Essays of Charles Lamb

Essays of Elia / Charles Lamb

Question:- Evaluate Charles Lamb as an essayist. Or Comment on Lamb’s style.

Not only in his diction, but also in his mode of thinking, Charles Lamb is Elizabethan. He has all the prejudices as well as the greatness of that age. He imitates Elizabethan writers in number of ways. He is fond of coining new words, he likes alliteration in prose, he uses compound words extensively, he forms adjectives from proper nouns and he introduces many words which have become obsolete now.

When Lamb is reflective as in ‘New Year’s Eve’ and ‘the Popular Fallacies’, his style resembles the style of Sir Thomas Browne. Following passage from ‘New Year’s Eve’ is very reflective:

Of all sounds of all bells – (bells, the music nighest bordering upon heaven)- most solemn and touching is the peal which rings out the old year. I never hear it without gathering –up my mind to a concentration of all the images that have been diffused over the past twelve months; all I have done or suffered, performed or neglected, in that regretted time. I begin to know its worth, as when a person dies.

Some times we find the style of Lamb becoming fantastic like Burton. Look at the following passage from ‘Chapter on Ears’

Significantly, I could never be made to understand (yet have I taken some pains) what a note of music is; or how one note should differ from another. Much less in voices can I distinguish a soprano from a tenor.

The way in which Lamb starts the essay talking about ears and then says, he has no ears and quickly adds, ‘for music’ is humorous. Lamb talks about the sounds of carpenter’s hammer in a warm summer noon and then talks about ‘the measured malice of music’ to indicate his inaptness at understanding music.

One of the reasons for the popularity of Lamb’s essays is his witty style. In ‘My Relations’, he amusingly talks about his age and about his relatives: “I am arrived at that point of life at which a man may account it a blessing, as it is a singularity, if he have (sic) either of his parents surviving.” Charles Lamb picked up the terminology and style of the writers he read with much enthusiasm. Sometimes this style creates problems also. In ‘All Fool’s Day’, Lamb uses antique style where the subject is not capable of the deep thought and fine observation with which we are accustomed to associate it. In this essay, even the powerful fancy of Lamb fails to make it pleasing.

When Lamb picks up the modern theme, he adopts modern style also. In ‘Newspapers Thirty – five Years Ago’ his style is very much different from other essays. When Lamb describes rural beauty, he assumes almost Wordsworthian style. Whatever his style many be, Lamb’s thoughts are his own, fresh and original.

Generally, the use of quotation in an essay marks the weakness of the writer. Quotations are justifiable only if they are fit to the context and do not make any sense of incongruity. Milton could successfully use the passages of Greek and Latin writers in his works. Lamb also freely uses quotations. In his essay ‘My First Play’, Lamb uses the quotation from Wordsworth, “O, cuckoo! Shall I call thee bird, Or but a wandering voice?’. He transforms this quotation in to ‘The note of the cuckoo, a phantom of a voice.’

Sometimes he would combine two quotations from two different writers. His essay, ‘Ellistoniana’ has a quotation which is taken from two different sources. His line, ‘The last retreat and recess’ is taken from Swift’s ‘my late, my last retreat’ and Pope’s ‘the temple’s last recess’.

One of the essential qualities of an essay is humour. People often confuse the terms like wit, humour and fun. The first is based on intellect, the second on insight and sympathy and the third on vigour and freshness of mind and body. Lamb has all these three qualities. In ‘Poor Relations’, the opening is sheer wit, but when we read the story of Favel’s flight from the university, we feel like crying rather than laughing. Humour might be defined as extreme sensitiveness to the true proportions of things. We are so used to exaggerate one or other side of a fact that the true proportion when strikes us with a sense of incongruity excites laughter. However, what is more interesting is that we would be unknowingly laughing at our own previous misconceptions. Wit can be defined as an intellectual triumph and brings a sense of self satisfaction. Fun is the creation of animal spirits and health. In ‘All Fool’s Day’ Lamb creates fun with the description of pleasant nonsense like the idle talk when the wine is going round after dinner. The essay ‘Dissertation upon a Roasted Pig’ is full of sheer absurdities.

