Serious Literature

I've been surfing the web to read about what people think about Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and I came across this amazing comment.

...my husband, a Tolkien scholar, often observes that these days, in literature, to write about deep and ultimate themes, it is almost impossible to do so in, say, poetry or "adult" literature and be taken seriously - for that, you must write in fantasy and/or children's literature - and then your readers will find you.

I certainly believe it. One of the worst parts of high school were the English classes. I love to read and even back then I was a voracious reader, reading lots of material outside of the requirements of school. But all that "great literature" was something I read but couldn't really stand. All it showed was that life and living was pointless and we all died even if you win you lost. "The Old Man and the Sea" was particularly nasty that way. They all ended with the protagonist (I can't call them heroes) either dead or insane. The best case for one was merely social and financial ruination. We only studied the tragedies of Shakespeare where everyone pretty much died. After 3 years of that is it any great surprise that the average American doesn't read for fun. There is no pleasure in it. Then I find a post like this that just pegs the sad/pity-meter.

I sampled all kinds of genres when I was young, it was fun to wander into the library and choose a book at random to see where it might take me. I still do that but not so often. I settled on scifi and fantasy because some of them would deal with hard and troubling questions.

What makes us human and different from the animals?
Why do people make choices that are obviously bad for themselves and others?
Why are so many people listening to someone who despises them and doing what he says?
How can good people do awful things?

There are plenty more questions but these are a good start. Too much great literature is only based around jealousy or envy, that isn't necessarily bad but there are far more emotions out there then just those.

Harry Potter generally is a coming of age story, but is also about love and the nature of good vs evil.

If schools really wanted people to learn to read they would offer a huge variety of material to read. Encouraging people to find the books they like best. That will help them learn to like to read if find some they want to read.

But it is still interesting that the literature that explores the hard stuff is considered kids stuff. Is that irony I smell.

Books are the most powerful time savers out there.

Today the American Library Association's posters have employed Denzel Washington to encourage kids to read. But how many of these students really buy the message?

I recently spoke with a junior who was stressed about her decreasing ability to focus on anything for longer than two minutes or so. I tried to inspire her by talking about the importance of reading as a way to train the brain. I told her that a good reader develops the same powers of concentration that an athlete or a Buddhist would employ in sport or meditation. "A lot out there is conspiring to distract you," I said.

She rolled her eyes. "That's your opinion about books. It doesn't make it true." To her, the idea that reading might benefit the mind was, well, lame.

This totally misses the point of books, at least non-entertainment books, they are a short cut to learning. Those posters are propaganda and obvious propaganda too. We don't live long enough to recreate all the thought out there and most of those thoughts were wrong anyway.

It is not unusual for an author of a book to work on a problem for 20 years, wasting lots of time on false ideas and dead end theories and then writes a book that filters out all the bad stuff and leaves just the best stuff for us to use to get to the next level.

" If I have seen further it is by standing on the shoulders of Giants." -Isaac Newton

Those giants were only able to leave books behind so that others could continue the work.

A book will condense a lifetime of work into something that you can read in a matter of hours or days.

How valuable is that? I read about people that do time management who recommend taking 2 minute showers instead of 7 minute showers to save time. That's pretty good but it is like clipping coupons or buying in bulk, sure they save some money but it is better to buy a good used car and save thousands of dollars in one fell blow then to clip hundreds of coupons over years. If I can condense 20 years, 5 years, or even just 1 year of research into something I can read in a matter of hours how much better is my life? How much further can I go? If I read just 4 books that condense 20 years of research into a weeks worth of reading I have saved an entire lifetime.

What is that worth to you?

That is what is so important about reading and books.