Discussion/study of In Cold Blood for the past month or so has gotten me to a weird point in my thinking, and one that has repercussions across everything I teach.  Basically, I reached a crisis point.  I passed out copies of the book, started reading it with the Am Lit Brigade, and then realized: there’s really no way to “teach” this book.  Like, there’s no point in discussing plot, characterization, setting, theme, &c, all those good old-fashioned Englishy things, because the book is a work of journalism.  Capote obviously took some liberties (especially in recreating the Clutters‘ last day alive), but the book is a full-length work of nonfiction.  And I realized, too, that this is the first nonfiction work I’ve taught since I was in an 8th grade US History classroom. 

It’s been very liberating.

Dispensing with the basic questions (”Which one’s Dick and which one’s Perry?”  “Who’s Bobo?”  “Where’s Kansas?”) quickly, we moved on to the more imporant questions of ethics.  Was Capote right in hiring a lawyer to prolong these guys’ lives?  Is it okay for him to have made a ton of money off of this story?  Did he get too involved in the case to be an objective reporter?  Why do we feel such empathy for Perry, when he obviously is a monster?  Watching the film Capote opened up a lot of questions and has been invaluable to our investigation of Capote and the Clutter case.

I’m beginning to understand what it feels like to engage in real discussion of books with teenagers.  The Clutter case is fascinating, yes, and the book is really well-written.  But the side conversations, the tangents, the explorations, have been even more gratifying.  And I can’t help it, every once in a while, when I feel like the students are feeling it too–feeling like they’re getting at something true about themselves, and about our culture, that is only catalyzed by the book, not dependent upon it. 

The question becomes, though, if this can really be done through the study of a more traditional work of literature.  Will they becomes so bogged down in the characters/plot specifics of Death of a Salesman to notice the wider implications of the play?  Will we be able to figure out if there is a difference, and what that difference is, between how we read fiction and how we read nonfiction?

I haven’t started the Am Lit Brigade blogging yet, but I plan to very soon.  I’m going to try Clay Burell’s new strategy with them–response to reading questions on my blog, but keep their own thoughts/explorations/etc on their own blogs.