Step 1: Screen Clip One

a) Introduce students to the film by explaining that they are going to see clips from a documentary about a relationship between a father and a son that invites us to consider the role of memory and legacy. Both the father and the son are accomplished Chinese artists living in Shanghai.

b) Give a prompt for viewing: In addition to listening to the story, pay attention to the different ways the story is being told - including, visually, artistically, and through an artistic representation of an artistic process.

c) Show the clip.

Step 2: Discuss Clip One

When the clip finishes, invite students to share reactions. As part of the discussion, guide students to explore the following questions:

Based on this clip, what can you infer that Maleonn feeling? What evidence do you have from viewing this clip that allows you to infer how he is feeling?

• What different storytelling techniques do you notice? What emotions did each of the techniques evoke? What does that tell you about the choice of storytelling format and the message? What impact does each artistic choice have on the way the story feels for you, a viewer? Why do you think these different approaches have different impacts on the viewer?

Help them see the diversity of techniques: e.g., Maleonn speaks, both philosophically and in a radio interview; the filmmakers use standard documentary footage (e.g., the radio interview) and also “dreamy” footage of the water in the swimming pool; the filmmakers use music; Maleonn draws; Maleonn references creating a stage performance (and we get to see a glimpse of a puppet he will eventually use in that performance).

What is special about parent-child relationships? Why do you think it was important to Maleonn to preserve some of his childhood stories before his father’s memory was completely gone? In what way is Maleonn’s process an act of love and an act of preserving his father’s legacy?

Step 3: Screen and Discuss Clip Two

a) Introduce the clip explaining that students are going to see parts of the stage performance that Maleonn created, “Papa’s Time Machine.” Screen the clip.

b) When the clip finishes, invite students to share reactions, including what they noticed about storytelling techniques (e.g., the use of puppets, scrim silhouettes, props, sound). As part of the discussion, guide students to explore the following questions:

• Were you able to connect to any stories that Maleonn shared? Were you able to connect to any of the methods he used to tell this story? Why did some aspects of the creative storytelling impact you more than others?
• How is it that very personal stories from another person’s life can move us? What aspects of Maleonn and his father’s relationship are unique to the two of them? What aspects of their relationship are more universal?
• How can performance art invite us to feel connected to the stories and experiences of others?

c) Gradually move the discussion from the stories that Maleonn and the filmmakers have told, to literary stories they have read. Invite them to consider and recall works or authors that really resonated with them.

d) Break into small groups for a brief discussion exploring the question “What makes a story great?” Encourage them to consider the elements of stories that speak across cultures and ages; that allow for connection despite difference. Invite students to explore what makes a “universal” theme universal, and when/how storytellers transform accounts of one person’s personal experience to something meaningful for lots of people. Have them discuss other stories they’ve listed that have had a similar impact in their lives. What lessons have they taken from such stories?

e) As time allows, reconvene as a full class and invite students to share anything interesting that came up in their small group conversations. Then segue to their assignment.

Step 5: Assignment

Let students choose one of these assignments:

a) Tell the story of one of your own parent-child moments that you would like to remember, even if the memories of the people involved begin to fade. Choose a story that you believe has a universal theme (to which others might relate).

• [Depending on curricular needs, require students to submit their story in writing, or allow them to tell the story in any media format of their choice.]

b) Choose a single episode/story from a literary work you have read. Explain how the story presents a universal theme, i.e., why it would interest others.

• [This option is especially important for students whose family experiences include trauma that they aren’t ready to share publicly.]

[optional] Step 6: The Literary Canon

Help students explore how the existing literary canon offers well written works that explore universal themes:

• Why does a literary canon exist?
• What is it about texts written more than a hundred years ago that still speak to readers today?
• Who decides which works to include and which to leave out?
• In what ways can this “canon” be problematic based on who made the decisions for what is included/excluded? How does history, society, and culture determine what is ‘important’ or ‘great?’ Why is this also worthy of critique?

The scholar most associated with declarations about the literary canon is the late Harold Bloom. Discuss these Bloom quotes:

• "To choose works for study by high school students on the basis of ethnicity, sexual orientation, skin pigmentation, gender, or national heritage is ultimately destructive. The only criteria that can matter in the end are intellectual and aesthetic."
• "It isn't professors, or people who make lists, or whole societies even, who establish what the literary canon is. It is the strong writers who come later," Bloom asserts. "They choose the canon for us. Homer is chosen by all the Greek writers who come after him, by Europe, and by the Western world ever since, and Dante is chosen by Chaucer, and all who come after him. Chaucer is chosen by Shakespeare, then Shakespeare is chosen by Milton and everybody else since—and by Charles Dickens. It is not an arbitrary matter—it comes out of the literary tradition itself"(Source:https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/oct/20/harold-bloom-defence-of-western-greats-blinded-him-to-other-cultures)

Research and report on contemporary responses to Bloom, especially by scholars from races, ethnicities, or gender identities that have been historically excluded from the canon.