Caveats for Teaching the Novel

Abstract The author credits much of the success he has had in teaching the novel to his adjustments to the of teaching. Is it realistic to teach the novel as if one's students are going to become English teachers? Is it realistic to teach a novel that is beyond the capacities of the students? Is it smart to plod through a novel, when the joy of reading a novel is in reading it at one's own pace? And what if the students expect worksheets? The author offers some tips, some caveats, for creating the opportunity to have success in teaching the novel. Introduction I have taught English Literature for thirty-six years and my favorite genre is the novel. According to student evaluations I do this extremely well. I think my edge is that whatever does not kill you makes you stronger. Silas Marner tried to kill me when I was fourteen years old. To have hopes of becoming an English teacher one presumably needs a high level of success in High School English. My future career nearly ended with George Eliot's Silas Marner. For whatever reasons, including immaturity, I could not fight my way through that text. And given the propensity of English teachers to spend weeks on a single novel, it was one of the worst periods of my academic life. I have made a point to remember that. That memory alone has made me a more empathetic teacher. My second strongest memory as a student of the novel was reading Alan Paton's Cry, The Beloved Country (which I see has recently made Oprah's Book Club) when I was in college. I had allotted what should have been sufficient time to finish the book, but in savoring the book, I found myself reading it at a very deliberate pace ... so much so that it was my only time as a student that I had to rush to the library to read in Master Plots on how the story ended, rush to take the exam, and then rush back to my dorm room to finish the book. I do not fault the professor for the timing of the exam, but I am forever reminded of the significance of coming to love reading literature. I mention these two stories to suggest that the key to teaching the novel successfully is adjusting to the social and educational variables that set the context for teaching the novel. Realities about your class Have you considered that if you are teaching the novel in a High School English class, it is unlikely any one of your students will go on to become an English major (much less an English teacher)? Have you considered as you make your teaching preparations that you already know more about the novel than any of your students are likely to want to know? Have you wondered why it has been reported that college graduates do not read a book the two years after graduation? I think that the implications of these questions is in preparing to teach a particular novel with regard to 1) working to help one's students connect with the novel; 2) emphasizing the aspects of the novel that educated people (rather than English majors) need to know; and 3) doing everything possible to make the reading of the novel such a good experience that the student is more likely, rather than less likely, to continue to read novels. While my experience has been that Nathaniel Hawthorne's writing style in The Scarlet Letter is challenging for students, I have found it fairly easy to get students to identify with the issues of guilt and the cruelty of peer pressure. While some of the details may be forgotten the power of the red letter A and the characters of Hester Prynne, Arthur Dimmesdale, and Roger Chillingworth remain a part of the consciousness of most educated Americans. I have also found that the more difficult the novel the more important it is to work quickly, that students understand that this is a first reading, that they will have a working knowledge of the text, that this is surely a book to which they will want to return to again. Teaching/learning realities 1. …