APPRECIATING PROSE
III SEMESTER
(2019 Admission)
BA ENGLISH
CORE COURSE
UNIVERSITY OF CALICUT School of Distance Education, Calicut University (P.O), Malappuram, Kerala, India 673635
19008 School of distance Education
UNIVERSITY OF CALICUT SCHOOL OF DISTANCE EDUCATION Study Material III SEMESTER B A ENGLISH Core Course ENG3 B03 2019 Admission
APPRECIATING PROSE Prepared by: Module I: Smt. Smitha N, Assistant Professor of English (On Contract), School of Distance Education, Calicut University.
Module II: Smt. Nabeela Musthafa Assistant Professor of English (On Contract) School of Distance Education Calicut University Scrutinized by: Dr. Muhammed Noufal K., Assistant Professor Department of English CKGM Govt. College, Perambra.
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Contents
General Introduction Introduction to Prose Francis Bacon – Of Studies Charles Lamb – Dream Children: A Reverie G K Chesterton – On Running after One’s Hat Albert Camus - Nobel Acceptance Speech Arundhati Roy – Come September Pico Iyer – In Paris of the Humble Comma Chinua Achebe – The Education of British Protected Child Marcel Junod - The First Atom Bomb UshaJesudasan – Justice Versus Mercy
References
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Introduction
This Self Learning Material of Appreciating Prose has been designed and organized for students of third semester B A English Programme. The text Appreciating Prose is a collection of essays intends to familiarise the students with the different types of prose writing. The first module of this text gives the students awareness to the important features of the different prose forms and the evolution of prose writing. This historical insight will help you to better understand and analyse the given prose pieces of the second module. The selected prose pieces in the second module fulfil the objectives of giving a flavour of different prose forms like essays, memoirs, autobiography, public speech and others. The topics discussed in the prose pieces ranging from the very light and casual way of looking at everyday life experiences to the heart breaking traumas of the Bombing. Detailed summary of the texts are provided with exercises in this SLM. In addition, a model question paper is given at the end to familiarise the students with the question pattern of the university examination. We request you to read original essays before going through this SLM. Wish you a happy learning experience. Appreciating Prose 5 School of distance Education
Introduction to Prose What is prose? Prose is the verbal or written language which follows ordinary linguistic patterns and sentence structure. It is the most common form of writing in literature. Prose is used in both fiction and nonfiction. It follows grammatical rules such as punctuation, sentence structure and vocabulary. Prose comes from the Latin term ‘Prose Oratio’ meaning straight forward or direct speech. The word prose was first introduced in English in the 14th century. According to Oxford Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, prose is the writing that is not poetry. It consists of both Fiction and Nonfiction writings. Functions of Prose Prose is used when the writer wants to tell a story in a straight forward manner To resemble everyday language Convey an idea, information or a story in simple language Writer fulfils a story’s benefits in prose
Appreciating Prose 6 School of distance Education Writer creates a voice for himself/herself through prose Builds relationship with readers through conversations. Prose applies a natural flow of speech Most comfortable way to express or convey ideas, thoughts and feelings It is also common writing used in newspapers, Magazines and many other communication mediums. Prose varieties Descriptive Prose It refers to the type of prose writing used to describe specific events, people or setting within prose. Descriptive prose describes things as they are. Narrative Prose Narrative prose is a format of prose writing which tells a definite story. In other words narrative prose means ordinary speech that tells a story. Exposing Prose Exposing prose is the kind of writing through which things are explained as facts, data, ideas, concepts and the like. It is a prominent kind of writing in prose.
Appreciating Prose 7 School of distance Education Different forms of fiction Novel The novel is an extended version of short story. The word ‘Novel’ is derived from the Italian word novella meaning ‘little new thing’ which was a short piece of fiction. Novel is the most popular form of fiction since the early eighteenth century. The Novel denotes a prose narrative of characters and their actions in what is visibly everyday life. It has various sub-genres like Picaresque novel, epistolary novel, historic novel, science fiction etc. Short story A short story is a piece of prose fiction that focuses on evoking a single mood or an event. It is usually shorter than a novel and deals with few characters. Characters are disclosed through actions. The setting of a short story is often simplified (one time and place), and one or two main characters may be introduced without full backstories. In this concise, concentrated format, every word and story detail has to work hard. Short stories typically focus on a single plot instead of multiple subplots, like people might see in novels. Some stories follow a traditional narrative arc, with exposition (description) at the beginning, rising
Appreciating Prose 8 School of distance Education action, a climax (peak moment of conflict or action), and a resolution at the end. However, contemporary short fiction is more likely to begin in the middle of the action (in medias res), drawing readers right into a dramatic scene.While short stories of the past often revolved around a central theme or moral lesson, today it is common to find stories with ambiguous endings. This type of unresolved story invites open-ended readings and suggests a more complex understanding of reality and human behavior.
The short story genre is well suited to experimentation in prose writing style and form, but most of the short story authors still work to create a distinct mood using classic literary devices (point of view, imagery, foreshadowing, metaphor, diction/word choice, tone, and sentence structure).
Tale
Tale is a prose narrative that describes the details of a real or imaginary incident or story. It is an old form of literature. Tale is one thing that many of us have listened
Appreciating Prose 9 School of distance Education to when we were growing up. Tale has a great oral tradition, and there have been stories passing from one generation to another. These tales have constantly been one of the most popular genres of literature and many of them were written hundred years ago and still relevant. A tale tells the story about a main character who is called the protagonist of the story. This is one of the characteristic of Tale and character need not necessarily be a human being. It can be an animal, bird, superficial being etc. These stories are mostly exaggerated. This is done intentionally by the author to engage the reader. Tales are funny as well.
Biography Biography is a form of prose in which the subject deals with the life of an individual. It is an account of events happened in a person’s life. The word biography is derived from the Greek word ‘bios’ meaning ‘life’ and ‘graphei’ meaning ‘to write’. Biographies are written to share the hopes, moods and aspirations of that person. Information included in biographies are based on facts.The person’s life story is told with respect to other people and events of the time they lived. In biography the
Appreciating Prose 10 School of distance Education writer tells the story in a way that the reader can relate to the person and believe in his actions. It tries to develop an interpersonal relationship with the person and the reader. Autobiography
The term autobiography refers to a biography written by the person itself. In an autobiography the writer attempts to reveal selected events or experiences of his/her own life. The writing is necessarily subjective. It cannot be a complete account of the author since the future has still to be lived.When an autobiography is told in chronological order, the author usually writes about the circumstances of their birth, childhood experiences, and educational background. Anecdotes about these life stages and experiences are common. According to the American poet W H Longfellow, “Autobiography is a product of first-hand experience; biography, of second hand knowledge”. The word autobiography was first used by William Taylor in 1797 in the English periodical The Monthly Review and in its present sense it was used by Robert Southey in 1809.
Appreciating Prose 11 School of distance Education Autobiographies are often about people who have achieved some level of fame. In this case, parts of the autobiography would explain the author's rise or journey to fame. The author's career is usually discussed including the personal details. Some autobiographies are written by young adults, while others are written later in life. For example, Helen Keller wrote her autobiography, The Story of My Life, when she was a student in college. She went on to live for over fifty years after her autobiography was published. Memoir A memoir is a collection of memories of an individual written in prose. In memoir, the writer describes events or people happened in their life. In an autobiography incidents are narrated in a chronological order whereas in memoir, the timeline is scattered. When considering the characteristics of a memoir, the style of the narrative must be the important one. Memoirs are mostly written from a first-person point of view. This means it comes from the personal perspective of the individual in the form of first- person narrative. The story comes from the narrative of “I” instead of “you” or “we.” Memoir has a specific focus. It
Appreciating Prose 12 School of distance Education can have the focus on anything. But, most of them tend to focus on specific relationships or events that have already happened.
Even though the memoir is very subjective when someone reads it, they feel like they personally know the writer. It should be personal and compelling in nature. Memoirs are limited in nature. It is not a complete chronology of a person’s life. Memoirs are about specific incidents in time which have a story offered to the reader. Memoirs are highly descriptive as well, transporting the reader directly into each memory or story as if they are really there, experiencing the events on a first-hand basis. Newspaper Article There are several types of newspaper articles such as newspaper reports, features, editorials etc. They basically focus on events happening around them. The major function of newspaper article is to inform ordinary citizen the events happening in society. Journal Articles These are scholarly articles focusing on specific academic subjects like literature, science, history or art. Journal articles contain a long text preceded with an abstract and are provided with source of information.
Appreciating Prose 13 School of distance Education Travelogues Travelogues are the written piece of prose that describes the experiences of a traveller. These are two kinds of travelogues namely travel literature and travel documentary. Records of the travel experience come under travel literature. Travel documentary is the visual records of travel. Travelogue, the definition says, it is a narrative with the aid of slides and pictures before an audience. Travel Accounts or Travel Literature needs to be looked at from the point of view of its implication, the style of writing and the involvement of the writer’s personality according to the standards of literature. Speech A speech is written prose delivered by a speaker to an audience. It is an art of public presentation. Prose is divided into two major categories; fiction and nonfiction. Fiction is the narration of imaginary events and people. Nonfiction tells us facts and information about the world around us. It can be on any topic. Fiction includes Novel, Romance, short story etc. Essays, stories based on real life, biography, autobiography etc. come under nonfiction.
Appreciating Prose 14 School of distance Education Essay A moderate lengthy piece of prose written on a specific topic is called essay. The word essay is derived from the French term ‘essai’ meaning attempt. The function of essay is to give an insight of the topic. It also reveals the view of the author about the particular discussion. There are two kinds of essays, one is informal and the other is formal.Informal is more personal and aims to entertain readers. Formal essays are more focused on serious subjects. The style of a formal essay is objective and thoughtful. Essays are of different types such as philosophical essays, scientific essays. Philosophical essay is an academic writing that defends a claim, providing valid information and knowledge on topic. A scientific essay deals with a scientific problem, through analysis and tries to develop a solution. Scientific essays are mostly featured. Each type of essay serves a distinct purpose. History of English Prose The earliest English prose work is the law code of King Aethelbert of Kent. It was written after the few years of the arrival of st.Augustine in AD 597. Actual literary
Appreciating Prose 15 School of distance Education prose dates from the 9th century when King Alfred improved the state of English learning. He also translated several works to English. The Anglo Saxon chronicle gives an account of events such as Danish war, Norman conquest etc. Aelfric, the student of Aethel wold of Winchester was a prominent writer of 10th century. His work ‘Homilies’ were popular in England. King Alfred translated ‘Consolation of philosophy’ by Boethius. English language had to face a stiff competition from both Anglo Norman and Latin. In 14th century tracts of Richard Rolle were popular. His works include The commandment, Meditations on the passion and The form of perfect living. Middle English period was a blooming period for English prose. Many translations were involved in the growth of Middle English prose. A major example is The mirror of the blessed life of Jesus Christ by Nicholas Love. A slight shift was there from the religious tradition during 14th century. Chaucer’s Tale of Melibee (Tale of Melibeus) is an example. His other works such as ‘The treatise on the Astrolabe and Equatorie of the Planetsalso come under this category. John of Trevisa translated Renulf Higden’s ‘Polychronicon’(c. 1385-87)
Appreciating Prose 16 School of distance Education and BartholomaeusAnglicus’sDe ProprietatibusRerum (1398, ‘On the properties of things’). These are the examples of secular prose. Most widely read secular prose work of the period is ‘The voyage and the travels of sir John Mandeville’. The 15th century witnessed the serious writings in prose such as ‘The chronicle of England’ by John Capgrave (1393 -1464) and ‘The Governance of England’ by Fortescue (c. 1394 – 1476). Elyot popularized educational prose in the 15th century. William Caxton, Sir Thomas Malory are the most prominent prose writers of the middle English period. William Caxton (1422 -1490) William Caxton is known as the ‘The English Printer’. He printed most of the English works including Chaucer and Malory. Caxton made and printed twenty-four ttranslations from various languages. Most remarkable of them were, The Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye (1471) and The game and Playe of chesse(1471). Sir Thomas More (1478 -1535) Thomas More is known for his Latin works. Most popular is Utopia, which presents the idea of an
Appreciating Prose 17 School of distance Education imaginative ideal state. His other works are, The Lyfe of John Picus and The history of Richard III. Sir Thomas Malory He is known for his Romance ‘Morte’d Arthur’ a cycle of Arthurian legends, which was given the title ‘Le MorteDarthur’ by William Caxton when he printed his edition in 1485. It is a skillful blend of dialogue and narrative, full of colour and life. Prose had risen to a position of priority during Elizabethan Age. It was an age of intellectual esteem in English Literature. The tradition of Latin almost passed away. Richard Hakluyt’s ‘Principle Navigation voyages and discoveries of the English nation, (15890, a collection of travelogues was popular of time. William Painter, Geoffrey Fenton and George Pettie are the other early Elizabethan prose writers. 16th Century Prose It can be divided into two periods; prose writing before 1579 and prose writing during the early years of 16th century. English prose till 1579 didn’t show any notable growth. But after that there was a rapid growth in the production of prose in English literature. ‘Of the laws
Appreciating Prose 18 School of distance Education of ecclesiastical polity’ by Richard Hooker is the first English classic of serious prose. The 16th century prose includes romances; a number of romances were produced. They were all written in Euphemistic style, a prose style developed by John Lyly. ‘Euphues; The Anatomy of Witt’ by John Lyly is the most prominent work of the time. Elizabethan pamphlets were known for its satirical style and unformed structure. Popular of them were Thomas Nashe, Robert Greene and Thomas Lodge. Sermon writing was also a flourishing genre of the time. Donne was the most famous among them. Lot of texts were translated from other languages to English during 16th century. Some of them are;
Virgil by Phaer and Stanyhurst
Plutarch’s lives by Thomas North
Ovid by Golding and Chapman
Homer by Chapman
Elizabethan period also witnessed the birth of literary criticism. Stephen Gosson attached poetry as immoral in his book ‘The School of Abuse’. Philip Sidney’s ‘The apologie for poetrie’ was a reply to Gosson’s argument. Appreciating Prose 19 School of distance Education William Webbe’s‘A discourse of English poetry’ is the first historical survey of poets and poetry. Poetry as an art was considered in Puttenham’s‘The arte of English Poesy’.
17th century
The period of prose can be divided into two,
1. Prose in the age of Milton
2. Prose during restoration
Interest in scientific details and observation marked the prose of 17th century. There was clarity, directness and economy of expression. The impetus towards a scientific prose derived ultimately from Francis Bacon who took “all knowledge for his province”. In the advancement of learning and ‘The NovumOrganum’ are two prominent works of Bacon. He visualized a great scope of knowledge through his works. The style which Bacon followed was entirely different from the Elizabethan and 16th century prose. It is loose in structure, easy to comprehend, elaborate and coloured. It was also a period of biography, autobiography, history and personal essays. The prose of this age possessed a strong philosophical character.
