Hi Osman,
That's no problem Callum! I have to say that Robert Browning doesn't appeal to me much though! It must be an 'English teacher' thing.
Maybe so. To be honest, I'm not usually that keen on most 19th-century literature; there's always something twee about a lot of it. I particularly liked 'My Last Duchess', though, because of the way that we are suddenly introduced to this strange character with no background, and we have to look for nuances of language to work out exactly what's going on. It's like a puzzle, and Ferrara's crime is only revealed with very close reading. I love that sort of thing - it's why James Joyce is my favourite writer!
What do you think of Far from the Madding Crowd by Thomas Hardy? We're studying it now.
I'm not very keen on Thomas Hardy either - scandalous for an English teacher, I know! Having said that, his poetry is very good, but I find his novels very bleak. There's nothing wrong with being bleak, of course, but in the context of a chunky novel it's easy to feel overwhelmed by it.
Do you suggest we try to interpret things word-for-word when reading pre-1914 prose or just to get the gist of what's going on?
It depends how deeply you want to get into the book. When I read older literature I always want to know exactly what every word means, so I would recommend you try to do that. Feel free to show me some example sentences if you're having difficulty.
Also, do you know why the exam boards are so insistent on us doing pre-1914 poetry and prose? Why must it still apply to everyone in the twenty-first century?
It's partly to introduce you to the massive cultural heritage of English literature, and partly to show the enormous variety of tone, register and expression that's possible with the language. By the end of an English course, you should have a general impression of how the language has grown and developed. Also, unusual words and expressions can be very interesting, don't you think? For example, in the fourteenth century, the word 'also' was quite new. The word you'd find in its place more often is, wait for it, 'eek'! What a wonderful word!
Hi Muhammad,
I just wanted to ask why poets sometimes write certain words with apostraphes, for example mock'd instead of mocked, and shatter'd instead of shattered. Is this simply the style of old poetry?
Khaldun is right - this is called elision. Here's the reason for it: Before the 20th century, with a word like 'looked', you'd have a choice as to how to pronounce it, with one syllable, as we do now, or two (look-ed). In poetry, the number of syllables in a line is often very important in order to maintain a particular rhythm, so by eliding the word (making it shorter), the poet is making it clear how to pronounce it to give the intended rhythm. Conversely, if the poet wants the word to be pronounced with two syllables, you will see an accent over the 'e' to indicate this.
I hope that makes sense!
Peace
eace:
