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PARTISAN REVIEW
self, and does not inevitably reinforce the ego's old refrain (reader–
response) or undermine its very existence (decomposition). I believe,
and believe I could demonstrate, that nonartistic experiences do not
provide this release from the confines of self with an intensity compa–
rable to that afforded by works of art and literature.
The most troubling and potentially controversial issue raised by
the teaching of literature lurks constantly in the background of Donald
Marshall's essay and never comes out into the open. All parties to the
activity-students, teachers, parents, society in general-tacitly assume
that the reading of literary masterpieces will contribute to the forma–
tion of character. We even take for granted that the curious professional
rituals of earning a teaching certificate or a Ph.D. in literature-rituals
that include no examination of a candidate's personal life, no rigorous
physical or moral discipline, no period of vigil and prayer, no syste–
matic self-appraisal or self-analysis-qualify a set of certified persons
to speak with authority in the classroom about character and moral
choices in works of literature. And what students hear about the moral
stature of Hamlet or Faust or Tom Sawyer presumably makes a
difference
to
their lives.
At the same time we literary types-critics and teachers-have
helped to establish a complementary principle that has now survived
I"
most legal tests: namely, that the forms of pornography do not incite
to
crime, are not demonstrably pernicious for adults, and have a right to
be published and sold. However, if we believe that pornography does
not corrupt, how far can we consistently argue that the humanities
humanize? How real is the dilemma?
A discussion of teaching literature in the eighties, or at any time,
cries out for an examination of how the surrogate domain of literature
permits a form of moral exploration or experiment within the life of
.I
the imagination, and then directs that fragile process back
to
our own
r
existence. Sensitivity to persons and language, to place and time; the
ability to suspend habits of thought in order
to
inspect and modify
them; an awareness of the temptation
to
break conventions and
continuities capriciously or willfully-all these items are at stake in the
study of literature. Within the special experimental environment of the
classroom, the interpretation of literary texts confronts us constantly
with questions of character and morality. Eventually those discussions
impinge on our behavior in facing the searing crises of being ourselves.
All the formal and sty
I
istic mastery of
Madame Bovary
or
Ulysses
does
not remove them from this personal context.
Donald Marshall 's paper argues cogently that good books need not
