Words that hover above the page

by Anne White

Ideas are everywhere, in the words and, so to speak, behind the words, present because they are literally present and present even if they appear to be absent. A writer may despise the idea of zoos and communicate that hatred by writing a book about animals in the bush, never mentioning zoos, never alluding to zoos or dropping a hint about zoos. Because of the way the mind works, we get the message...If you picture a page of writing as three-dimensional, with the words hovering a half-inch or so above the paper, then you begin to see where the ideas are: behind the words, between the words, really everywhere. (Eric Maisel, Deep Writing)

In Jan Karon’s novel Out to Canaan, people in Mitford are feeling overworked and stressed by a variety of situations. Partway through the book, Father Tim invites his parishioners to a special evening church service, and as they recite the prayer of confession, we are given a glimpse of what is going on in their minds.

“Most merciful God,” Esther Bolick prayed aloud and in unison with the others from the Book of Common Prayer, “we confess that we have sinned against You in thought, word, and deed…” She felt the words enter her aching bones like balm.

“…by what we have done,” prayed Gene, “and by what we have left undone.”

“We have not loved You with our whole heart,” intoned Uncle Billy Watson…He found the words of the prayer beautiful. They made him feel hopeful and closer to the Lord, and maybe it was true that he hadn’t always done right by his neighbors, but he would try to do better, he would start before he hit the street this very night.

Now, setting questions of religious faith aside just for the moment, the point is that there is something going on here that transcends the levels of understanding, the social backgrounds and whatnot of the people praying. One big reason that this prayer speaks to Esther, Gene, Uncle Billy, and others I did not include here, is that the words, as Eric Maisel says, have dimensionality. The words, the sentences, are allowed to live, and to give life. There is enough space above them, between them, and underneath them, for each person to find green pastures and quiet waters. 

This is, in effect, the definition of a living book, and also of a living education. In Home Education, Charlotte Mason acknowledges that much good educational theory has been "conceived and perfected by large hearted educators to aid the many sided evolution of the living, growing, most complex human being"; it respects our own dimensionality (perhaps another way of saying "personhood").

The wind has painted fancies

on my wings.

Fancies...

Where was I?

O yes! Lord,

I had something to tell you:

Amen.

("The Prayer of the Butterfly" in Prayers from the Ark)

However, we tend to take such vital, free-fluttering ideas, and pin them down on collecting boards, labelling and cataloguing them, but ignoring the fact that they will never fly again. Charlotte says, "but what a miserable wooden system does it become in the hands of ignorant practitioners!...the observing of rules until the habit of doing certain things, of behaving in certain ways, is confirmed, and, therefore, the art is acquired––is so successful in achieving precise results, that it is no wonder there should be endless attempts to straiten the whole field of education to the limits of a system" (p. 9). 

These systems, these books, these artificially-generated things, are "precise" but also "straitened"; there is no room in them for us to move or breathe. I once wrote on our family blog:

... the stuff that gets used the least here is usually something produced specifically for the classroom...Case in point: a music-and-math resource book...which has such classic songs in it as this (sung to the tune of Three Blind Mice): "Let's make a people graph / Let's make a people graph / Of all our friends / In the classroom. / Boys stand over here. / Girls stand over there. / Then line up in two rows / So we can compare, / So we can compare." My daughter says she'd rather sing "Aiken Drum" any day.

Charlotte said the same thing:

The promoters of the kindergarten system have done much to introduce games of this, or rather of a more educational kind; but is it not a fact that the singing games of the kindergarten are apt to be somewhat inane? Also, it is doubtful how far the prettiest plays, learnt at school and from a teacher, will take hold of the children as do the games which have been passed on from hand to hand through an endless chain of children, and are not be found in the print-books at all. (Home Education, p. 82)

Near the end of Home Education, Charlotte discusses the religious training of young children, and she pulls no punches on what we might call un-dimensional teaching: 

There is no more fruitful source of what it is hardly too much to call infant infidelity than the unreal dead words which are poured upon children about the best things, with an artificial solemnity of tone and manner intended to make up for the want of living meaning in the words. Let the parent who only knows one thing from above teach his child that one; more will come to him by the time the child is ready for more. (pp. 346-347)

So, let the parent who knows no more than one prayer-book prayer, one or two good hymns by heart, a couple of folk songs, a favourite tale, and the names of one butterfly, two trees, or three wild flowers, share these things freely.  Let the ideas that are present take flight, and those that are absent also be noticed by their absence. God will surely bless such an education more than He will a whole heap of unreal dead-leaf words, though they be raked ever so neatly into piles. 

