Herman Melville’s Moby-Dick has long suffered from popular misconceptions surrounding the novel. Despite its near universal acclaim as the “Great American novel,” the work still struggles to find its way into the curriculum of any academic level below that of college. While I concede that teaching Moby-Dick in the high-school classroom is problematic, it seems that bringing it into a community-college syllabus is a bit more feasible. Though community-college students may often present challenges similar to those of in high-school, I feel that the novel’s status within the American literary canon makes it an indispensable part of any serious college curriculum. Despite the practical obstacle of time restraints, the novel’s interactions with
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free will, race and class, good and evil, theology, sexuality, philosophy and other more nuanced themes can be used in unison with its more straightforward, superficial plot elements like man versus nature and single-minded revenge. After all, “a revenge plot is a revenge plot…” (Lamb, 46), no matter what other elements may surround it. With these focused strategies in mind, students can obtain a greater appreciation for the unique qualities the novel provides, and perhaps guide them to a better understanding of other seemingly complicated texts as well as active close-reading in itself. How to even begin a game plan for teaching a novel like Moby-Dick can be a daunting task in itself. How does one develop a strategy for presenting a complex novel to students that, at the community-college level, are likely not English or literature majors, and that are likely coming to the text with erroneous preconceptions? Take for instance the likelihood that any previous engagement with the novel was probably shaped around the simplistic notion “that Ahab represents “good” and the whale “evil,” or that Ahab represents “evil” and the whale “good” (Lamb, 43). Ideas like these are not necessarily terrible starting points for understanding the text, but they can give students the idea that the novel …show more content…
This need not be painful for instructor or student. Rather than subjecting students to tedious and predictable reading quizzes (that often only require a quick Google search to pass), students should instead be offered a choice in the form of two different types of reading responses. Students may either write a brief paragraph focusing on one particular passage or chapter that they found particularly interesting, or write a paragraph based upon a specific question about a passage or chapter that they would like to discuss in class. Not only does these options give students an opportunity to change up the direction of their individual responses, but also encourages close reading of the text and hopefully inspires students to lead discussions based around their own interpretations and
free will, race and class, good and evil, theology, sexuality, philosophy and other more nuanced themes can be used in unison with its more straightforward, superficial plot elements like man versus nature and single-minded revenge. After all, “a revenge plot is a revenge plot…” (Lamb, 46), no matter what other elements may surround it. With these focused strategies in mind, students can obtain a greater appreciation for the unique qualities the novel provides, and perhaps guide them to a better understanding of other seemingly complicated texts as well as active close-reading in itself. How to even begin a game plan for teaching a novel like Moby-Dick can be a daunting task in itself. How does one develop a strategy for presenting a complex novel to students that, at the community-college level, are likely not English or literature majors, and that are likely coming to the text with erroneous preconceptions? Take for instance the likelihood that any previous engagement with the novel was probably shaped around the simplistic notion “that Ahab represents “good” and the whale “evil,” or that Ahab represents “evil” and the whale “good” (Lamb, 43). Ideas like these are not necessarily terrible starting points for understanding the text, but they can give students the idea that the novel …show more content…
This need not be painful for instructor or student. Rather than subjecting students to tedious and predictable reading quizzes (that often only require a quick Google search to pass), students should instead be offered a choice in the form of two different types of reading responses. Students may either write a brief paragraph focusing on one particular passage or chapter that they found particularly interesting, or write a paragraph based upon a specific question about a passage or chapter that they would like to discuss in class. Not only does these options give students an opportunity to change up the direction of their individual responses, but also encourages close reading of the text and hopefully inspires students to lead discussions based around their own interpretations and