In reaction to a rigid, overrefined classical curriculum, some educational philosophers have swung sharply to an espousal of “life experience” as the sole source of learning. Using their narrow interpretation of John Dewey’s theories for support and sp
In reaction to a rigid, overrefined classical curriculum, some educational philosophers have swung sharply to an espousal of “life experience” as the sole source of learning. Using their narrow interpretation of John Dewey’s theories for support and spouting such phrases as “Teach the child, not the subject,” they demand an end to rigorous study and insist that only through doing can learning take place. While not all adherents to this philosophy would totally eliminate the study of great books, the gradual subordination of literature in the school curriculum reflects their influence.
What is the purpose of literature? Why read if life alone is to be our teacher? James Joyce tells us that the artist reveals the human condition by re-creating life out of life; Aristotle, that art presents universal truths because its form is taken from nature. Thus, consciously or otherwise, great writers extend our understanding of ourselves and our world. We can soar with them to the heights of aspiration or plummet with them to the depths of despair. How much wider is the understanding we gain from reading than from viewing life through the keyhole of our individual experience.
This function of literature, the enlarging of our life sphere, is of major importance in itself. Additionally, however, literature suggests solutions to social problems. The overweening ambitions of political leaders—and their sneering contempt for the law—did not appear for the first time in the writings of Bernstein and Woodward. The problems and behavior of the guilt-ridden did not await the appearance of the bearded psychoanalysts of the nineteenth century.
Federal Judge Learned Hand wrote, “I venture to believe that it is as important to a judge called upon to pass on a question of constitutional law, to have a