As the butterfly said...Amen.

As Many Begin the School Year

by Anne White

If you are familiar with the priest/poet Malcolm Guite, you may also have followed his You-tube study visits over the past few years. In one of the most recent, he read from the chapter “The Three Sleepers” from The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. Guite titled the video “At Aslan’s Table,” referring to the way that the scene and certain objects described in it mirror those of older legends and even Scripture. In this passage, a group of  travellers land on an island and are invited to feast from a well-spread table.

But on the table itself there was set out such a banquet as had never been seen, not even when Peter the High King kept his court at Cair Paravel. There were turkeys and geese and peacocks, there were boars’ heads and sides of venison, there were pies shaped like ships under full sail…there were nuts and grapes, pineapples and peaches, pomegranates and melons and tomatoes. There were flagons of gold and silver and curiously-wrought glass; and the smell of the fruit and the wine blew towards them like a promise of all happiness.

However, wary from previous experiences with Turkish Delight and other nasty enchanted things, they hold back. It is the chivalrous and swashbuckling mouse Reepicheep who takes the leap of faith.

…the Mouse, standing on the table, held up a golden cup between its tiny paws and said, “Lady, I pledge you.” Then it fell to on cold peacock, and in a short while everyone else followed its example. All were very hungry and the meal, if not quite what you wanted for a very early breakfast, was excellent as a very late supper.

Lucy (we all know Lucy, don’t we?) asks their hostess (whose name we don’t yet know) why the place is called “Aslan’s table.” “It is set here by his bidding,” said the girl, “for those who come so far.”

Sometimes food, even in Narnia, is just good food.

We may approach the educational table with some of that same nervousness. Are we even supposed to be here? The food looks good, though not what we’re used to; but, on the other hand, those three hairy men sleeping around the table might throw up some red flags. (Later it turns out that their enchanted state had nothing to do with the food.) The sane, sensible, cautious adults may hang back, wondering what they’ve gotten themselves and their children into. We are invited, our children are invited, and yet we hesitate.  This does not look like food from the children’s menu. The peaches and grapes should be okay, but cold peacock?

I cannot possibly describe my bewildered, fascinated disbelief when the first batch of books arrived. Of them all, 'Plutarch's Lives' hit me hardest. Those long, measured periods in difficult language! Alison, at eleven, would not understand a word! How on earth was Robin going to assimilate 'Mankind in the Making' and 'The Spangled Heavens'? What was Charles going to make of 'Pilgrim's Progress'? ("To Prosper in Good Life and Good Literature" by Joyce McGechan, in The Parents’ Review, January 1967)

Even those who have been here before may feel a bit of hesitation, an uncertainty over these new-again pomegranates and pies shaped like ships. But we nevertheless light the candles, bake the back-to-school cookies, and raise our cups of tea.

We bashed--and that is the only verb that describes our progress in those early days--through the text-books, got the gist of them by determined attention, and miraculously found ourselves enjoying every minute. Narrations were wobbly affairs, half inarticulate, half incorporating remembered phrases from the reading. Parsing and Analysis they found absorbing and rewarding. French and Latin were fun. After all, languages were words, weren't they? A sudden word-hunger seemed to grip them all; and a new world had opened up. When, at morning prayers, they sang: 'Praise for the singing! Praise for the morning! / Praise for them springing / Fresh from the Word!' their eyes shone. They were not thanking God as a dutiful routine, but joyfully. (Joyce McGechan, same)

We come by invitation, "for those who come so far." Languages are words, and food is food. We eat and drink by God’s provision, and under his protection. And we pray that this small leap of faith will bring others to the table as well.

