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Dr. Michael Raiger Joins Ave Maria Faculty
By Mary Suarez
Although he has only just begun his first year teaching Literature at Ave Maria University, Dr. Michael Raiger already provides a familiar and friendly face to the students. While many freshmen are just being introduced to him in their Literary Tradition class, other students may remember him from last school year, when he visited to give a talk on the Romantic poet Coleridge. Others will recognize him because he is frequently seen at daily Mass on campus, often accompanied by well behaved, curly haired children, of which he as seven. No matter the circumstance, Dr. Raiger's presence on the campus of Ave Maria University has already established the freshness and enthusiasm one finds in his teaching approach as well as his manner.
Given the opportunity to sit and talk with Dr. Raiger then, was a very highly anticipated occasion. Appropriately enough, our interview began with a discussion on the Philadelphia Phillies, Dr. Raiger's favorite baseball team, which he passionately follows to the point of verging on what he calls "an obsession." One is immediately struck with the realization that this intensity is characteristic of Dr. Raiger, not only as a sports fan but even more powerfully as a literature professor. After just a few classes in his course on Romanticism, his favorite period in Literature, one can't help but be impressed by Dr. Raiger's passion for his subject.
Although he originally studied philosophy at Boston College, Dr. Raiger discovered his deep love for Coleridge and the Romantic movement at the recommendation of a friend, who suggested that "Kant has nothing on Coleridge." All it took was a reading of "This Lime-Tree Bower My Prison" and Dr. Raiger was, in his own words, hooked. At each mention of the poet's name, Dr. Raiger's entire face lights up as he immediately enters into praise of his poetry. He explains "there is just something about the way beauty spoke to Coleridge and told him of God's presence that really just came together for me." Dr. Raiger readily elaborates that "Coleridge uses loss for gain. He gains out of loss, in a way that uses nature as a kind of remarkable revelation of God's presence."
One is struck yet again with the appropriateness of it all: Dr. Raiger's passion and enthusiasm in many ways mirrors the defining traits of the Romantics he studies. He describes the Romantic movement as "a huge burst of energy" which "uses poetry unashamedly and unapologetically for theological representation." Dr. Raiger explains that his course on the subject will focus on "the two elements that form an axis that cut across each other in a sense, if you will, and that is the relationship between subject and object and between human beings and nature." His teaching approach is casual yet thought provoking, as his continual encouragement of discussion is further facilitated by his welcoming manner and keen insights. Indeed, almost each and every sentence Dr. Raiger articulates about literature could be used as material for an hour long in-class discussion or a topic of a paper.
To conclude our interview, I asked Dr. Raiger what he would say to a student considering majoring in Literature, or rather, what makes Literature such an important field of study. With a twinkle in his eye, he replied, "I'll give a Coleridgeian answer. It combines the head and the heart. Poetry is, and should be- and this is one of the great things about this literature department at Ave Maria- that which combines deep reflection and thought, with deep feeling. You can get that in theology, you can get that in philosophy, but I think in poetry to the greatest degree."