Hamilton Salsich's Page

“… in the very temple of Delight
Veil’d Melancholy has her sovran shrine…”
--Keats, “Ode on Melancholy”


Last week, when one of my students was beside herself because of the C+ she had received on an essay (she’s usually an ‘A’ student), I thought of these lines by Keats. This girl normally experiences nothing but success in English class; she dwells “in the very temple of Delight” in my classroom. She labors diligently on each task and receives high tributes for her work. She generally knows l… Continue

“It was not till Tom had pushed off and they were on the wide water,—he face to face with Maggie,—that the full meaning of what had happened rushed upon his mind. It came with so overpowering a force,—it was such a new revelation to his spirit, of the depths in life that had lain beyond his vision, which he had fancied so keen and clear,—that he was unable to ask a question.”
-- from The Mill on the Floss by George Eliot (my italics)

This passage seemingly has nothing whatever to… Continue

I have often enjoyed comparing my work as a teacher to that of a gardener. Both of us are interested in helping things grow – the gardener her plants and I my burgeoning students. Both of us take pleasure in walking among our charges, admiring the expansion of leaves or minds, and both of us love the times when we can stand apart and marvel at the final product – the unfolded flower petals, the spreading-out minds of teenagers. What I find especially satisfying about this metaphor is that neithe… Continue

The other day, when I was told I would be missing two sections of English class because of some special activities at school, I was initially upset, even a little irate, but luckily I soon remembered that there are innumerable activities that are at least as important as English class. It’s seems preposterous to me that I can so easily fall into the trap of believing that the subject matter of my curriculum is unrivaled in its importance. Where did I get the notion that learning the rule for sem… Continue

This year I’m going to try teaching writing with the help of Mozart’s music. It’s often struck me that classical composers must have worked in a somewhat similar fashion to the way my young writers work on their formal essay assignments. When I listen to a Mozart quartet, I hear the main theme developed in various ways, just as I (hopefully) see a thesis expanded and explained in the students’ essays. Mozart comes back, over and over, to the major idea of the piece, and I insist that the student… Continue