In Which Tom Learns His Lesson

 by Anne White 

In English, a sentence stretches from left to right…A writer composes a sentence with subject and verb at the beginning, followed by other subordinate elements…Think of [the] main clause as the locomotive that pulls all of the cars that follow…If the writer wants to create suspense, or build tension, or make the reader wait and wonder, or join a journey of discovery, or hold on for dear life, he can save subject and verb of the main clause until later…[but] this variation works only when most sentences branch to the right, a pattern that creates meaning, momentum, and literary power. (Roy Peter Clark, Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer) 

Every sentence speaks of someone or of something, and tells us something about that of which it speaks…In our sentence we speak of 'Tom.' We say about him that he 'has learned his lesson.' The thing we speak of is often called the SUBJECT, which just means that which we talk about. (Charlotte Mason, Home Education) 

Listen.

If someone tells you what a story is about, they are probably right.

If they tell you that that is all the story is about, they are very definitely wrong.

Any story is about a host of things. It is about the author; it is about the world the author sees and deals with and lives in; it is about the words chosen and the way those words are deployed; it is about the story itself and what happens in the story; it is about the people in the story; it is polemic; it is opinion. (Neil Gaiman, introduction to Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451)

 Listen. I will tell you a story about stories.

In high school we were handed a book of classic short stories. We handled that book objectively, tightly, scientifically, trying to identify the exact bacteria on the lens of “The Most Dangerous Game” and “The Rocking Horse Winner.” We mapped the rising action, the climax, the denouement; wrote up our lab reports; got our marks.

In university, we had a course on The Short Story that took the opposite, subjective, biblio-therapeutic approach. If “Young Goodman Brown” or “Bartleby the Scrivener” reminded us of our boyfriends, landlords, weird uncles, that's what the story meant. Well, as Neil Gaiman says, if a reader tells you what a story is about, they are probably right.

However, as every sentence speaks of someone or of something, so does every story. A good story deserves more than the reader’s subjective reaction. It is, though, about more than stuffing a square peg of character, voice, polemic, opinion, into a round hole of rising action, saying that's "all the story is about." Writing professor George Saunders has expanded on the idea of “someone”:

… perhaps the most radical idea of all [is] that every human being is worthy of attention and that the origins of every good and evil capability of the universe may be found by observing a single, even very humble, person and the turnings of his or her mind. (A Swim in a Pond in the Rain)

Saunders also says that, as we read a particular story by Tolstoy,

we begin living it; the words disappear and we find ourselves thinking not about word choice but about the decisions the characters are making and decisions we have made, or might have to make someday, in our actual lives. (same)

So, what is a better way to read, to write, or to teach novels, plays, stories? We go back to what Charlotte told us about sentences: they speak of someone, they speak of something that happens. We follow someone around as they swim in a pond in the rain, or drive through a blizzard, or surreptitiously slip a book into their pocket. As musical compositions begin with a theme and then introduce variations, so do stories. You thought the wolf was going to blow the brick house down, but surprise, you’re wrong. And here is the kicker: the story, as we receive it, is not only about the decisions made by the characters, but also by the author.

As apprentice writers, we watch for the ways the words themselves, the shapes of the sentences, the parallels and variations build suspense, fear, relief, delight. As readers, we are allowed to let them disappear, but only so that we can make even more discoveries (beyond weird uncles); so that we can begin living it. 

Start with subjects. Continue with verbs. If it worked for Tom, it can still work for us.

Babble On

by Anne White

Near the end of C. S. Lewis’s novel That Hideous Strength, the speeches being given at a college banquet turn into word salad (“Tidies and fugleman—I sheel foor that we all—er—most steeply rebut the defensible, though, I trust, lavatory…”). If you haven’t read the book, the explanation is both complicated and simple: the wizard Merlin, resurrected for the occasion, has been interfering. This is what happens next:

[Merlin] had left the dining room as soon as the curse of Babel was well fixed upon the enemies. No one had seen him go. Wither had once heard his voice calling loud and intolerably glad above the riot of nonsense, "Qui Verbum Dei contempserunt, eis auferetur etiam verbum hominis."

The translation of the Latin is given in a footnote: "They that have despised the word of God, from them shall the word of man also be taken away."

We can turn that around, and say that to love and revere the Word of God, we must also revere the “word of man.” That does not mean “the wisdom of this world [which] is foolishness with God” (1 Cor. 3:19), but rather something sacred and profound: God’s gift of language. The curse of Babel was that people lost their ability to communicate with each other; so its reverse is to be able to speak, to understand, to share meaning and metaphor, to instruct, to exhort, to tell stories, to make jokes. Think of the talking animals in Narnia. Think of what happens to Ginger the Cat in Lewis’s The Last Battle, when he loses that privilege.

