L09-04-14-14-252

1. L09-04-14-14-252 Announcements: Email? Are you all getting messages from me? From Belinda? The email from me on Saturday, details changes in the schedule, including an additional week on Jane Eyre, to prepare you to write the first assignment. There will also be a memo on guidelines for discussion section presentations: watch for it in the next two days. Here’s the outline of the changes. 4-18:  Assignment 1 distributed  (due two weeks later) (on Jane Eyre)4-21: Start The Portrait of a Lady5-2:  Assignment 1 due5-7: Start The Book of Laughter and Forgetting5-10:  Assignment 2 distributed    (on Portrait of a Lady)5-24: Assignment 2 due5-26: Start Foe5-28: Assignment 3 distributed  (on Book of Laughter and Forgetting)6-7: Assignment 3 due A reminder that there is a final exam, on Foe: in class, no notes or texts, no electronic devices. Two other matters: First, it is my practice to invite all member of my classes to our house for dinner before the end of the term. The clearest day for me is SATURDAY, MAY 10, 6-8 PM. You may bring friends, partners; nothing more: come hungry. ALSO, I am circulating today and tomorrow a sign up sheet for conferences with me, in the HUB (ground floor, mezzanine), two or three at a time.

2. Moral perplexity A little background: I cancelled the distribution of the first assignment until the end of the week for one overriding reason: there’s no surprise in students finding this novel perplexing, particularly on axiological (i.e. value) grounds: who are the good guys, who’s bad, and how can one sort it out in a narrative this tricky. The surprise for me was how the difficulty seems to be taking shape. If the misunderstanding of the distinction between mores (the values of a community) and ethos (the character of the individual) is as fundamental as it has seemed to me, then it’s fairly clear that I need to be clearer, and more responsive to the actual difficulties this novel may present to you. Hence, the plan to meet with all of you: you’ll find it considerably different from merely listening to me in a cavernous room. But, a story (or two) in a minute: Peter Matthiesson’s At Play in the Fields of the Lord, a 1991 movie based on the 1965 novel. And King Lear. Illustration of the principle that “THINK” means “PAIN and TROUBLE”

3. The Sunday papers. . . Were, as usual, full to the margins with articles about the dreadful plight of education: South Carolina “science test” (next slide), “How to raise a Moral Child” (dreadful: teach them guilt), a whole NY Times section on the catastrophes and muddles of “need” in financial aid, a syndicated story about the problems of getting good advice about how to get into college, a puff piece showing that overall, college of education graduates (our elementary and secondary school teachers) have an aggregate score of 106 (along with social workers 103), and school counselors (105) ) are near the bottom in reported college IQ scores (scary close to the national average of 97 –that’s within the margin of error). . . And then, a Chronicle of Higher Education piece on the crisis of “mediocre teaching” in college. (And today, NY Times, “The College Faculty Crisis.”) All against a full decade of hand wringing that college students come to college thinking that they know how to write, only to find, in shock and dismay, that maybe ‘not so much’, and get even more complaints on sloppy thinking, flat on innovative potential, dismal performance, scoring below half the world on standardized tests, know virtually no history, can’t handle math, are put off by science, and are bored to tears by literature, language, etc. Think computer science and business might be cool, but can’t do the first and can’t stand the second. And are not ready to take jobs in the ‘real world’—even as they seem prepared to lie, cheat, steal, and climb over the bodies of their contemporaries with crampons and cleats in order to get into the ‘prestige’ universities—on the bizarre belief that that will land them in good paying careers. Also, a side bar on one of these dismal stories about the UW having fallen in the prestige sweepstakes to #46 (down 4 places, I think) Meanwhile, grade inflation has emptied out any meaning in grades as such. Shit. This is Not a Good Story. And you guys have been hearing it pretty much all your lives, it appears. What do YOU think???

