Reading Steiner’s Afterword, I became very aware of several things; one, being that we would be putting this book down soon and two, that Steiner is confronting what all masters at some point face: a world that may be changing without them.  Still he says hopefully, "Life as we know it could not carry on without [masters and disciples]."  And then adds: "But there are significant changes underway" (179).  And with this, before we put his book down, he will have his final lesson.
This brings me back to childhood for a moment.  My dad liked to read us a short story called "The Last Class" by Alphonse Daudet.  Like many fables "intended" for children, it carried a pretty heavy message—one that I scarcely could grasp at the time.  After reading the afterword, and feeling sentimental about Steiner’s last words, I decided to revisit this short French tale that takes place in 1873 prior to the Prussian occupation of Alsace and Lorrain, and really read it.  And read it—with the idea in mind that it is not just the teacher’s last class; it is the final class of Steiner’s master. 

Our disciple in this story is a young boy name Frantz who is faced with the decision between skipping school to be a part of the lovely day brimming with sunshine and blackbirds or attending school to be examined on his knowledge of the participle.  Frantz feels his master’s pull however, and opts for the participles—and once his mind is made up, he doesn’t meander, he books it to school (this is dedication!).  It is the adults along the way who tell him he doesn’t need to rush—school’s not going anywhere.

It is on his path to school that he observes a gathering around the town bulletin board—the one that always bears the bad news.  But with the thought of facing Monsieur Hamel’s iron stick, and even worse, his disappointment, he hurries past.

Once in the classroom, he expects to receive what he thinks he deserves, but instead finds the class is silent "like a Sunday morning," and that Monsieur Hamel is not the least bit upset.  As the Monsieur speaks gently to him, Frantz notices he is wearing his finest clothing and that there are adults from the town perched on benches in the back, notebooks in hand. 

The Monsieur ascends his platform and informs the class that this will be his last class as there is no more French to be taught; from now on, only German.  And that a new teacher will be taking his place.  At this, thoughts fly through Frantz’s head—he doesn’t know how to write yet and may ever know now.  How could they!  Guilt and regret burden his young body—why did he ever miss class or not pay attention?  His heavy books seemed now "like old friends—from whom [he] should be terribly grieved to part."  It all became clear now, to little Frantz, what it all meant. 

And as Monsieur Hamel begins to speak to the class, he too questions aloud the times that opportunities to study were missed for other activities.  He takes the chance to share life lessons with the class—things he had always felt were important, but somehow, he felt, never got relayed in his daily lessons.  The class was never more attentive and the teacher was never so patient.   He puts words to his innermost thoughts on the importance of their French tongue as "it was the most beautiful language in the world, the most clear, the most substantial; [and] that…[they must] never forget it, because [according to Monsieur] when a people falls into servitude, "so long as it clings to its language, it is as if it held the key to its prison.""

From time to time during the during the writing lesson, Frantz looks up at his teacher and imagines what is happening behind his pensive stare at the objects on his desk.  All those years of teaching to come to this, he thinks.

The fable comes to a close as the clock strikes twelve and the master rises one last time "pale as death."  Unable to speak, he writes his last words on the blackboard.  And not being able to turn around to look at his class one last time, he dismisses them with his hand.

George Steiner, almost seventy years after Daudet’s story of Frantz, finds himself as a child, leaving France a month before the Nazi occupation of Paris.  Steiner in his 2007 interview, reports that even in New York City he remained faithful to his native French language by attending a French Lycee.  And in his final thoughts in Lessons of the Masters this tone of longing for things past, but also recognizing what is to come, rings through.  The "sovereignty of the scientific," the "patriarchal structure inherent in the relations of the Master to the disciple…receding," and the current "age of irreverence," as Steiner calls it, are all taking the ideas of the master and disciple to new places.  Still Steiner doesn’t leave us here.  He tells us after all of our hand wringing and confusion that teaching is "satisfaction beyond compare" and that "there is no craft more privileged" (183,84).  Steiner had a lot of other things to say in this book—rightfully so, he was engaged in his argument—but this is what Steiner has been wanting to sing all along.  And like Monsieur Hamel, he says what he has been meaning to say and then leaves us with only writing—admitting that "argument should end in poetry" (184).

Why is it that we don’t get to the heart of our lessons until we are at the end?  The last day of class I would always read my class the Nelson Mandela speech containing Marianne William’s "It is our light, not our darkness, that most frightens us."  As they would walk out the door I would hand them a rose (and thinking of this now, after reading Steiner, I wonder what this meant?).  Why is it that I never read this at the beginning?  What might happen differently if I did?  Do I fear what could happen if I am too "real" with my students or is there something to be said for having to build up to what I will only know at the end?  The fable of "The Last Class" speaks to the power that every lesson holds in our memories; the teacher and the student both are caught at the end wondering why they ever took study for granted, why they never said what their intentions meant.  Frantz loved his teacher enough to miss a beautiful day for a participle exam; Monsieur Hamel loved his students enough he shared his love for his language with them.   Despite all that I may have thought Steiner was getting at when I first started reading this book, at the end, I am wondering why I didn’t really get it in the beginning.  Then again, I don’t think Steiner intended us to really get it right away.