Category Archives: Words Words Words

Losing Literacy

My poor book club witnessed a wide range of my emotions last night, from despair through righteous fury in our discussion of Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451 last night. We talked for quite a while about a society that is losing its ability to read (one theory that arose was connected to scientific tests being done which are suggesting that the physical act of reading text is an increasing effort for the evolving human brain, as opposed to pictograms or other forms of communication, which was quite interesting). Naturally, that led to talking about the educational system repeatedly dropping its standards. Education is expensive; failing a student means you have to pay for a year of that student’s education twice; and heaven forbid we discourage their efforts by negative reinforcement. No, no, we must empower them instead by passing them despite their lack of skills necessary to acquiring the next set of skills, which in turn undermines the next level, and so forth. Why is it a crime to do this with faulty screws on an assembly line of, say, airplane engines, but not with the human mind in an educational system?

Today I discovered an article in the Times Online (that’s the UK times, not the NY Times) that addresses the same problem. The author of the piece had agreed to teach a journalism course, and began by asking the students which news programmes they watched. They couldn’t answer. Nor could they name newspapers that they read regularly. These were journalism students, who should be studying the medium to which they aspire. Or, if not studying, then at least aware of, exposed to. One assumes that they must have heard about journalism somewhere!

Was it not reasonable to expect undergraduates who had signed up for a three-year media degree (encompassing subjects ranging from print journalism and website design to video production and broadcast news) to have more than a passing interest in the news agenda?

Apparently, yes.

�Many of the students I teach have basic language and writing problems which have not been addressed at school or by the university,� says a lecturer in broadcast journalism at another university.

Foreign students paying to attend media courses are being misled by universities, says the departmental head, who is obliged to take a significant percentage of them each year. �In my view, universities that take students who don�t speak English to a good standard are taking money under false pretences,� he says.

Foreign students? At least they have the excuse of a language barrier. How about the local students who can’t write an essay, because they’ve never been taught how, in all their years of schooling?

An interesting point came up in the discussion last night. Once education became compulsory, it began communicating ideas and analytical methods to more people than ever before. Suddenly there were more educated people, bending class boundaries, flooding professional career positions. In the last quarter of the twentieth century, educational standards have been lowered alarmingly, perhaps in response to that flood of educated persons. Is society top-heavy with thinkers, who can so easily become agitators? The paranoid side of me which reads too much science fiction and dystopic novels wonders if the lowest common denominator has become the measuring stick for us all in order to keep better control over society. The point was made last night that time and again in various societies, the intelligensia has become the ruling class, and anyone of promise is usually plucked out of the masses to either be locked away, terminated, or to become part of the system of government. Which means, as soon as a government educates its citizens, they are in immediate danger. (And you may choose who I mean by �they� � the government, or the people it has educated. Or both.)

Bleak.

It returns to the question which crops up every once in a while: what purpose do artists serve? The philosophers, the writers, the painters – what function do they serve in society? Granted, yes, entertainment is one of their functions, but by no means their primary one. Artists are the conscience of a culture; they question, they compare, they cast issues in a different light, they challenge and they overturn… so long as they are free to do so.

Creative writers enjoyed great prestige in both the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union because of literature’s unique role as a sounding board for deeper political and social issues. Vladimir Lenin believed that literature and art could be exploited for ideological and political as well as educational purposes. As a result, the party rapidly established control over print and electronic media, book publishing and distribution, bookstores and libraries, and it created or abolished newspapers and periodicals at will. – from the Library of Congress’ Russian Archives: Attacks on Intelligensia: Censorship

With the intelligensia on your side, your regime will be quickly accepted. Having artists on staff (or the patrons who fund that art on your side) to uphold the current status quo is a clever move. It leaves the artist open to accusations of not producing “real” art, however – art produced freely and without allegiance. Defining that state is problematic, as artists throughout the ages are usually at the mercy of some sort of patron, or at least those clients for whom s/he produces work. Ideally, however, freed of the capitalist imperative (ha ha ha), an artist has the right � perhaps even the duty � to respond to the ideas of the day, to discuss, to question, and to push the envelope ever further. Building a better mousetrap may have gotten us to where we are today technologically, but it has been the philosophers who have made us, morally and ethically, the thinking and feeling human beings we are presently. (Interestingly enough, they used to be one and the same. Leonardo da Vinci, anyone?)

