From the Desk of...
Andy Bethune, assistant professor of English

February 13, 2004

Four weeks into my first term at Albion, in the fall of 2000, I walked into a class to teach selections from Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales--one of my favorite works. As we discussed the ways in which Chaucer’s late-14th century Middle English differs from our language today, a student asked in a clear, confident voice, “Why do we have to learn this stuff?”

Whether he realized it or not, his question resonated with me on multiple levels. Most directly he was asking why I felt compelled to take students through the arcane mysteries that comprise the Great Vowel Shift; implicitly, however, he was questioning why we should bother sitting in a class reading poetry that is more than six hundred years old. There was an audible gasp in response to his question, a sense among students that I was being challenged—perhaps inappropriately. In fact, I welcome such questions, and frequently tell my students that the unexamined course is not worth taking.

As a medievalist, I deal with this sort of question on a daily basis. Universities and colleges in Great Britain and North America are facing difficult financial times and cutbacks loom over many departments, programs, and faculty positions. Medievalists in particular feel the heat when compelled to justify the usefulness of their work: Is what we do relevant today? Not many of my students will become scholars of medieval literature, and it’s incumbent on me to demonstrate the ways in which studying the Middle Ages can be a beneficial and rewarding experience for students at a liberal arts college such as Albion.

My research is on heroes in political poetry in England in the 13th and 14th centuries—poems that celebrate the exploits and character of historical figures and see them transcend into legend to be revered as essential elements of an incipient national psyche.

As abstract as that may sound, the national euphoria that’s expressed in poems commemorating Simon de Montfort’s victory at the Battle of Lewes in 1264 is not that far removed from the excitement felt across Canada at Paul Henderson’s series-winning goal in the 1972 Canada-Russia hockey series; the outpouring of grief over the 1376 death of Edward the Black Prince, the greatest knight of his generation, is similar to the sense of loss felt among Canadians at the announcement of Wayne Gretzky’s 1988 trade from the Edmonton Oilers to the Los Angeles Kings. These events had cultural, political, and social consequences that helped to shape the countries into the nations that they are today.

Lurking not far beneath the surface in my classes is the question, “Does literature engage with the world in meaningful ways?” The answer, of course, is yes.

Literature can teach, amuse, delight, entertain, sadden, infuriate, enlighten, and challenge. Perhaps most importantly, it can allow us to understand ourselves and the world around us (and, at times, help us to see that the world around us makes no sense!) by helping us to recognize elements our contemporary societies have in common with those removed from us by time, space, or both; but literature also leads us to challenge many of our own views when we contrast them with those of others, frequently forcing us to question ourselves and our belief systems. That’s why we need--and should want--to learn this stuff.