Appreciating Prose 20 School of distance Education Important prose writers and their work Robert Burton Robert Burton (1577-1640) wrote "The Anatomy of Melancholy," an analysis of the symptoms, causes, and cures of the melancholic temperament. It is considered as the most remarkable work of English Literature. He devoted most of his life to composing his magnum opus, The Anatomy of Melancholy. This work was first published in 1621, and later had many editions incorporated Burton's revisions. In the Anatomy Burton uses the device of a fictitious author, Democritus Junior. The utopia, which he includes in the introductory section and which is the first example of this genre to be written by an English author, shows acute awareness of economic abuses and practical remedies. He advocates a planned, capitalistic society which makes maximum use of resources of men and materials, and he cogently analyzes England's faults, treating them as a sort of national melancholia. Burton then presents an exhaustive medical analysis of the disease of melancholy based on the old theory that a healthy body contains a proper balance of four "humors," or fluids: phlegm, blood, choler, and black
Appreciating Prose 21 School of distance Education bile. Imbalance makes a man phlegmatic, sanguine, choleric, or, if the excess is black bile, melancholy. The melancholy man could be introspective like Hamlet, or mildly eccentric and able to enjoy a good cry like Jacques in Shakespeare's As You Like It, or healthily contemplative like Milton's II Penseroso. Thomas Browne
The works of Sir Thomas Browne are mostly a mixture of religious faith and scientific details. That applies to his most read work ‘Religio Medici’ too. he composed Religiomedici (A Doctor's Religion) "as a personal exercise."
In 1635, while working as a young doctor in Yorkshire.HisReligio, contrasts with the doctrinaire religious rigidity of his contemporaries. He wrote as a humane Anglican, convinced of his own faith, delighted by the wonders of theology, but open-minded and aware of the limitations of human logic and the problems of false prejudices. In an age of intolerance, he respected every man's right to decide on his own beliefs: "I could
Appreciating Prose 22 School of distance Education never divide myself from any man upon the difference of an opinion."
The Religio is a deliberately digressive, liberal testimonial of Browne's experiences in religion and thought. He explores such topics as the relations of logic and faith, nature as God's art, musical harmonies, witchcraft, and man as inhabiting the "divided and distinguished worlds" of soul and spirit, reason and sense. The treatise is a revelation of self, but it is written from the perspective of eternity and filled in richly, imaginative, ornate, and flexible prose. Urn Burial is considered to be his another master piece. It is a reflection of human mortality induced by the discovery of some ancient urns. Brown was a great stylist of the time.
John Milton
John Milton is best known for Paradise Lost, widely regarded as the greatest epic poem in English. Together with Paradise Regained, it formed his reputation as one of the finest English prose writers. In his prose works he advocated the abolition of the Church of England.
Appreciating Prose 23 School of distance Education Milton’s prose was written either in personal interest or in public interest. After completing his studies at Cambridge, Milton spent six years living with his family in Buckinghamshire and studying independently. In that time, he wrote “On the Morning of Christ’s Nativity,” “On Shakespeare,” “L’Allegro,” “Il Penseroso,” and "Lycidas," an elegy in memory of a friend who was drowned. Milton was a Puritan who believed in the authority of the Bible, and opposed religious institutions like the Church of England, and the monarchy.He wrote pamphlets on radical topics like freedom of the press, in favour of Oliver Cromwell during English civil war. In 1667, he published Paradise Lost in 10 volumes. It is considered to be his greatest work and the greatest epic poem written in English. The free-verse poem tells us the story of how Satan tempted Adam and Eve, and their expulsion from the Garden of Eden. A revised, 12-volume version of Paradise Lost was published in 1674.
Restoration Prose This period is known as The Age of Reason and The Enlightenment because of the country’s shift from an
Appreciating Prose 24 School of distance Education emotional approach to thinking to an educational and factual one. With the exception of the works of John Dryden and Bunyan, the prose works of the Restoration times were of little importance. Dryden mainly focused on literary criticism and Bunyans’ works were allegorical in nature. John Dryden The poet, critic, and playwright John Dryden was a prominent figure of the restoration period. Over the span of nearly 40 years, he wrote in a wide range of genres to great success and acclaim. As a poet, Dryden is best known as a satirist and was England's first poet laureate in 1668. Beside satires, Dryden wrote elegies, prologues, epilogues, odes, and panegyrics. His most famous poem is Absalom and Achitophel (1681). Dryden was so influential in Restoration England that the period was known as the Age of Dryden. Born at a vicarage in North Hampshire in 1631, Dryden was the son of parliamentary supporters, but exhibited royalist sympathies early. His poem “Upon the Death of Lord Hastings'' supports a royalist agenda. Three years after graduating from Trinity College, Cambridge,
Appreciating Prose 25 School of distance Education he moved to London and wrote his "Heroic Stanzas" in 1659. After writing the poem "Annus Mirabilis'' in 1667, Dryden was named the poet laureate of England. Dryden wrote plays throughout the 1670s, and was at the forefront of Restoration comedy. His best-known plays were Marriage à la Mode in 1673 and All for Love in 1678. Although he had written many plays, they were never as successful as his poetry, and he eventually turned back to satires. Most of his satires were aimed at the Whigs. At the end of his career, Dryden returned to theatrical writing and also took up translation. He died in the year 1700. John Bunyan Bunyan was the contemporary of Milton who was as prominent as him. The Pilgrim’s Progress is his masterpiece, an allegory which takes the form of a dream. The narrative stands for it’s style enriched by the beauty, simplicity and vividness of its language. He was the first one to use such a simple language in prose fiction. That made an appealing effect on readers. His other known works are The life and death of Mr.Badman and ‘The Holy War’.
Appreciating Prose 26 School of distance Education 18th Century Prose 18th century witnessed a great production of prose works. Matthew Arnold called it a century of prose. He had also suggested that even the poetry of the era had a prosaic nature. The only prominent poet of 18th century was Alexander Pope. Daniel Defoe The novelist, pamphleteer and journalist Daniel Defoe is best known for his novels 'Robinson Crusoe' and 'Moll Flanders. Daniel Defoe was a merchant and participated in several failing businesses, had to face bankruptcy. He was also a powerful political writer who was put in jail for slander. He turned into fiction later in life, and wrote Robinson Crusoe one of the most widely read fictions of all the time. Having always been interested in politics, Defoe published his first literary piece, a political pamphlet, in 1683. He continued to write political works, working as a journalist, until the early 1700s. Many of Defoe's works during this period were in favour of King William III, also known as "William Henry of Orange." Some of his most popular works include The True-Born Englishman, and the Review.
Appreciating Prose 27 School of distance Education Defoe took up a new genre ‘novel’ in 1719, around the age of 59, when he published Robinson Crusoe, a novel based on several short essays that he had composed over the years. A handful of novels followed soon after— often with rogues and criminals as lead characters— including Moll Flanders, Colonel Jack, Captain Singleton, Journal of the Plague Year and his last major fiction piece, Roxana (1724). Richard Steele Sir Richard Steele (1672-1729) was a British essayist, dramatist, and a politician who is best known for his series of essays written in collaboration with Addison. After his school education, he got acquainted with Addison and both of them went to Oxford. Before finishing his college, he joined cadet service. During the years of military service in London, Steele became acquainted with a circle of literary and artistic figures, and he began to write. His first comedy, The Funeral, or Grief A-la-mode, was performed successfully at Drury Lane Theatre in 1701. This play was a satire on the new profession of undertaking. It was followed by The Lying Lover, or The Ladies' Friendship in 1703. His third comedy, The Tender
Appreciating Prose 28 School of distance Education Husband, or The Accomplished Fools, produced in 1705, achieved some success, perhaps because Addison helped him write it. Steele launched his own paper, the Tatler, On April 12, 1709.The major part of the Tatler issues were authored by Steele, Addison writing about 46 by himself and about 36 in conjunction with Steele. The Tatler, though well accepted, discontinued publication for obscure reasons on Jan. 2, 1711.The Steele-Addison literary partnership is one of the most successful in the history of English literature. Steele made many contributions into periodical journalism. The most notable of these, some of which were purely political, were the Guardian, the Englishman; and the Lover, which saw the publication of 40 essays by Steele. The Plebeian (1718), Steele's most famous political journal, put him in a dispute with Addison. Jonathan Swift Jonathan Swift the author of the widely read novel of all time 'Gulliver's Travels,' was an Irish author and satirist. He was dean of St. Patrick's Cathedral in Dublin. Swift graduated from Trinity college and worked as a statesman. Swift had written many political works but
Appreciating Prose 29 School of distance Education Gulliver’s Travels popularised him as a great writer. In 1713, he took the post of dean at St. Patrick's Cathedral in Dublin. While leading his congregation at St. Patrick's, Swift began to write what would become his best-known work. In 1726, he finished the manuscript, then he traveled to London and benefited from the help of several friends, who anonymously published it as Travels into Several Remote Nations of the World, in Four Parts. By Lemuel Gulliver, first a Surgeon, andthen a Captain of Several Ships also known, more simply, as Gulliver's Travels. The book was an immediate success and hasn't been out of print since its first run. Interestingly, much of the storyline points to historical events that Swift had lived through years prior during intense political turmoil.
Joseph Addison Addison was a versatile writer who was known for his drama, poetry and essays. He is the founder of the periodical “spectator'' with Sir Richard Steele. Addison used poetry to reflect his political ambitions; his earliest poems include flattering references to influential men. In 1699 Addison was rewarded with a grant of money which
Appreciating Prose 30 School of distance Education allowed him to make the grand tour, a series of visits to the main European capitals, which was a standard part of the education of the 18th-century gentleman. One record of his travels is his long poem Letter from Italy. In 1709 Addison had begun to write for the Tatler, a magazine edited by his friend Sir Richard Steele; Addison contributed to all 42 essays. The last issue of this periodical was published in January 1711. Two months later, under the joint editorship of Addison and Steele, the first number of the Spectator appeared.In 1713 Addison wrote Cato: A Tragedy, a play in which he undertook to imitate and to improve upon classical Greek tragedy. The play was a success, probably because some of the audience took it to be a political allegory. Alexander Pope wrote the prologue, and Samuel Johnson later praised the play as Addison's noblest work. Addison was known for his political writings. He died in the year 1719. 2nd Half of 18th Century The second half of the 18th century witnessed the rise of great writers like Dr.Johnson, Goldsmith, Gibbon and Edmund Burke.
Appreciating Prose 31 School of distance Education Samuel Johnson Samuel Johnson commonly known as Dr.Johnson was a great author, poet, moralist and literary critic. One of Dr. Johnson’s greatest contributions was publishing, in 1747, The Dictionary of the English Language. He left oxford without finishing college due to his financial crisis. After trying a few things, Johnson left for London where began spending more time writing. He made a living writing for the Gentleman’s Magazine – a report on Parliament. He also wrote a tragedy, Irene, and some attempts at poetry. Johnson was also employed to catalogue the extensive library of Edward Harley, Earl of Oxford. This gave Johnson the opportunity to grow his great love of reading and the English language. He was inspired to start working on a comprehensive dictionary of the English language. It would take him eight years, but it was considered to be his finest achievement. Though other dictionaries were in existence, the ‘Johnson Dictionary of the English language’ was a huge step forward in its comprehensiveness and quality.
Appreciating Prose 32 School of distance Education Johnson was a prolific writer. For two years he almost single-handedly wrote a journal – ‘The Rambler’ full of moral essays.Johnson also embarked on an ambitious project – “Lives of the Most Eminent English Poets” (10 volumes) and an influential edition of Shakespeare’s plays.After a series of illnesses, he died in 1784. After his death, his contributions to English literature were increasingly admired. He had left a great body of work and was credited with being England’s finest literary critic of his time.
Oliver Goldsmith Oliver Goldsmith was a prolific poet, dramatist, novelist and essayist. He has done an extensive amount of writing, to say he wrote, translated and compiled more than 40 volumes. His writings were admired for their good sense, moderation and intellectual honesty. Goldsmith was a medical practitioner by profession. But he used his monetary benefits from the practice for contributing essays and articles for famous journals such as the Monthly' and the ‘Critical’. His first book, An Enquiry into the Present State of Polite Learning in Europe (1759),
Appreciating Prose 33 School of distance Education included an important essay on the English stage. By the mid-1760s Goldsmith, or "Goldy" as Dr. Johnson fondly nicknamed him, had established a steady income as a compiler. An original member of the famous "Club" founded by Dr. Johnson in 1764, Goldsmith enjoyed the friendship of such 18th century notables as Edmund Burke and Sir Joshua Reynolds, who later wrote a brief biographical sketch of him.Goldsmith made his early literary reputation as an essayist. The eight weekly numbers of the Bee (1759), which contain some excellent small poems, dramatic criticism, moral tales, and serious and fanciful discourses, exhibit his preoccupation with vivid and rich human detail and his felicitous style. Perhaps his finest sustained work as an essayist, however, was The Citizen of the World (1762), which had appeared serially in the Public Ledger in 1760-1761. Goldsmith employed the popular 18th-century device of a foreign traveler commenting in letters to his home country upon the strange customs of the lands through which he passed. These "Chinese Letters" exhibit Goldsmith at his relaxed, playful, and graceful best.
Appreciating Prose 34 School of distance Education Edward Gibbon Edward Gibbon is known for his historical work “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire."Gibbon's "Autobiography" is a classic of the genre. He published in 1761 an Essay on the Study of Literature, written in French, and considered possible historical subjects. He began a history of the Swiss republics in French in 1767, which he abandoned. David Hume, who read this work, urged him to write history, but in English. He joined the famous Literary Club and became a Member of Parliament in 1774, and in February 1776 he published the first volume of his Decline and Fall. 19th century Prose Prose in the Romantic period First half of the 19th century known as romantic period witnessed a great amount of poetry Though they were poets Wordsworth, Coleridge, Keats and Shelley contributed a substantial amount of prose works. Poetry dominated prose in the romantic period. Jane Austen and Walter Scott were the prominent figures in novel
Appreciating Prose 35 School of distance Education Charles Lamb, William Hazlitt and Thomas De Quincey expanded the genre of essay. The French Revolution triggered heated discussion about the political and social issues. Many journals came into the limelight during the romantic period such as, The Morning Chronicle -1769 The Morning post - 1772 The Times- 1785 The Edinburgh Review- 1802 The Quarterly Review- 1802 Blackwood’s Magazine -1817 The London Magazine -1820 Other major contributions in Prose Richard Price- Love of our Country- (written on the background of French Revolution) Edmund Burke- Conservative Reflections on the Revolution in France Mary Wollstone craft- A Vindication of the rights of the Men (1790) A Vindication of the Rights of Woman (1792). This book is considered as the bible of feminist movements.
Appreciating Prose 36 School of distance Education Wordsworth- Preface to Lyrical Ballads (A specimen of work considered to be the niche in the history of Literary Criticism) Shelley- Defence of Poetry (1821) Sir Walter Scott- Dryden (1808) Swift ( 1814) Lives of the Novelists(1821-24) Life of Napoleon(1827) The Tales of a Grandfather (1828-30) Charles Lamb Charles Lamb was one of the most original essayists in the tradition of English who captivated the discerning English reading public with his personal essays in the London Magazine, collected as Essays of Elia (1823) and The Last Essays of Elia (1833). Known for their charm, humor, and perception, and laced with idiosyncrasies, these essays appear to be modest in scope, but their soundings are deep, and their ripples extend to embrace much of human life—particularly the life of the imagination.