So where are today’s artists? The one who are to serve as our moral compasses? Probably at the bottom of a slush pile in a publisher’s office. Turned away from a film production company because their idea “just wouldn’t sell”. Check out this rant on the current state of art prostituting for the state entitled No Baudelaires in Babylon: Tom Bradley’s Comments at the Paris Sorbonne International Conference on Electronic Literature. Wicked and grating and not for the faint of heart.

Perhaps my frustration stems from the apparent devaluing of the intellectual aspect of our culture in favour of speed and efficiency. There must be some way the two can co-exist instead of one triumphing at the expense of the other. Maybe I�m too idealistic (as I was accused of being by one of my thesis examiners), but I believe that the solution lies in an equal attention to mind, body and soul. Capitalism doesn�t have to exist in an intellectual and aesthetic vacuum. I freely admit that new methods of communication and entertainment can have value; I just don�t think they should be replacing the older methods. Such a replacement limits access to the valuable older works (be they film, text, or musical), thereby cutting off generations from their heritage. Everyone should have access to the works of the world, modern and ancient, whether they want it or not. The option should exist.

See what happens? Give me free time and I get restless and start rabble-rousing, exhorting people to think. Next thing you know, I�ll vanish � for my own good, of course, and to keep the rest of you nice and safe�

A Positive EI Experience?

Well. That was anti-climactic.

I just came back from the EI office. Having heard horror stories, I was expecting a dark, crowded, dour office with hard wooden chairs and evil civil servants looking down their noses at me because I was no longer one of society’s beneficial contributors. Evidently, I read too much Dickens (or Lemony Snicket). Instead, I walked into a bright, open office, waited in a line of four people to get to the front desk, told the nice gentleman who served me in the language of my choice that I had applied on-line but was here to drop off my Record of Employment, where did I need to go? He smiled at me and said I didn’t need to go anywhere or see anyone, because he could take it. Seeing by the print-outs in my hand that I had obtained a confirmation number from the on-line application (I’m so prepared), he told me that I’d be receiving further instructions in the mail. I blinked, and said, “That’s all?” “Yes, he said, smiling again and holding out his hand for my ROE. “Can I just make a copy of this, then?” I said, still stunned. He even directed me to a (free) photocopier, then gestured me out of line again when I returned to take the ROE with another friendly smile.

And I walked out five minutes after I’d walked in. It would have been sooner if I’d thought ahead and had already made the copy of my ROE. My husband couldn’t stop shaking his head with a grin; he claims that the ease of the whole exercise further underscores the fact that this was the right decision.

Musical Voyeurism

And here I thought my migraines and backaches would be history once I stopped working. Apparently I live a rich fantasy life.

I’m lying in my bedroom working on my laptop. Usually I have music on, but right now there’s a saxophonist wandering through some pieces nearby. This is the sax player who completely enthralled me by playing “My Favourite Things” for twenty minutes last summer, arresting my motion as I swung into the bedroom with the intent to quickly grab a book.

There’s something particularly special about overhearing someone playing an instrument. Making music is such an intimate practice that listening in is a bit voyeuristic, in a way. Music has a different life if you’re aware that you have an audience; it becomes performance rather than an act of love, and while performance can be done lovingly it inevitably acquires a different dimension. Some might argue that it’s a necessary dimension – the old tree falling in a forest paradox. While performance adds spice to music, much the way an audience adds an essential element to a piece of theatre, I think that an audience of one – namely, the musician – can serve a more immediate purpose. The act of making music entails pulling emotion out of one’s soul and interpreting it through an instrument. That act of interpretation fulfils a desire within the musician whether anyone else is there or not – possibly in a purer fashion if they are alone, since there is no need to groom that emotion to present it to someone else. It’s music for the love of it, proven so by the fact that no audience is required.

Writing can be like that too. I know plenty of people who write to satisfy something inside them who, once a body of work is accomplished, quietly tuck it away somewhere. They feel no need to share the product; it was the act of putting thought to paper that satisfied some urge. I know others, of course, who seek to communicate to/with others via written word, and who have published, or who at the very least pass the writing on to someone else. The point is, the act can be done for the sake of the act itself.

