Riona (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
rionaleonhart) wrote2010-10-22 07:02 pm
rionaleonhart) wrote2010-10-22 07:02 pm
Some Things Have Changed, But Can't You Tell?
Here's a scientific experiment I'd like to see: give a group of literature students at university a novel to study. Have the tutor tell them it's generally considered a great work of literature and hand out pretentious critical essays on it. Ask the students what they think of its style, its themes, the book as a whole and so on. Tell them only afterwards that in fact it is generally considered not to be a great or even a particularly good work of literature: a Mills & Boon novel, perhaps?
You'd also need a control group of students who were given the book to read without the 'we're studying this; it's a highly respected work of literature' aspect, of course, and perhaps a third group who do hear that it's a respected work but don't receive the critical essays. I think the results could be genuinely interesting, or at least mildly amusing. Really, this is a concept born of how deeply dubious I was about some of the pretentious literary criticism we had to read on my course.
On a mostly unrelated note, although I suppose he is an English teacher:
(I've just realised that Josh Stevenson's Eevee represents not only his sexual confusion but the fact that he's easily influenced; an Eevee can be led down many different paths, after all. Yes.)
I was listening to 'Elle's Theme'* from Silent Hill: Homecoming when I was uploading this image, which, naturally, made me start thinking about how Tom would fare in Silent Hill. Perhaps that's why he's matured so much by the third series: he spent the summer holidays in Silent Hill, haunted by the entire tragic Lorna arc, and emerged determined never to hurt anyone like that again. There's one to add to the frustratingly long list of Waterloo Road Fics That Won't Exist Unless I Write Them Myself, then.
* The title of this entry - some things have changed, but can't you tell? - is how I hear the lyrics at 2.30. I can't find any online transcriptions of the lyrics that share this perception - some say some things have changed, what can't be new to them and some some things have changed, what can't be mortal - but I like my interpretation more, whether it's a mishearing or not.
You'd also need a control group of students who were given the book to read without the 'we're studying this; it's a highly respected work of literature' aspect, of course, and perhaps a third group who do hear that it's a respected work but don't receive the critical essays. I think the results could be genuinely interesting, or at least mildly amusing. Really, this is a concept born of how deeply dubious I was about some of the pretentious literary criticism we had to read on my course.
On a mostly unrelated note, although I suppose he is an English teacher:
(I've just realised that Josh Stevenson's Eevee represents not only his sexual confusion but the fact that he's easily influenced; an Eevee can be led down many different paths, after all. Yes.)
I was listening to 'Elle's Theme'* from Silent Hill: Homecoming when I was uploading this image, which, naturally, made me start thinking about how Tom would fare in Silent Hill. Perhaps that's why he's matured so much by the third series: he spent the summer holidays in Silent Hill, haunted by the entire tragic Lorna arc, and emerged determined never to hurt anyone like that again. There's one to add to the frustratingly long list of Waterloo Road Fics That Won't Exist Unless I Write Them Myself, then.
* The title of this entry - some things have changed, but can't you tell? - is how I hear the lyrics at 2.30. I can't find any online transcriptions of the lyrics that share this perception - some say some things have changed, what can't be new to them and some some things have changed, what can't be mortal - but I like my interpretation more, whether it's a mishearing or not.
no subject
Also I think your student book experiment would be both brilliant and hilarious. I half think Mills and Boon would be a bit too obvious, the absolute strict formula/pacing/length is really obvious to anyone who's read a few. But some of the romantic fiction that isn't published as mills and boon and is pretending to be better than that would be excellent.
no subject
You have a good point about Mills & Boon perhaps being a bit too transparent. Hmmm. (...I'm thinking about this as if I'm actually planning to carry it out, but I don't think that's going to happen.)