Title: Tales out of school
First published: 1999
Description: Jo Keroes's scope is wide: she examines the teacher as represented in fiction and film in works ranging from the twelfth-century letters of Abelard and Heloise to contemporary films such as Dangerous Minds and Educating Rita. And from the twelfth through the twentieth century, Keroes shows, the teaching encounter is essentially erotic.

Tracing the roots of eros from cultural as well as psychological perspectives, Keroes defines erotic in terms broader than the merely sexual. She analyzes ways in which teachers serve as convenient figures on whom to map conflicts about gender, power, and desire.

To show how portrayals of men and women differ, even in situations that are very much alike, she examines pairs of texts, using a film or a novel with a woman protagonist (Up the Down Staircase, for example) as counterpoint to one featuring a male teacher (Blackboard Jungle) or The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie balanced against Dead Poets Society.
Subjects: Teacher-student relationships in literature, Teachers in motion pictures, History and criticism, Education in literature, Desire in literature, Teachers, English fiction, Teachers in literature, American fiction, Gender identity in literature, Authority in literature, Gender identity in motion pictures, Lehrer, Schüler, Roman, Sekseverschillen, Films, Leerkrachten, Letterkunde, Engels, Erotiek, Film, American fiction, history and criticism, English fiction, history and criticism
Places: English-speaking countries
LC classification: PS374.T43 K47 1999