyhole of our single existence.
Can we measure the richness gained by the young reader venturing down the Mississippi with Tom and Huck, or cheering Ivanhoe as he battles the Black Knight; the deepening understanding of the mature reader of the tragic South of William Fanlkner and Tennessess Williams, of the awesome determination--and frailty--of Patrick White’s Australian pioneers
This function of literature, the enlarging of our own life sphere, is of itself of major importance. Additionally, however, it has been suggested that solutions of social problems may be suggested in the study of literature. The overweening ambitions of political leaders--and their sneering contempt for the law--did not appear for the first time in the writings of Bernstein and Woodeard; the problems, and the consequent actions, of the guiltridden did not await the appearance of the bearded psychoanalyst of the twentieth century.
Federal Judge Learned Hand has written, "I venture to believe that it is as important to a judge called upon to pass on a question of constitutional law, to have at least a bowing acquaintance with Thucydided, Gibbon, and Carlyle, with Homer, Dante, Shakespeare, and Milton, with Montaigne and Rabelais, with Plato, Bacon, Hume, and Kant, as with the books which have been specitically written on the subject. For in such matters everything turns upon the spirit in which he approaches the questions before him. "
But what of our dissenters Can we overcome the disapproval of their" life experience classroom "theory of learning We must start with the field of agreement—that education should serve to improve the individual and society. We must educate them to the understanding that the voice of human experience should stretch our human faculties, and open us to learning. We must convince them—in their own personal language per haps-- of the "togetherness" of life and art; we must prove to them that far from being separate, literature is that pan of life which illumines life.
As the author sees it, one of the most important gains from the study of great literature is ______.