4. Contemporary pain & trouble: EDUCATION

5. Reading &Moral certainty In reading, you are invited not only by a structure of suspense, but the concomitant expectation of moral meaning. What happens if you cannot figure out who are the good guys and the bad guys? At Play King Lear What kind of problem is this? Teen novels, fantasy and sci-fi, adventure, video games, zombies, aliens: The common element is certain moral categories, never mind the fact that the ‘good’ guys are, by and large, cold blooded murderers. They are getting the bad guys, for real, which makes me feel so good. Just cut off their heads, shoot them in the face, take out the whole evil squadron with a magical machine gun (no recoil, no tears, no blood spatters on your new shirt)

6. A crucial point, misunderstood Morals and Ethics The mores of a community comprise a sensus communis, the aggregate sense of the community, which reflects commonplace beliefs and practices which are almost never the subject of thought. They are just “standards” that you “supposed to” obey. Ethics, etymologically, means character, and the difference is that it takes an ethical agent to evaluate the mores of the community. That everyone agrees does not make it right. Our MORAL SENSE is a convenient way to refer to the problem of making moral judgments, and it takes serious thinking, not just the formulation of an opinion. The FUNCTIONAL DIMENSION OF LITERATURE IS MORAL REASONING.

7. Kant, from Critique of the Power of Judgment • The following maxims of the common human understanding . . ., can . . . serve to elucidate [the] fundamental principles [of reflective judgment. ]They are the following: • 1. To think for oneself; • 2. To think in the position of everyone else; • 3. Always to think in accord with oneself. • The first is the maxim of the unprejudiced way of thinking, • the second of the broad-minded way, • the third that of the consistent way. • The first is the maxim of a reason that is never passive. The tendency toward the latter, hence toward heteronomy of reason, is called prejudice; and the greatest prejudice of all is that of representing reason as if it were not subject to the rules of nature on which the understanding grounds it by means of its own essential law i.e., superstition. • Liberation from superstition is called enlightenment,* since, although this designation is also applied to liberation from prejudices in general, it is [5: 294] superstition above all (in sensu eminenti) that deserves to be called a prejudice, since the blindness to which superstition leads, which indeed it even demands as an obligation, is what makes most evident the need to be led by others, hence the condition of a passive reason. • As far as the second maxim of the way of thinking is concerned, we are accustomed to calling someone limited (narrow-minded, in contrast to broad-minded) whose talents do not suffice for any great employment (especially if it is intensive).

8. Kant: What is Orientation in Thinking :apply these principles in reading “However exalted the application of our concepts, and however far up from sensibility we may abstract them, still they will always be appended to image representations, whose proper function is to make these concepts, which are not otherwise derived from experience, serviceable for experiential use. For how would we procure sense and significance for our concepts if we did not underpin them with some intuition (which ultimately must always be an example from some possible experience)? If from this concrete act of the understanding we leave out the association of the image - in the first place an accidental perception through the senses then what is left over is the pure concept of understanding, whose range is now enlarged and contains a rule for thinking in general.” • If the orientation is skewed, you cannot make your thought apply to experience, and you will not find your way.

9. What about Jane Eyre Is she good? Criminal? How do you decide? Character by character, you need to make a judgment, not by what you have been taught was good, but what you can affirm really to be so THAT MEANS A SIMPLE ONE WORD RESPONSE IS RADICALLY INADEQUATE, EVERY TIME. Mrs. Reed, John Reed, Georgiana, Eliza Mr. Brocklehurst Miss Temple Helen Burns Mrs. Fairfax ROCHESTER St. John Rivers Moral ambiguities everywhere This Is where exact reading is needed

10. The three principles Think for yourself. Think in the position of everyone else. Think consistently. The practical dimension is that you can make this novel applicable to yourself. There’s nothing here of moral black and white: no monsters, thrones, angels or spooks (except in a child’s mind), but people, with generally ordinary histories. To make an ANSWERABLE argument requires that you take seriously what you assert as something to which you actually and seriously assent. To make an UNPREJUDICED argument, you have to consider the point of view of the other. And to make a COMPELLING argument, you have to be consistent, including counter arguments to your own claim.

11. The idea of Speaking • Background: I must speak, she is directed to speak, she holds back. • P 124 ff. • The exchanges

12. Rochester, p. 124 • "Ah! well, come forward; be seated here." He drew a chair near his own. "I am not fond of the prattle of children," he continued; "for, old bachelor as I am, I have no pleasant associations connected with their lisp. It would be intolerable to me to pass a whole evening tete-a-tete with a brat. Don't draw that chair farther off, Miss Eyre; sit down exactly where I placed it–if you please, that is. Confound these civilities! I continually forget them. Nor do I particularly affect simple-minded old ladies. By-the-bye, I must have mine in mind; it won't do to neglect her; she is a Fairfax, or wed to one; and blood is said to be thicker than water.“ • What do YOU think? What does Jane make of this?

