I've been thinking of what I want to pursue in the future. With each passing day in class, the passing of lessons, and with the discourse of knowledge, I am increasingly inclined to make literature my future.
What makes literature so appealing to me for one? To me, without literature, you will never be able to understand the human race. The human race is so complex and each person in this planet is vastly different from the other. Literature to me encapsulates this understanding. It is through the study of one's character and personality as highlighted by the author that makes the reader understand, perhaps abstractly the psyche of the character. Take King Lear for example.
I once exclaimed to my teacher, Mrs Goh in the middle of class "oh why does Cordelia die!". And like all literature teachers, Mrs Goh went into a tirade of reasons as to why Lear brought it upon himself. That to me is the beauty of literature. That by understanding the psyche, the background, the personality of the character, are we then able to understand the character. It is painful to read about a one-dimensional character simply because he/she is so shallow, so colourless and so drab. Conversely, none of us are shallow, colourless or drab, and even if we are, there are so many forces that make us as such. Using the analogy of King Lear, we are able to see from the bigger picture as to why Lear is as such, why Cordelia as such and so on. Literature to me is a microcosm of the human race - where the human race seems to write about themselves in a third person.
To me, you understand lit, you understand life. Similarly, you love lit, you love life. Why so? Take for example Celie's narrative in The Color Purple. To me, the most poignant line is - "I spent fifteen minutes with my children. And she been going on for months bout how ungrateful I sis. White folks is a miracle of affliction, say Sophia." It makes you feel for the character. You see how Sophia Butler, induitably a domineering, strong-willed spirit can descend to such resignation, because of the consequence of racism. To some who may not appreciate literature, this would probably incite a "oh. so what?" response. But for me, you want to weep for Sophia because you know that Sophia is not a made-up character. She must have been born out of something in the author. Writing to me is not a blank slate. If one has a blank slate one is unable to write anything - think Lear "nothing will come out of nothing". Something must be there. And that something must be caused by larger historical factors. Understanding this would enable us to understand the human race.
Understanding the human race is only caused by understanding literature. Honestly, to me at least, it is impossible to understand the human race through Science or Mathematics. Granted, we can understand the composition of the human race, but never the behaviour of humans. How can atoms, molecules, sigma, pi and Pythagoras aid us in our understanding of human behaviour?
Literature on the other hand, gives us those insights to how us humans behave. It gives us a deeper understand as to how us humans carry ourselves in our daily discourse.
And if can see that, you will gradually love literature. Once you get that love for literature, you will be granted insights into life. And with those insights, you will gradually learn to love life.
- signing of from the class of joppa
ian
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I think sometimes that people forget that science used to be called natural philosophy, and that atoms, molecules, sigma and pi-orbitals are all as much constructs of the human mind and psychology as Lear, Cordelia, Goneril and Regan are. You can learn a lot from humanity's choice of metaphors and analogies, whether in the sciences or in the arts.
The difference is that images and metaphors and figures of speech are more obvious in the arts than in the sciences, because we are biased that way. Fortunately, not all of us have lost the 'dark-adapted eye'.
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