The Trouble With Norton

There's perhaps nothing more important for an aspiring writer then to read, and as much as possible. While my undergraduate career has kept me busy reading novels, essays, chapters in a textbook, etc., it seems more often than not to have been 'busy' work. That's not to say I haven't learned anything, that's far from true, but I do have a particular bone to pick with the English literature courses, and that's the usage of the Norton Anthology. It seems that the approach here has been one of quantity over quality as students in the survey courses (Brit. Lit. I-III and American Lit. I-II) are subject to a wide range of influential authors, but only short or sometimes even incomplete examples of their work. Poets, essays and short stories are exceptions to my frustration whereas novels are not. While I do think that Norton is a good introduction to the most significant literature in our world throughout the ages, I do not think that we should be assigned merely three to four chapters of a book. In American Literature I last fall we read an abridged version of both Uncle Tom's Cabin and The Scarlett Letter , which I think is both unfortunate and depriving. Some would say that Norton highlights the important parts of novels, but this seems to me to be kind of insulting toward the author.

When I was a student at PLU, I took an American Literature class in which we read nine novels over the semester, and I felt as though I was really able to gain an understanding and confident opinion about the author and their work. I don't know if I can say that about the survey courses here at EWU, and that's simply because I think there's too much text trying to be packed into one course. I believe we would benefit more from focusing on half a dozen authors opposed to twenty. I do like the fact that we're being introduced to all these writers, but I simply wish there was enough time to delve deeper upon each of them. I do not feel as though we're giving these works justice, and maybe that's something to do with the quarter system, who knows. I don't mean to bash the system, and I hate to think that's what I'm doing. I just wish there was more time to learn and analyze because I know that's the only way I'm going to be able to really remember and gain something from these works. My advice to anyone taking a survey course is to write down the authors that interest you, however much time you spend on them in class, and go on from there and explore them and their work on your own.