“Look, look!” said the voice of the Bear. “It can’t talk. It has forgotten how to talk!...” And then the greatest terror of all fell upon those Narnians. For every one of them had been taught—when it was only a chick or a puppy or a cub—how Aslan at the beginning of the world had turned the beasts of Narnia into Talking Beasts and warned them that if they weren’t good they might one day be turned back again…”And now it is coming upon us,” they moaned.

How do we keep this gift and not lose it? And how do we teach the children under our care to cherish and not to despise it?

We talk to them. We sing to them. We read to them, repeat, repeat. Most of us reading this, know this. It is good  to read books full of strong and deep language; but (as in our music and art studies), we may also need to provide specific work on technique. And, in a time when the “curse of Babel” threatens civilization, we may need to go even further not only to protect our own walls, but to venture out in the spirit of those who go out carrying  tools to rebuild storm-flattened houses. Educator Marva Collins, always a proponent of word study in the classroom, wrote about a vocabulary “weapon” that she found; and tells us, as she told her students, why it really mattered.

That fall I discovered a secret weapon for building vocabulary, a book called Vocabulary for the College-Bound Student [by Harold Levine]. I ordered copies for all the students in Westside Prep. 

“Words are ideas. They make up thoughts. If our words are limited, our thoughts are limited,” I said, holding up the book and pointing to its title. “You see what this says? It says for the college-bound student, not the failure-bound student. To succeed in life, you must be a thinker, and to be a thinker, you must have vocabulary.” (Marva Collins’ Way, p. 170)

The introduction to Vocabulary for the College-Bound Student (available online) echoes the military, “secret weapon” analogy:

Though reading is the basic means of vocabulary growth, it is a relatively slow means. For the college-bound student who has not achieved a superior vocabulary, reading needs to be supplemented by a direct attack that will yield comparatively rapid growth—and that is the purpose of this book.

We may not require Harold Levine’s help in building our own vocabulary, but we could do worse than spread some of that curiosity and delight in words, and, in consequence, the ability to use them to think, to write, and to share dreams. Weapons or tools, whichever idea works better for us—the important thing is to develop skill in their use, and also care and respect for them, so that we will never be forced to rebut the defensible, though, I trust, lavatory.

[Aslan] said, “Rise up, Sir Peter Wolf’s-Bane. And,  whatever happens, never forget to wipe your sword.” (C. S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe)

You might be using living books if....

Over in our forum we have an ongoing thread called 'You might be using AmblesideOnline if...' and then parents share their stories.  It's a lot of fun.  One of my favourite such stories from our own family is from many years ago, when my own mother took my second daughter to the pet store for phone, and then teasingly suggested they should buy a pet snake.  "Oh, let's do that!" said my girl, then 8 years old, "Mother will be aghast!"

Sometimes people post on our facebook group, too, and I got permission to share this one because it tickled me so much.

Back-story- Mom instructed daughter to finish her Chaucer Storybook reading before bed.  Daughter could not find it so could not complete her assignment.  She delivered this note to her mother:

Isn't that delightful?  

Feel free to share your own examples of how living books have changed your own family's vocabulary and brought some humour and light into your lives.

Plutarch comments on things, words, and learning languages

"But I my selfe that dwell in a poore litle towne, and yet doe remayne there willingly least it should become lesse : whilest I was in Italy, and at Rome, I had no leysure to study and exercise the Latine tongue, as well for the great busines I had then to doe, as also to satisfie them that came to learne Philosophie of me : so that even somewhat too late, and now in my latter time, I began to take my Latine bookes in my hand. And thereby, a straunge thing to tell you, but yet true : I learned not, nor understood matters so much by the words, as I came to understand the words, by common experience and knowledge I had in things. But furthermore, to knowe howe to pronownce the Latin tongue well, or to speake it readily, or to understand the signification, translations, and fine joyning of the simple words one with another, which doe bewtifie and set forth the tongue : surely I judge it to be a marvailous pleasant and sweete thing, but withall it requireth a long and laborsome study, meete for those that have better leysure then I have, and that have young yeares on their backes to follow such pleasure."  ~~ Plutarch, Life of Demosthenes