However, if you can get students to see it as a starting point - to use NFS to find their way and transition into the original text - then there is a great implementation of Vygotsky educational theory. NFS gives people access to the stories and characters of the Bard, albeit, stripping away the best part. However, for students who are terrified of Shakespeare and don't realize that his language is as difficult as they think it is, but trick themselves into not understanding the most simple phrases - for these students it is a great starting point. I still think many of its interpretations are wrong. I was for the longest time vehemently against NFS. A place to start, or my battle with No Fear Shakespeare. You don't always have agree or take what it says on face value (something I always tell my students) but it usually knows what it's talking about.ģ. SparkNotes is someone to bounce ideas off of. Look, sometimes the best of us literary snob need some help identifying the obscure Gaelic references that fill Joyce's books. Instead of combing through 1500 pages, you use SparkNotes summaries to quickly locate what happens in which chapter - then find the passage in the book. There's a particular part I am thinking about that I need to reference, but I forgot to take note of it while reading (not having the foresight to know that I would need it). A quick reference: hypothetical me is writing an essay on a large or dense book (let's say, Clarissa).

However, I cannot top Juniper's rant (which I agree with) and will force my own personal biases aside and present the uses:ġ. have their uses - but are a very good tool for the lazy as well. Oh also, I think Spark Notes misses major themes and such to expose Spark Notes reliant students. Sorry if I sound like a snob, that rant has been building up for a while. Stupid people exist, and a lot of them are taking university English classes. Great idea!' Passionless vegetable-people, I tell ya. These kids should go to a career college or something, their prospects would be better than doing meh in university for four years in a major they don't like, and I wouldn't have to be surrounded by the kind of people who think 'well, I did best in English in highschool, I guess that's what I'll major in. I don't understand why people major in English if they don't seriously, seriously love it, it's not like literature is a big money maker. I don't get it, why are they there? It's not exactly the easiest way to get an arts credit, and a lot of these people are friggin' English majors. So many people in my English classes have relied on Spark Notes, and they also claim that they don't like to read.

Jude the obscure sparknotes