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[Cole Parker]

For those who are interested, there's a new Orson Scott Card book out in paperback: Ender in Exile.

I've never read any of his stuff, but know there are folks here who enjoy his writing.

Consider this a public service announcement.

C

[EleCivil]

I took it out of the library a while back.

It was entertaining, but not at all what I was expecting. I'd thought it would be mostly about Ender's search for a new Formic homeworld, but a good two thirds of the book was about personality conflicts and relationships between passengers on his first relativistic, near-light speed trip to a human colony.

Now, that's fine with me, because I think OSC is at his best when he's writing about psychologically broken characters and their subtle power struggles, but if you're looking for sci-fi exploration, aliens, and colony planets, you'll be waiting a while.

Oh, and get ready for gratuitous Shakespeare references, 'cause a good fourth of this book revolves around the crew of a colony ship organizing a readers' theater performance of The Tempest. No, really.

Overall, I liked it for what it was, but I probably won't have the urge to read it again. And this is coming from a man who's read Ender's Game about 12 times, and the rest of the series at least 5 (yes, even those last few "A space wizard did it!" books that no one else seems to like).

And hey, since I'm here, I'll plug his books "Characters and Viewpoint" and "How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy." Both great books on writing, regardless of your genre of choice. I know they've probably been mentioned here before, but it's worth repeating.

[JamesSavik]

I can't wait to miss that one.

After reading much of his work- which has gay characters which earned him many gay fans, I feel really betrayed by OSC. I can't stand that Mormon mother....

[Redacted for reasons of decorum]

...hope that haggis chokes on his holy underwear since he has his head completely up his ass.

[Cole Parker]

As I started this, I can hijack it, can't I?

I'll take the silence as affirmation and continue.

E/C mentioned The Tempest. Ah, the memories. I was assigned to do a report on a Shakespeare play in 11th grade English. I chose The Tempest. I think I liked the name.

Then, I tried to read it. Man, was that a waste of time. Never have I tried to read such gibberish. It made no sense at all. It also turned me off from Shakespeare for life. Reading that was torture, and having to write a report on something I didn't have a clue about was even worse torture. This was before you could go on the Internet and search for The Tempest and get a synopsis in about three seconds flat. Of course, I waited till the day before the report was due to write it, and by then it was too late to go to the library and check out whether there were notes on the play in an encyclopedia. I was screwed.

I forget just what I did. I wrote something. I handed it it. I don't remember failing the course, so I must have survived it. I think I've purposely wiped the memories clean. I do remember vividly suffering through knowing I had to write a report and not having any idea what I was writing about.

Has anyone else read that play? Were they able to make heads or tails of it? All you saying yes, you're better men than I.

C

[The Pecman]

I think there are aspects of Card's work that are very good, but he's a lousy human being. His outspoken anti-gay comments make it hard for me to separate his writing from the man. Having said that: I very much enjoyed his book Characters and Viewpoint, which was very helpful to me in my own writing.

[DesDownunder]

Ah Cole, you were the victim of what I describe as the "Scholastic Shakespeare effect."

In my other life as lecturer to teachers on drama, I try to get them to understand that "teaching" Shakespeare is bound to failure.

As with poetry, the young pupil has to be allowed to discover it as if it was his discovery, or a shared experience, and not a requirement of the curriculum.

Reading Shakespeare in a classroom is almost certain to lead to rejection except in the hands of a few gifted teachers.

To set an essay where the work hasn't even been discussed is tantamount to culture murder.

Appreciation of Shakespeare requires guidance, patience and above all "play-acting."

Introduction to Shakespeare in my school (First year highschool) was by a performance of "The Merchant of Venice," by a national theatre company, subsidised by a government which was much better at this than our present one. We kids went around for the rest of the year trying to be actors and sprouting, "The quality of mercy is not strain-ed" at every opportunity. And we had no formal drama classes in those days.

The trick is take the students to see Shakespeare and to talk about the play without analysing it to death. Getting them to perform scenes also works marvels in awareness of what Shakespeare is all about.

But you have to make it relevant for them.

The Tempest is not an easy play.

[JamesSavik]

Ah Cole, you were the victim of what I describe as the "Scholastic Shakespeare effect."

It all depends on which one of Shakespeare's plays you pick. The Tempest is an awful one to pick for a beginner. The only one worse that I can think of would be Titus Andronicus.

There are much better ones for beginners: Romeo & Juliett is the one most people suffer through in 9th grade.

Hamlet and Macbeth are much studied plays and are quite interesting when well done.

I would suggest Henry the Fifth, Richard the Third.

THESE ARE PLAYS and are meant to be seen and not read.

Try to find plays done by Richard Burton or Laurence Olivier: they really do kick ass!

[Cole Parker]

There is a lot in what you say, Des. Makes a lot of sense. Perhaps hearing the lines spoken, with proper inflection in the proper places, set in a dramatic context that can be visualized, would make the words a lot more meaningful. The words of The Tempest didn't make much sense to me. I couldn't get into it at all.