Appreciating Prose 37 School of distance Education William Hazlitt (1778 -1830) William Hazlitt is best known for his humouristic essays. Charles Lamb introduced Hazlitt to William Godwin and other important literary figures in London. In 1805 Joseph Johnson published Hazlitt's first book, An Essay on the Principles of Human Action. The following year Hazlitt published Free Thoughts on Public Affairs, an attack on William Pitt and his government's foreign policy. Hazlitt opposed England's war with France and its consequent heavy taxation. This was followed by a series of articles and pamphlets on political corruption and the need to reform the voting system. Hazlitt wrote several books on literature including Characters of Shakespeare (1817), A View of the English Stage (1818), English Poets (1818) and English Comic Writers (1819). In these books he urged the artist to be aware of his social and political responsibilities. Hazlitt continued to write about politics and his most important books on this subject is Political Essays with Sketches of Public Characters (1819). He wrote many volume of essays of which the most effective is The Spirit of the Age(1825) Hazlitt’s prose is forceful, original and at times musical.
Appreciating Prose 38 School of distance Education Thomas De Quincey (1785 -1859) Thomas De Quincey is English essayist and critic, best known for his Confessions of an English Opium- Eater. The highly poetic and imaginative prose of the Confessions makes it one of the enduring stylistic masterpieces of English literature. De Quincey is known as the writer of ‘impassioned prose’. His prose works are more imaginative and melodious than many poetical works He was an ardent critic of the classism of the neo classic period. The English Mail Coach(1849), Suspiria de Profundis (1845) and One Murder considered as one of the Fine Arts (1827) are his most famous works. Victorian Prose Democracy and reform are the main characteristics of Victorian period. These two words encompass changes in political, social, intellectual and religious fields unparalleled in many previous periods of British history. Material prosperity coupled with brilliant prospects for its indefinite continuance opened by science and technology induced in most people a mood of optimism. Novel became more popular during this period with Eliot,
Appreciating Prose 39 School of distance Education Dickens, and Thackeray producing some of the masterpieces of English language. Victorian age produced poets like Tennyson, Browning and Arnoldand in prose John Ruskin, William Morris, Thomas Carlyle and Macaulay. Thomas Carlyle (1795 – 1881) Thomas Carlyle was one of the most influential essayists in the Victorian period. His earliest works were mostly translations, essays and biographies. His great novel Sartor Resartus was appeared in instalments in Frazer’s Magazine (1834). It was published in book form in 1838 after his success with The French Revolution ( 1837). His historical works besides The French Revolution are The Letters and Speeches of Oliver Cromwell (1845) and The Monumental History of Frederick the Great (1858-65). His Life of John Sterling appeared in 1861. The series of lectures which he delivered in 1837 was published as On Heroes, Hero – Worship and the Heroic in History(1841). His style was entirely personal which is poetic and full of shrieks- capitals, italics, dashes, exclamations – strange coinages and bewildering syntax.
Appreciating Prose 40 School of distance Education John Ruskin (1819 -1900) Ruskin was the leading English critic and essayist of the Victorian era. The number of Ruskin’s works is so large and he wrote on variety of themes including literature, education, geology, architecture, myth, ornithology, botany and political economy. His work on art are: Modern Painters(1843-60) in five volumes, The Seven Lamps of Architecture(1849), and the Stones of Venice (1851-53). In these three great works Ruskin gave a comprehensive description of almost every piece of architecture and paintings in Europe in a magnificent style. His most celebrated work Unto the Last (1860-62) appeared in the Cornhill Magazine. The literary term ‘Pathetic fallacy’ is Ruskin’s contribution.
William Morris (1834-96) William Morris carried forward Ruskin’s approach to social and economic problems through art to active propaganda for socialism. He hatred industrialism and delivered lectures and wrote essays on this subject. Of his socialist writings the best known are News from Nowhere (1891) and A Dream of John Ball (1888).
Appreciating Prose 41 School of distance Education Macaulay (1800-59) Macaulay is the most thorough and the most brilliant representative of the early Victorians. He was a poet, essayist and historian. His fame as a man of letters rests on Lays of Ancient Rome, critical and historical Essays, and his History of England. He contributed five biographies for Encyclopaedia Britannica. The typical Macaulay essay is a dissertation or long discourse in which the subject is treated against its historical background. Milton, for example, is viewed in the representative of the political and religious conditions of his time. His essays also dealt with literary subjects like Milton, Byron, Bunyan etc. His History of England remained unfinished with four volumes of the books completed during his life time. Walter Pater (1839 – 94) Pater was an English essayist, literary and art critic, and fiction writer, regarded as one of the great stylists. His works on Renaissance subjects were popular but controversial in his times. The collection of his essays appeared as Studies in the History of the Renaissance (1873). His Appreciations (1889) is on literary themes
Appreciating Prose 42 School of distance Education with an introductory essay on style. Pater was a representative of the school of Aesthetic criticism. He was a strong believer of the theory of the art for art’s sake. He focused his attention always on form rather than subject matter.
R L Stevenson (1850-94) R L Stevenson was a Scottish essayist, poet, and author of fiction and travel books, best known for his novels Treasure Island (1881), Kidnapped (1886), Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886). His collection of essays includes An Inland Voyage (1878), Travels with a Donkey in the Cevennes (1879) and VirginibusPuerisque (1881). Mathew Arnold (1882 -88)
Mathew Arnold was an English poet and cultural critic whose critical essays were marked for their highest value. Essays in Criticism (1865&1889) contains Arnold’s most important essays on English Literature. His most significant work of social criticism is Culture and Anarchy (1869). He is a man of lucid and elegant style.
Appreciating Prose 43 School of distance Education Prose in 20thCentury 20th century literature is greatly influenced by the changes in ideology, beliefs and political stances after the world war.The effects of the war reflected in the prose written at the time. These changes were seen in the fiction as well as non-fiction. Though many prose works came out, fiction seemingly dominated other genres. The two world wars, social and political changes, emergence of capitalism, birth of technology, the struggle of post- colonial people; all these things contributed to a great amount of literature produced in the 20th century. A loss of style happened in prose by the end of the 19th century. Because most of the prose writers were from a journalistic background.The literary or personal Essay continued to flourish in 20th Century. Fiction became a prominent and independent genre. The 20th century was very prolific in the production of criticism and many movements sprang up with their own theories and interpretation of literary works. Travel writing and historical writings gained popularity during this period.
Appreciating Prose 44 School of distance Education Major writers of 20th century
A G GARDINER Alfred George Gardiner known as A G Gardiner was an English Journalist, essayist and editor. His essays, written under the alias "Alpha of the Plough", are widely acclaimed. He was also Chairman of the National Anti- Sweating League, an advocacy group which campaigned for a minimum wage. From 1915 he contributed to The Star under the pseudonym Alpha of the Plough. At the time The Star had several anonymous essayists whose pseudonyms were the names of stars. Invited to choose the name of a star as a pseudonym he chose the name of the brightest (alpha) star in the constellation "the Plough." His essays are uniformly elegant, graceful and humorous. His uniqueness lay in his ability to teach the basic truths of life in an easy and amusing manner; the collections Pillars of Society, Pebbles on the Shore, Many Furrows and Leaves in the Wind are some of his best-known writings. A reviewer of Pebbles on the Shore said Gardiner wrote with "fluency, deftness, lightness, grace, and usually a very real sparkle".
Appreciating Prose 45 School of distance Education E V LUCAS Edward Verral Lucas was a versatile and popular English writer of the 20th century. He was journalist with a very wide range of learning. He is recognized as the pre- eminent editor of Charlie’s Lamb’s works and the biographer of Lamb. His editions of the life and letters of Charles Lamb was the result of his lifelong sympathy and devoted research. It goes to his credit that he popularized the love of Charles Lamb in the twentieth century. Though he wore the mantle of Lamb there are a few dissimilarities between the two writers. His essays enjoyed immense popularity. They are marked by fancy, literary articles, commonsense, lightness of touch, wit, ease, irony and humour. His humour, though generally kind and humane, is sometimes almost harsh and savage as in “Those Thirty Minutes in which he raised against those people who agonize their friends by seeing them off in railway journeys. Following are some of the major works of EV Lucas; The Open Road (1899) Highways and Byways in Susser (1904) A Wanders in London (1906)
Appreciating Prose 46 School of distance Education Over Bemerton (1908) Good Company (1909) Old Lamps for New (1911) Fixed Vintages (1919) Giving and Receiving (1922)
Hilaire Belloc (1870 – 1953) Joseph Hiaire Rene Belloc, a French-born poet, historian, and essayist, was among the most versatile English writers of the first quarter of the 20th century. He is most remembered for his light verse, particularly for children, and for the lucidity and easy grace of his essays. He was a very close friend and collaborator of Chesterton and were jokingly named together “the chesterbelloc”. His essays collections are On Nothing, On Something, On Everything etc.
G K Chesterton (1874 -1936) Gilbert Keith Chesterton is one of the prolific essayists of the 20th century. As an essayist Chesterton was generally fantastic but nevertheless genuinely thoughtful. Due to his excessive use of paradox, he has
Appreciating Prose 47 School of distance Education been referred to as ‘the prince of paradox’. The best of essay books of Chesterton include All Things Considered (1908), Tremendous Trifles (1909), A Defence of Nonsense (1911) and A Miscellany of Men (1912). He made his mark with his contributions to the Daily News.
Max Beerbohm (1872 -1956) Mas Beerbohm, the brilliant dramatic critic of the Saturday Review, was a master of irony and satire. His best known work, In Christmas Garland, he parodies his contemporaries: Benson, Wells, Conrad, Bennett, Shaw etc. His first book of essays characteristically entitled The Works of Max Beerbohm appeared in 1896. He was a good satirist as well. A G Ward describes him as “philosophic jester bursting bubbles of snobbery and pretence with wit and irony and satire. Robert Lynd (1879-1949) Robert Lynd, scholar and critic, was an essayist of exceptional charm deriving from his wit and wisdom. His best is contained in The Pleasure of Ignorance (1921) and Essays on Life and Literature (1951). He used the letters
Appreciating Prose 48 School of distance Education Y.Y. to write week essays for the New Statesman for a number of years. Biography in the 20TH Century Biography in the twentieth century reflected in the rise of modernism in the arts. Works of Darwin, Marx, Feud and Carl Jung influenced the writings of Biography. Changes in style also were reflected in biographers’ adoption of a scientific outlook. Works of modernist biography include Lytton Strachey’s Eminent Victorians (1918) and Queen Victoria (1921) and the Numerous Lives by Andre Maurois (1885 -1967).Lytton Strachey is regarded as a great modern biographer. He brought radical changes in the conventional laundry biographical tradition which presented the persons as heroes and heroines, and tried to present his men and women as human beings of flesh and blood with natural follies and weaknesses. He presented Victoria not as a queen but as a woman with all her virtues and weaknesses. Strachey was a master of brilliant prose style. The chief characteristics of his style were clarity, penetration, precision, humour and irony. The influence of psychology, especially the works of Freud and Jung, eventually led to the development of
Appreciating Prose 49 School of distance Education psychobiography. Experimental forms and methods were explored in works as diverse as Virginia Woolf’s mock biography Orlando(1928). Peter Ackroyd’s biography of Dickens is regarded as one of the best biographies in English Language. Ackroyd’s other biographies included T S Eliot (1984), Blake(1995), The Life of Thomas More(1998), Charlie Chaplin(2014), and Alfred Hitchcock (2015).
Another major development in the late 20th was the widespread appearance of biographies by and about women, and in particular the emergence of feminist writings as a literary form. Late twentieth century feminist biographies were numerous and included several lives of Woolf. Feminist biographers have drawn inspiration from the works of earlier feminists, including the writings of Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860–1935) and Woolf's essays A Room of One's Own (1929) and Three Guineas (1938).
Appreciating Prose 50 School of distance Education 21stCentury Prose
It is an age of multiple trends. Prose in this century celebrates varieties of forms—of prose that breaks the rules, bends conventions, and reconfigures genre. History remains as the major concern of the era. Contemporary issues like climate change, environmental issues and international conflicts also received global attention. Science fiction is another major genre of 21st century. Use of pastiche (parody) is one of the characteristics of 21st century prose. As the century is in early stages, prediction of the literary trends and styles of the century is indeed a difficult task.
Appreciating Prose 51 School of distance Education MODULE II
REFLECTIONS AND SPEECHES
FRANCIS BACON
Bacon worked as a lawyer as well as a scientist during his lifetime. He also served as an attorney general and as Lord Chancellor of England. Bacon’s most valuable work revolves around philosophical and Aristotelian concepts that supported the scientific method. He is known as the father of the scientific method that was influenced by his own ‘Baconian’ method. He is known as the father of modern English prose as well. Francis Bacon published over 50 essays beginning with “Of” like “Of Atheism”, “Of Marrriage”, “Of Truth” etc. He published three editions of his essays, the first one in 1597, second in 1612 and the final one in 1625. The last two editions were published along with a few additional essays as well.
Appreciating Prose 52 School of distance Education OF STUDIES
TEXT (Taken from the 1625 edition of Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral)
Studies serve for delight, for ornament, and for ability. Their chief use for delight is in privateness and retiring; for ornament, is in discourse; and for ability, is in the judgment and disposition of business. For expert men can execute, and perhaps judge of particulars, one by one; but the general counsels, and the plots and marshalling of affairs, come best from those that are learned. To spend too much time in studies is sloth; to use them too much for ornament, is affectation; to make judgment wholly by their rules, is the humor of a scholar. They perfect nature, and are perfected by experience: for natural abilities are like natural plants, that need pruning, by study; and studies themselves do give forth directions too much at large, except they be bounded in by experience. Crafty men condemn studies, simple men admire them, and wise men use them; for they teach not their own use; but that is a wisdom without them, and above them, won by
Appreciating Prose 53 School of distance Education observation. Read not to contradict and confute; nor to believe and take for granted; nor to find talk and discourse; but to weigh and consider. Some books are to be tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to be chewed and digested; that is, some books are to be read only in parts; others to be read, but not curiously; and some few to be read wholly, and with diligence and attention. Some books also may be read by deputy, and extracts made of them by others; but that would be only in the less important arguments, and the meaner sort of books, else distilled books are like common distilled waters, flashy things. Reading maketh a full man; conference a ready man; and writing an exact man. And therefore, if a man write little, he had need have a great memory; if he confer little, he had need have a present wit: and if he read little, he had need have much cunning, to seem to know that he doth not. Histories make men wise; poets witty; the mathematics subtle; natural philosophy deep; moral grave; logic and rhetoric able to contend. Abeuntstudia in mores [Studies pass into and influence manners]. Nay, there is no stond or impediment in the wit but may be wrought out by fit studies; like as diseases of
Appreciating Prose 54 School of distance Education the body may have appropriate exercises. Bowling is good for the stone and reins; shooting for the lungs and breast; gentle walking for the stomach; riding for the head; and the like. So if a man’s wit be wandering, let him study the mathematics; for in demonstrations, if his wit be called away never so little, he must begin again. If his wit be not apt to distinguish or find differences, let him study the Schoolmen; for they are cyminisectores [splitters of hairs]. If he be not apt to beat over matters, and to call up one thing to prove and illustrate another, let him study the lawyers’ cases. So every defect of the mind may have a special receipt.
