The reading assignments of IB Junior English are no feat for the faint of heart. This is true in the case of the Stranger. Many of my friends see no literary value in the Stranger, if not all the books in the IB English course in general. I will try my best to answer the question: does the Stranger have literary value, and if/not so why?
Assigning literary value to the Stranger is a difficult task. It is obvious (although debatable) that the Stranger is more significant compared to Megan's Busy Day. However, it is much harder to confidently say that the Stranger has more literary value than Their Eyes Were Watching God. Good writing cannot be quantified, so assigning value that is relative is difficult. The best rating scale I can give the Stranger is that it has literary value, kind of (but is a stretch), and not at all.
How does one determine value?
Opinions are one way of assigning value to books. Most of the time, people have conflicting opinions of books. That's how English teachers receive essays that, are for the most part, original. A single person advocating the significance of a book can usually be disregarded, but a consensus opinion of a million people? It is far more likely that view is correct (or however close to correct humans can get). How about in the case of the Stranger?
Despite the public opinions of my classmates, I believe the vast majority of people who see the actual value in the Stranger are probably English majors, professors, and English buffs. The majority of the people who read the Stranger are probably high school students who have no idea why they have to read the book. They are told that the book is great and that reading it will benefit them in some way. English majors, professors, and English buffs probably don't make up a majority of the Stranger readers, but their opinion certainly should not be disregarded.
These people certainly devote a significant amount of time understanding and analysis texts such as the Stranger. They could, from an academic perspective, prove that the Stranger has beautiful or obscure literary what not, which, in their opinion, makes the book valuable. Their opinions are valuable because of the time, effort, interest, and expertise they pour into the book.
However, it is important to remember the majority of the readers of the Strangers are not academics that enjoy the Stranger for intrinsic reasons. Also it is important to remember value is relative. One man's trash is another man's treasure, as they say. One analogy works well: in ancient times, Spartans used iron rods for currency. Now in modern times, we use pieces of paper worth more than what it takes to make them. Our money is only worth something if we believe it to be worth something. It the Earth had an abundance of gold, I doubt gold would be worth much.
An important part of relevance is context. Even with dedicating several days examining Camus' philosophies, we only vaguely understood Camus' thinking and the world that he created for, which did Camus and us a great disservice. Right out of the gates, the novel was worth as much to high school students as a couple iron rods, which probably account for several of the half-something attempts on essays we will be turning in in a few weeks. In addition, the world is much different from the time Camus lived and the values are much different. Existentialism is not as significant as it once was after WWII.
An even more fundamental problem is the lack of preparation or interest in English. I will clarify the last point. Most of the English classes I have taken in my lifetime have done a horrible job preparing me to understand, analyze, and communicate themes in a book. They have hardly showed me the intrinsic values of reading (I do like to read though). I suppose my general point here is how little students recognize the value in literature. Another iron rod for us. Most people don't really have an interest in English. Most of students today will eventually become engineers, doctors, or other professions, which honestly don't fully use the skills English classes attempt to teach. Not many students will go on to become English majors.
I suppose from an academic perspective, the Stranger has literary significance. For students, it really doesn't. Some say that the short sentences and the absence of fancy words makes it significant. To them, I say, "Don't children's books also have short sentences and lack fancy words?" Granted, obviously aren't as valuable as the Stranger but the point is probably one that some high school student trying to slack his or her way through a journal. I guess to a high school student, the book is not valuable. To academia it is. In my opinion, what makes it academically valuable is that it gives insight to what Albert Camus thought and his philosophy. So that makes it kind of valuable.
No comments:
Post a Comment