What will an A level in English Literature offer you as a school leaver?

This is a spider-diagram I have developed for potential students who are considering taking English Literature as an A Level option.

'The Jabberwocky' by Lewis Carroll

‘That’ poem for me was one I came across aged nine after receiving a children’s book of classic poetry from the primary school I was leaving. On the first page was ‘The Owl and the Pussycat’ by Edward Lear and on the second ‘The Tyger’ by William Blake. But on the third page was a poem I had never heard of before: ‘The Jabberwocky’ by Lewis Carroll. The first time I attempted to read it I gave up after the first stanza; it was nothing short of silly nonsense I couldn’t make head or tail of. But it was in the book I carried around with me tucked under my nine year old arm and little did I realise that one night, before lights out, I would flick through the pages of that increasingly smudged book and give in to ‘The Jabberwocky’. It was a Harry Potter ‘swish and flick’ moment: the jumbled letters and curious phrases not only sounded right but there was plot to the nonsense –it was magically making sense!

For anyone unfamiliar with the poem Carroll enjoyed mixing words together creating a word that was tangible to the reader but without formal definition. These are called portmanteau words originating in meaning from the portmanteau bag which is an old suitcase made of two equal sides. I later discovered that Humpty Dumpty explains to Alice the coinage of the words in the poem. He explains the practice of combining words in various ways by telling Alice, “you see it's like a portmanteau—there are two meanings packed up into one word.” It was not only the achievement of being able to understand the poem that filled me up it was also the fantastical story of the piece that really took me. The poem is about a little boy who is warned by his father to beware of beasts that lurk such as the Jabberwock, the Jubjub bird and of course the ghastly Bandersnatch! The child ponders beneath a Tumtum tree with his sword resting at his side and considers thoughtfully how best to rid the world of these beasts. It is at this time the Jabberwock crashes through the undergrowth and the boy engages in a courageous attack of the beast and whips off its head and drags it home as his prize. His father beams with pride and the poem concludes as it began with the descriptions of the thick turgid air –pure poetic bliss.

As you can imagine in recent years I have often wondered how I would teach ‘The Jabberwocky’ and after being introduced to Variation Theory I started to consider what broader issues I wanted to teach through the lesson. The research that surrounds Variation Theory would prove useful when planning a lesson that involves analysing ‘The Jabberwocky’ because of the language that has been used. Mun Ling Lo has noted that “according to Variation Theory, meanings do not originate primarily from sameness, but from difference, with sameness playing a secondary role.” If pupils were introduced to ‘The Jabberwocky’ they would be in a better position in terms of understanding if they were exposed to other forms of poetry. Perhaps I myself went through a similar learning experience with the poem; the first time I attempted to read it I had to abandon it. This could simply have been because at this stage I had not been exposed to a great deal of poetry. However, after flicking through the pages of my poetry collection several times I was more aware of the various forms of poetry and was therefore in a better position in terms of being able to understand it. Ling Lo observes, “if you do not know what English is and you hear 100 people speaking English, you will have no better idea of the meaning of “a language” –according to Variation Theory, meanings do not originate primarily from sameness, but from difference, with sameness playing a secondary role.” If I had read one hundred portmanteau poems I would not necessarily have had a better understanding of the meaning of the poetry. But, having read a wider variety of poetry of different forms, I developed an ability to comprehend the meaning.

A number of contextual layers surround ‘The Jabberwocky’ from its place in Through the Looking Glass to Carroll’s colourful life experiences. However, often context can cloud poetic analysis and so it would therefore be useful to teach pupils the context later. Keeping Variation Theory in mind it would perhaps be useful conducting a comparative lesson coupling ‘The Jabberwocky’ with a completely different piece of poetry. It could be coupled with another nonsense piece such as ‘The Owl and the Pussycat’ or something entirely different like a war poem drawing on the portrayal of conflict. With lower sets it could even be useful incorporating a Claire Gadsby activity of having one person lead another blind-folded through the landscape of the poem. I think that by teaching a poem that excites you it would be easier to pass on your enthusiasm and for me ‘The Jabberwocky’ would be the ideal piece.
http://www.jabberwocky.com/carroll/jabber/jabberwocky.html