Dead Poets Society: The Welton Way

In the Dead Poets Society, there are two conflicting educational methods: the “Welton way” and the “Keating way.” Under Welton’s methods, the individual student is restrained. Welton teaches their student to blindly obey every piece of information thrown at them. Their students are taught to regurgitate information, not chew on it, swallow it, or spit it out. The students are not taught to be individuals but instead are forced to fit the exact same mold of straight A’s to Ivy League colleges to wealthy career paths. Keating, however, wants his students to think for themselves; they should ask questions and experience life because they only get one to live. Keating’s teachings enthrall his student, Neil Perry, who takes Keating’s torch and runs
with it. Keating’s other student, Richard Cameron, however, tries his very best to extinguish the torch. Eventually, Neil’s father hears about the Keating method versus Welton method, and he immediately become a Cameron. He does not work for nothing and he will not have some backwards teacher fill his kids head with nonsense. Thus, the battle between the Keating way and Welton way begins. The Welton mentality towards education restrains the individual because it defines education as a systematic means for to certain kind of success-- a wealthy job-- and teaches conformity over critical thinking. The teachers at Welton define education as the a means to an end and just one step for Welton students to go to an Ivy and get a good job. Neil’s dad embodies this Welton mentality as he makes Neil cancel some of his extracurriculars, such as writing for The Annual because he knows these fun activities have nothing to do with his son's future career as a doctor. The Welton method doesn’t desire to create any real passion for knowledge, but instead wants to graduate students who will make a bunch of money. This definition of success is emulated when the students are being inducted into Welton and are asked to name the four pillars of Welton: tradition, honor, discipline, and excellence. These four pillars reflect their model of success. Only through tradition can there be honor. Only with honor can there be discipline. Only with all three of these can there truly be success. Ultimately, the point of following these pillars is to achieve their definition of success: getting good grades, attending a good college, and getting a high-paying job. In addition to defining success, Welton tells their students that their way to knowledge is the only way to learn. In the service where the new students are inducted, each student is handed a candle, and one of Welton’s teachers lights the first candle. Though this ceremony symbolizes the start each student’s quest for knowledge, the singular Welton candle that ignites the first candle also symbolizes that their knowledge only started with Welton. Before, their naive questions and inquiries have led them nowhere. Yet now, with Welton, their minds will be put to use. Only Welton can light the true path to knowledge. Though Welton tries its best to conform their students, Mr.
Keating does not. Mr. Keating pushes his students out of their normal school environments to teach his students how to unlearn their blind obedience and to think for themselves. Keating embodies the Romantic ideas of independent thinking and experiencing life. These Romantic thoughts make a very big impression on one of Keating’s students: Neil Perry. Neil Perry embodies many aspects of a Romantic hero because he has an admiration for imagination and living life. He loves the idea that Keating’s Dead Poets Society existed outside of Welton and that it emphasized living life, not just hearing about it. So, Neil restarts the Dead Poets Society and claims himself the leader. He calls his friends to come with him and they start to read the real poets works, not just the poetry limited with in Welton’s walls. They read about love, sorrow, and legends, and expand that small section dedicated to the Romantics in their poetry textbooks. Additionally, like other Romantic heroes, Neil ultimately rejects the authority around him. Neil restarts the Society knowing that if Welton found out, he would be expelled. He also auditions for the play without his father’s permission and even forges a letter of permission from his father. Neil is also a misunderstood young man in revolt against his surroundings. Unlike the students at Welton who are content with following the career paths their parents have laid out for them, Neil really
just wants to be an actor. He doesn’t want to perform open heart surgery, but perform on the stage. He doesn’t want to learn about the anatomy of the human body, but learn choreography and dance. However, Neil gets so carried away with wanting to experience life at its fullest that the fullest becomes too unobtainable. A true Romantic’s rebellion alters people’s way of thinking and tells them to pursue their passions. Though Neil’s rebellion starts off with this mentality, his rebellion quickly shoots off the Romantic’s path when he thinks life isn’t worth living anymore. The Romantics believe life is the best present, and thus Neil, but taking his own life, threw that present away. Neil was no longer a true romantic because he had thrown away the very essence the Romantics wanted to experience: life. After Neil chokes on the bone, Welton goes into a frenzy.
The school needs someone to blame for Neil’s suicide because they need to keep Welton’s reputation intact. As many would have guessed, Mr. Keating becomes the scapegoat. Yet, there is a case to be made that Neil’s father, not Mr. Keating, is responsible for Neil’s death. Neil’s father does care for his son, but he cares about his personal image more. Mr. Neil has a very big concern for his own pride and reputation, not his son’s own ambitions and experiences: he wants a mini-me, not an unique son. When Neil reprimands his father in front of Neil’s friends, his father immediately commands him never embarrass him like that again. Again, when Neil doesn’t ask permission to audition for the play, he is more angry at the fact that Neil made him sound like a liar in front of Neil’s friends mother. From this constant pressure to make his father look good, Mr. Perry immediately casts his son under his shadow and represses Neil into someone he isn’t. Additionally, Mr. Perry has basically planned out his son’s life. He makes Neil quit some of his extracurriculars, like writing for The Annual newspaper, so he can do more work that will prepare him to be a doctor, and when Neil finally says he doesn’t want to be a doctor, Mr. Perry says Neil is going to military school because he won’t obey the plan set for his life. This consistent pressure, represent, and scrutinization causes Neil to finally say enough, and pull the trigger,
because he figured that if he couldn’t live the life he wanted, what was the point of living at all. Thus, with this argument, I do not believe Mr. Keating should have been fired. Welton was just looking for a scapegoat that would keep their reputation semi-intact, and Mr. Keating was the most obvious choice: he was knew, he was radical, and he was a “threat.” However, Neil had loved acting since he was a kid and he was already quarreling with his father’s plans even before Keating walked through that door. Neil, not Mr. Keating, found the play flyer and auditioned himself. Mr. Keating even asked Neil to tell his father and be open with him about the play, but Neil was hesitant. Mr. Keating pushed Neil to interact with his father more and try to push for a compromise, but Neil himself knew there was no compromise to be made because his father was stubborn, therefore making his father the harsher villain than Keating. However, not every student was enamored with Keating’s hands on, questionable style of teaching. Richard Cameron has almost no romantic qualities and is the basic definition of a suck up. Unlike the romantic heroes, Cameron learns to pass at life. He starts taking notes on the poetry nonsense in the introduction of the poetry class when Keating says it is complete “excrement.” He continually asks, “Is this going to be on the test?” or, “Do you think he is going to test us on this?” because he is only worried about passing, not actually observing and feeling what he is learning. Cameron also completely submits to the authority around him. He is the first to snitch on the Dead Poets Society in order to save his neck, and even tells everyone else to do the same if they want to keep attending Welton. When Keating is finally fired, Cameron is the first to answer Mr. Nolan when the class is asked where they are in the poetry textbook. Everyone else is silent, feeling shame and remorse, yet Cameron is back to business as usual. He has no sympathy and no remorse. He just wants to pass and knows that if he answers Nolan, he can learn what he will need to study for their next test. Those who live life and adapt the Keating way must realize that there is a difference between rebelling out of feelings and losing sight of those feelings all together. Though Neil started off his rebellion correctly, he quickly lost sight of what it was he was trying to accomplish: living life to its fullest. One must not be a Cameron, just going through the motions of life, but one must also not be a Neil, forgetting the value of living it.