EXPLANATORY NOTES
Bacon begins the essay by stating that there are three basic purposes for studying, one is for delight (pleasure), second is for ornament (showing off) and the third is to attain ability (skill). So basically, he believes that studies help those who read for enjoyment, those who wish to improve their written or spoken language skills and also those who want to add value to the products or services
Appreciating Prose 55 School of distance Education that they bring to the marketplace. According to Bacon, studying for delight is used as a private or retirement activity and for ornament, it is used in discourses (both written and spoken) and to attain ability, it is used in the judgment and nature of business. He then goes on to say that ‘expert men’ (may be a reference to practically experienced men with less or no formal education) are definitely capable in their own way but not as good as learned men. He also says that spending too much time on studies is unproductive and leads to laziness (sloth), similarly using studies chiefly for ornament leads to artificial and pretentious language. And to make judgments and decisions only by conforming to the rules studied is a scholar's state of mind. Therefore, Bacon suggests a combination of both studies and practical experience for achieving the best. He emphasizes the reciprocal relation shared by experience and studies.
Bacon then goes on to describe three kinds of men, crafty men, simple men and wise men. He states that crafty (cunning) men criticize and disapprove of studies
Appreciating Prose 56 School of distance Education not realizing its value, while simple men admire and appreciate studies. On the other hand, it is the wise men who use studies effectively and wisely combining it with observation. Bacon warns one against reading merely in order to argue or refute nor should one read in order to take it at its face value believing everything. He also says one mustn’t read in order to find something to talk about or discuss, but one must read in order to consider and contemplate. He then goes on to talk about different kinds of books and advises one to spend time on each kind of book depending on its quality. Some books only need to be tasted, while some others may be swallowed and others may be chewed and digested. Meaning that one must not spend too much time on books that need only be tasted or skimmed through and one only needs to briefly go through some other books or can be understood through secondary sources too. But the third kind of books that are to be chewed and digested needs close and careful reading as these are useful books of good quality. Bacon defines the purpose of reading by stating that reading makes a man ‘full’ or complete, while conference (or conversation) makes one a ready man and writing makes one an exact
Appreciating Prose 57 School of distance Education man. The essayist also says that if a man writes less, he will lack a good memory, he speaks too little he will lack wit and presence of mind, and if he reads less he won’t have much knowledge and learning.
Bacon then goes on to shed light on the different aims of studying subjects like History, Maths etc. A study of history makes one wise while studying poetry makes him witty. On the other hand, studying Math’s makes a man exact, accurate and precise and studying philosophy increases the depth of one’s mind. Similarly, studying morals makes a man serious whereas studying logic and rhetoric makes him ready to defend through arguments. Bacon concludes the essay by suggesting that studies help one to remove the defects that his or her mind may have and highlights the fact that every small problem of the human mind does have an impact on the individual and the world as well.
This essay focuses on two everlasting themes that Bacon believed in, the first being the superiority of the learned in making judgments, the second is the concept
Appreciating Prose 58 School of distance Education that the value of studies is connected with its usefulness. Throughout the essay, Bacon advises against using studies as a means to show off in front of others or to use it to argue with others. Instead, he believed that studies had the ability to help discipline the mind.
BACON’S STYLE: Talking about Bacon’s prose style, Dean Church famously noted that, “They come down like the strokes of a hammer.” Bacon’s sentences are indeed as powerful and impactful like the strokes of a hammer. He took English prose to a completely different level and thus also set a golden standard for prose writing. Montaigne is the one who popularized the essay as a literary genre, but his essays were quite personal while Bacon’s essays show no glimpse of Bacon in it. Bacon very successfully keeps himself and his character or nature completely detached from his essays. But what sets Bacon’s prose apart is his aphoristic style. An aphoristic style means one that is brief, condensed and terse. You could take one sentence from his essay and elaborate that one sentence into an entire essay itself,
Appreciating Prose 59 School of distance Education which means each of his sentences were that concentrated and contained that much scope. He never rambled about or bothered about giving introductions to the topics dealt with in his essays, he jumped straight into the topic. He also used metaphors and similes extensively and always at apt places so that it would thrill and charm the reader. He also used Latin quotations generously throughout his prose. And even though his style was heavy with learning, it was still lucid and understandable. It was also quite flexible as he dealt with a variety of subjects using the same style. Despite his unique and unmatchable style, his themes were universal and very relatable for almost everyone.
I. EXERCISES (AS GIVEN IN THE UNIVERSITY PRESCRIBED TEXT)
1. What should be the purpose of reading?
2. What does spending too much time in studies indicate?
3. Explain Abeuntstudia in mores.
Appreciating Prose 60 School of distance Education 4. Which subject is fit for a man who is unable to concentrate?
5. What is the subject fit for a man who is unable to distinguish or find differences?
II. Answer the following in a paragraph. 1. What are the different modes of reading?
2. How does Bacon classify books?
3. What are the remedies suggested by Bacon for mental deficiencies?
III. Write an essay on the following. 1. Bacon’s essay “Of Studies” contains short maxims which exhibit an astonishing treasure of insight. Elucidate.
2. What features of Bacon’s prose style have you identified from the essay you have studied?
Activity Compare Bacon’s “Of Studies” and Samuel Johnson’s “On Studies”.
Appreciating Prose 61 School of distance Education FURTHER REFERENCES 1. http://www.shanlaxjournals.in/pdf/ENG/V2N2/E NG_V2_N2_007.pdf 2. https://earlybritishlit.pressbooks.com/chapter/fran cis-bacon-essays/
CHARLES LAMB
Charles Lamb was born in London in 1775 and educated at Christ’s Hospital where he met Coleridge. He worked in the East India Company after leaving a job as a clerk at the South Sea House. It was only late in life that he started writing. “Tales from Shakespeare” was the first book that brought Lamb the recognition and fame he yearned for. Essays of Elia is a collection of essays that he had written to London magazines, most of them being autobiographical in nature; Dream Children is part of this collection. “Essays of Elia” was first published in book form in the year 1823. His family, his descent, his school days, his early surroundings etc. are the subject matter of the essays in Essays of Elia. Elia is the persona that Lamb uses when writing essays.
Appreciating Prose 62 School of distance Education DREAM CHILDREN - A REVERIE
Now remember that Elia is the pen name of Charles Lamb and so James Elia stands for Lamb himself. So one evening, Lambs imaginary children, Alice and John ask him about their great grandmother Mrs. Field and this is how Lamb narrates the story of Mrs. Field and her great house. He sways back and forth between the present and past while he narrates childhood experiences along with recording the children's present reactions to it. He describes the charm of the old and big house that their great grandmother lived in. The house did not actually belong to her, she was the caretaker of this house and the owner had built a newer and more fashionable house somewhere else, leaving this house under the care of Mrs. Field. In between there is a reference to the Ballad of the Children in the Wood. This Ballad is a story about two little orphans, a boy and a girl and how they had a very cruel uncle who took them to a forest nearby and abandoned the children there. The poor orphans died of hunger and cold in that forest. Even the birds (Robin Redbreasts) felt such pity for these two children that they
Appreciating Prose 63 School of distance Education tried to cover their dead bodies with leaves. This is the story of the ballad and there was a rumour that the ghosts of these two children haunted the area and especially this particular house in which Mrs. Field lived in. Now the narrator says that this whole story was carved in wood and kept for show as the chimney piece of this great mansion. But the real owner of the house who is described here as the ‘foolish rich person’ pulled down this carved piece and put a marble piece of modern invention in its place. Now this new piece had no story in it and changed the look of the entire place. Now when Elia narrated this detail, Alice put a disapproving, yet soft look on her face which looked just like one of her mother’s looks. Lamb paints a noble picture of Mrs. Field (Mary Field) as well. She was well respected and she looked after the house with great care even though it wasn’t her own. And after her death, the house was untended and left to decay. Many of the good old decorations of this mansion were then ripped away and put up in the owners fashionable, new house which according to Elia made it look really awkward and out of place. John smiled when Elia narrated this.
Appreciating Prose 64 School of distance Education Elia then narrates how grandmother Field’s funeral was. Since she was a very religious and charitable person, there was a huge crowd attending her funeral. When Elia goes on to describe Mrs. Field as a tall and graceful person who danced well, little Alice’s feet played an involuntary movement (pretending to dance a small step). He says that even though cancer bent their great grandmother’s body in pain, her attitude and spirit were untouched and remained strong. She was also quite a brave lady who slept alone in that huge mansion which was believed to be haunted. Mrs. Field once told Lamb how she had seen the ghosts of those two orphans (from the story of the Ballad narrated earlier) playing along the staircase, but she wasn't afraid of them as she believed they were innocent souls who could do no harm. On the other hand, Elia himself was quite scared to sleep alone in that house and always insisted his maid slept in the same room for he wasn’t half as religious as his grandmother and so believed the ghosts may harm him. But he never saw those ghosts. Now here John actually feels scared listening to all this talk about ghosts, but he tries to put on a brave look. Now Elia goes on to tell the children how generous and good their
Appreciating Prose 65 School of distance Education grandmother was to her grandchildren as she allowed them to come and stay over and play at this great mansion during the holidays. Here Lamb’s childhood experiences are portrayed in the essays describing the great gardens and how Lamb spent his idle time there. He used to stare so much at the marble statues of the Twelve Caesars that he would feel either himself becoming a statue or the statues coming alive. The narrator used to love roaming about the great house and the great gardens. The description he gives of the gardens is so tempting as Lamb engages all the five senses of his readers in this piece of description. Elia declares that he took a lot of pleasure in roaming around the garden unlike other children who would have preferred to enjoy the sweet flavours of the different fruits found in the garden. On hearing this, John immediately keeps back the bunch of grapes that he had taken from a plate with the intention to eat and also share it with his sister, Alice.
The narrator then shifts his focus to a description of the kids' uncle, John L, who seemed to be the favourite of Mrs. Field. Elia says he was quite handsome and lively.
Appreciating Prose 66 School of distance Education He was so strong that he rode horses at a very young age and also joined the hunters. Now James Elia is described as being lame-footed (although Lamb was never lame- footed)and so John L, Elia’s brother, would carry him on his back for miles. But later on in life, John L also became lame and the narrator regrets to admit that he (Elia) wasn’t as considerate as John L used to be. And when John L died, Elia initially thought he wasn’t so affected by his brother's death, but then it gradually began to haunt him and he started to miss everything about John L. The narrator then started sincerely wishing John L was alive again even if it was to quarrel with him. Elia felt as uncomfortable as he imagined John L would have felt when his limb was taken off by the doctor. At this point, the kids plead him to stop and instead tell them something about their pretty mother, Alice. Lamb thus narrates how he courted the beautiful Alice (probably referring to Ann Simmons) for seven long years and while at it he notices the children growing fainter and fainter until he could see nothing but two sad features that reminds him that they are not his or Alice's children, or children at all for that matter. Lamb then ends the essay by waking up in his
Appreciating Prose 67 School of distance Education bachelor chair where he had fallen asleep and was having a daydream.
AN ANALYSIS
The essays Lamb wrote under the pseudonym “Elia” under the title “Essays of Elia” are mostly intimate revelations of his own personal life, experiences, emotions and thoughts. In Dream Children, Lamb uses ‘stream of consciousness’ technique to write the essay. Stream of consciousness refers to a style of writing in which the writer narrates his thoughts and ideas in the same flow as they come into his mind. The essay sort of blurs the line between fiction and essay. Lamb has used a conversational and informal tone throughout the essay. There seems to be two settings in the essay, one Lamb’s real world (where he is seated in his arm-chair) and second, the place in Lamb’s dream where he is narrating the story to his children. Beneath the wit and humour of Lamb’s “Dream Children” lies a strong note of nostalgia, regret and melancholy. It almost feels like Lamb is trying to hide or go past these emotions of disappointments and frustrations by laughing rather than weeping.
Appreciating Prose 68 School of distance Education There is a mingling of both joy and sorrow throughout the essay. Even in his description of the good old days at his grandmother’s house, death and such harsh realities are still portrayed in it like in his stating of the fact that his grandmother died of cancer despite being a highly respected and religious woman. Lamb also hints at the unfortunately early death of his elder brother John Lamb in the essay. “Faithful Bridget” in the essay refers to Lamb’s elder sister, Mary Lamb, who never married due to her mental health conditions. She is called “faithful” as she is the sole companion in Lamb’s life and when the daydream ends, he finds her sitting beside him not Ann or the children he and Ann might have had together. The narrator’s bachelor armchair symbolizes his loneliness and lack of a wife and children.
Lamb uses the essay as a medium to express his long unfulfilled desires and longings, like his desire to marry Ann Simmons. He tried escaping into the world of fantasy and memories by narrating his childhood days but then crash-lands back to reality in the realization that the children are imaginary after all. By the end of the essay he
Appreciating Prose 69 School of distance Education returns back from the imaginary world to the realization that he never got to marry Ann as Ann married someone called Bartrum. Lamb is therefore just a bachelor who is having a reverie. Although the essay begins on a misleadingly realistic note, the subtitle “A Reverie” (which literally means a daydream) prepares the reader for a return to reality.
The humoristic attitude of the essay gradually washes off revealing a melancholy picture. The readers are in for a painful awakening at the end of the essay when they realize that the narrator is a bachelor after all and the children were merely products of his imagination. His description of the children's reactions and their expressions seemed so realistic that one finds it hard to believe he never was a father after all. It also reveals the author’s keen observation and knowledge about child psychology. And thus we come to the significance of the title “Dream Children” as Lamb dreams or longs to have children of his own.
Appreciating Prose 70 School of distance Education EXERCISES
I. Answer the following in two or three sentences
1. Why is the essay entitled “A Reverie”?
2. How does Lamb present his brother John L -- ?
3. Whom does Lamb refer to as “faithful Bridget” by his side?
4. How does Charles Lamb describe Alice W-- whom he courted?
5. What does the author mean by “busy -- idle diversion”?
II. Answer the following in a paragraph
1. Write a brief note on the autobiographical elements in the essay “Dream Children”.
2. How does Lamb present his grandmother Field before his dream children?
3. What are the similarities between Alice, the mother and Alice, the daughter?
Appreciating Prose 71 School of distance Education 4. Discuss the element of pathos in the essay “Dream Children”.
III. Write an essay on the following
1. Justify the statement that “Dream Children : A Reverie” is a lyric in prose.
2. Give a critical appreciation of Lamb’s essay “Dream Children”.
Activity
Compare Charles Lamb’s “Dream Children” and Robert Lynd’s “A Disappointed Man”.
FURTHER REFERENCES
1. Text of the essay : http://essays.quotidiana.org/lamb/dream_children _a_reverie/ 2. https://www.grin.com/document/308448
Appreciating Prose 72 School of distance Education G.K.CHESTERTON
Gilbert Keith Chesterton is an English novelist, short story writer, playwright, critic, essayist, biographer and poet. He gained popularity in the literary field as the author of the Father Brown detective series. With the publication of works like “Robert Browning”, “Charles Dickens”, “William Blake” etc., he earned himself a position as a literary critic. His autobiography was published in 1936.
