Subject
Fitzgerald in The New Yorker (fwd)
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Date
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** I find this whole line of argument somewhat odd -- especially on a
Nabokov list, of all places! -- but I know I started it all
with the Fitzgerald's quote so here it is. For the sake of fairness,
Fitzgerald did instruct his daughter to take poetry classes if she wanted
to be a writer. And, yes, some schools did teach Tolstoy while he was
alive but this is all beside the point since there are obviously layers
and layers of "understanding" a sophisticated literary text so I am not
quite sure what kind of "understanding" we are talking about here. GD**
From: Iann88@aol.com
As to teaching popular writers and "artists", schools didn't teach
Shakespeare's plays in his day did they, or even many years
after. Obviously he was understood for a very long time without instruction.
Schools didn't teach Tolstoy in his day did they.
When did this teaching of contemporary writers begin? Have we forgotten that
simple question? It's a topic that intrigues me. Perhaps when academia
became so pervasive -- or the idea of academia? that writers started to
absorb that atmosphere and that audience, thinking the common reader was
dead. And this goes for Nabokov and others. Comments?
Phillip Iannarelli
Nabokov list, of all places! -- but I know I started it all
with the Fitzgerald's quote so here it is. For the sake of fairness,
Fitzgerald did instruct his daughter to take poetry classes if she wanted
to be a writer. And, yes, some schools did teach Tolstoy while he was
alive but this is all beside the point since there are obviously layers
and layers of "understanding" a sophisticated literary text so I am not
quite sure what kind of "understanding" we are talking about here. GD**
From: Iann88@aol.com
As to teaching popular writers and "artists", schools didn't teach
Shakespeare's plays in his day did they, or even many years
after. Obviously he was understood for a very long time without instruction.
Schools didn't teach Tolstoy in his day did they.
When did this teaching of contemporary writers begin? Have we forgotten that
simple question? It's a topic that intrigues me. Perhaps when academia
became so pervasive -- or the idea of academia? that writers started to
absorb that atmosphere and that audience, thinking the common reader was
dead. And this goes for Nabokov and others. Comments?
Phillip Iannarelli