“We can only ever see the world the way we see it. But if you read to see the way someone else sees it, that makes the world bigger.”
In light of staff strikes, budget cuts, and the casualisation of the academic workforce, The Student sat down with Dr Zosia Kuczyńska, a teaching fellow at the University of Edinburgh, to address the fundamental question of the study of literature: why do we still read? At the core of this issue is a matter of purpose. What is the point of studying literature in a world fraught with political turmoil and crises?
“I am not one to stress the utilitarian value of studying literature, but I do think, with my activist-adjacent hat on, that if you know how to pick apart exactly what someone’s saying, the metaphors they are engaging with, or what they are referencing, that will stop you from being manipulated.”
This view of literature perhaps protects only the individual—what of the people who do not study literature, who would not be shielded from damaging propaganda? Dr Kuczyńska suggests an alternative purpose for literature. The texts we study—and which survive the test of time—have largely been born out of communities of writers and thinkers who have chosen to coalesce in times of need. “Poetry is not necessarily going to save the world, but you can form communities and take care of one another. I can make spaces in my classroom for people to be safe.”
There is also the well-documented trend of the literature syllabus shrinking: students at all stages of education are rarely expected to read whole novels, and teachers often assign excerpts instead. Some scholars have suggested that this, alongside the popularisation of AI, spells the death of humanities degrees. Dr Kuczyńska takes a more positive view on this perceived crisis.
“Reading is my job and my love, but if it is something someone does not enjoy, I am not going to force it on them. There is so much amazing art being made with words, but also with other media. If reading is not your vibe, then that is fine. The problem is not that people do not read anymore, but a systemic problem with education.”
Dr Kuczyńska references the work at the Scottish Book Trust in investigating the importance of school libraries. After years of drastic cuts, the weakening of public reading infrastructure has played an equally significant role in weakening the study of literature.
Within literature then, the study of the canon is also an inevitable subject of controversy. The stereotype of the canon being “stale, male, and pale” is unfortunately true, as issues with canon formation mean that more people are excluded rather than included in canonisation.
Still, Dr Kuczyńska suggests that there is a point in studying our potentially problematic pasts, not least because many pieces of contemporary literature are based on engagement with works from the past. It can also be meaningful to form new canons through exploration and study, but funding cuts have made such efforts tricky.
“There is a limit to the amount of labour people who are on precarious contracts can do, because frankly, half our time has to be spent trying to find the next job.”
The casualisation of the academic workforce forces most of the staff onto temporary contracts, which limits the diversification of the curriculum. Individual educators do not always get the opportunity to influence the course material, as they are often limited to teaching inherited courses. The decolonisation of literature is difficult when the people most dedicated to this endeavour are not afforded the freedom and security necessary to engage in it.
Nonetheless, the study of literature survives. Every civilisation believes itself to be at the end times; every generation of poets believes itself to be the last. In trying times, literature might soothe the troubled, entertain the masses, or chronicle an epoch. It may not change the world, but it exists. It is as Auden elucidates. “[P]oetry makes nothing happen: it survives.”
Dr Zosia Kuczyńska is a Teaching Fellow in Modern and Contemporary Literature at the University of Edinburgh. She is also a published poet with The Emma Press, among other places, and a researcher of queer archives and literature.
Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash
