Approaches to Teaching Tolstoy's 'Anna Karenina' by Liza Knapp , Amy Mandelker (review)

Abstract

304 Reviews poetry. This threat to the traditional printed poem requires the corrective of leesbevordering based on a Romantic notion of literature and delivered by those who 'act froma cultural ideal and use a relatively superior tone' (p. 109) and who neglect digital culture. But Vaessens also notes that the reading programme itself has a democratic aspect in that it actively seeks a broad audience. While the papers discussed above represent the strong trend towards analysis of the literary field in the Netherlands, other contributors address the theme of time in the culture of the Low Countries from the perspectives of colonial and postcolonial studies, medieval studies, and linguistics. Natasha Tinsley approaches a Surinamese woman writer from the perspective of decolonizing queer theory, while Orlanda Lie looks at 'The Concept of Time in the Medieval World View'. Jan Noordegraaf ar? gues that Dutch eighteenth-century linguistics, an aspect of Dutch learning that has been largely ignored, marks the beginning of a historical and empirical dimension to linguistic philosophy and a sense of the possibility of change over time and therefore of what Willemyns refers to as 'language planning'. Other contributions from lin? guists focus on time as expressed through the use of tenses (Wim Klooster, Robert S. Kirsner), adverbials (Thomas F. Shannon and Michael P. Coffey), and particles (Kirsner). Readers ofJanus at the Millennium will gain a sense of the state of Dutch Studies in the world through a wide range of articles on the language, literature, history,and society of the Low Countries which are generally of a high quality. Scholars in the field will undoubtedly extend their knowledge and understanding of the Netherlands and Belgium and encounter new approaches to their subject. University College London Jane Fenoulhet Approaches to Teaching Tolstoy's 'Anna Karenina'. Ed. by Liza Knapp and Amy Mandelker . (Approaches to Teaching World Literature) New York: The Modern Language Association of America. 2003. x + 229 pp. ?22.55 (pbk ?9.75). ISBN 0-87352-904-9 (pbk 0-87352-905-7). This book is to be very warmly welcomed. While covering some fairlyfamiliar ma? terial and approaches in a form which will be accessible to undergraduates and the general reader, it also offersspirited and innovative discussions of key aspects of what is perhaps the most important of Russian novels. As such, it accords well with the overall aims of the series of which it forms a part: 'The series is intended to serve non-specialists as well as specialists, inexperienced as well as experienced teachers, graduate students who wish to learn effectiveways of teaching as well as senior professors who wish to compare their own approaches with the approaches of colleagues in other schools' (p. vii). In these terms it should become an indispensable part ofthe preparatory materials of all teachers of nineteenth-century Russian literature. This specific volume was prepared by soliciting responses to a questionnaire from those who actually teach the novel, although the precise mechanism by which the contributions came to be written is not fully explained. After a series of five intro? ductory sections written by the two editors, there are twenty-one short essays divided into three unequal sections, 'Anna Karenina in Tolstoy's Life, Thought and Times', 'Anna Karenina in the Literary Traditions of Russia and the West', and 'Classroom Approaches to Anna Karenina'. All the essays have much to offer,while many belie the ostensible purpose of the volume to become, in effect,outstanding short articles. The contributors are almost all from the USA, including most of the 'stars' of that particular firmament. Although it is not altogether clear why the two editors chose to hive offtheir own five introductory pieces, each of these contributions is a model of clarity and pro? vides an excellent overture to the thematics and problematics of the volume. Amy MLR, ioi.i, 2006 305 Mandelker's 'Teaching Anna Karenina' points to the challenges and difficulties of teaching this novel in the twenty-firstcentury: 'Those of us who teach the novel regularly find that it persistently detonates heated classroom debates of issues that continue to be topical: sex and sexuality, gender roles, social constriction of indivi? dual self-expression and fulfilment' and so on...