Literary criticism of children's literature asserts a one-directional view of power with the adult writer constructing the child reader. Using "aetonormativity"-- adult perceptions of normality -- this paper explores what happens when children co-construct publishable fiction. Our analysis of drama and creative writing workshops shows…

Despite ongoing and prolific critical scholarship arguing for the widening of the secondary language arts curriculum, many practicing teachers are required or encouraged to teach a curriculum dominated by canonical texts. This is often the case at schools with highly diverse students whose varied cultural and linguistic backgrounds have…

The author does not really like "Hamlet." He loves the play, the language, and the characters, but always finds it difficult to teach. Part of this is because he prefers to assign students scenes to perform as they read a Shakespeare text, but Hamlet does not divide nicely into manageable scenes, and he usually does not have enough teenage Ken…

Argues that William Shakespeare's "The Tempest" is the play that is best suited for the high school English curriculum of the 1990s. Discusses historical and critical aspects the play's key themes. Shows ways of using the play in high school classes, and describes 19 works to read alongside of"The Tempest." (HB)

Sketches a model of the inductive method for teaching literature, using Eugene O'Neill's "The Hairy Ape" as an example. (RB)

In terms of structure, the play "Othello" is a distortion of an initiation ritual. Arnold van Gennup, in his book "The Rites of Passage," reduces all initiation rituals into three definable phases: separation, transition, and incorporation. The general pattern of the initiation ritual in "Othello" is as follows:…

The series editor of the "Cambridge School Shakespeare" describes how recent Shakespearean theatre productions, involving astonishing cultural transpositions of space and time, have influenced his views about teaching the bard in schools. To reach students, teachers in multicultural settings should replace the pedagogy of explication and…

Explains a teaching technique for explicating "Macbeth" that depends on textual proof. (RB)

This paper discusses the problems of interpeting "Oedipus Rex" and argues that morality was not the primary question being raised in this play, nor was Sophocles urging people to humility and piety. Instead, Sophocles was primarily interested in the insufficiency of human knowledge. The gods and their role in destiny, the character and…

Presents annotations of nine books (or sets of books) published between 1990 and 1997 that look at ways in which Shakespeare can be presented and explored in English or Drama classes. (NH)

CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGISTS LOOK FOR SUBSTANTIAL CONNECTIONS BETWEEN A WRITER'S LITERARY WORK AND THE EXTERNALS OF HIS LIFE, A PRACTICE THAT ENGLISH SCHOLARS ESCHEW. HOWEVER, A USEFUL KIND OF AUTOBIOGRAPHY MAY BE FOUND IN THE WORKINGS OF SHAKESPEARE'S IMAGINATION THROUGHOUT MOST OF HIS PLAYS. SHAKESPEARE, IN HAMLET'S WORDS, CAN BE CONCEIVED AS "A…