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A Creative Approach to the Study of LiteratureAuthor(s): Frank W. ChandlerSource: The English Journal, Vol. 4, No. 5 (May, 1915), pp. 281-291Published by: National Council of Teachers of EnglishStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/800899.

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T H ENGLISH JOURN LVOLUME V MAY915 NUMBER

A CREATIVE APPROACH TO THE STUDY OFLITERATURE

FRANK W. CHANDLERUniversity of Cincinnati

Whoever would study literature must come directly into touchwith it. A statement so obvious might seem unnecessary; yetteachers are still prone to substitute for acquaintance with litera-ture itself a knowledge of the facts about literature. Courses inliterary history are an essential part of the college curriculum,but such courses, unless they are pursued by those who have alreadyacquired some feeling for and understanding of literature, are stul-tifying. It is doubtless the business of our colleges and univer-sities to teach literary scholarship; but it is even more imperativelythe business of our schools to teach literary appreciation.How shall the pupil be made to realize the virtue of literatureas art ? How shall he be taught to feel and to interpret a lyric, anovel, a play ? These are the vital questions for the school teacherto answer, not merely, How shall the pupil be made to mastercertain facts regarding certain authors-their dates, lives, works,environments, and sources ?The need for teaching literary appreciation in the schools isbeginning to be generally recognized, although university-bredinstructors to some extent still insist on foisting upon their unhappyhigh-school charges the methods of university scholarship. Theneed for teaching literary appreciation to the Freshman enteringcollege is less often admitted. It is assumed that he already knowshow to read worthy works of the imagination with some intellectual

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282 THE ENGLISH JOURNALand aesthetic response. Perhaps this assumptionmay be a safeone a dozen years hence when the schools have buckled down totheirpropertask with singlenessof purpose. At present,however,the assumption s without warrant,and what most FreshmenandsomeSophomores equire s not a historicalsurveyof Englishlitera-ture, but, as a preliminary,a coursein literary appreciation. Atthe University of Cincinnati I have been attempting to conductsuch a course,and the experimenthas been fraughtwith interest.In this course, I lay no stress upon literary history. Instead,I assign for study examplesof various types of literature-ballad,lyric, descriptivepoem, short and long verse-narrative,essay, anddrama-without dogmatizingmuchon the distinctionsof the forms.I begin with balladsand lyrics becausethey are the kinds of poemmost easily read and understood. Certain students on one daygive me oral andwrittenreportson what they have read; andthen,at the next recitation, they show me how far they have been ableto enter into the spirit of an assigned poem by endeavoringtoexpressthat spirit in verses of their own. Thus critical interpre-tation and appreciativecreationcomplementeach other. At firstthe attempts in both directionsarevery crude,but in a shortperiodsurprisingly good results follow. In the meantime, during theclassexercises,I usually read aloud the poems under considerationand set the students to discussing them as to meanings, meters,diction, and artistic effects. Next, I read aloud a class criticism,and then a class poem in the same vein, and call for commentsonboth. I give no set lecturesbecauseI believe that the socialgroupshoulddo the work,not the teacher.At the start, studentcriticismsare often lamentablymeagerandinaccurate. Thus, on one assignment, several naive Freshmenwrite impromptureportsas follows:"Fitzgerald'sRubaiyatof OmarKhayyamtells about a man who wasthinking all the time that he had to die because everyone before him had diedand he knew that everyone would die, so he knew he would fall in line withthe rest and die."

"Omar Khlayyam s a poem on the same order as Rubaiyat. It says toenjoy while you may and leave the rest to chance.""Rubaiyat tells of a man who is sitting in a garden talking to his sweet-heart. The poem expresses the opinions of the man.""This is a eulogy on life told by a skeptic. It is a very peculiarpoem andhard to understand.


