CHAPTER XI

EMOTION

Teaching children to read with feeling is one of the most difficult tasks failing to the lot of the teacher, and yet it is one that has, if successfully accomplished, far-reaching results. For, apart from the legitimate development of emotion, it enlarges their sympathy and lays the foundation for a genuine love of literature.

We must confess that emotional expression is rarely found in our public schools. It would avail little to discuss the causes of this condition in detail. In this chapter we shall try to discover a remedy. Emotion in reading comes largely through the imagination. Unless the mind conceives the thought, how can the nerves thrill and tingle? It is for this that we need teachers who are themselves lovers of the beautiful, sublime, tender, in order that they may impart their appreciation and feeling to their classes. Emotion is catching, and so is the absence of it! Time, time, time, is here the great need. It takes time to think; time for the picture to come forth in its fulness out of subconsciousness. Is not imagination the basis of literary interpretation, of historical study, yes, even of mathematics and science? The time spent on the development of imagination and emotion in the reading lesson will show its results in every other study.

If, then, the teacher would get the right emotion, he must see to it that the child has the proper and adequate stimulus. Appeal to his everyday experience and make that serve as an introduction to the new experience of the poem.

Let us suppose we are speaking to the children:

If your class were to have a contest with another class, let us say in spelling, and your class were to come out victorious, you would, no doubt, feel very joyful over the result. Now, let us suppose that after the victory one of the members of the class should get up on his seat and wave his hand above his head, crying: "Three cheers for our class!" Would there be any difference between the way in which he spoke those words and the way in which he would read the same words if they came in a sentence like this: "If we win I shall give three cheers for our class'?

Of course, you will see at once that there would be a great deal of difference. In the first place, he would be very joyful, and perhaps excited, and this joy and excitement would get into his voice, and he would call out, "Three cheers for our class," with a great deal of feeling, or emotion; and everybody would see at once just how exultant he was. Now, what is it that causes that feeling, or emotion? I do not think that there will be much difficulty in answering this question. He was very much excited before the spelling contest came off, and now that it has been decided in your favor there is a feeling of great joy that comes over the whole body, and it is almost impossible to keep back the expression of that joy. In other words, he has been strongly moved.

I want to impress now upon you that as you go on with your study of reading, you will find that there is a great deal of emotion in many of the passages you will be called upon to read, and the only way to discover what the emotion is, must be by getting a very clear picture. But remember that the picture itself is not very likely to move you unless you enter into the spirit of the picture just as you entered into the spirit of the spelling contest. Do you see my meaning? One might say the words, "Three cheers for our class, and not express very much emotion. One might even have a very clear picture of the whole spelling match, and yet not be very much moved. But if you will close your eyes and let the picture get hold of you, I think there will be no trouble about the emotion. Let me see whether I can make clear to you what I mean by letting the picture get hold of you.

Suppose we take this line from a well-known speech, "Wolsey on His Fall:"-"Farewell, a long farewell to all my greatness!" Who speaks those words? is the first question. The answer is: An old man who has been for many years one of the leading men in the court of Henry VIII. He has used every effort to gain great power,

and has forgotten his God, and now at last the king has cast him off. Just after Wolsey has been informed of his loss of power, he utters the words quoted above. Just think how much these words mean to this poor man. Think how much he must suffer, and then try to feel as much as you can what it would mean to you if everything you had hoped for and struggled for were to be taken away from you. Of course, I know that you have not been so ambitious as Wolsey, but yet I think you will have no trouble in imagining just how you would feel if everything you cared for were to be taken away from you. Well, this is all that you need feel in order to read with emotion the lines of Wolsey. Just think this over for a few minutes, and then see how much regret you can feel as you utter these words. Be sure that you get the meaning of the words; be sure you get hold of the picture; try to imagine just how you would feel if you were very deeply disappointed, and then utter the words of Wolsey.

This, then, is what I mean by telling you to let the picture get hold of you. When you were exultant over the result of the spelling contest, joy possessed you. When Wolsey learned of his fall, sorrow and remorse possessed him. So with all emotions. You must think over the whole story; you must think over all the events connected with it until you really feel somewhat as the speaker felt whose words you are reading. Then there will be no trouble about the expression.

The teacher will observe that the two illustrations are chosen from two distinct fields: one near to the child's experience, the other far removed from it. It is further observed that both are direct discourse rather than description.

It seems the best plan to begin the definite study of emotional expression by using extracts in which the pupil uses direct rather than indirect discourse. The reason for this is that it is far more difficult to read, with expression, a passage of description in which the pupil would be expected to put emotion, than a piece of direct quotation. For instance, is it not easier for a child to enter into the spirit of the first of the

following stanzas than into that of the second, granting even that it is difficult to conceive the anguish of the father?

The father came on deck. He gasped,

"O God! thy will be done!
Then suddenly a rifle grasped,
And aimed it at his son:

"Jump-far-out, boy, into the wave!
Jump, or I fire!" he said;

"That only chance your life can save!
Jump! jump! boy!" He obeyed.

He sank-he rose-he lived he moved,
And for the ship struck out:
On board we hailed the lad beloved,
With many a manly shout.

His father drew, in silent joy,

Those wet arms round his neck,

And folded to his heart his boy

Then fainted on the deck.

In the second place, the reason for choosing selections in which the emotion is akin to those of the child's own experience must be clear. How many pupils ten or eleven years old can be expected to enter into the spirit of Whittier's The Barefoot Boy?

Blessings on thee, little man—

Barefoot boy, with cheek of tan!
With thy turned-up pantaloons,
And thy merry whistled tunes;

With thy red lip, redder still,

Kissed by strawberries on the hill;
With the sunshine on thy face,

Through thy torn brim's jaunty grace;

From my heart I give thee joy!

I was once a barefoot boy!

It is only to discourage him, to ask him to feel like an adult who looks back upon the joys of boyhood. One hears this

selection read in an affected voice and manner, where it is clear that the child is simply trying to imitate his teacher. But such experiences simply go to prove the contention that children should not be called upon to represent emotions far removed from their own experience.

But how shall we get our pupils to express emotions beyond their experience? The answer is: the teacher should strive to find those experiences in the child's life that are similar to those of the selection to be read. We have shown how this might be done in the line from Wolsey's speech. The child has experienced regret; let us make use of this experience to get him to feel something of Wolsey's feeling. Again (and this applies largely to advanced classes), it is by no means necessary that the pupil should ever have come into contact with the picture that stirs the writer, in order to represent the latter's feelings. It is the joy that the lover of nature feels that finds expression in these lines:

How the robin feeds her young,

How the oriole's nest is hung;

Where the whitest lilies blow,
Where the freshest berries grow,

Where the ground-nut trails its vine;
Where the wood-grape's clusters shine;
Of the black wasp's cunning way,

Mason of his walls of clay.

-The Barefoot Boy. WHITTIER.

But how can we get the true expression from one who knows nothing of the joy we take in contemplating the pictures of this stanza? By reminding him that our joy is not far different from his when rejoicing in a beautiful book, a lucky hit at baseball, or a pretty Christmas gift. Let us remember that it is not enough that he shall get the pictures: he must get the joy. And if he cannot get the joy from the pictures of the poet, he must get it from the memory of his