The Politics of Literature

Abstract

As teachers of literature we find ourselves involved with and compromised by the contemporary world. The events of the December 1968 Modern Language Association meeting made our dilemma painfully clear. The dissidents of the MLA have shaken the organization out of its lethargy. We must assess the extent of our responsibility and the nature of our commitments on two levels, the personal and the professional. To teach literature effectively and communicate with students themselves intensely aware of contemporary realities we must ourselves be responsible and conscious. The present disagreement within the MLA concerns the mode of our responsibility: shall we act as private individuals on social and political questions or shall we assume that precise and uniform political involvement is our best course? The course proposed to us by the dissidents of the MLA would endanger our position as critical intellectuals free to determine our own responsibility and to assume it. To politicize the MLA would be to institutionalize bad faith precisely at the moment when we realize most acutely the necessity of good faith and ruthless honesty with ourselves if we are to survive as a meaningful organization.