On reflection, I can certainly blame the teacher for much of my torment. She let us pick what play to read with no guidance whatsoever. When I chose The Tempest, she did nothing to discourage me. I wasn't the brightest bulb in the classroom chandelier, and so that was definitely not the play for me. One of the comedies would have been much better. I saw one of the comedies performed once, I think it was As You Like It, and really thought it great fun. Nothing like The Tempest, and not very difficult to understand.

In high school, we read Macbeth aloud in an English class and discussed it. I got discouraged right away. I was told the three witches at the beginning represented all evil in the world. Huh? Where did that come from? I thought they were simply three witches. How would a reader be supposed to know otherwise? The fact he was writing one thing and I was supposed to interpret it as something else was enough to overwhelm my 14-year-old brain. I didn't pay too much attention to the rest of the story. But then, I was like that.

I have somewhat the same problem with much literature. When some critics discuss a book, say one by a noted literary author, they frequently speak of allusions and metaphors and such, finding them seriously meaningful, and announce that one of them they point to is the whole purpose of the book. After reading the book in question, I often find what the critic cited to have no relevance at all to me. How he could see the things he speaks of are beyond me. Of course, I've also heard authors interviewed and asked questions about remarks critics have made, and they've often said the critics are critics because they can't write, and are envious and bitter about that and have been know to be disparaging because of it. Your point of discovering an author by yourself and reading him without preconceived notions of what he's saying is an excellent one, I think.

C

[Cole Parker]

Thanks, James. Yes, I can see where the impact of the speech would suffer should it be read lying in your teenage bed, being distracted by having your TV set on in the background and your mother arguing with your sister about the character of her boyfriend in the next room. It would be easy to miss the rallying effect of the speech without the visual images of the setting and hearing the words expressed so emotionally to rally the troops as they do.

I'll bet they don't fly off the pages like that.

C

[EleCivil]

I can't wait to miss that one.

After reading much of his work- which has gay characters which earned him many gay fans, I feel really betrayed by OSC. I can't stand that Mormon mother....

Yes, I'm aware of Card's dickery. But I loved his books before I knew about it, and I can't bring myself to stop loving them. The artist may be a raging jackass, but the art is still good. Well, not "Empire." That was god-awful. And his sci-fi re-telling of the Book of Mormon was kind of weird. And one of his books was pretty much "The Life of a Mormon Computer Programmer...and also, there's a gay serial killer. And ghosts! Ghosts that live in video games!" Needless to say, not the best read.

Come to think of it, Ender and the books on writing were good. Screw the rest of it.

As with poetry, the young pupil has to be allowed to discover it as if it was his discovery, or a shared experience, and not a requirement of the curriculum.

Depends on what kind of poetry, and how it's being taught. I've yet to meet a student of any age who doesn't dig Shel Silverstein, and The D-minus Poems of Jeremy Bloom always brings it home. But even young students can get into the deeper stuff.

The other day, I was sitting cross-legged on the floor with my 4th graders, all taking turns reading Langston Hughes poems. (It's not officially in the curriculum, but I found a whole box of his books gathering dust in storage, so I had to grab 'em.) Some would drum on the floor and read to the rhythms. Some would improvise a melody and sing his more bluesy verses. Others would stand and recite, carefully. Some of them were simple poems about rain or snow, others about politics and "current" events that I knew they didn't quite understand (Awkward moments include: "How do you say this word? N-e-g-r-o?" and "What's a minstrel show?"), but it didn't matter - they could listen to the sounds rather than the words.

Sure, some were more into it than others, but when even half a class is coming up to me to recite poems from memory during their down time, I consider it a win.

I think the common thread, here, is performance. Shakespeare plays and Hughes poems are both meant to be performed. Reading them silently to yourself might work decently enough for word nerds like me, but for NON-crazy people, they've got to be seen and heard. Speaking the words yourself makes them yours, and all of a sudden it doesn't matter whether you can understand and analyze every word - you can catch hold of the mood and tone and just let it carry you.

[Bruin Fisher]

When I find Aladdin's lamp, I'm going to ask the genie to make me a child again, and put me in EleCivil's class.

What a teacher, I would give a lot to sit in your class; I didn't get anything like that at my school. Actually, I didn't get anything at my school!

[DesDownunder]

I'll quote myself, but this time I will reveal the source of my inspiration:

Quote from my post above:

...except in the hands of a few gifted teachers.

Yes, I was thinking of EleCivil; guess I got that right.

[Merkin]

Speaking the words yourself makes them yours, and all of a sudden it doesn't matter whether you can understand and analyze every word - you can catch hold of the mood and tone and just let it carry you.

Absolutely. Poetry has always been meant to be read aloud -- even to oneself.

James

[The Pecman]

The trick is take the students to see Shakespeare and to talk about the play without analysing it to death. Getting them to perform scenes also works marvels in awareness of what Shakespeare is all about.

But you have to make it relevant for them. The Tempest is not an easy play.

Maybe take the class to see Forbidden Planet instead, since that classic sci-fi film reuses a lot of the themes of Shakespeare's classic.

I think we went to see Taming of the Shrew (1967 Elizabeth Taylor film version) for a class of mine, several years after it was released, and had a great time. At least that's a comedy, and its themes are so broad, you can enjoy it on many different levels.