I envy my saxophonist neighbour. Not just his (her?) talent and his technique, but his/her comfort in practicing with open windows. I cringe at the thought of anyone hearing me practice, to such an extent that my husband created a miniature practice room for me in our huge front hall closet in our last apartment. It was just big enough for me to sit in and have full bow arm extension in both directions, soundproofed with styrofoam and carpeting and yet I still was convinced that people could hear me. This terror of being overheard originates partially from my innate shyness, and partially from my first two years as a cellist in an apartment over a crusty elderly woman who complained if my cats ran up and down the hall.You can imagine her reaction when I practiced scales, or when a friend came over with her violin to play duets. Loud banging on my floor shattered whatever shreds of self-confidence I was struggling to establish, at a time when I was trying to figure out who I was, how to express myself as an individual, how to deal with being an adult learner with all the inhibitions that implies, and how to survive with my parents newly removed from the province. Reactions formed so early on have persisted throughout my eight years of cello-playing, which is one of the reasons why I love listening to this saxophone. Someone somewhere not only is comfortable enough to play without caring who hears, or who might complain, even if the same music is played for twenty minutes. The knowledge that someone that close to me (geographically, if not personally) is inspiring.

So, too, is my astonishing ability to play as much Bach as I have discovered I am capable of playing. A year ago, I was crushed at how poorly I played pieces I performed with capable technique when I was still studying with a teacher. Ten months of struggling in orchestra has restored much of the technique I’d thought lost. Which, of course, is one of the reasons I joined. That… and the ability to practice with less self-consciousness, as does that saxophone player nearby who will likely never know how happy s/he makes me, or what a wonderful example s/he sets me.

On Theatre

I picked up a terrific book yesterday called Standing Naked in the Wings, a collection of anecdotes and personal narratives of Canadian performers, mainly stage performers but also some TV and film actors. I’m enjoying it immensely. I’ve laughed out loud a few times, giggled until tears came to my eyes, and felt my throat swell shut in empathy once or twice, too. My favourite line so far:

The sword fights at Stratford are a basic part of mounting plays written in an era when homocide was a domestic art.

I adore the theatre. I love working in it (good thing, seeing as how I’ve been doing it for over seventeen years now), I love participating in an audience setting, I love reading about it. One of my best Christmas presents last year was a gift from my parents called Romancing the Bard: Stratford at Fifty, and there’s a book out called Stratford Gold which I’m dying to get (don’t worry, I abide by my own no-buying-gift-like-things-for-yourself-within-thirty-days-of-your-birthdate! rule). If I can’t be rehearsing or performing, then dash it all, I’ll read about other people rehearsing and performing!

Something that has really surfaced while I’ve been reading this anecdotal collection is the realisation that my past couple of turns with Lakeshore Light Opera haven’t satisfied me at all. I think perhaps it’s the extended rehearsal time (rehearsing for six months instead of two, you really lose the sense of focus and tension I feel is necessary to maintaining a good theatre product, I find, even though there’s music and choreography and stage direction to cobble together). It’s more than time to move on. However, I’ll do one last show, simply because I cannot pass up the potential opportunity to work with my adopted big/younger/twin brother Rob in a musical comedy one last time. (Besides, then I’ll have had a stab at pretty much the entire accepted Savoyard canon before I start repeating shows I’ve already done.) We’ll see what the gods grant us.

My parents, thank goodness, have supported me in this foolish and addictive pastime since I began, having been members on the tech crew of a community theatre group in the Maritimes before I was born. In fact, they go so far as to tell me that if I could only make money from it, they’d consider it a complete and total success. Anyone feel like ponying up to support me in my indulgent pursuit of a life on stage?

On Shakespeare And Words

The latest issue of The Economist reviews a book called Shakespeare’s Words: A Glossary & Language Companion by David and Ben Crystal, and the review begins thusly: “Although welcome as a magnificent tool, this doorstop compendium prompts an alarming question: has Shakespeare become a foreign language to us?”

I’m wildly vacillating between two extremes. On one hand, sure, modern English-speaking people don’t know enough about their own language to understand a lot of Shakespeare, which is lamentable. On the other, you don’t need to understand every word to understand the meaning. That’s why Shakespeare’s tucked into that little slot that’s marked “Genius”.

On the other other hand (let’s move down to feet, shall we?) I anticipate this new book with glee, word-lover that I am. One of the reasons I relish Shakespeare is because he uses so many different words. His vocabulary is delightfully varied, and if he didn’t have a word for something, he made it up. A goodly portion of our modern lexicon is derived from Shakespeare’s oeuvre.

Without further ado, check the review out. I hate the fact that people feel the need for a glossary to understand what someone is saying, when if they just listened and watched they’d get the gist of it, but even a glossary is preferable to rewriting a perfectly good piece of theatre. That, in my mind, is punishable by death. My back goes up every time someone suggests rewriting a line in a Savoy opera “because modern audiences don’t know the phrase”. Tough. The piece of theatre is a piece of history. Constantly updating it means you will lose the heart of it. Look at what happened to the Bible. Sure, King James brought the Bible to more people who hadn’t had previous access to it, but he rewrote and twisted meanings left, right and centre. (Incidentally, yes, that’s the same King James for whom Macbeth was written. He really had a thing about witches, didn’t he?) Rather than pandering (look! A Shakespearean word!) to the lowest common denominator, why not educate them instead by leaving the challenging reference as is and the LCD rising as a result?