ON RUNNING AFTER ONE’S HAT
Throughout Chestertons’ writings, he attempts to employ elements of paradox, parable or allegory in order to shed light on spiritual truths, due to which he earned himself the nickname, ‘The Prince of Paradox’. His writing is often described as being witty and clever. He used paradox not only for the fun of it but also as a weapon against social satire. In “On Running After One’s Hat”, Chesterton attempts to encourage an optimistic approach towards life’s silly little annoyances. He believes that any
Appreciating Prose 73 School of distance Education person can easily overcome the hardships of life if they are willing to view life through the eyes of a child, especially in the face of inconveniences. EXPLANATORY NOTES
In the first paragraph, the narrator expresses his optimistic view on the London floods. He almost feels envious that the flood has begun when he is not there in London town, it seems almost as if he was talking of a concert or an entertaining event that he missed because he was out of town. He thus successfully lends a romantic or almost poetic tone to the flood.
In the second paragraph, he points out that we must take an optimistic as well as romantic stand when faced by adversities and calamities, like floods or fires, in our lives. Such an attitude is always better than being too serious and complaining about such circumstances. He also admits that it is certainly not possible to enjoy real pain when experiencing it, but it could still be taken as something positive and can be supported in such a manner. He declares that most of the time, human beings
Appreciating Prose 74 School of distance Education (both men and women), are either sad or angry over things that are mere figments of their imagination. Here he contrasts the view of a kid versus that of an adult while waiting for a train to arrive. The kid’s imaginative and open mind would find this waiting time fun, interesting and new as opposed to the irritated feeling that an adult would have because he may find the exact same situation as boring, mundane and tiresome. In fact, adults are so serious and solemn that they spend such fun times thinking and contemplating over serious matters. The author says that he himself is a victim of such a habit. And so he goes on to say that if he had been there in Clapham Junction right now, he would have been so engrossed in his own thoughts that he would be covered in water (upto his waist at least), before even realizing that he is standing in water. In fact, for adults, all such daily activities could turn easily into annoying ones just because of their emotional outlook and attitude. The narrator states that this is just an example which may be applied for almost all other cases of daily irritations that we face.
Appreciating Prose 75 School of distance Education In the next paragraph, he points out that it is generally considered unpleasant to run after one’s hat. And he wonders why this is so since running is obviously not the problem for people could run so much faster when it comes to sports or games. But when it's a nice silk hat they're running behind, they feel humiliated. The narrator points out that such incidents need not be considered as humiliating or annoying events, rather they should be taken as funny events that are worth doing. He says it is as worthy as the act of making love and it is obviously not as ridiculous as a man running behind his wife. In the fourth paragraph, the author cites the same example of running behind one’s hat on a windy day. He confirms that if one feels rightly about it, this annoying and humiliating situation could turn into an act of sacred joy or a sportive event or even an exciting pursuit. He further states that such an act of running behind your own hat would be so funny to watch that it could give much pleasure to the crown watching this scene.
In the next paragraph, the author says that if the same example is applied to other daily nuisances like trying to get a fly out of your milk or trying to open a jammed
Appreciating Prose 76 School of distance Education drawer. These everyday annoyances wouldn't be that irritating if we use our sense of humour and emotional strength to turn it into a funny or challenging event. Like, for example, the act of trying to open a jammed drawer could be imagined as if you're fighting an oppressive enemy. Basically, the narrator tries to convey that one could simply use one’s imagination to turn an annoyance into a fun event. This is the piece of advice that the narrator gave to a friend with a jammed drawer and he is sure that after hearing this, his friend would everyday be turning the opening of a stuck drawer into a sportive, fun battle like act. In the final paragraph, the narrator sheds light on the fact that inconveniences are born out of unimaginative or accidental situations, which are also considered in the wrong sense. So the London floods are not all that bad as people make it out to be. And he ends his message quoting a Catholic priest from a story who said that “Wine is good with everything except water”. Now the narrator points out that if we use the same principle for the London floods, then “Water is good with everything except wine”. And so he urges the readers to always remain optimistic
Appreciating Prose 77 School of distance Education and imaginative no matter what his life circumstances are. This essay reminds us of the importance of a positive attitude, especially regarding petty things in our daily life which tend to irritate us. Inconvenient situations may be turned into enjoyable ones with the right attitude and open imagination. People may find such an approach unrealistic or impractical, but Chesterton highlights the fact that such romantic views are also equally logical and at times more sensible as well. At the same time, he ignores the hardships and loss that the poor would suffer during the floods and such adversities. His views in this essay are thus one sided to an extent. The significance and power of the emotional point of view may be considered as the basic message of the entire essay. Another valid point that the essay makes is the need to get rid of thoughts about humiliating oneself or being embarrassed about oneself when doing the right thing or taking a childlike, optimistic view of life. The importance of not being bothered about the probability of the society laughing at you is also highlighted by Chesterton here. On the whole the essay prompts one to take life in a lighter and fun manner. Appreciating Prose 78 School of distance Education EXERCISES
I. Answer the following in one or two sentences.
1. Why does Chesterton think that people find it unpleasant to run after a hat?
2. What does Chesterton mean by “the most comic things of all are exactly the things that are most worth doing”?
3. What examples are given by Chesterton to make the situations of frustration into thrilling and adventurous ones?
II. Answer the following in a paragraph. 1. Explain “inconveniences that make men swear and women cry are really sentimental or imaginative inconveniences -- things altogether of the mind”.
2. What according to Chesterton, will become the sport of the upper classes in the future?
Appreciating Prose 79 School of distance Education
III. Write an essay on the following. 1. How does Chesterton romanticize difficult situations by dwelling on the notion that “an inconvenience is only an adventure wrongly considered”?
Activity Compare Chesterton’s “On Running After One’s Hat” with Robert Lynd’s “On Good Resolutions”.
FURTHER REFERENCES 1. Text of the essay : http://essays.quotidiana.org/chesterton/running_a fter_ones_hat/ 2. http://sittingbee.com/on-running-after-ones-hat- g-k-chesterton/ 3. https://arsartium.org/wp- content/uploads/2018/09/8.-Think-Healthy-Live- Healthy-G.K.-Chestertons-On-Running-After- Ones-Hat-by-Neelam-Agrawal.pdf
Appreciating Prose 80 School of distance Education ALBERT CAMUS
Albert Camus was a philosopher, journalist, editor, playwright, director and writer of novels, short stories, political essays and activist. He had little to no faith in rationalism and opposed systematic philosophy. Camus categorized his works into three cycles. Each cycle consisted of a novel, an essay and a play. The first cycle published between 1942 and 1944 consists of The Stranger, The Myth of Sisyphus and Caligula. It is in this cycle that he presents the world as essentially absurd. The second was the cycle of revolt which includes The Plague, The Rebel and The Just Assassins. The Rebel, along with some of his other newspaper editorials, political essays, plays and fiction earned him a reputation of a moralist. The Rebel also brought him in conflict with his friend, Jean-Paul Sartre, which provoked a major political- intellectual divide of the Cold-War era, as both of them went on to become the leading intellectual voices of the anti- Communist and pro-Communist left.In 1957 he won the Nobel Prize for literature. In 1960, he died in a car accident, at the age of 46.
Appreciating Prose 81 School of distance Education NOBEL ACCEPTANCE SPEECH
In Albert Camus’ “Nobel Acceptance Speech”, Camus expresses his views on the role of a writer and also his ideas on art and literature. In Camus opinion writers should be servants to truth and they are supposed to understand rather than judge. Camus highlights the need for writers to put themselves at the service of those who suffer rather than those who make history. Camus begins his speech by expressing gratitude at the honour conferred upon him and he admits that everyone likes to be recognized, especially artists. Being a young, modest and kind of shy person, he feels awkward at receiving the Nobel and being pushed into the limelight all of a sudden. He feels that there are greater writers in Europe who are more deserving than him. He says it is also a time of unending misery for Algeria (his birthplace).
He declares that the Nobel Prize is a far too generous fortune and was shocked to receive it. Now that he did receive it, he cannot simply rest under its glory. Instead he
Appreciating Prose 82 School of distance Education would have to live up to its expectations. And that he has to support him to do this is his idea of his art and the role of the writer. He then goes on to elaborate on these two points for the rest of his speech.
Although art is an indispensable factor in Camus life, he never prioritized it over and above everything else. For him, art is a means to connect himself with his fellow men and it allows him to live at the same level with them. It kind of forces or urges the artist to mingle with others. He also believes that one can experience the most down to earth and universal truths of this world through art. True artists don't mock or judge anything, rather they try to understand and comprehend things. And if they, as artists, had to take someone's side or support someone, they would probably choose the creator over the judge.
Camus goes on to say that this doesn't mean the writer’s job is an easy one. An artist has to help those who suffer in history rather than those who make history. Therefore, he must take care not to tag along with tyrannous rulers. Instead, he should use his art to transmit
Appreciating Prose 83 School of distance Education the silence or sufferings of some unknown person(whose pain would otherwise go unheard) to the world. Albert Camus states two major tasks or commitments that every artist must attempt to attain. These are : 1. To accept the service of truth
2. To accept the service of liberty.
And the artist must stay away from lies and subjugation (or servitude) for gaining popularity or acceptance. No matter what an artist's personal weaknesses are, Camus urges them to stay true to the above given two commitments. And it is in this way that the true nobility of an artist’s craft or work would be brought out. It is not always easy to refuse to lie or resist oppression, but an artist must take effort to do so.
Camus then admits that he too feels hopelessly lost like all the people of his generation due to the impact of the World wars and other atrocities. But what holds Camus together and supports him is his commitment to not just write but also share and take part in the misery and hopes of his fellow beings. He also says that no one
Appreciating Prose 84 School of distance Education has any right to ask anyone in his generation to be optimistic because they are living in a Europe of torture and prisons. And we must also try to understand the rejection of religious or moral beliefs of this age. And even in such trying times, most Algerians and other Europeans have rejected this sort of nihilism and tried to create their own second births. And they have openly fought against all odds in the history of their times. While each generation feels that it is their task to change and better the world, according to Camus, his generation had a different task. And that task was to prevent the world from ruining itself. He describes his generation as one with dead Gods, mad technology and failed revolutions. He emphasizes that his age was also an age in which intelligence was used to propagate and spread hatred and oppression. He also expresses his concern and doubts over whether his generation would be able to succeed at the previously mentioned task or not. But still, even an attempt at such a mission must be encouraged and praised. And so Camus feels it would be appropriate to pass on the honour he received to his entire generation.
Appreciating Prose 85 School of distance Education Although the writer's craft is a noble one, we should not always expect complete solutions or high morals from him. Artists are bound to fail as they move towards achieving the two goals of liberty and truth. Even Camus himself, as a writer, is not a preacher of virtue. He has his own personal weaknesses that explains his errors, but at the same time has also helped him understand his craft better. Camus ends the speech by accepting the honour bestowed upon him as homage paid to people like him, who are involved in the same fight but haven't received the privilege or honour that Camus himself had. And unlike him, they are still suffering. Once again, he expresses his sincere gratitude and makes a promise of faithfulness which he believes all true artists silently repeat to themselves every day. EXERCISES I. Answer the following in one or two sentences
1. Why does Camus say that he felt a kind of panic and shock on hearing the declaration of Nobel Prize?
Appreciating Prose 86 School of distance Education 2. Why does he say that he cannot live without art? 3. Why according to Camus an artist cannot remain different and aloof from others in the society? II. Answer the following in a Paragraph. 1. What are the roles and duties of a writer according to Camus? 2. Why does Camus say that the task of his generation is to prevent the world from destroying it rather than reform it? III. Write an essay on the following. 1. To what extent does the speech represent Camus as a philosopher rather than solely as an author of friction? Activity Compare Camus’ “Nobel Acceptance Speech” with Doris Lessing’s Nobel Lecture, “On Not winning the Nobel Prize”. FURTHER REFERENCES 1. Text of the essay : https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literatu re/1957/camus/speech/
2. https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/literatu re/1957/ceremony-speech/
Appreciating Prose 87 School of distance Education ARUNDHATI ROY Suzanna Arundhati Roy is an Indian writer, actress, political and environmental activist who won the Booker prize for fiction in 1997 for her very first novel - “The God of Small Things”. This novel sold over six million copies and was published in around 16 languages across nineteen countries although it did create controversy in India as it is about a relationship between a Sryian Christian and a Hindu ‘untouchable’. She also authored many non-fiction books including “The Cost of Living” (1999) which is a critical attack on the Indian government for its handling of the controversial Narmada Valley dam project and for its nuclear testing programmer. She has published another collection of essays dealing with the downfalls of democracy in modern India in a book titled “Listening to Grasshoppers: Field Notes on Democracy” (2009). She was awarded the Lannan Prize for Cultural Freedom in 2003 and the Sydney PEace Prize in 2004 in recognition of her involvement in human rights issues.
Appreciating Prose 88 School of distance Education COME SEPTEMBER This is an acclaimed Lannan Foundation lecture delivered by Arundhati Roy on the 18th of September, 2002. This speech was delivered at Lensic Performing Arts Centre, Santa Fe, New Mexico. While reading the original essay (which is easily available online), I would highly recommend you read it closely, giving time for understanding each sentence and do not hesitate to use a dictionary or google up the meaning of a word or phrase when you don’t seem to understand it completely. What I have provided below is more like a paraphrasing of the essay for better and easier understanding. EXPLANATORY NOTES Before beginning her speech, Arundhati Roy says that she is going to be reading aloud her written speech due to two reasons. One is that she is a writer and so she feels more comfortable when she writes and secondly, the problem she is going to speak about is quite complex and one must take care of the language used while treating such delicate subjects.
Appreciating Prose 89 School of distance Education She then begins her speech by stating that writers don’t exactly invent stories, rather stories choose writers from the world and they insist upon being told. We often think that only fiction is considered as stories, but Roy says that both fiction and nonfiction may be taken as stories. As far as she is concerned, she believes that she can easily write fiction but non-fiction has to be forced out of her. But whether it be fiction or nonfiction, one of her basic themes is the relation between power and powerlessness. On the surface level, her works might seem to be about history or nations, but she says that they are actually more about power. The ruthlessness and the physics of power is what she is concerned with in depicting in her works. Roy says that the governments of India and Pakistan keep promising their citizens that there will be a nuclear war and hence call the citizens of both these countries as brain-washed citizens. Roy thinks about the relationship between citizens and the State and how citizens who have views that are not in accordance with the Indian Government are branded or termed as ‘anti-nationals’. She attributes most of the genocide (or mass murder) of the 20th Century to
Appreciating Prose 90 School of distance Education nationalism. Roy describes flags as ‘shrink wraps’ which are used by the government to cover and subsequently shrink (or reduce) the brains of their citizens in the name of ‘nationalism’. She also points out that it is a worrying matter when even artists like writers or painters etc. begin to mould their art for the service of the nation. She says that this sort of propaganda did happen in India in 1998 during the Nuclear tests and in 1999 in Pakistan during the Kargil War. It even happened in the US during the Gulf War and it is happening now under the pretence of ‘War against Terror’. And she gives china-made US flags as an example for this. She states that she herself had been termed as ‘anti American’ for criticizing the American government's actions. This whole notion of Anti- Americanism is turning into an ideology in itself. According to Roy, the term ‘anti-american’ is used by the American establishment to define its critics (she says it's an inaccurate definition). Then Roy tries to define or give a meaning to this term (Anti-American). And she points out that merging America’s culture, its geographical beauty, the ordinary pleasures of the ordinary people there along with criticism of the American government’s
Appreciating Prose 91 School of distance Education foreign policy is actually a purposely created, effective strategy. On the other hand, Roy says that there are many Americans who do not want to be associated with their government’s policies. In fact, most of the time the most severe and scholarly critiques of the hypocrisy and contradictions in the U.S. government policy comes from the American citizen itself. So when non- Americans need to know about what's going on in America, they rely on Americans like Noam Chomsky, Edward Said, Howard Zinn, Amy Goodman etc.
