As someone pointed out in class Friday, there is so much to write about Waterland that I must choose one topic upon which to elaborate. I find that the subjects of education and schooling are more prominent in this book than in Our Mutual Friend, but rather than compare the two novels, I will attempt to focus on the Swift novel for now. Although I, myself, am typically unable to separate learning from school (as I mentioned in my initial blog), I realize that many feel they receive education through life rather than institution. I find this to be manifest in the character of Tom Crick, who, although he is a teacher and obviously values schooling, nonetheless (thus far) seems to have learned a greater amount through life experiences. Chapter 10, devoted entirely to "the Question Why," is when I began to notice that Tom seems full of contradictions. He claims that learning history is important because it helps to satisfy the search for "explanation" and that by learning history, we "learn from our mistakes so it will be better in future..." Yet, he also claims that we may not come "to an Explanation, but to a knowledge of the limits of our power to explain" and that history "teaches us no shortcuts to Salvation, no recipe for a New World." So, according to the history teacher, the reason to learn his subject is to find answers and learn from the past to create a better future...But these can never be achieved. Perhaps he realizes that it isn't World history (or any to be found in textbooks) which has formed him, disciplined him, enlightened him; but his own personal history and that of the human condition which have educated him most. While teaching his students irrefutable facts about war, dates,people, and their homeland, he simultaneously relays the personal stories of historical figures(i.e. that of Sarah and Thomas Atkinson) and of his own youth. It is through his childhood and adolescent experiences that Tom learns valuable life lessons: those of death, sex, love, and family. He claims that the moment he saw Freddie Parr's body "that I came out of a dream." This represents the "Here and Now", a significant point in life that seems to put things into perspective. The death of his mother (whose stories he misses); the death of his friend and the reality of seeing the body; the burden of knowledge of his brother's involvement in that death; the discovery of his own sexuality; the responsibility of parenthood: such things cannot be taught in a classroom. But Tom tries to teach these things. My question is the question of "Why?"