13. 125 • "You examine me, Miss Eyre," said he: "do you think me handsome?" • I should, if I had deliberated, have replied to this question by something conventionally vague and polite; but the answer somehow slipped from my tongue before I was aware–"No, sir." • "Ah! By my word! there is something singular about you," said he: "you have the air of a little nonnette; quaint, quiet, grave, and simple, as you sit with your hands before you, and your eyes generally bent on the carpet (except, by-the-bye, when they are directed piercingly to my face; as just now, for instance); and when one asks you a question, or makes a remark to which you are obliged to reply, you rap out a round rejoinder, which, if not blunt, is at least brusque. What do you mean by it?" • "Sir, I was too plain; I beg your pardon. I ought to have replied that it was not easy to give an impromptu answer to a question about appearances; that tastes mostly differ; and that beauty is of little consequence, or something of that sort." • "You ought to have replied no such thing. Beauty of little consequence, indeed! And so, under pretence of softening the previous outrage, of stroking and soothing me into placidity, you stick a sly penknife under my ear! Go on: what fault do you find with me, pray? I suppose I have all my limbs and all my features like any other man?" • "Mr. Rochester, allow me to disown my first answer: I intended no pointed repartee: it was only a blunder." • "Just so: I think so: and you shall be answerable for it. Criticise me: does my forehead not please you?" • He lifted up the sable waves of hair which lay horizontally over his brow, and showed a solid enough mass of intellectual organs, but an abrupt deficiency where the suave sign of benevolence should have risen. • "Now, ma'am, am I a fool?" • "Far from it, sir. You would, perhaps, think me rude if I inquired in return whether you are a philanthropist?"

14. Transition to reformations • "There again! Another stick of the penknife, when she pretended to pat my head: and that is because I said I did not like the society of children and old women (low be it spoken!). No, young lady, I am not a general philanthropist; but I bear a conscience;" and he pointed to the prominences which are said to indicate that faculty, and which, fortunately for him, were sufficiently conspicuous; giving, indeed, a marked breadth to the upper part of his head: "and, besides, I once had a kind of rude tenderness of heart. When I was as old as you, I was a feeling fellow enough, partial to the unfledged, unfostered, and unlucky; but Fortune has knocked me about since: she has even kneaded me with her knuckles, and now I flatter myself I am hard and tough as an India-rubber ball; pervious, though, through a chink or two still, and with one sentient point in the middle of the lump. Yes: does that leave hope for me?" • "Hope of what, sir?" • "Of my final re-transformation from India-rubber back to flesh?" • "Decidedly he has had too much wine," I thought; and I did not know what answer to make to his queer question: how could I tell whether he was capable of being re-transformed?

15. The IDEA of speech takes shape • . It would please me now to draw you out–to learn more of you–therefore speak." • Instead of speaking, I smiled; and not a very complacent or submissive smile either. • "Speak," he urged. • "What about, sir?" • "Whatever you like. I leave both the choice of subject and the manner of treating it entirely to yourself." • Accordingly I sat and said nothing: "If he expects me to talk for the mere sake of talking and showing off, he will find he has addressed himself to the wrong person," I thought. • "You are dumb, Miss Eyre." • I was dumb still. He bent his head a little towards me, and with a single hasty glance seemed to dive into my eyes. • "Stubborn?" he said, "and annoyed. Ah! it is consistent. I put my request in an absurd, almost insolent form. Miss Eyre, I beg your pardon. The fact is, once for all, I don't wish to treat you like an inferior: that is" (correcting himself), "I claim only such superiority as must result from twenty years' difference in age and a century's advance in experience. This is legitimate, et j'y tiens, as Adele would say; and it is by virtue of this superiority, and this alone, that I desire you to have the goodness to talk to me a little now, and divert my thoughts, which are galled with dwelling on one point–cankering as a rusty nail." • THERE IS A STORY THERE, and she has to LISTEN, TO ATTEND, IN ORDER TO GET TO IT.