Pig – let me speak his praise- is no less provocative of the appetite than he is satisfactory to the criticalness of the censorious palate. The strong man may batten on him, and the weakling refuseth not his mild juices… no part is better or worse than other.

Lamb invents details sometimes. His discussion at St. Omer’s, when he was a student there, of the lawfulness of beating pigs to death and the story of the little chimney sweep found sleeping on the state bed in Arundel Castle. The thorough paced liar in ‘The Old Margate Hoy’ is no one but Lamb himself. Sometimes he takes the liberty of changing the facts. In ‘Amicus Redivivus’, Lamb writes that he drew his friend Dyer from the New River, whereas in reality, he was away from home at the time and arrived only after Dyer was rescued and put to bed.

Mystification is another characteristic of his essays. In ‘Dream Children’, he talks about his children, but the fact is that Lamb never married and towards the end of the essay, the children vanish. In ‘South Sea House’, he speaks of real people and then pretends they have no existence. In ‘Christ’s Hospital’, he begins in the character of Coleridge, “In Mr. Lamb’s “works”, published a year or two since, I find a magnificent eulogy on my old school. Towards the end of the same essay, he speaks as himself.

There is a mixture of Fun and Wit in his metaphors and comparisons. The clerks of the South-Sea House remind him of the animals in a Noah’s Ark; the sage who invented a less expensive way of roasting pigs than that which required burning down of a house is compared to ‘Our Locke’. The cook in ‘The Old Margate Hoy’, reminds him of Ariel.

Lamb has a special liking for a reversed irony. He makes a statement or uses a phrase which at first is unpleasing, but becomes pleasing when considered carefully. About his sister, he writes, “We are generally in harmony, with occasional bickerings, as it should be among near relations.”

Lamb also has a special liking for Paradoxes and Oxymoron. We find sentences like, “Awoke in to sleep and found the vision true.” He coins phrases like, “Fortunate piece of ill- fortune.”

Our smiles and our tears are alike limited by our powers of sympathy and insight. Lamb’s Humour is largely the effect of a sane and healthy protest against the melancholy induced by the morbid taint in his mind. He laughs to save himself from weeping, but every now and then his mind passes on to the sadder aspects of life. Description of his dead brother in ‘Dream Children’, the flight of Favel from the university in ‘Poor Relations’, the story of the sick boy in ‘The Old Margate Hoy’ and at number of other instances, we find pathos.

Lamb’s essays “are almost wholly autobiographical (though often he appropriated to himself the experiences of others.) The persona of Elia predominates in nearly all of the essays. Lamb’s style, therefore, is highly personal and mannered, its function being to create and delineate this persona with humour and sometimes pathos.” (Merriam Webster’s Encyclopedia, Massachusetts, 1995, p.656)

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Sources:-

(1) Lamb, Charles. Essays of Elia, Macmillan, India, 1895

(2) Merriam Webster’s Encyclopedia, Massachusetts, 1995
(3) < http://www.enotes.com/nineteenth-century-criticism/lamb-charles> September 16, 2007

Process of Communication

Process of communication:-

Definition of the word ‘communication’:-

The word communication is derived from the Latin word ‘communis’ meaning ‘common’. It stands for a natural activity of all human beings to convey opinions, feelings, information and ideas to others through words, body language or signs.

The process of communication starts with the transmitter. The transmitter is described as Tx. The role of a transmitter is that of a sender. She/ he sends the message. The message may or may not be verbal always. To send the message properly, the transmitter changes her/ his ideas into words / actions. This process is known as ‘encoding’. The sender sends the message through proper ‘channel’ or medium. If the receiver or ‘Rx’ has to understand the message properly, she/ he has to again change words / actions into ideas. This process is known as ‘decoding’. If the message reaches properly, the receiver indicates to the sender whether the message has been properly understood or not. This return information is known as ‘feedback’. Getting proper feedback is vital for successful communication because communication can not be one way deal. Moreover, the roles of the transmitter and the receiver keep on changing.