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APPROACH TO THE STUDY OF LITERATURE 283Pupils who can say no more than this about Fitzgerald's versionof Omar are evidently in crying need of a course to develop their

literary perceptions. I am therefore not discouraged, nor do I dis-courage them. Very soon they learn that what is required is amuch more searching analysis, and they proceed to make it. Idemand in such work that they set down their own reactions with-out reference to the stock criticism of experts, and, above all, with-out attempting to truckle to my opinions and preferences. In twoor three months this is the sort of fresh and original criticism thata fearless youth will give of a work like Browning's "Fra LippoLippi," before we have discussed it in class. The criticism isfunny, of course, because inadequate, yet valuable because real:

Before writing about Browning's "Fra Lippo Lippi," I must first state myestimate of Browning as a poet. To begin with, I do not appreciate his works.For the most part they require too much exertion on the part of the reader todraw out the meaning. A real poet is clear, concise, and to the point. I haveworked over some of the lines of Browning for five minutes at a time and yetgot only a hazy idea of their meaning. It is not because of my inability tounderstand English poetry that I fail to comprehend what he is driving at,because I can understand Tennyson or Shakespeare,if not at the first reading,at the second. Browning's lack of clearness and attempts at the profound,which are only muddy and not deep, were always a source of worry to me, forI came to the conclusion that it was my soggy and unable thinking. However,I have partly, if not completely, taken the blame off of myself by discoveringthat he had negro blood in his make-up. I have often come into contact withmembers of this emotional race, and their conversation consists of long, mean-ingless wordsand indistinct allusions. I see these characteristicsin Browning'sworks every time I try to read them. When Browning, however, attempts towork with the simpler things he does show some ability. This is instanced inhis reference to the boy drawing in his song book, in this monologue, and tothe relating of the simple incident of "The Pied Piper of Hamelin" and theequally simple "Incident of the French Camp." Nevertheless, his poems arenot worth the digging requiredto get out the pithy lines."Fra Lippo Lippi" tells the story of a monk who advocates realistic paint-ing at the end of the Dark Ages. This very theme strikes me as useless, asall the artists have long ago decided that that was the correct method, and noone now disputes the point. It is like two old soldiers fighting out the CivilWar; it is a settled issue and no one cares. The monk in the poem tells howhe was tired of life at an early age and is persuadedby another monk to renouncelands and riches, which he never had, to become a monk. After a while hebecomes a painter who does the conventional decorating in the churches, butin his own studio he departs from the stiff and set models of art and paints


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284 THE ENGLISH JOURNALnature as he sees it. He tells the whole story himself, picturing himself to becaught by guards as he is trying to escape from a palace where he has been setto do some conventional work against his will. He addresses his story to theguards, who make no replies but patiently listen to him. This poem is anexcellent example of an overestimated poet overestimating a theme and gettingaway with it before the world; and smugly I see him smile behind a screen ofunmerited praise.Such a criticism is worth while and welcome, although othersin the class bend theirenergiesto convince the Freshmanwho wroteit that his failure to get anything out of "Fra Lippo Lippi" is notBrowning's ault but his own. To this end, I myself recite much ofthe monologuealoud, interruptingmy readingnow and then witha rapid fire of questions as to the meanings of various lines andphrasesand as to theway in which these should be rendered. Fromthis exercise,which may well consume a whole period, we emergerefreshed and stimulated, and even my doubting Thomas is pre-paredthereafter to find in Browningwhat he had so largelymissedthere before.But it is not so muchuponthe discussionandpreparedcriticismsof the poems assigned that I rely for the success of my labors inteaching literary appreciation; it is ratherupon the originalcom-positionof the students. It is their creativeapproachto literaturethat makes them really feel it. While, for example,one set is pre-paring a prose review of Omar's Rubaiyat, as I have indicated,anotherset is preparing o reproduce n verse of their own the samemeasures,moods,and ideas. It is my experience hat in the effortto catch the spirit and lilt of Omarby trying to write in his style,this second set invariably gains more in the way of actual under-standing than do those who merely write an essay about Omar.Here, for example, are a few quatrains done thus to order by aFreshman and evincinga degreeof appreciationscarcelyto be dis-played or tested by any prose analysis:

Oh fill the cup and snatch the blooming rose,Nor vainly seek to learn what no one knows-Look how each brooding questioner in turnLike desert sand into the Nowhere blows.Lo every blade of grass that upward springsCould tell of long-forgotten buried kings;And myriads that drew the breath of lifeHave lived and died where now the cricket sings.


