Assignment 1:1, An Introduction
A photo to help you put a face to my name 🙂
Hello, everyone!
My name is Magdalena How, and I’d like wish you all a warm welcome to my blog for ENGL 372 99C!
Before I continue with my introduction, I would like to acknowledge that I am writing this post from my apartment located on the traditional, ancestral, and unceded territories of the Coast Salish Peoples, including the territories of the səl̓ilwətaɁɬ təməxʷ (Tsleil-Waututh), Skwxwú7mesh-ulh Temíx̱w (Squamish), S’ólh Téméxw (Stó:lō), and xʷməθkwəy̓əm (Musqueam) Nations. If you’d like to find out more about the history of the land on which you live, check out the fantastic interactive map created by Native Land Digital. 🙂
As stated in the course overview, ENGL 372 (Section 99C), taught by Dr. Erika Paterson, will examine Canadian literature and orature including both European and Indigenous traditions with a key focus on stories. As this particular section is offered entirely online, each student will be creating a blog (like this one!) on which we will be posting our assignments and engaging in discourse with each other via the comments section.
I’m taking this course as an elective as I enter the final term of my Master of Music in Opera at UBC. (Slight tangent: if any of you happen to be curious about the Opera Program at UBC, or how one produces opera during a pandemic, you can check out our website here: https://music.ubc.ca/opera). As a performer, telling stories is an essential element of what I do, and I am very much looking forward to discovering more about the importance and impact of the wide range of stories encapsulated in this course. In addition to the prospect of learning more about the role stories play and have played in our society and history, I am hoping to deepen my knowledge of those stories that are not part of my own personal cultural background but are crucial to building a better understanding of the place in which I live: the stories and traditions of the First Nations people whose land I call home. As an added bonus, I am excited to work on my digital literacy skills and improve my ability to communicate using online platforms.
In short, I am very much looking forward to working with all you fellow students as we embark on this course together!
Cheers,
Magda
Works Cited
Native Land. native-land.ca. Accessed 12 January 2021.
Paterson, Erika. “Course Overview.” English 372 99C Canadian Studies. UBC Blogs. Web. Accessed 12 January 2021.
UBC Opera. The University of British Columbia. music.ubc.ca/opera. Accessed 12 January 2021.
Hello Magdalena! Thanks for the Opera Website; Edward Chamberlin didn’t cover the opera options of communication and now I wonder if it’s orality or literature. I mean, it has to be written before it can be sung, right?––Both score and lyrics. Yet it is undeniably oral. Do you consider it to be literature? If it’s titled “Mansfield Park” then it can’t escape the literature designation entirely. Are you acting in Mansfield Park? I’ll buy the $10 ticket if you’re in it. That raises the question of novelist Richard Wagamese’s “Indian Horse”, too, which was made into a film. I’m not so sure about this simple orality/literature dichotomy.
Cheers!
Joe
Personally, I think Opera should be looked at as a form of literature (and music in general). Literature is about telling a story — the medium from which it comes from should not matter. As an English Literature major, the question of what is literature often comes up in my other classes. In todays modern age I honestly feel like we cannot just consider books as the only form of literature anymore; think of movies that didn’t come from novels, or music that when the lyrics are read reads just like poetry.
I’ve never seen an opera, or heard one to its full extent, so my knowledge of it comes from the various descriptions I’ve read in historical-based novels. Perhaps this is a question you can answer Magdalena: do Operas tell a story in the music? Or is that something fanciful that authors like to put into their books?
Hi Joe,
That’s a great question you ask about literature and opera – makes me think about how excited I was when Bob Dylan won the Noble prize for Literature based on his lyrics, thanks for raising such an interesting question.
Hello!
Joe – to answer succinctly: yes, I do consider opera to be a form of literature! In its completed form it is very much an amalgamation of the oral and the written (and the staged, and the theatrical, and so on…); however, at least in my interpretation, opera primarily serves the goal of telling a story. And as Cayla says, that’s what literature is about!
Cayla – yes (in general), operas do tell a story through the music! The music and the libretto (the text) work together to tell the story. Of course, there’s the additional complexity that each performance will be filtered through a different set of directors, singers, orchestra members, set designers, and all the other myriad creatives who work to present an opera. This results in a wide variety of interpretations of the same story! As you can imagine, this leads to all sorts of debates as to which elements of opera are most important to the story, etc… not dissimilar to the debates raging over the validity of different forms of orature and literature, in fact. 🙂
January 19, 2021
Hello Magdalena,
You have one of my most favorite names – so beautiful. Thank you for posting your welcome, you bring a wonderful perspective to our course of studies and I am very much looking forward to learning more and working together. My background is also in performance – theatre. Great links too, Thank you Magdalena.
I wanted to post this link to Thomson Highway as well, I am sure you’ve heard of his work, but just in case 🙂
Thank you very much! I can’t wait to explore more about stories of all sorts in this course – and I’ll be sure to take a look at Tomson Highway’s works! 🙂
Hi Magdalena. Thank you for your post; it’s great to meet another music student here in our virtual web space, and I’m glad you and the opera programme are able to continue your good work in these difficult times! I appreciate your interest in the relstionships between music, performance, and storytelling. One of the best examples I can think of is the early music specialist Benjamin Bagby’s rendition of “Beowulf”(https://www.bagbybeowulf.com/)–it’s such a magical combination of song, gesture, and narration, and “Beowulf” itself troubles the boundaries between “oral” and “literary” cultures and expressions. And I think you’re right, Joe, in that opera often does something similar. There’s that pull between textuality (and the supposedly autonomous work) and the singularity and spontaneity of performance, too. I’d be curious to hear (maybe as the term goes on) how you as a singer–I am a mere instrumentalist!–think about music and narrative and your storytelling role as a performer.
All best to you,
Connor
Hi Connor – it’s lovely to meet you too!
I think you hit the nail on the head when you mentioned the “magical combination of song, gesture, and narration” – not only in that rendition of Beowulf (which looks excellent!), but in performing arts in general. In my opinion, opera (and other performing arts), become more than the sum of their parts; they combine elements of orature and literature to fulfill their primary goal of conveying a story.
On another note, I couldn’t help smiling as I read your story of hiking and finding yourself diverted and enjoying stories on the way back. 🙂 It sounds like a wonderful experience!