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Torneo di lettura

Nel mese di aprile 2006 presso la scuola media di Nova Milanese era in corso un fatto entusiasmante come un "torneo di lettura".  Anna Ferrari ha tenuto un incontro con i ragazzi delle classi prime dal titolo Saper leggere, saper raccontare: dalla sua esperienza di scrittrice a quella di insegnante ha cercato di spiegare cosa significhi "leggere". L'esperienza, molto coinvolgente per la relatrice, ha riscosso un'accalorata partecipazione dei ragazzi, che le hanno rivolto numerose e interessanti domande.  Un'avventura come questa  ci convince, una volta di più,  che la lettura è un atto "magico".

Qui può scaricare il testo dell'incontro.         

UTZ or “the best of possible worlds” , by Bruce Chatwin

(extract)

Quello che segue è un estratto da un seminario, più che una lezione,  dedicato alla narrativa in lingua in classe e contiene sia suggerimenti didattici, ma non dettagliati piani di lavoro,  sia idee personali sul racconto Utz, di Bruce Chatwin.  L'idea di fondo è invogliare i ragazzi alla fatica del leggere, anche in una lingua straniera. Si vuole che essi colgano l'essenza non i dettagli, al di là delle barriere linguistiche, per lasciarsi coinvolgere dalle idee e dalle tematiche.

        Index:

1. The novel

1.   The characters

2.   The setting

3.   The times

4.    The “genre”

2. The Themes

1. The Golem

2. Alchemy

3. Porcelains

3. Conclusions

 

why UTZ is worth of notice

One of the aims of this paper is to get the students appreciate modern literature before the dedicated time of the last year, particularly short stories, which, as the genre suggests, are short and consequently have their own appeal to the classroom.

Why Utz? There is not a peculiar reason, simply I liked it, and so I thought that also my students would like it.

Other more serious reasons are: it is by a contemporary writer, it is written in a rich and powerful language, it is connected to art and creativity, it is complex enough to make students think, and easily pleasant enough not to reject them.

Some colleagues may find other reasons, for example the time setting and the related political issues (the Iron Curtain, totalitarism). They are important themes, though, but I’m not going to treat them. The borders of this papers are more restricted, and I’m not quite good at dealing with these aspects of literary works. So, to others the hard task(?)!

A final consideration: only after I had experimented this analysis in my classroom 8A(a fourth year, 2° term, italian liceo linguistico), I decided to write it down. And I learnt a very important lesson: let your students speak their own opinions and deductions, do not try to teach them what you have found interesting in this paper, but use this material exclusively to guide them to grasp the most of this shiny little story.

Introduction to characters

In order of toughness they are: Utz, the protagonist; Martha, Utz’s maid; the I-voice; Orlik, one of his friend. Other minor characters make their appearance in the novel, and they will be considered at the due time. In my opinion they serve as links among the different paths the novel takes.

Everybody knows that characters are important in a novel, but that is not the reason why I started with them. Characters in Utz are the right starting point to attract student’s interest, furthermore they conduct perfectly the story. It is not the case of a novel of ideas, here ideas have blood and flesh just as human beings.

Utz is defined as the owner of a spectacular collection of Messein porcelains which… has survived the Second World War and the years of Stalinism in Czechoslovakia. It is as if to say what your friend was like, you’d answer: he is a lawyer, isn’t it?

Actually this extremely clear statements establish the key note of the whole novel: porcelains and totalitarism. The link between them being Utz.

Shortly later in this chapter we are told that the name "utz" carries a lot of negative connotations, such as drunk, dimwit, and similar, and that the Utzes were a minor family of Saxon landowners, pretty rich and noble, however not of the highest range.

Yet there is something more about this figure, something dazzling and puzzling: his face was immediately forgettable. When describing him,  the narrator is even in doubt as to whether he has a moustache.  On reflection, he  even states that a moustache would overwhelm his face so much that it’d better not be there.

What is missing in Utz’s physical description, is to be found in the abundance of details we are given about his porcelains collection. With a subtle and sensuous pleasure by the author, we are led through Utz’s apartment covered with shelves and shown his beautiful pieces of porcelains. The beloved are Harlequin and the figures of Commedia dell’Arte, the Spaghetti Eater, a splendid tureen… When Utz speaks about them, his eyes light up, he is filled with pleasure. But where did all these little beings, come from?

All started when he was a child and since then on he never abandoned his collections and was even able to spare it from the greedy hands of Stalinistic collectivisation.

Actually there had been a time when Utz tried to leave his porcelains, feeling captured by them, and went to a Spa. But homesickness was so deep that he had to come back home, to his porcelains and to Martha, their caretaker.