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September 8th - 2008 - literary day:
Literature - Pulse of a universal culture
Miran Perera
Today a rapid change is taking place in the literary world and our
country cannot stand aloof. More emphasis is laid on computer literature
and reading on the internet than on reading literature the traditional
way.
Specialised knowledge in the various fields of academic activity is
the end all and be all of learning. It is time that the reading habit of
literature is inculcated in the ordinary student in this country.
All parents and most citizens of this country would understand that
enabling children to have easy access to text books prescribed by the
school and books on literature is a fundamental human right.
These text books and books of literature should be provided
efficiently and effectively through a state controlled system or in the
alternctive the state must ensure the easy availability of such books in
the market at a reasonable price in all parts of the country.
If we consider teaching of English literature from the perspective of
a definite aid to the acquisition of language then our aim of teaching
literature plus the methodology will assume a newer dimension.
Generally the study of literature of any nation tends to enhance the
particular language ability as well though necessarily it need not be so
as a corollary. A clear distinction exists between the knowledge of a
particular language, say linguistically and the proficiency in the use
of that language.
We should be able to distinguish between a piece of literary art and
a compendium on topical diseases - both use the language but in
different ways for different purposes. Literature is expressing in
uncommon ways the common thoughts that occur to the generality of human
beings.
Libraries have most of the books published by the leading
universities of the world like Oxford, Cambridge, Harvard, Yale,
Princeton, California and Delhi among others and also by the centres of
learning and publishing houses in the Soviet Union and the Peoples
Republic of China on various disciplines.
Reading these books are like being educated in those institutions of
learning and their countries. In addition the books of world famous
authors like Homer, Virgil, Horace, Plato, Aristotle, Machiavelli,
Dante, Valtaire, Rousseau, Alexander Dumas, Victor Hugo, Maupassant,
Zola, Satre, Moravia, Tolstoy, Checkov, Dostoevsky, Pushkin, Turgenev,
Gorky, Mulk Raj Anand, R. K. Narayan, Solzhenitsyn, Pearl S. Buck,
Michener, Mailer, Steinbeck, Updike, Karl Marx, Fredrich Engels,
Veblen, Gorden Fraser, Mark Twain, Aldous Huxley, Bertrand Russel, H.G.
Wells, Toynbee, Henry Lucas, Will Durant, Arthur C. Clarke, Shakespeare,
Shaw, Thomas Hardy, are available at libraries. Mention must also be
made of Jawaharlal Nehru who was one of the ten best writers of English
prose in the world.
The Sri Lankan government opted to provide school text books up to
the GCE O/L, classes, free of charge since 1980.
This was a noble initiative which enhanced the concept of equity.
However while on the one hand we introduced the excellent principle
of promoting equality in accessing educational material on the other
hand by entrusting the responsibility of book writing, production and
distribution exclusively to the state therefore committed a series of
blunders.
The blunders compromised on the quality of the books produced and
seriously hampered the regular distribution of books in accordance with
given schedules effectively. There also came a way through this state
monopolistic regime for not building our own capacity for writing and
publishing text books.
The result was that it not only produced dull, drab and unappealing
text books that children found least attractive but that the text books
contained mistakes, gross errors, which on many occasions infringed on
serious ethno religious sensitivities.
The fact that literature has a role in language learning cannot just
be ignored.
The grace the charm the persuasive effect of literary language has to
be realised and accepted.
Even one’s native language develops on this basis.
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