Education and Narnia
Posted: August 14th, 2007, 3:00 amOk, here's a topic that I'm sure wiser and more learned minds than my own will be able to add much more insight to. But I thought I'd get it started.
Lewis must have had some pretty strong feelings about education, being that he was, himself, a professor. I'm certain he must have wearied of the student who's grammar was so aweful that reading an essay was painful. Or of the student who's grasp of metaphor was nil.
But I think he certainly gave us a glimpse of his attitude toward public education (at the very least, in his own time) within the words of CoN.
Let's consider... The dear old Professor in LWW who questions to himself, "What do they teach them in these schools?" And I believe he says this more than once. He's truly amazed at what the children don't know. It's all in Plato, after all.
And we can't begin a conversation about this without including a reference to Experiment House in SC. I have no idea if this school was based on any real facility Lewis knew of, or if it was simply a conglomorate of different 'shortcomings' Lewis saw in education in general. Whichever it was, he was not impressed.
There are other references to education in the books.... Caspian's education by Cornelius, Cor's statement that all sorts of horrible things were going to happen to him now - he was to be educated. The young lady in PC who teaches the 'pig-boys' in Beruna and how miserable she looked. There are a lot of things we might infer from these instances....
So, what do you think? Was Lewis making a comment on education, or was he just adding some kind of humorous note about school (something his young readers could identify with - I know I could), or was he doing both? Let's discuss!
Lewis must have had some pretty strong feelings about education, being that he was, himself, a professor. I'm certain he must have wearied of the student who's grammar was so aweful that reading an essay was painful. Or of the student who's grasp of metaphor was nil.
But I think he certainly gave us a glimpse of his attitude toward public education (at the very least, in his own time) within the words of CoN.
Let's consider... The dear old Professor in LWW who questions to himself, "What do they teach them in these schools?" And I believe he says this more than once. He's truly amazed at what the children don't know. It's all in Plato, after all.
And we can't begin a conversation about this without including a reference to Experiment House in SC. I have no idea if this school was based on any real facility Lewis knew of, or if it was simply a conglomorate of different 'shortcomings' Lewis saw in education in general. Whichever it was, he was not impressed.
There are other references to education in the books.... Caspian's education by Cornelius, Cor's statement that all sorts of horrible things were going to happen to him now - he was to be educated. The young lady in PC who teaches the 'pig-boys' in Beruna and how miserable she looked. There are a lot of things we might infer from these instances....
So, what do you think? Was Lewis making a comment on education, or was he just adding some kind of humorous note about school (something his young readers could identify with - I know I could), or was he doing both? Let's discuss!