Now Roy compares this American scenario with the present Indian scenario where many Indians would feel embarrassed and ashamed if they were in any way connected with the present Indian government’s authoritarian policies which curbed the rights of the state of Kashmir and neglected the government led massacre against Muslims in Gujarat. And just as people are termed anti-American, Indians or people who criticize the Indian government are also termed as anti-Indian by the government. She questions the rights of the Indian or
Appreciating Prose 92 School of distance Education American or any government to define what ‘India’ or ‘America’ should be. She criticizes the extremes which such governments apply in supposing that if someone doesn’t love them then they ought to hate them or if someone doesn’t support Bush then he must be a Taliban supporter. She also brings into light the fake agenda behind the US war against Afghanistan and shares her thoughts on how it actually began in the pretense of capturing Osamabin Laden and then turned into a pretense of liberating Afghan women from their burqas. Roy points out that if the US actually had a feminist mission on their minds then why haven’t they bothered about raising a war against Saudi Arabia, which is the country who supports them in their military operations. And she points out that there are so many other countries like India, Pakistan, Bangladesh etc where women face injustices and other minority communities also suffer. So should all these countries be bombed? Will bombing prove an effective remedy for these injustices, sectarianism and bias? Can those social evils be bombed out of a place??Does bombing have the ability to transport us to a feminist paradise asks Roy. By raising these
Appreciating Prose 93 School of distance Education questions Roy is obviously hinting at the pretentiousness, hypocrisy and futility behind the reasons for the US war against Afghanistan. Then Roy goes on to say that it’s a coincidence that she is in America in September, which is a month of terrible anniversaries. Nobody needs to remind anyone of the anniversary of 9/11, you automatically remember incidents that we just cannot forget. Roy recalls how almost three thousand ordinary citizens were killed in that terrorist attack on 9/11. She knows that the impact of that attack still remains, the memory of it remains quite fresh in everyone’s mind and the pain of having lost their loved ones or the anger against those who did it hasn’t quite gone yet. Roy says there is a strange and deadly war burning around the world. And while she acknowledges that the 9/11 attack’s impact or pain still remains she also hints at the futility of war despite all this. She points out that all those people who lost their loved ones in this terrible terrorist attack also know deep inside that no war or no amount of revenge is going to bring back their loved ones or console the pain and sorrow or loss they are experiencing. In fact, according to Roy, all that war can
Appreciating Prose 94 School of distance Education do is to brutally violate or contaminate the memory of those dead loved ones. Roy believes that fuelling a war based on these sentiments only devalues or degrades grief. And this whole concept of exploiting human feelings (personal grief /sorrow) for political agendas or commercial purpose is a terrible thing for a country or State to do to its own people. Roy admits it's not clever to talk about Loss in a public platform and yet she would really love to talk about it. She wants to talk about what loss means to individual people or what it means to people who have learnt to live it throughout their lives as if it was a constant companion. She is not bringing up this dreaded topic of 9/11 in order to accuse anyone or provoke anyone. Instead, she is doing it to take part in the sorrow and also to clear out some of the uncertainties related to it and very gently welcome America back to the world. Basically to help American citizens step out of their sorrow and despair. Roy then recalls what happened in Chile on September 11, 1973 when US backed General Pinochet overthrew the democratically elected government. So the first Marxian President (President Allende) to be democratically elected
Appreciating Prose 95 School of distance Education was found dead inside his palace and it still remains a mystery whether it was actually a suicide or a murder. Roy then enumerates the terror and brutality that followed including the cutting off a musicians hand in public and then throwing his guitar back to him and mockingly asking him to play before being shot down. The dictatorship that followed not only killed people but also took the freedom and lives out of the living people and Roy says General Pinochet must be held responsible for stealing even the lives of the living Chileans. Through this narration Roy also brings in to view the insensitiveness of the US when General Pinochet was finally arrested in 1999. Roy says that there are many more countries where the Central Intelligence Agency of the US works (or plays) in, either openly or secretly. And then there are other countries which suffered under not the CIA, but the US military interventions like Korea, Indonesia etc. Roy reminds us of the fact that many Septembers had passed since the nuclear strikes in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and so many bombings and slaughtering of millions of Asian people have taken place during so many September. She diverts from the topic and also mocks at how the National
Appreciating Prose 96 School of distance Education Atomic Museum has commercialized the atomic attack in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Roy states that September 11 has a tragic memory for the Middle East as well due to British colonialism. She calls Palestine and Kashmir as gifts of imperialism and British colonialism to the modern world. She then goes on to quote Winston Churchill and Israeli Prime Minister’s notions of Palestine and Palestinians. She notes that they all used terms like ‘dog’, ‘grasshoppers’ and ‘two legged beasts’ to describe Palestinians and Roy reminds the world that these came from the mouths of the Heads of State and not from ordinary people. The situation in Palestine still hasn't improved, according to Roy, the people in Palestine still live without dignity or any control over their natural resources. Many young Palestinians have turned themselves into human bombs or suicide bombers because of all the pent up anger. Roy points out that Israel is still practicing colonialism in Palestine under the pretence of a new, twenty first century ‘war’. And as usual it is America who backs and supports Israel in all their wars. A lot of financial support is provided by the US to Israel for this
Appreciating Prose 97 School of distance Education purpose. Here, Roy raises serious questions about condemning suicide bombers and whether the cruelty and violence they may have faced. For example, the Palestinians have been going through a war for around eighty years. So what can the world advise them to do once they do come out of it eventually? It is again on September 11th that George Bush made a speech to a joint session of Congress announcing the US government’s decision to rage a war against Iraq. She then narrates how Saddam Hussain conducted a US and UK governments backed genocide against his own people initially in 1988. In 1990, Saddam Hussain invaded Kuwait on his own without any US or UK intervention which set his relation with them to deteriorate and so they decided to exterminate him. Roy points out that the US and UK governments casually decided to exterminate Saddam Hussain, so casually as if he were their pet and they had suddenly lost interest in the pet. And from 1991 onwards both America and British fired thousands of missiles and bombs on Iraq for over a decade. And anyone who did talk or write against these wars were accused of moral equivalence.
Appreciating Prose 98 School of distance Education Apparently a decade of bombing left Saddam Hussai untouched and so then the US took to raging a war again in the name of weapons asserting that Iraq has weapons of mass destruction. Roy notes that the U.S. has the largest collection of weapons and military equipment and is the only country in the world to have used it on ordinary citizens. She also mocks at the recent U.S. intervention in holding back a war that was about to rage between India and Pakistan. She asks sarcastically why it is so hard for the U.S. to follow its own advice and stay away from wars. She accuses them of being guilty of uselessly moralizing as they waged wars while they preached about peace. Ironically, George Bush calls the U.S. as the most peaceful nation on earth and here, Roy points out that America has been at war with one country or another every year for the last fifty years.
Roy then writes how oil trade is another major concern for the U.S.Roy writes that it is oil that keeps the Free Market in America rolling and because of that the U.S. believes that whoever controls the oil market controls the world. And this explains their recent
Appreciating Prose 99 School of distance Education interventions in the Balkans, Central Asia and their constant guarding over the Middle East. Roy states that the New York Times columnist, Thomas Friedman, in his article titled “Craziness Pays” and in his book called “The Lexus and the Olive Tree” has written very accurately and briefly about corporate globalization.
Here, Roy tries to give us a clear picture on how America uses the Free Market also as one of their weapons. And then she sarcastically draws out the contrast between the ideals of Al Qaeda and America, how the former stands for the Word and the latter stands for profit. She equates U.S. with Al fayda (‘fayda’ means profit in Urdu). This is merely Roy’s way of playing around with words and also at the same time pointing out that America is not that different from the terrorist organization of Al Qaeda that they always seem to be so against (Al Qaeda Vs Al Fayda). Although at present it looks as if Al Fayda is winning the war, Roy says you never know when things may change and flip around.
Appreciating Prose 100 School of distance Education Throughout the rest of the essay Roy paints a bleak picture of the effects of Corporate Globalization. She notes how corporate globalization has not been able to reduce the number of poor people in the country despite having raised the world’s total income. And what is actually happening under the banner of Corporate Globalization is plundering of natural resources, privatization of water, undermining of democracies etc. And in developing countries like India, this project of corporate globalization is cutting through the lives of people. And so the poorer are getting poorer and richer getting richer which is leading to a kind of civil unrest or discord among people. And in order to suppress or control those who are protesting against corporate globalization, governments label such protestors as ‘terrorists’ says Roy. But what Roy means by ‘civil unrest’ is not just protests, but also a tendency to commit more crimes and other terrible things start cropping up like cultural nationalism (Cultural nationalism is a form of nationalism in which the nation is defined by a shared culture), religious intolerance, fascism (or authoritarianism) and the most obvious one is terrorism. So according to Roy, these
Appreciating Prose 101 School of distance Education evils are the outcome of corporate globalization. Roy points out that the concept that the Free Market will break down national barriers and the final destination of Corporate Globalization is a sort of paradise where everyone can live together happily inside John Lennon’s song (“Imagine there’s no country”) is just a made up story or a rumour. The Free Market is in fact weakening or suppressing democracy and corporate glozalization in order to attain its aims sometimes use the police, the courts and at times even the army. So Roy says that the police, the court and the army are merely pretending to deliver justice and keep the law. So basically whats being globalized is not respect for human rights or free movement of people or awareness about racial discrimination but instead movement of goods, money, patents and profitable services.
Roy points out that a year after the U.S. declared war against Afghanistan (in the name of opposing terror), each country in the world has sort of been losing freedom in the pretence of protecting freedom and democracy. And any
Appreciating Prose 102 School of distance Education kind of difference of opinion is treated or labelled as ‘terrorism’. And different kinds of laws are being passed in order to sustain this suppression of freedom in the name of terrorism. Sarcastically Roy points out that Bin Laden and Mullah Omar are not even in the picture, they seem to have disappeared altogether and even the Taliban have disappeared but unfortunately their spirit is still alive. This spirit, according to Roy, is coming up in the least expected places like India, Pakistan, Nigeria, America, Afghanistan and in all Central Asian republics under the U.S. backed Northern Alliance. And meanwhile, all natural resources and all signs of 4,600 million years of evolution are being put up for sale. Mockingly, Roy says that even justice is up for sales and that anyone who has money can buy it easily. So when Donald Rumsfed (a retired American politician, who served as Secretary of Defence under Gerald Ford and under George W. Bush also) said that his aim in the War against Terror was to convince the world that Americans must be allowed to continue their way of life, Roy replies that the so-called ‘American way of Life
Appreciating Prose 103 School of distance Education ’ is not exactly that sustainable as they don't seem to accept that there is a world beyond America.
Despite the bleak and terrifying picture of the world that Roy painted uptil now in the essay, she senses that there is hope as even ‘power’ has a shelf life. Hence it will explode or go out of use one day. In fact, Roy feels that cracks and bleedings have already started to appear. Roy feels that the world is essentially being run by three organizations (and not democracy). These three organizations are The International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and the World Trade Organization and all three of these are dominated by the U.S. But such a world run by leaders whom nobody elected or nobody even knows is definitely not going to last for long says Roy. She further points out that Soveit-style communism failed because it allowed too few people to seize too much power. And Roy believes that 21st Century market capitalism is also doomed to fail just like this because of the same reasons. Both of these notions (Soveit style communism and Capitalism) are after all constructs of the human mind and therefore incomplete.
Appreciating Prose 104 School of distance Education She ends the essay by saying probably things will get better after they get worse first. Maybe solutions will be sent down from Heaven, some little God is either preparing for us or is already on her way. Although many of us won’t be here to greet her, on really quiet days, Roy says she can hear this little God breathing. Basically, Roy is conveying the fact that there is hope for the world and it's not too far away. Roy thanks her listeners and ends this enlightening speech. Some of the main points made in the essay by Roy are the ill effects of globalization and capitalism, the hypocrisy of the U.S., the misuse of nationalism and the growing gap between rich and poor. She also focuses on other historical events that took place in the month of ‘September’ in which countries like America itself had unleashed similar kinds of attacks as the September 11th attack. Roy mocks and sarcastically presents her opinions with the effective use of puns, phrases and apt quotations which she combines with her political knowledge in order to expose the injustices of the present world scenario. However, she also provides hope for a better world in future.
Appreciating Prose 105 School of distance Education EXERCISES
I. Answer the following in one or two sentences
1. What is the occasion of Arundhati Roy’s speech, “Come September”?
2. What is the recurring theme of Roy’s writings?
3. Why does Roy call the people of India and Pakistan as ‘brainwashed citizenary’?
4. Who is branded as an ‘anti-national’ in India, according to Roy?
II. Answer the following in a paragraph
1. “Flags are bits of coloured cloth that governments use first to shrink-wrap people’s brains and then as ceremonial shrouds to bury the dead.”Explain.
2. What does Roy conclude about the possibility of being “anti” -an entire country? Does she accept or reject this label? Explain her thinking in this topic.
3. What kinds of experiences and emotions does Roy believe that Americans share with others as a result of the September 11 terrorist attacks?
Appreciating Prose 106 School of distance Education
4. Why does Roy believe that the American way of life is not sustainable? Do you agree with her?
III. Write an Essay on the following
1. The concept of Nationalism and anti- Americanism as discussed by Roy in her speech “Come September”.
2. Does knowing that significant things happened on other September change your perception of 9/11 as a historical term?Why? IV. Activity 1. Roy gave this speech in 2002. How might Roy’s speech be different if she was giving it today? Think about events that would have reinforced her narrative and also those that may contradict her argument.
FURTHER REFERENCES 1. Text of the essay: https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/com e-september/217403
Appreciating Prose 107 School of distance Education PICO IYER Siddharth Pico Raghavan Iyer is a British born writer, novelist and essayist. He has also written introductions to more than 70 books. He has also been simultaneously writing around a hundred articles a year for Time, The New York Times, The New York Review of Books, Harper’s Magazine and many more periodicals around the world. His books, which include “The Lady and the Monk”, “The Global Soul”, “Falling off the Map” etc. have been translated into several different languages and published worldwide.
IN PRAISE OF THE HUMBLE COMMA EXPLANATORY NOTES
In the opening paragraph, the humble comma is compared to the Gods. Iyer laments the fact that the comma is often underestimated. According to Pico Iyer, the comma is often neglected, often used but very rarely given any attention just like our breath.
Appreciating Prose 108 School of distance Education In the next paragraph, Iyer emphasizes the importance of punctuation in order to maintain law and order. Punctuation is compared to the traffic lights and other road signals, where the full stop (or period) is the red light; the comma is the yellow light that reminds us to slow down and so on. He says that the punctuation is powerful enough to separate even the inseparables which is probably why lovers detest it and try not to use it while on the hand people like teachers love it.
In the third paragraph of the essay, Iyer declares that punctuation is the pillar that holds the society upright. He says that punctuation was quite important in the Victorian age (which he calls as the age of the corset- a corset refers to a tight fitting undergarment worn by women in order to shape the figure). But then, modernists came in and threw off the punctuation which resulted in a Molly Bloom’s 36 pages of unpunctuated prose in Joyce’s novel. The rebellion against punctuation was so much that writers like E.E.Cummings even began writing ‘God’ completely in the lower case.