Please note that by updating I don’t mean changing the setting, or performing the work in different costume. I think Baz Luhrmann’s Romeo and Juliet was brilliant, transmitting the truth of the piece to modern audiences while preserving the language – excellent proof that one doesn’t need to rewrite something to tell a story originally written in Elizabeth I’s reign. Luhrmann’s work made the point (and “o, excellent well” at that) that proved something which more high school English teachers should know by now: Shakespeare is meant to be watched, at the very least heard aloud, and not read. Updating, for me, means changing words, phrases, into what a modern interpeter thinks would be equivalent. It resembles translation in that a translator cannot translate word for word; s/he must search out equivalent idiom and translate meaning. I find it ludicrous that people think Shakespeare (let alone William Schwenk Gilbert) requires translation. Older texts such as works in Middle English? Well, we’re now getting to the point where our language has shifted so much over the last millennium that yes, an extensive glossary or a side-by-side translation is required for the lay reader when approaching works dating from 1240 CE like King Horn. Chaucer (d. 1400 CE) is iffy; but again, if read aloud, his works such as the mainstay Canterbury Tales make much more sense. Shakespeare is a mere four hundred years old. Language has not shifted so far in four centuries that a translation is required.

Is Shakespeare truly becoming more obscure, though?

It is sometimes assumed that it is only a question of time before Shakespeare becomes inaccessible. But does time come into it? As early as 1679, John Dryden was complaining that �the tongue is so much refined since Shakespeare’s time that many of his words are scarce intelligible, and his whole style is so pestered with figurative expressions that it is as affected as it is obscure.� Shakespeare’s 17th- and 18th-century adaptors blithely clarified him. In 1664, when William Davenant adapted �Macbeth�, the hero was made to say that his bloody hands would �add a tincture to/The sea.� Not until 1744 when Garrick, in part, restored the original, was Shakespeare’s �multitudinous seas incarnadine� heard again on stage. In fact, time may have helped. Modernism has made us more patient with obscurity. We rate suggestion more than clarity. When, for example, the horrified Claudio in �Measure for Measure� imagines himself dead and lying �in cold obstruction�, we relish the strange blockish mouthful before turning to the notes. -from The Economist review Fardels By Any Other Name

Indeed. Our society has this queer dual drive to honour the past (“it must be good, because it is old”, also known as nostalgia), and to remake everything in a contemporaneous fashion, bringing things up to speed to be as cutting-edge as possible. We outgrow and outstrip our own accomplishments of a mere decade ago; it’s little wonder that much of modern society considers four-hundred-year-old theatre no longer accessible. It requires time, and patience, and the willingness to luxuriate in language, something that many people have forgotten how to do in this microwave- and Internet-dominated world.

What has also killed Shakespeare in the twentieth-century is bad, bad theatre. Dreadful interpretations. Actors still being trained to strike a pose and declaim, as opposed to speaking the emotion implicit in the script. Poorly done theatre in an age where TV and movies distribute a permanent product to billions of people in almost no time at all has had an adverse affect on how historical theatre is perceived. A fleeting, brilliant piece of live theatre has more power and depth to it, yet because it is fleeting less people are exposed to it, changed by it. Twentieth and twenty-first century media has made possible the sharing of exquisitely crafted art, but it has also made possible the sharing of so much crap. Unfortunately, there’s more of the latter, overwhelming the art by sheer numbers.

Is there hope? You bet. So long as the world doesn’t decide to go the way of Ray Bradbury’s dystopic utopia in Fahrenheit 451 and destroy literature because each author says something different, thereby dividing the people who cannot rest peacefully is they do not all share the same unchallenged opinion. Personally, I’m hoping for a renaissance in the arts sometime soon. Then again, I’m one of those who thinks holding a tangible, bound book in my hands is infinitely preferable to scrolling through an e-book. Someday, I’ll probably become outdated too, and need to be brought up to speed – contemporised, for the lack of a better term. Until then, however, I’ll honour original works in their original forms as best I can.

Looming

Something in the back of my mind is panicking and saying, “I know I’ve forgotten something, I know I’ve forgotten something…”

I’m putting it down to not-working-panic hitting early.