Is Literature Dangerous? Or, the Teacher's Anguish

Extract

Talking about teaching modern literature is also a way of talking about the relationship between literature and society, such an old topic that there is now scarcely any desire to deal with it. But when the teacher in a school or university classroom opens a novel, a poetry collection, or most often an anthology or classic with its attendant notes, and starts reading, trying as hard as possible to grab the attention of twenty or a hundred students, at that moment something crucial happens that has to do with the relationship between literature and society.