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APPROACH TO THE STUDY OF LITERATURE 285Forothersoulsbefore hee trodthiswayAndprattledof a lifebeyond he clay;Andthey believedandwovea foolishdream-Ah, they believed-but tell me--wherearethey?Thendrain he cupand let the morrowbe,Tomorrow'sight mayneverdawnforthee;And if thy placebe empty 'neaththe vine,Whoof the passing hrongwillcareorsee?

Practically,this method has the sanction of writers ikeJohnson,Franklin, and Stevenson, who employed it diligently to cultivatetheir own mastery of prose. Philosophically,it has the sanctionof the great Italian aesthetician Benedetto Croce, who maintainsthat art is expressionand that expressionand subject-matterarenot twofold, but single, and that the critic of poetry in order toappreciatemust become for the moment a poet. As I read, thereis awakened n me somethingof the sameemotionand thought thatfirstunitedin the poet to producehis work,and so in my conscious-ness, I live it over, I reproduce t. Only by such reproductionorexpression, ndeed, can I appreciateart, and my ability to repro-duce imaginatively the work of others quickens both my sensi-tiveness to that work and my capacity for beautiful expressionsof my own.

Acceptingsucha theoryforwhat it is worth,I askmy Freshmenand Sophomores o read and then to writeballads, dramaticmono-logues, sonnets, Spenserianstanzas, heroic couplets, nature lyrics,lyrics of love, of patriotism, of religiousfeeling, elegies in countrychurchyards,and what not, believing that the creative approachto literatureis the most natural as it is certainly the most joyous.A student who has read Shelley's "Indian Serenade" is told towrite a "Song of the Serenader"and presents these verses, whichI read aloud to the class and criticize,changingonly one line at thesuggestionof anotherstudent:Oh ummeright-wind,low hetrees,Set themsinging ow,Whisperingweet in my lady's ear,I love--I love her so.

Ah little night-birds,weetly call,Tenderly ell my quest,Tell her I wait 'neathherwindowhere,To claspherto my breast.


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286 THE ENGLISH JOURNALOh soul of the summer night, oh soulCry out through the gloom above,That the Rose of her Heart may bloom tonightInto a perfect Love

One who has read Cowper'scouplets "On the Receipt of MyMother'sPicture Out of Norfolk" is bidden, with others, to writein the same meter and mood a reminiscentpoem in simple dictionbindingthe thought about somedefiniteobject connectedwith thepast. As a result, I receive, at the next class meeting, versesentitled "A Little Crutch"-not very poeticalperhaps,but sincere:

Withinmy handsI hold a tiny crutch;I clasp t to my breastwith reverent ouch,Thiscauseof all my infantgriefsandtears;Ah Memory of my blighted childhood years.I see a longandsunnysmiling treet;I hearthe scampering f little feetThat playedat racinggamesthe wholeday through;Ah howI longed o runandplaythemtoo.EachmorningwhenI hobbledout to play,A crippledmite, yet striving o be gay,I beggedmy comradesora quietgame;But jumping, kipping, acingwas theiraim.So left alone,my smilewould lit awayAnd on my browa furrow ameto stay,Forponderas I would,I couldnot seeWhycrippledweremy limbswhile theirswere free.

The honesty of this effort is vouched for in the note appendedby the author,who writes, "If criticized n class, please do not dis-close my identity, as this is a bit too personal."Anotherstudentafterhearinga discussionof a groupof religiouslyrics, is struckby the charmof William Blake, and writes for meat commanda Blakish thing entitled "Quest":

I soughtmy GodIn my fearof the to-beThat, childlike, hadyearned o see;Eternitycalledout to me;I soughtmy God.I mademy GodOfmy love and dreamsandtears,Of the mistsof after-years,Ofthe faiththat cheers, hro'doubtsandfears;I mademy God.


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APPROACH TO THE STUDY OF LITERATURE 287I found my GodIn a sweet, celestial fire,In the flames of young desireStill higher, higher to aspire;I found my God.