Types of communication:-

Broadly speaking there are two major types of communication:- Verbal and Non-verbal. Generally when we communicate, we use words. Communication through written or spoken words is verbal communication. Here the skills of the transmitter are:- Speaking and writing; where as the skills of the receiver are:- Listening and reading. Communication without words is Non-Verbal communication. It may be done through facial expressions, gestures, eyes, posture, colours, clothes, pictures or signs. Other types of communication are:-

1. Intra personal communication

2. Inter personal communication

3. Group communication

4. Mass communication

5. Meta communication

When the person communicates with herself / himself then that communication is known as intra- personal communication. Examples are – dreams, reading aloud, talking to one self, writing our own ideas.

Communication between two/ more persons is known as inter personal communication. Here the Tx and the Rx depend on one another. They send and understand messages through direct channels (words) and indirect channels (body language).

Communication in a group of three to twelve people is known as group communication. All the members in a group should be working towards the same goal. If all the members in a group perform the same activity it is known as additive group, if all the members in a group work differently to achieve the same result it is known as conjunctive group and when members discuss the solution to a problem it is known as disjunctive group. There can be a social group also.

When the messages are communicated through mass media like television, radio, news papers etc., it is known as mass communication.

The word ‘meta’ is from Greek language. It means ‘higher’ or ‘more than’. For a lot of people the exchange of information is most important in a conversation. The fact is, however, that with every sentence we speak, we send a great deal of additional messages and in the end it is always the receiver who decides on their contents. According to the selected meaning, the reaction of the receiver will be different. In the case the selected meaning doesn’t match the sender’s intention (what is more rule than exception) conflicts are bound to happen.

The modern notion of making ‘teaching – learning’ competitive has brought more hazards than benefits. Both as a student and as a teacher, I have always felt and observed that so –called ‘competitive edge’ has changed the outlook of teachers / students and academic institutes on education. We tend to forget that the ultimate goal of education is not ‘information’ but ‘wisdom’. In my short career as a lecturer in a commerce college and two semesters in an engineering college, I have observed that students have forgotten the importance of creativity, innovativeness and originality and teachers also harp on the same notes. Competency of a student is more often than not determined by the performance in the exams. Competency of a teacher is also judged by the research output and the publication.

There is no denying that the industry and people want capable human beings in order to gain handsome profit. But can ‘performance’ be the only / main benchmark? A country, for instance, comes up with a record breaking production of goods and earns lot of profit, but when the goods are tested by standard quality tests, they are proved to be hazardous to health. The country may be gaining revenue, but is losing credibility and respect.

In the same way, an academic institute of repute may produce students with knowledge and information in abundance but if ‘honesty’ and ‘wisdom’ are not involved in the process of teaching – learning, ultimately that knowledge would be hollow and without conviction. I feel strongly that the concept of distance –education or intranet lacks vital characteristic of true education i.e. ‘making all stakeholders true human beings.’

I as a teacher, and as a human being feel that ‘honesty’ or ‘wisdom’ are nurtured if only ‘creativity’ and ‘originality’ are given more emphasis in teaching – learning process. I know that being a literature / language teacher I can shout this at the top of my voice to which other teachers belonging to other disciplines may frown saying that there is little / no scope for creativity in their subjects. A teacher of grammar may say, for an instance that rules are rules. Can a teacher or a student change / modify rules on the veiled pretext of ‘originality’? My answer would be –An absolute idea should lead to relative quest of truth. Language is only an instrument; ‘wisdom’ is the ultimate goal. Famous poet Walt Whitman addressed this to scientists:

I accept Reality and dare not question it,
Materialism first and last imbuing.

