The Emerging Scholars Blog

How well does film convey material from classic literature? Can film be used to introduce a book and draw people into reading or does it stall the imagination, even inoculate against digging into the original text?  Any classroom or personal experience(s) to share?

What brings the question to mind? The recent release of the trailer for Tim Burton giving a stab at Alice in Wonderland (2010) with Johnny Depp (Mad Hatter), Anne Hathaway (White Queen), Helena Bonham Carter (Red Queen) and Mia Wasikowska (Alice). With my 9 year old twins, I’d be Mad as a Hatter to introduce Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland w/this rendering of the classic tale,* but if I was a college professor hoping to stir interest in literature?  Hmm. …

*I’m not text only, I confess to enjoying a conversation regarding the value of John Tenniel’s illustrations ;-)

In my post last week about advice for undergraduates, Katie Weakland shared a comment that I thought was particularly apt:

I suggest meeting your major professors early in your career – your first semester – and asking them to mentor you and/or let you do research with them. The early you can get your feet wet with research the better. I also suggest reading the primary literature in your field as soon as possible.

Meeting your professors and starting research early are both very important (I have stories I could share for each), but for the moment, I’m going to focus on primary literature. Read the rest of this entry »

I feel I am closest to God when writing. You’re singing praises. You’re describing the world, as it is. And even if the passages turn out sordid or depressing, there’s something holy about the truth — John Updike, commenting when interviewed for NPR’s ‘Tell Me A Story,’ as reflected upon by the host, Marjorie Leet Ford, March 31, 2003.*

Over breakfast this morning, I read the NY Times article A Relentless Updike Mapped America’s Mysteries.  In addition, I watched the brief, but stimulating October 2008 interview of John Updike (1932-2009) focused upon the craft of fiction and the art of writing.  Hungry for more, I watched the A Life in Letters Interview. ** With regard to both pieces, I was struck by the wisdom of this 76 year old from central Pennsylvania (who moved north for a Harvard education and continued in suburban Massachusetts for writing and family life).  As for Updike’s Tour of Protestantism, I found a helpful piece in Religion & Ethics Newsweekly’s report on his 2004 presentation at the Center for Religious Inquiry, St. Bartholomew’s Church, New York City.

Any Updike fans/experts have thoughts to share regarding the film version of “The Witches of Eastwick” (1987) versus his 1984 book, his range of writing, his characters, his themes (and the research involved in them), his life, his faith?  I must confess that I’m not very familiar with Updike and would love to learn more.  Teach me. Read the rest of this entry »

ESN member Madelaine Hron, assistant professor in the Department of English and Film at Wilfrid Lauriern University (Waterloo, Ontario, Canada), just announced the release of Translating Pain: Immigrant Suffering in Literature & Culture (University of Toronto Press, February 12, 2009).

The book cover, the book title, and previous conversations with the author (extending back to her 2004-2005 post-doc at Carnegie Mellon University), led me to ask her whether she would be willing to share about her work with ESN.  Madelaine quickly responded by passing along the below summary and commenting that she would be happy to answer any questions folks may have regarding her new book. So if you have questions, post them.  Also, if you’d have interest in an on-line ESN reading group, let me know.  Note to faculty:  you might consider ordering it as an academic resource.

Translating Pain: Immigrant Suffering in Literature & Culture

In the post–Cold War, post–9/11 era, the immigrant experience has changed dramatically. Despite the recent successes of immigrant and world literatures, there has been little scholarship on how the hardships of immigration are conveyed in immigrant narratives. Translating Pain fills this gap by examining literature from Muslim North Africa, the Caribbean, and Eastern Europe to reveal the representation of immigrant suffering in fiction.

Applying immigrant psychology to literary analysis, Madelaine Hron examines the ways in which different forms of physical and psychological pain are expressed in a wide variety of texts. She juxtaposes post-colonial and post-communist concerns about immigration, and contrasts Muslim world views with those of Caribbean creolité and post–Cold War ethics. Demonstrating how pain is translated into literature, she explores the ways in which it also shapes narrative, culture, history, and politics.

A compelling and accessible study, Translating Pain is a groundbreaking work of literary and postcolonial studies. Read the rest of this entry »

Today is John Milton’s 400th birthday – or, rather, would have been. If you choose to celebrate this occasion, you can visit the John Milton Reading Room at Dartmouth, which contains ALL of Milton’s poetry (in English, Italian, Latin, and Greek) and selections from his prose, along with annotations.

(HT: The Wired Campus)

Faith and Culture Devotional

New from Zondervan, A Faith and Culture Devotional
seems custom-made for ESN members. Edited by Kelly Monroe Kullberg (of the Veritas Forum, Finding God at Harvard, Finding God Beyond Harvard, and, most recently, InterVarsity’s Women in the Academy and Professions) and Lael Arrington (host of the radio show “The Things That Matter Most”), the devotional is designed to be read daily for 15 weeks. Each week, there is one reading from seven different subject areas: theology, history, philosophy, science, literature, arts, and contemporary culture.

If that doesn’t interest you, here are some of the authors of those daily readings: Read the rest of this entry »

Over at Books & Culture, Karl W. Giberson reviews The Oxford Book of Modern Science Writing, edited by (in Gilberson’s phrase) “that arch-villain Richard Dawkins.” Gilberson is being cheeky, and he notes that, in this volume, Dawkins’ love for science and skill as a writer and editor shines through. Gilberson notes that Dawkins “is exceptional in being a member of Britain’s most élite scientific and literary societies, the Royal Society and the Royal Society of Literature.”

The review is worth reading. I, for one, love a good piece of science writing. But Gilberson raises a good question:

Literature—plays, essays, screenplays for movies, novels, nonfiction—has to be about something. “Literature” has no natural content any more than sentences have natural meaning. So why isn’t there more “science” in literature? Science transforms both our world and our worldview, and yet a solid work of literature is more likely to be about an alcoholic than a scientist.

‘Twas not always so. I still remember vividly being introduced – really introduced – to John Donne and his great poem, “A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning,” which was written to his pregnant wife as he was about to leave for an overseas journey. The time being 1611, and both travel and childbirth being much more dangerous then than now, Donne and his wife had little assurance of seeing each other again. (Indeed, their child was born stillborn while Donne was gone.) Donne’s imagery to comfort his wife was taken directly from science and engineering: metallurgy, draftsmanship, geometry.

Our two souls, therefore, which are one,
    Though I must go, endure not yet
A breach, but an expansion,
    Like gold to airy thinness beat.

If they be two, they are two so
    As stiff twin compasses are two;
Thy soul, the fixed foot, makes no show
    To move, but doth, if th’ other do.

And though it in the center sit,
    Yet when the other far doth roam,
It leans and hearkens after it,
    And grows erect, as that comes home.