Appreciating Prose 109 School of distance Education In the next paragraph, Iyer sheds light on the power of punctuations to reveal the culture of the age it is being used in. As an example, he says that the hustle and bustle of the 60’s is quite evident in the exploding exclamation marks and riotous capital letters they used.
In the fifth paragraph, the author states that punctuation is much more than a mirror to a culture, it is like the music in our minds. Punctuation is compared to the small ways or actions humans use to express their emotions. And thus punctuations, according to Iyer, are a means of conveying human emotions.
In the next paragraph, he states that punctuation has the power to change the tone and significance of a speech. For example, a dropped apostrophe in a parent’s speech may turn an ordinary sentence into a scolding or an order and so on.
In the seventh paragraph, he compares the humble comma to a necklace which is powerful enough to elevate the entire look of a normal outfit. The comma is also
Appreciating Prose 110 School of distance Education compared to the beautiful sound of gushing water that takes a simple Japanese landscape to the next level. Punctuations, according to Iyer, have the power to transform ordinary sentences by lending it beauty and subtlety. In the eighth paragraph, Iyer says that a world with just periods will result in a flat and monotonous world. Words can't bend or curve, but it is the punctuations that do it instead lending language a sort of rhythm and music. In the final paragraph, Iyer emphasizes the emotional quality of punctuations. Just as lovers focus on the small details of their lover, punctuations are the small details that make a big difference in one’s language. Punctuation, no matter how small it is, can turn a sentence that would convey ecstasy and love into one that gives a lover a heartache instead. He ends the essay just as he began the essay by comparing punctuations with the Gods. “In Praise of the Humble Comma” is an essay by journalist Pico Iyer published in the Times magazine on June 24, 2001. In the essay, Pico Iyer basically conveys the necessity of punctuation in everyday written language. He believed that it was not just a grammatical need, but
Appreciating Prose 111 School of distance Education also an emotional necessity. He presents punctuation in a fun, humorous and inviting way which makes us view punctuation in a way that we had never before thought or imagined. He emphasizes that the power and role of punctuation is very often underestimated. He personifies comma in his essay to drive home the point that language is made better with the use of punctuation. The comma is described in the essay’s title as the ‘humble’ comma because it is often overlooked, underestimated and considered as a trivial or ignorable element in language. Iyer opines that written language could become dull and monotonous without punctuation. He uses metaphorical language and also draws analogies to emphasize his points. The main points that Iyer conveys through the essay are that punctuation holds the society upright and that it is a signature of cultures, music to our minds and it also lends written words a human voice. Punctuations, according to Iyer, are also capable of communicating the general attitude of a particular time period. Even inner or connotative meanings can be conveyed with the use of punctuations. Iyer concludes the essay by focusing on the significance of the little things in
Appreciating Prose 112 School of distance Education life. He effectively uses instances from our daily life to warn us against overlooking the little things in life, as you need to focus on the smaller things in order to attain the bigger achievements in one’s life. He believed that punctuation has the power to influence the way we live and love and not just the way we read and write. EXERCISES I. Answer the following in two or three sentences
1. Why does Pico Iyer compare the comma to breath at the beginning of the essay? In what way are they similar?
2. Why does Iyer say that school teachers exalt punctuations but lovers defy them?
3. Explain the comparison of punctuation marks to music.
4. Explain the oxymoronic saying that a comma “separates inseparables”.
II. Answer the following in a paragraph 1. What are the different comparisons employed by Iyer to describe the importance of punctuation marks and commas?
Appreciating Prose 113 School of distance Education 2. How does Iyer justify the relation between a comma and a human emotion?
3. What does Iyer say about Joyce and Cummings? What point does he try to make by these two examples about punctuation?
III. Write an essay on the following 1. Bring out the linguistic and socio-cultural aspects of punctuation marks as expressed by Iyer in the essay “In Praise of the Humble Comma”.
2. Elucidate the titular significance of the essay “In Praise of the Humble Comma”.
Activity Compare Iyer’s “In Praise of the Humble Comma” with Satchidanandan’s “Stammer”. FURTHER REFERENCES 1. http://journoportfolio.s3-website-eu-west- 1.amazonaws.com/users/34517/uploads/1534ef07 -28cf-4f52-a278-758e776ef753.pdf
Appreciating Prose 114 School of distance Education CHINUA ACHEBE
Chinua Achebe is a Nigerian novelist, critic and short story writer and is often called as the “father of modern African literature”.”Things Fall Apart” is his first novel and it was published in 1958. He is also the recipient of the Nigerian National Order of Merit, which is Nigeria’s highest honour for intellectual achievement. Even Though he writes in English, he makes it a point to incorporate Igbo vocabulary, folktales and narratives into his world. Thereby, he reminds his own people of the value of their pasts and also informs the outside world of the richness of Igbo culture. Achebe’s first book of essays was published in 1975 and titled as “Morning Yet on Creation Day”. The same year, he delivered a lecture titled “An Image of Africa: Racism in Conrad’s Heart of Darkness”, in which he asserted that Conrad’s famous novel dehumanizes Africans. It later went on to get published and became a seminal postcolonial African work.
Appreciating Prose 115 School of distance Education THE EDUCATION OF A BRITISH PROTECTED CHILD
This essay, “The Education of a British Protected Child” is taken from the book with the same title. This book is a collection of autobiographical essays that deal with a wide range of subjects ranging from the political to the historical to the personal. In this excerpt from the book, Achebe gives us a picture of his childhood years in colonial Nigeria, recalling both happy, interesting pieces of his memory along with the bitter truths of colonial rule.
Achebe begins the essay by warning the readers not to expect a scholarly work. He then talks of how his application to Trinity College, Cambridge was rejected when he tried to get in for graduation. And he thinks that had he been taken into Cambridge back then, this essay that we are reading right now would have been more scholarly rather than being a personal or subjective story of a boy growing up in British ruled Nigeria. So basically, he is saying that he has turned into a writer rather than a scholar.
Appreciating Prose 116 School of distance Education He then narrates how he was defined as a “British Protected Person” when he needed to get a passport for his first travel abroad. This happened three years before Nigeria got independence from colonial rule. He then says that if anyone expects him to talk about colonialism, he will only hear the cons or disadvantages of colonialism from Achebe’s mouth. And he wishes to take the middle ground for this purpose and goes on to explain why the Igbo people consider the middle ground lucky. In the next few paragraphs, Achebe gives us a brief sketch of the Igbo people. He writes that when a conflict arises between themselves, the Igbo’s are more bothered about restoring peace than thinking about who is right or wrong. He describes the Igbo community as practical and realistic people who are not dreamy or romantic. Achebe declares that marriage is not so easy and colonial rule was even stronger than any marriage in the Igbo community. Then he promises his readers that he wouldn’t discuss colonialism here but he intends to simply put forward his basic reasons of objection towards colonial rule. Achebe views colonialism as a major crime as it is a deceitful practice to tear away a person's identity, land and even
Appreciating Prose 117 School of distance Education their history and then pretend that the victim is some kind of inferior or minor who needs protection. He says that even the person committing this crime (i.e., the coloniser), knows that he is doing a crime and so he tries to hide this robbery and theft he is committing by pretending to be the protector. Achebe calls this pretension as a shameless kind of hypocrisy. He quotes King Leopold II of the Belgians as an example for such hypocrites. These are the words spoken by King Leopold II: “I am pleased to think that our agents, nearly all of whom are volunteers drawn from the ranks of the Belgian Army, have always present in their minds a strong sense of the career in which they are engaged, and are animated with a pure sense of patriotism; not sparing their own blood, they will the more spare the blood of the natives, who will see in them the all powerful protectors of their lives and their property,
Appreciating Prose 118 School of distance Education benevolent teachers of whom they have so great a need.” Achebe states that the entire continent of Europe is responsible for creating the terrible character of Mr. Kurtz in Conrad’s “Heart of Darkness”. He then goes on to say that even the colonizer has to pay small prices in this process of colonizing (so it’s not just the colonized victim who suffers). For example, they lose their sense of humour and sense of ridiculousness. The author then goes on to talk about the victim or the colonized. The victim lives on and accepts his fate with the help of his humour. He then goes on to describe the state of the colonized by giving an example from his mother’s life experience. In return for her education, she had to work as domestic help at her school Principal’s house (who was not a native, but someone from the West) and was given a beating for laughing at the Principal when this Western lady tried to speak Igbo language. By the time Achebe started going to school, native teachers had begun to teach, but the system of punishments like using the rod to beat children, remained the same.
Appreciating Prose 119 School of distance Education The narrator then recalls memories of the different photos, posters and pictures hung up on the walls of his house and the colonial impact it had on his young mind. Ironically, his father had put these up as a form of education. Achebe knew that it would be imprudent or cheeky to compare his story with the story of Moses, but couldn't help doing so because there actually was some similarity. He then talks of how Christianity creeped into their lives and native culture and how it was different from their native traditions, festivals and culture. As a child, he looked forward to seeing the masquerades that were part of their native festival (the Nwafor festival) and he remembers watching them from far off as it wasnt safe to go near them because they carried bundles of whip which they were ready to use on anyone available to them. As children, they would count the masquerades and usually, in a good year, there used to be over a hundred masquerades. He notes that Christianity sort of divided their village into two sections of people. One section was considered to be the people of the church and the other section was taken as people of the world. But despite this divide, they still enjoyed each other's traditions and
Appreciating Prose 120 School of distance Education festivals. The Christians celebrated Christmas, Easter, the Empire Day (on May 24th) and the Anniversary (on July 27th). The author then narrates his memory of the Empire Day celebrations (which is the birthday of Queen Victoria) in his school and the sports competition between different schools which followed the celebrations. He remembers how proud he felt when he turned ten years old and was considered old enough to walk to a place called Onitsha and back from there even though it was quite an exhausting walk. He was quite a good student as far as his school work was concerned and was nicknamed ‘Dictionary’ by his peers. However, he admits he wasn't so good at sports and games but that wasn’t a big deal in his culture anyway. He then narrates in detail two memories from his trip to Onitsha on the Empire day, which stands out in his mind. One is that he felt he was all free in a big city like Onitsha and had money in his pocket too. Both the freedom and money together made him feel so proud and independent that he bought himself half a penny worth of groundnuts to eat and there was so much of it that even thinking about groundnuts now made him feel sick. The
Appreciating Prose 121 School of distance Education second detail is that he saw a legendary, eccentric Englishman called Dr. J.M. Stuart Young walking down New Market Road bare headed in the sun just as legend said he would be. One more interesting thing about this person that legend said was that he (Stuart Young) had made friends with a mermaid of River Niger and he had made an agreement with her that he would stay single if he got great riches in return for it. It was only later on that Achebe learned that it was doubtful if Stuart actually had a doctoral degree or not. But what is to be noted about Young is that although he arrived in Africa as a colonial civil servant, he turned against the colonial system of monopolizing the European commercial cartels (with the help of native support from Africans). He also wrote poetry and fiction and years later Achebe himself invoked the memory of Stuart Young in a short story titled “Uncle Ben’s Choice”.
The next event Achebe talks of is the Anniversary which was held every year on July 27th as an annual commemoration of the coming of the Gospel to Igbo land. It seems that every Anniversary celebration had been
Appreciating Prose 122 School of distance Education wrecked by bad weather and it is believed that it was because there was heavy rain beating down on the Bishop Adjai Crowther and his missionary team who brought in the Gospel on 27th July, 1857. The best part of this celebration however was that school children got to eat juicy new yams and stew. Achebe points out that colonization in Africa was not exactly a labour intensive task as there were hardly any British people working in the administration or the church or even in commerce sectors. But despite this they were still quite powerful and authoritative. Achebe then goes on to enumerate a few religious questions and answers about Christianity, which is known as catechism and which was taught to preschool children in those days. However, Achebe escaped from this training and was instead given training at home by reading portions from the Bible daily. Since the Second World War began while Achebe was just finishing his second year in primary school, most of his primary education took place against the background of the War. He realized the impact of the war on Africa when his art teacher was enlisted to the armed service by two white people who
Appreciating Prose 123 School of distance Education came along with their assistants to Achebe’s school. He also remembers that there was a campaign to increase palm kernel production in order to support Britain against Germany in the war and as the war progressed, the supplies they had at home and school depleted and there came a time when salt was so scarce it just disappeared from the open market. Achebe also noted down a song titled “Germany is Falling” which was a popular war song they all sang enthusiastically.
Then he moves on to memories of his secondary schooling and how he joined the Government College at Umuahia under the guidance of his elder brother, John, who was a teacher. Although Achebe himself wasn’t that happy to join there, he now admits that John made the right decision back then because it was one of the two first class boarding schools for boys set up by the British and turned out to be the best one later on. Around this time the Second World war began and the Government College, Umuahia was closed down so that its buildings could be used as a prisoner-of-war camp for German and Italian citizens. But before the war ended itself, the College
Appreciating Prose 124 School of distance Education reopened to impart education. And their new principal, William Simpson, was a revolutionary person who brought in a new concept known as the ‘Textbook Act’. According to this Act, Simpson made a rule which encouraged reading novels and prohibited the reading of textbooks on three days of the week which the students made use of as they had a good library as well. Achebe also feels that the alumni of this college have played an outstanding role in the development of modern African literature. Another very interesting point that Achebe makes here is that the books they read at the library in their college were really books meant for English boys. None of the Africans could really relate with them or their exciting stories though they hardly ever realized it back then. But it did get kind of prepare them for a day in the future when they would be able to read between the lines and realize the colonizing effect that these books had and gave them the courage to question these.
Achebe got the chance to study in Nigeria’s first university institution at Ibadan. Now he had turned from a British Protected Child to a British Protected Person. He
Appreciating Prose 125 School of distance Education then goes on to talk about one of the most remarkable teachers he had met at Ibadan, named James Welch, to whom Achebe expressed the growing discontent in the students towards the college. To this, Welch replies, “We may not be able to teach you what you want or even what you need. We can only teach what we know.” Achebe ironically asks his readers, ‘what else can an honest and conscientious teacher teach but what he knows?’. And he declares that the education program of the colonial system is obviously far from being perfect as colonialism itself is a refusal of human worth and dignity.
But as Achebe mentioned earlier on in this essay, he was not focussing on the harsh humiliations of colonial rule but rather on the little sparks of humanity here and there even from the side of the colonizer at times. And as an example for this, he points out that the logo of the Government College at Umuahia was a pair of torches, one black and one white, shining together ‘silently’, says Achebe. And a generation after this logo was set up, an Australian teacher added a motto to it - “In unumluceant” which translates to “We May Shine as One”.