Hurrah for positive science! long live exact demonstration!
Fetch stonecrop mixt with cedar and branches of lilac,
This is the lexicographer, this the chemist, this made a grammar of
the old cartouches,
These mariners put the ship through dangerous unknown seas.
This is the geologist, this works with the scalper, and this is a
mathematician.

Gentlemen, to you the first honors always!
Your facts are useful, and yet they are not my dwelling,
I but enter by them to an area of my dwelling.

The ultimate goal of education is to make students good human beings. A doctor may be a skilled person, but if the same doctor is not an amiable person and may stop an urgent surgery for the sake of money – the medical college which produced that doctor fails; a geologist or a petroleum engineer may have come out of an academic institute scoring 10 out of 10 GPAs, but if that same geologist or a petroleum engineer considers the earth as only the means of possessing natural resources – the system fails. The reason why the ecological danger is threatening the world is only the reason of this greed. Information may be passed on to an individual but wisdom springs from within. All academic institutes and all teachers should encourage creative ideas and should evaluate students on the principles they possess.

I have heard students talking about placement prospects and their financial expectations are understandable. After rigorous study and costly education they justifiably expect a good reward. They talk of monthly income in six digits. All around me, I listen words like ‘entrepreneurship’, ‘bucks’, ‘global opportunities’ etc. I have also heard faculty speculating on the sixth pay commission features and comparing packages of different educational institutes. I get disappointed when I don’t listen to words like ‘responsibility’, ‘civic sense’, ‘tolerance’, ‘national duty’. Who will instill all these ideas in the minds of young people? Parents are eager to see their children at the top. They watch ‘Tare Jameen Par’ and long for ideal teachers for their children, faculty would blow trumpet on stale age old proverb ‘one can take the horse to the water, but one can not compel it to drink the water’, in between the real purpose of education is lost.

I believe that the first job of a teacher in an age of internet flooding is to explain to students the importance of having ‘creative ideas’. Borrowed ideas can increase knowledge – not wisdom. Plagiarism must be explained to students elaborately and they must be persuaded to stop it even if their grades suffer. Students when they know that the teacher loves them irrespective of their grades will try to stand true in the eyes of the teacher and that is why I believe, education suffers when institutes are flooded with students. Creativity can be encouraged only if the students are in limited numbers.

Knowing the abilities of the students and putting them to constructive use is the duty of each teacher. I try to understand the personality of my students which is crucial for establishing good rapport in the class. Even when taking attendance, names create healthier atmosphere than roll numbers. The only place on this earth where people are impersonalized into numbers should be jails – not colleges. A mechanic of a car knows about each part of the car and its mechanism. Does a teacher know the hidden talent of each student? A student may not get good marks in exam but that same student may have a strong zeal for a social cause, a student may not speak well in acceptable pronunciation, but that same student may have a talent of creative writing. Why not bring out the best from a student instead of demanding our own ideas back from them? An age old wisdom says, “Students do not care as to how much their teacher knows, as long as they know how much that teacher cares.”

I try to know and learn from my students. They have made me what I am. I love them in spite of their imperfections because even I am not perfect. I evaluate them as per the system of which I am a part but I convey it in clear terms to my students that ‘Grades are not life. There are people who love you and accept you the way you are.’ I begin my each presentation with ‘Works Cited’ to set an example among my students that plagiarism can not be tolerated in academics. I always make room for questions that test the originality of my students, instead of guiding them to recommended reading / required reading. Students should themselves decide what to read and how to use it. I accept and respect the opinions of students but I also let them know my own stand firmly and politely. I always try to remain conscious about the use of gender in and out of the class because I know that students will follow my example. A healthy human society is made of men and women both.

I attach more importance to ‘humanity’ than to ‘scholarship’. A computer can work efficiently and incessantly but a computer can never be a social animal. Academic institutes are not factories they are gardens where trees can grow in the direction they decide.

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