Hobart Senior High School - Memories Yearbook (Hobart, IN)

Page 33 text:

D The appreciation of the importance of the study of Eng- lish is shown by the fact that in no other subject are four years of work compulsory for graduation. The course is well planned and carefully presented, and consists of two parts. The first is two years’ work in composition in English, teaching the student to write English clearly, concisely and expressively. The second is two years’ study of the life and writings of the great lights of Eng- lish and American literature. The class of 1914 put in two years of composition work under the able guidance, for the first year of Mr. C. E. Newlin, and for the second year of Miss Edith Wood (Parker). Many were the themes we composed in those two years, on such a variety of subjects that it would be useless to try to recount them. During the past two years we have taken up the study of the authors and their lives and works, receiving instruction from Supt. Thompson, and we have enjoyed and profited from our work. The classics we have studied are numerous. In our Freshman year, under Mr. Newlin, we read eagerly Scott’s “Ivanhoe,” enjoyed his “Lady of the Lake,” admired the patriotic sentiments of both Washington’s “Farewell Address” and Webster’s “Bunker Hill Ora- tion,” were piloted safely through Addison’s “De Cov- erley Papers,” and received our first introduction to classic drama in Sliakepeare’s “Merchant of Venice.” As Sophomores, Miss Wood brought home to us the beau- ties of Milton’s “Minor Poems,” struggled hard to bring us to an understanding of Macaulay’s very scholarly and verbose “Essay on Milton,” showed us the charm of Hawthorne’s style in his “House of Seven Gables,” and the great character-portraying power of Shakespeare in £T == Q t) his powerful tragedy “Macbeth,” besides giving us much pleasure in helping us to interpret George Eliot’s “Silas Marner.” Last year Mr. Thompson introduced us to Tenny- son’s excellent lyrical poems, “Idylls of the King,” founded on the legends of King Arthur and his knights, and written in the most expressive and poetic language. We read also Dickens’ “Tale of Two Cities” and mar- velled at the great novelist’s power of description both of scenes and of characters. Carlyle’s “Essay on Burns” was read, and we appreciated his praise of Bums’ work, and were interested in his explanation of Bums’ peculiar character. Here the essayist, without ignoring the short- comings of the poet, praises his excellent work and on his very faults preaches a whole philosophy of life in a way to bring home fundamental truths forcibly. Our Senior year, given to the study of English authors, has included reference work in the productions of many of them from Chaucer to Tennyson. We have studied especially Shakespeare’s “Julius Caesar.” In this great play Shakespeare, the master dramatist, kills his hero early in the second of five acts and yet at the end makes us feel the greatness of the man through the ruin and destruction brought about by his downfall. Thus we feel that our work in English has been com- prehensive. We have been introduced to the great writ- ers of England and America from Chaucer to Whitman, and have read some of the work of the greatest in each branch of literature. Our especial gratitude is due our teachers for their kind patience and helpfulness in meet- ing our faults and failings. Surely our four years of work in English have been filled with pleasure and profit. GEORGE H. WHITE.

Page 32 text:

a G. H. THOMPSON English ENGLISH LITERATURE. r ALL, I believe, it will be agreed that one of the greatest foes of progress in any age is a narrowness in the development of the minds of the people. However, this narrowness is rapidly growing less, and the present age is progressing because the interests and activities of the people are gradually becoming more extensive. Many agents are at work in creating a many-sided development of the public mind. Some are working among the present generation, bringing before the adults a variety of new subjects for their thoughtful consideration. But it is also agreed that the work which yields the most certain, the most lasting, if not the most rapid results, is the work among the rising generation, whose minds, still in the formative state, are ready to be shaped and molded by any potent influence. It is vitally important that the influences which are brought to bear on these young minds are influences which tend to combat narrowness and to promote their greater development. The greatest broadening agent at work in this important field to-day is the study of the English language in the High Schools of America. This stndv not only broadens the view and gives the needed variety to the ideas of the student, but is of great aid to him in grasping the full meaning of the text-books in any other line of research, which meaning often escapes the understanding of those who, from lack of proper study or from a meager, inexpressive vocabulary, are unable to comprehend in its entirety the idea presented. Then, too, with a good understanding of English, the wonders, the beauties, the pleasures of the great world of English literature are open to him. He may pass the day in monotonous, mind-dulling labor, and spend his evenings with the greatest minds of all time, thinking their thoughts, and adding to them observations from his own experience, thus preventing his mind from becoming nar- rowed to the unpromising confines of his uneventful daily labor. Surely the study of the English language by the rising generation will be a great factor in aiding the prog- ress of the race. Hobart High School has always stood for progress. G

Page 34 text:

0=0 0=0 u t) G 0 == o