Appreciating Prose 126 School of distance Education
So Achebe’s real focus in this essay is on these people who despite being the colonizer, had kindness or humanity that shone through them and believed in standing united with the colonized Africans, as the symbol of Government College, Umuahia makes it clear. People like William Simpson who knowingly or unknowingly laid the foundation for the beginnings of modern African literature and then the mysterious legend, Stuart Young who stepped out of the colonial system and set himself up as competition against his own people due to which he earned himself a grand funeral from the people of Onitsha. So there are such people from the side of the colonizers who did make efforts to reach out across
Appreciating Prose 127 School of distance Education the deep divide of colonialism, in order to touch the lives of at least a few of the colonized victims. Achebe ends the essay by pointing out an instance in the history of US and African relations when the relations were at an all time low. So in 1976, when Henry Kissinger met Joseph Garba, the Nigerian foreign minister at the United Nations, Kissinger asked what America was doing wrong in Africa. To this Garba replied, “Every thing!” and this is how Kissinger reacts to it: “Statistically that is impossible. Even if it is unintentional, we must be doing something right.” And Achebe feels that this dialogue between Kissinger and Garba could easily have been about colonialism. That is to say unintentionally, the colonizers have done some things right in Africa. And these few good things that they did do are what Achebe has fore grounded in this particular essay.
EXERCISES
I. Answer the following in one or two sentences
1. How did Achebe miss the opportunity of becoming a clear-cut scholar?
Appreciating Prose 128 School of distance Education 2. What according to Achebe are the advantages of taking the middle ground stand?
3. How do the Igbo people encounter human conflict?
4. How does Achebe establish that the conversion of Africans to Christianity was not an easy affair?
5. Who is Kurtz and why does Achebe mention the anime in the essay?
6. What made Miss Warner give Achebe’s mother a stern lecture on good manners?
II. Answer the following in a paragraph 1. Describe the experience of Achebe’s mother as a first generation learner?
2. Give a description of the two secular festivals celebrated by the Christians of Nigeria.
3. Who are those English men mentioned by Achebe in the essay who crossed the divide of colonialism
Appreciating Prose 129 School of distance Education and knowingly or unknowingly contributed to the freedom of Africa?
4. What was the Textbook Act imposed by William Simpson in Government College Umuahia?
III. Write an essay on the following 1. Briefly describe Achebe’s experience as a student under the colonial education system.
Activity Critically evaluate the middle ground space that Achebe describes in the essay using Bhabha’s postcolonial concepts of hybridity and in the third space.
FURTHER REFERENCES 1. https://www.theguardian.com/books/2010/feb/13/ chinua-achebe-british-protected-child
Appreciating Prose 130 School of distance Education MARCEL JUNOD
Marcel Junod was a Swiss doctor and a field delegate of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC). He is remembered for his selfless service during the Abyssinian War, the Spanish Civil War and World War II. He was also the first foreign doctor to reach Hiroshima after the atom bomb attack by the U.S. on 6th August, 1945. In 1947, he published a book about his experiences which was titled “WArrior without Weapons”. He then worked for the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) in China and then settled in Europe in 1950. In the year 1952, he was appointed as a member of the ICRC and held the position of Vice President here until his death in 1961.
THE FIRST ATOM BOMB
In this essay, Junod describes the terrible destruction of the once prosperous and thickly populated city of Hiroshima in Japan during the Second World War. It was on the 6th of August, 1945 that an atom bomb was used
Appreciating Prose 131 School of distance Education for the first time in warfare on the city of Hiroshima. This essay begins by describing the once prosperous Hiroshima, then goes on to give us a very detailed account of the destruction of the city after the atom bomb attack and also sheds light on MacArthur’s speech on the futility of war. Through the essay, the essayist expresses his contempt for war and his genuine worry about the future of mankind with the emergence of such deadly modern weapons like the atom bomb.
The essay begins by Junod stating that it has been three weeks after the two atomic bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. He then goes on to describe the response of the Americans when he mentioned the word ‘Hiroshima’ as well as the response of the Japanese. He then writes of the inconclusive and uncertain number of deaths, injuries and other related symptoms of the atom bomb in Hiroshima. And then he goes on to talk of the telegram he had received from Bilfinger. The telegram conveyed that almost ninety percent of the city of Hiroshima had been destroyed along with many hospitals which were either destroyed completely or
Appreciating Prose 132 School of distance Education crucially damaged due to the bombing. The effects of the bomb remained mysterious and uncertain. The surviving victims were still in dangerous conditions and needed proper medical care, but there was a serious shortage of medical material like bandages and medicine etc. Appeals had been sent out for supplies to be urgently parachuted to the center of the town. According to the telegram, the things that were urgently required were large supplies of bandages, cotton wool, ointments for treating burns, sulphamides, blood plasma and transfusion kits. The telegram ended by stating that urgent action was required.
The author took this telegram along with a few photographs which he still had with him and immediately set off to the Yokohama Chamber of Commerce where General MacArthur and his staff had already positioned themselves. Marcel Junod then goes on to describe the reactions of General Fitch, Chief of the U.S. Information Service, Colonel Marcus, of the Prisoners of war DEpartment, Colonel Webster, Chief of the Hospital Service and Colonel Sams, incharge of assistance for the civil population towards the telegram and the
Appreciating Prose 133 School of distance Education photographs. Despite the telegram clearly mentioning that it was an urgent matter, these officials gave their consent to send in fifteen tons of medicament and hospital material, only after a week (on 7th September). They also asked Marcel Junod to board a plane to Hiroshima along with a commission of inquiry (or an investigation team) to analyze the situation there.
Once the investigation team of the International Red Cross reaches Hiroshima, they meet two Japanese interpreters - Miss Ito (Canadian born) and a Japanese journalist (who spent 20 years in the U.S.). According to Miss Ito, Hiroshima (the name means ‘the broad island’) was a busy and prosperous town placed on the delta of the river Ota. It was also the seventh largest town in Japan and the seven branches of the river Ota came together here in a perfect triangle. Hiroshima had many factories, oil refineries, a harbour and veen an arsenal with a population of around 2,50,000 people. They also had a military unit of 1,50,000 soldiers.
Appreciating Prose 134 School of distance Education After this account of the previous state and glory of Hiroshima, the journalist gives an account of the day that Hiroshima was hit by the atom bomb which was on the 6th of August. The journalist says that on that particular day the sky was clear and visibility was perfect for nearly twelve miles. On that day, at 7:09 am, an air-raid warning was given and four American planes appeared in the sky. However, the planes flew off without causing any disturbances and at 7:31 am the all-clear message was given, so people felt safe and came out of their shelters and returned back to their work and normal routines. All of a sudden, a harsh whitish pink coloured light appeared in the sky along with an unnatural tremor and a suffocating wave of heat and wind which was so powerful that it carried off all that was in its way. In a few seconds, many people were killed and severely injured by the scorching heat. Walls, houses, trams, trains etc were lifted off and flung into the air. Animals met with the same fate as man. Trees and plants were burnt and left like dry straw on the ground. Most of the people inside the houses were killed and those who had managed to stay alive died a few days later or even a month later because of the delayed
Appreciating Prose 135 School of distance Education effects of the deadly gamma rays. The journalist stated that half an hour after this explosion, the sky around Hiroshima was still cloudless, but a rain began to fall on the town and went on for about five minutes. This was caused by the instant rise of overheated air which went to a great height, where it condensed and fell back in the form of rain. After this a violent wind came up and the fires grew rapidly as most Japanese houses were built out of wood and straw. This fire faded out only by evening and then went out completely as there was literally nothing left to burn. Hiroshima had died. All the Japanese could utter was the word ‘look’ and this word was spoken with an indescribable but constrained emotion. The entire town was wiped off and all that remained was a stony waste. As the journalist finished his account, they stepped out of the car they were travelling in and made their way through a dead city where not even an animal could be spotted. They go on to meet Professor Tsusuki who was one of the best surgeons in Japan. He led the way and spoke loudly so the whole group could hear him clearly. The words that came out of his mouth were unconnected as it was driven by deep emotion. He said, “We must open
Appreciating Prose 136 School of distance Education our minds... we must try to understand everything.” He then pointed to the remainders of a base wall and said that it was once a hospital with two hundred beds, eight doctors and twenty nurses but now all of them, including the patients, had been killed by the atomic power. He then says, “That’s what an atomic bomb does...”
A few days before Marcel Junod left Tokyo, he was informed that General MacArthur wished to receive the delegation of the International Red Cross. When the General received them in his office, he was wearing the normal service uniform of the U.S.Army and the only sign of his high rank were the five stars hung around each of his shoulder strap. In a casual and relaxed manner, he sat down with them, smoking his pipe and thanked them for the work they had done on behalf of the imprisoned Americans. But it was evident that he was not thinking merely about his own men but also of all those who had no other hope of assistance. Unexpectedly, here he speaks against his professional character, rejecting the use and application of force. And the General says that, “Even with our present weapons, not including those still to be
Appreciating Prose 137 School of distance Education developed, a new war would leave nothing behind worthy of mention.” And so Marcel Junod ends the essay raising questions on the future of mankind if another war takes place and the urgent need for saving mankind from itself. EXERCISES I. Answer the following in a sentence or two.
1. What was the only information given regarding the effect of atomic bombardment prior to the Hiroshima attack?
2. Why did the Japanese maintain silence regarding the disaster at the beginning?
3. What did Junod do after receiving the telegram from Dr. Bilfinger?
4. Who were the Japanese interpreters who accompanied Junos and the team?
II. Answer the following in a paragraph. 1. What was the content of the disjointed report sent by Bilfinger?
Appreciating Prose 138 School of distance Education 2. What were the details given by Miss Ito about Hiroshima?
3. How did General MacArthur, the chief architect of victory in the Pacific, react to the incident?
III. Write an essay on the following 1. Give an account of the devastating havoc created by the atomic bombing in Hiroshima.
Further Reading (As given in the text) Dr. Takashi Nagai : Letter from Nagasaki Dr. Tamiki Hara : Letter from Hiroshima
USHA JESUDASAN
Usha Jesudasan is a writer and journalist who spent much of her life working with the neglected and downtrodden people in order to bridge the gap between people, cultures and faiths. She has also travelled extensively, especially Western Europe, researching and working with people and children who are victims of violence. She has also authored books like “A Child’s Appreciating Prose 139 School of distance Education Path”, “I will Lie Down in Peace”, “Being an Instrument of Peace”, “Brokeness” etc. Some of her articles include “An Act of Discovery”, “The Ahimsa Way”, “Mind Matters” etc.
JUSTICE VERSUS MERCY
Usha Jesudasan’s “Justice Versus Mercy” is an essay that deals with the conflict between justice and mercy using the story of Victor Hugo’s “Les Miserables”. Through the essay, Jesudasan attempts to bring out the need for mercy to be incorporated or blended with justice, especially where the poor and powerless are concerned. Hugo uses his novel, Les Miserables to condemn the unjust class-cased structure of 19th Century France. He exposes how it is the society’s structure that turns good, innocent people into beggars and criminals. In Les Miserables, the central character, Valjean transformed from a hate-filled criminal into a well-respected Mayor and philanthropist only because of the love and mercy he received from the Bishop.
Appreciating Prose 140 School of distance Education Usha Jesudasan begins the essay by pointing out that justice and mercy are twin concepts that have been explored in both life as well as in literature. She then raises important questions on what mercy and justice actually are and what their scope is. Jesudasan states that these twin themes have been explored and revealed in their real form in Victor Hugo’s novel, Les Miserables. She feels that Hugo also gives us space to express our own thoughts and doubts regarding these two concepts (i.e., justice and mercy). Jesudasan then goes on to narrate a gist of the story of Hugo’s Les Miserables. It is a story of a young, unemployed peasant named Jean Valjean who was sent to prison for stealing a loaf of bread for his sister and her seven starving children. As he attempted to escape from prison several times, his sentence was extended to 19 years. He finally does manage to get out of prison and he seeks food and shelter at a Bishop’s house. Out of his frustration and anger towards the privileged of the society, he steals the Bishop’s silver candlestick and runs off. But he is caught by the police and brought back to the Bishop. However, unexpectedly, the Bishop rescues him by
Appreciating Prose 141 School of distance Education saying that Valjean was a friend and that the Bishop himself had given the silver candlestick to him. Though the policeman (Javert) doesn’t believe this, he is forced to let go of Valjean. This incident changes Valjean into a better, hard working and committed person who goes on to become the Mayor of a town (after changing his original name). But Javert, the policeman, hunts him down and exposes him but Valjean somehow manages to escape. But Valjean is then forced to live a life of constant fear of being caught again and being sent back to prison. Javert continues to spend all his time trying to hunt down Valjean and take him back to prison for his theft and for taking up a false identity. All his life, Javert continues to pursue Valjean and when finally one day Valjean gets a chance to kill Javert, he decides to forgive him and he puts aside his feelings of bitterness and spares the one who harmed and hurt his life so much.Now, Javert, being an upright and just man, wants no favours from a thief and so he kills himself.
Usha Jesudasan uses this story to raise questions on who exactly is right or wrong. Javert’s attitude and
Appreciating Prose 142 School of distance Education notions of right and wrong are quite straightforward. He believed that if a person commits a crime, then he should pay for it. In the Bishops point of view, the Bishop believed more in mercy to change a person rather than punishing and further derogating a person. Jesudasan points out that some of us can easily relate with Javert (who stands for fairness and justice), while some others can easily identify with the Bishop (who stands for mercy). So should evil be condemned and rooted out before it destroys the society or shouldn't Valjean have been given a second chance after being punished with 19 years of imprisonment for stealing a loaf of bread for starving family members? This conflict between justice and mercy keeps on repeating itself in real life also. She sheds light on the fact that it is usually the innocent victims of social and economic injustice who suffer in the name of justice, while the real perpetrators escape due to their wealth, power or fame. She then ends the essay by asking how one reacts to being forgiven. Does it hurt your ego or make you feel ashamed like Javert? Or do you gradually destroy yourself because of your pride and self
Appreciating Prose 143 School of distance Education esteem? Or does it have the ability to change your life for the better like in the case of Valjean?
EXERCISES I. Answer the following in one or two sentences
1. Who is the author of Les Miserables?
2. How long was Jean Valjean in prison and why was he in prison?
3. What tempted Valjean to steal the silver candlestick from the Bishop house?
4. Why did Valjean decide to forgive and spare Javert?
II. Answer the following in a paragraph 1. Do you think Javert is justified in going to such lengths to pursue Jean Valjean? Why?
2. Briefly describe the incident that led to the transformation of Jean Valjean.
3. Why do you think Javert committed suicide?
Appreciating Prose 144 School of distance Education 4. In what way does Les Miserables reflect a Christian parable?
III. Write an essay on the following 1. How does Les Miserables illustrate that people are warped by an unjust social system?
2. What is Hugo’s perspective on Justice? How is it similar to and different from the legal definition of justice? Are there characters that embody these differing ideas of what justice means?
Activity Compare Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables and Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace.
References Abrahams M. H A glossary of Literary Terms. 7th ed. Boston: Heile&Heinle, 1999. Print. Albert Edward . History of English Literature, Fifth Edition, Oxford University Press,2000. Print
Appreciating Prose 145 School of distance Education Nayar M G (ed.) A Galaxy of English Essayists, McMillian India Limited, 1986. 2nd Edition. Print.
E- Sources www.britannica.com/art/English-literature/Prose www.users.bergen.org/raybat/prose.html www.scribd.com/document/261276935/Understanding - Prose-IGNOU www.britannica.com/art/English -literature/The -lyric www.britannica.com/art/English-literature /Later-Middle -English -Prose.html www.francis-bacon.com www.chesterton.com www.Britannica.com,art/biography/Albert-Camus www.Charles LambSociety.com www.ushajesudasan.com
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