Outline

D. H. Lawrence in the Classroom

1. Introduction
2. Reader Response Approach
3. The Virgin and the Gypsy
4. Activities
5. Conclusion

Invasion to Poland

I really liked the poem “September 1, 1939” by Auden. I liked it because it is a very political poem. It deals with the feelings of the people when the Second World War began. After reading it, I felt touched by his way of expressing the fear of each family, mother, father, child and people in general of the uncertainty of never knowing what will happen with the country and themselves. This highly connected with the idea of the governments making decisions across Europe which did not consider people’s opinion. The hopelessness was so immense and it is like that when you know that no matter what you think or do, nothing is going to change and nothing is in your hands. In the poem, Auden is questioning many things that we as humans have done wrong. For example, he questions that humans are always craving for what they cannot have. Nowadays, it is seen that we are craving for what the advertisements in the mass media are offering. Many times we cannot have everything and our priorities are not well arranged because we do not prioritize education and health in order to buy the new flat screen.

In conclusion, I would definitely use this poem as a cross-curricular activity with the History subject when students are being taught the World Wars.

Oscar: A boy alone in the city

While I was reading Oscar’s entry, I was remembering one time when I was at the subway station and a person had fallen to the rails. I heard some other people saying:” couldn’t he throw himself somewhere else or at another time”. Oscar’s perception of why we do not see children wandering around the city is pretty similar to my understanding of the dehumanized world we live in.

It is true that sometimes hopelessness of getting a job leads people to steal. However, we should encourage our students to go to the last honest and legitimate resource to face the situation instead of committing crimes. It is hard, but otherwise it can be considered as encouraging the students to do illegal deeds.

I also think that sometimes we have to create opportunities for our students so that they can become autonomous subjects who can create their own opportunities as well. Our teaching will make our students be better able to face the society we live in and then their opportunity of changing it will come.

I really liked Oscar’s entry because it really made me consider topics present in Oliver Twist as well as different things we see daily. It is really interesting to see how he relates everything to our Chilean society and ,at the end, that makes it more real.

The Waste Land

As part of our course, we read T.S. Eliot. He was an American poet who later changed his nationality to British. He as many others experienced war in an England which was very involved in it. After reading Eliot’s poem “The Waste Land”, I felt quiet shocked and confused.

Shocked simply because it is amazing to see in one poem how the war affected people’s lives specially in Europe. Here we understand the concept of existentialism. After the war, people were left with a feeling of nothingness. There was nothing in their hands to change their lives or society: all decisions were made by others.

I felt confused because Eliot presented a new way of writing. The sudden change of settings and narrators makes the poem very confusing, but, at the same time, a very rich one. During the different stanzas we can see that the settings are constantly changing. For example, in the first stanza, he begins in spring and unpredictably changes to summer.

Another feature present in the poem in the incorporation of other languages because he includes most of European people and countries in the concept of the waste land. Therefore, using different languages makes us understand the point he was trying to make.

I am now left with a feeling of lack of understanding. There is definitely much more to understand in this poem and I have not been able to get it. I guess, I need to work more with this poem, so that I finally understand it.

Lawrence Himself

In my opinion, D. H. Lawrence has an exquisite way of writing. It was so easy to read his stories: “The rocking horse winner” and “Odour of Chrysanthemums”. I very much enjoyed them.

It is also very interesting to see how most of his writings are autobiographical. Consequently, the fact that most of his male characters, particularly the man of the house, are miners is not coincidental. His father was a miner; therefore, he transmits that and puts his early life setting and context into his stories. We can see this especially in “Sons and Lovers”, one of his greatest novels and probably his most autobiographical one and in “Odour of Chrysanthemums”.

He also played with premonitions in both the stories. The sense of premonition is presented in “The rocking horse winner” every time the child rides the horse and hears the name of the winning horse. In “Odour of Chrysanthemums”, he introduces premonition when the wife feels something is wrong with his husband’s arrival. I really liked that in these stories.

In conclusion, male characters as miners and the small miner town as settings are definitely landmarks to his works.

Jane Austen

For a long time, I have been a fan of Jane Austen’s novels. I have read almost all of them, and I really admire her for everything she accomplished. Virginia Woolf made me appreciate Jane Austen much more than I did. Woolf was the author I needed to support me in my enjoyment of Austen.

Jane Austen lived in a time where women could be nothing but daughters and housewives. She was a writer in a time where nothing could be expected out of a woman. However, she wrote 6 of the most beautiful novels in English although she had no money and no room. She is world-wide recognized and dearly loved. Woolf states in many parts of her essay that Jane Austen proved the world, and men, that women could perfectly write as good as men. In some extent, Woolf compares Austen to Mozart in the following quote: “For while Jane Austen breaks from melody to melody as Mozart from song to song...” Therefore her genius is as Mozart’s or Shakespeare’s, to whom she also compares Jane Austen.

“Here was a woman (Jane Austen) about the year 18oo writing without hate, without bitterness, without fear, without protest, without preaching.” Thus, Jane Austen could write as the best of men and none of her conditions such as having no room, being poor, being interrupted and being a woman interfered in the complexity and richness of her writing.

19th century or 21st century?

As we have seen in class, London back in the Victorian age suffered many changes especially because of the modernity which has its roots on industrialization. London’s population increased more than the double in the 19th century because the employment market was at the big towns like London. One of the big issues of the time was the amount of population and overcrowding which was very well depicted in the movie "Oliver Twist" . We could see how so many people were at the markets and streets. Parks were also full, and over 10 people inhabited a house. What is more shocking was to see so many children alone in the streets. My question is: were they orphans just as Oliver? In the movie, we could see all the children that lived with Fagin and “worked” for him stealing. That sounds familiar. How many kids do we see “working” for other older people in the streets of Santiago? Or how many children are used as hooks for people to give them money?
All these issues depicted in “Oliver Twist” are present until today, and we can see them by just taking a Transantiago bus, subway or by going to Ahumada Street. It is almost incredible to believe that after over 150 years we still have the same problems in society.