AnotherFreshman,after we have studied in severalpieces thecharacteristicsof vers de socidtd,writes in the Austin Dobson veinof "My Lady's Handkerchief":A tiny squareof finest ace,A cobweb merely,And yet it means a world to me,Who lovedyou dearly.A fairyfragrance isesfrom t,MemoriesbringingOfglad May-morning romenadesAnd birdsa-singing.Ofhappyhours n blooming pringWhen wandering overThe dewy lawns we drank the breath

Of purpling clover.Your hairgleamed, hiningat my sideLike sparkling water,Andyou,a woodsprite, spedalong-Diana's daughter.That day you gambled for my heart,Youprecious innerAnd now I'm left alone to mournFor you, the winner.

Whenthe class,afterdiscussingthe traits of the dramaticmono-logue, bends its energies to producemonologuesof its own, I amhanded this adaptation of Tennyson's "Northern Farmer, NewStyle," entitled "The ModernFarmer":

Areyou goingto market,my woman? If so, let megive youa lift,It is hardto carry he baskets, houghyourload showsan uncommonthrift.No, I won't break your eggs-you can set them right down on the

floorof the car;Mymachine oes ike wind-don't bescared,ma'am-to me it is betterby farIf I smasha speed imit or two, it's the fun of the thingthat I like,Not forme is thehorseand thericketycartandthesandyoldpike; ...


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288 THE ENGLISH JOURNALSo the verse runs on for a hundred lines as the up-to-date

farmer, n his prattle to his passenger,reveals his philosophyof lifeand incidentallyhis character.In consideringa groupof naturepoems,I point out variouswaysin whichpoets dealwith nature, and set the class to experimentingwith each. As an example of the interpretative treatment of anatural object with which the poet has identified himself, as didShelleywith the cloud, onestudentspeaksfor "The SpringViolet"as follows: Withinmy close-shutheartI heard he voiceOf fragrant Spring-time; over hill and plainEchoed ts mellow,clear"Awake ejoiceSpring comes again "My soul wasfilledwithlilting songof birdAndrapturous reathings f the southwinds ow-Such music as the flowers in Eden heard

Long, long ago.Till in this quietmeadowwhereI standI felt the garments of the Spring trail past;Thenthrilledwithjoy of the exultant and,I bloomedat last.

After we have read Tennyson's "Sweet and Low," one of theablest students, in response to my order for a lullaby, pens theseverses:Sleep the rose with heavy petalsIn the garden dreams apart;Mother's arms are close about thee,Little Rose upon my Heart.Dreamy, drowsy, long, and goldenThrough the pines the moonbeams swayO'er the leaves the shadows scamper,Lonesome for thee, till the day.All along the purple woodlandElfin lights arise and shine;Glowwormsglimmer in the bushes-Fireflies twinkle on the vine.This is Heaven-love and twilightAnd a lullaby apart;Ah, to keepthee thusforever,Little Rose, upon my Heart


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APPROACHTO THE STUDY OF LITERATURE 289But why weary you with other examples of the success of amethod so obvious? Of course, these specimensof student com-

positions are well above the average. Of course, in my class of ahundred,therearemany whoseverse is devoid of merit even whereit managesto securesome correctnessof rhythmand rhyme. Butthose who fail to produce smooth lines learn, nevertheless, fromwhat is lackingin theirown workjust what to look for in the workof true poets; and the less able students listen with unfeigneddelight to the verse of their more brilliant fellows, yielding it anattention they would never accordin the first instance to the verseof the remote masters. As they perceive, however, that thecreationsof these mastersmay be approachedafaroff in miniaturein the writingsof some of theirown classmates,even the least com-petent studentsbegin to take an interestin the mastersthemselves.If it be objectedthat in this creativeapproach o literary appre-ciationI am teachingcompositionratherthanliterature,I replythatto make practical writers of my pupils is not at all my aim. Irequireoriginalpoemsfromthem, not that they may becomepoets,but that they may learn to understandpoems. I am not discour-aged, therefore,when I read much doggereland realize that thoseguilty of it are not qualifiedever to produceanything intrinsicallyworth while in this kind. For I know that he who has composedeven a maimed and halting sonnet as the result of real effortwillever after understandsonnets the better. So I forgive the Sopho-morewho, in strugglingto composea sonnetformy class in EnglishIII, presents one to me somewhat late, an effusion entitled "ATardy Sonnet," beginningin Shakespeareanwise:

Whento the sessionsof sweetEnglish hreeMy lagging ootstepsslowlywendtheirwayI sigh,to thinkof how, throughout achdayFortwolongweeks(how ongthey seemed o me )My penhas failed to answer o my plea,Andhow these wordswithinmy memory tay-"Asonnet,please"-Italian didhe say?Alas Alack Wordscouldnot harsherbeAndnow,as mid-semestermarksdrawnigh,I understandhat minemaynot be high;


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290 THE ENGLISH JOURNALAndso, although he Muse still grantsno aid,I try withzeal to turnaside hardfate,And writea sonnet,with mucheffortmade,And hand that sonnet n, though t be late.

Sometimes, in talking with other college teachers of English whoboast of their historical survey courses for Freshmen or Sophomores,I feel a sense of shame that I should be doing comparatively ele-mentary work. I sigh to think of the lectures upon literary monu-ments and movements with which I might illumine these freshyoung minds. But I am consoled whenever I talk with those whohave had such lectures in college, for, unless they have brought tothese a well-developed power to appreciate literature, I find thatthe lecturer's wisdom has been largely wasted. The time maysoon come when the schools will do what I am doing with my oneclass of college Freshmen and Sophomores. That is the work, Ibelieve, most feasible and valuable for them to undertake. Untilthen, however, it would seem to me desirable to give in college atleast one course in pure appreciation even at the risk of beinglooked upon as a sentimental dilettante.In conclusion, and to fortify my faith in my own method, letme offer the ballad of a Freshman, assigned to be written uponan item clipped from a recent newspaper. I give first the news-item which was selected as appropriate to ballad treatment out ofa large number of clippings supplied by the class:

A traitorhasjustbeenshot. He was a little French adbelonging o oneof the gymnasticsocietieswhichwearthe tri-colored ibbons,a poor youngfellow,who,in his infatuation,wantedto be a hero.As the German olumnwaspassingalonga woodeddefile,he wascaughtand askedwhether he Frenchwere about. He refused o give any informa-tion. Fifty yardsfurther here was fire fromthe cover of the wood. Theprisonerwas asked n French f he hadknown hattheenemywasin theforest,andhe did not denyit.He wentwitha firmstepto a telegraphpoleand stoodagainst t, with agreenvineyardat his back,and received he volley of a firingpartywith aproud mileon his face. Infatuatedwretch It wasa pity to seesuchwastedcourage.

Upon this item, copied evidently from a French journal, twenty-five students wrote ballads. By far the best follows:


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APPROACH TO THE STUDY OF LITERATURE 291Germantroops in the advance, headed for embattled France,Trampled down the purpling vineyards with the wantonness of war;A relentless Teuton host, fighting to make good their boastTo bring Europe to her knees and to rule forevermore.Through the veins of danger-loving youth the lust for blood surgedhot;So they marched-when on the sunny air there rang a foeman's shot,And the captain sharply eyed his boyish prisonerand swore."Did you know that ambush lay

Waiting for us on our way?Speak, or die " the captain cried.But the boy still set his trembling lips with fearless taunting glance;

"Speak, or die " the captain cried.And he said, "I die--for France "Then the grizzled captain gazed at his prisoner, amazed,And the soldiers stirred and murmuredto each other in surprise.

"Speak and you shall live," he said, but the boy still shook his head;And he ordered that the spy be shot before his very eyes.Yet the foolish, needless sacrifice of young blood touched his heart,And he paused and called the boy to him and spoke to him apart:"You are but a child, in truth.And you need not die, mad youth.Speak or die " the captain cried.But the boy tossed back his childish head with trembling, taunting glance."Speak or die " the captain cried,And he said, "I die--for France."

Angered at his failure, then, turned the captain to his men,As he roughly strode away and led the stubborn captive out;And the men that stood around him seized the prisonerand bound him;Then their leader called the Death Line forth with furious, lashing shout.So the boy thrust back his shoulders as he faced that grim, black line,Stood and faced them midst the green and purple of the ripening vine;When the smoke had cleared awayThere they saw him as he lay.

And, "The spy is dead " they cried.And his stiffening lips were set, but death masked his taunting glance."Ah, the spy is dead " they cried.So the boy had died-for France.

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