Housman's letters again

Another review of Archie Burnett's edition of Housman's letters has appeared, this time by Paul Johnson in the Literary Review. Johnson is wrong when he says that Last Poems was 'reluctantly published'. Housman had no desire to publish for decades because he had nothing to publish, but once Last Poems began to present itself to him he surprised his friends and his publisher with the news that he had something. Housman rarely did anything reluctantly. He did it of his own accord or he curtly explained why he would not.

But Johnson does appreciate Housman as an epistolographer, and excerpts this fine specimen for his readers:

When the meaning of a poem is obscure, it is due to one of three causes. Either the author through lack of skill has failed to express his meaning; or he has concealed it intentionally; or he has no meaning either to conceal or express. In none of these cases does he like to be asked about it. In the first case it makes him feel humiliated; in the second it makes him feel embarrassed; in the third it makes him feel found out. The real meaning of a poem is what it means to the reader.

Not bad. But overall there's nothing new in this review, and nothing that indicates any greater familiarity with the letters than one can get from a good biography (e.g., Housman, the Scholar-Poet by Richard Perceval Graves).

Now Frank Kermode's review in the London Review of Books (which I can't seem to access at the moment)--there's one worth reading.

How do you make kids care?

Admittedly it wasn't an inspired decision, but the other day I started off some of my classes with a piece from Nuntii Latini on the reelection of Pervez Musharraf. I thought that having them work through a current event in Latin would arouse some interest, and expected at least some of the students to recognize Musharraf. Not a single student did, and they found the whole thing incomprehensible without careful guidance and a modern history lesson. One student even asked what 'Pakistaniae' meant, after he failed to find it in his Latin glossary.

So that was a failure.

Today I was reminded just a bit of some of the silly things kids like to hear about when we came across fenestra, and I taught them defenestration. There was so much joy and laughter upon learning a word that means 'to throw someone out of a window', and to be honest I was surprised no one knew the word already. I think maybe I expect too much from them and have missed out on teaching opportunities because of it.

I'd like to hear from anyone who has thoughts on things that capture the interest and enthusiasm of students, however small. Please feel free to comment here.