Measure for Measure, a Loss : Students now arrive on college campuses without the grounding in literary masterpieces they once had.

Another school year is about to begin. Each fall, I experience a moment of panic. What if, during the summer, I have forgotten all I ever knew about English literature? What if I walk into the classroom and can’t remember how many pilgrims went to Canterbury, who wrote “Lycidas,” whether Hamlet loved Ophelia or Cordelia?

For years, I’ve taught a freshman course in early English poetry. The canonical authors remain the same (Chaucer, Donne, Shakespeare, Milton), but I, the students and even the classrooms have changed. Although I know a lot more about the texts than I did when I came to Caltech, I’m not sure I’m a better teacher. I used to depend on carefully prepared lecture notes; now discussions are far less structured. This has not been a conscious pedagogic decision, but a result of my no longer being able to read small print without glasses. Half the time I forget my spectacles, the other half I forget my notes. Thus, education marches on in mysterious ways.

Classes at Caltech used to be casual. We met in the comfortable lounges of the student houses or in the airy classrooms on the first floor of the beautiful humanities building or even, on warm autumn afternoons, on the lawn. These days, I’m usually assigned to a windowless room in the basement of some new lab. The entire first floor of the humanities building has been turned into financial development offices, and the grass seems less inviting, at least to these old bones.

The freshmen are still among the most brilliant students in the world, with high SAT scores and an abiding interest in science. The biggest difference is the presence of women in Caltech’s classrooms. Women undergraduates have been admitted since 1970; this year’s class is 30% female. There has also been an increase in the number of minority students and students from countries other than the United States and Canada. These changes have brought a welcome diversity, but with it has come a loss of shared educational experiences. High school instruction, even within the United States, is so varied (some of my colleagues would say “so weak”) that it is no longer possible to rely on a minimum of common knowledge, at least when it comes to literature.

When teaching Chaucer’s “Canterbury Tales,” I was once able to assume that most of the entering freshmen had already studied the General Prologue and a few tales. There were always those who could recite from memory the first 18 lines in its original language--”Whan that Aprill with hise shoures soote . . .” Nowadays, I consider myself lucky if some of the students have glanced at a prose translation. At other times, I’m almost relieved if they have read nothing and I don’t have to disabuse them of false notions about the poet. “No, Chaucer didn’t write in Old English; this is Middle English.” “No, he wasn’t Shakespeare’s contemporary. Chaucer died in 1400, the Bard in 1616.” “Actually, I’m afraid you’re just the tiniest bit confused about the Great Vowel Shift.” Plus I devote a week to the slow, philosophical “Knight’s Tale” to show the kids that not all of Chaucer’s stories are about bawdy sexual intrigues. Unfortunately, this cuts down on the time we can spend on his masterpieces of ribaldry.

Donne and Shakespeare are easier to teach. Students rarely read Donne before college. Since his poetry is best when it is most difficult, students often see it as a challenge and work hard to puzzle out the intricate layers of meaning. As in the ‘70s and ‘80s, almost all students still study several of Shakespeare’s plays in high school and come to the classroom with familiarity and even enthusiasm. This past summer, many will have gone to the film of “Much Ado About Nothing” and may well be eager to examine that play in depth or tackle another comedy.

The final item on my syllabus is Milton’s “Paradise Lost.” In 1969, when I taught my first class at Caltech, the students knew a little Latin and had studied classical mythology. Most had devoured chunks of “The Iliad,” “The Odyssey,” “The Aeneid” and the Bible. With such grounding, they were ready for the great Renaissance epic. Now, my undergraduates seem staggered by it. I used to assign eight of the 12 books. Then four. Then two. Lately, we spend hours on the first sentence. The students feel defeated. So do I.

Is paradise lost? Some of my younger colleagues at various universities may see it as a fortunate fall. Who needs to learn about interminable Christian poems by dead white European males anyway? Perhaps heaven and hell have been replaced by hypertexts soaring in hyperspace and other computer worlds about which my students know so much and I so little. But for my generation, it’s disheartening to lose a part of Western culture that has shaped how we think about our lives.