h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

My feelings on the subject of life exactly.

'Our Town' made me depressed when I read it in school. Revisiting the play when Paul Newman did it led to a revelation. At 16, I just wasn't ready for it.

One of my major beefs with the way literature is taught in high school is that they push kids into reading things that they might not have the maturity to appreciate. Lots of folks wind up hating to read because they are required to slog through so much that they can't relate to.

Now we have Accelerated Reading which is even worse. I just hate it. The kids love it until they hit about 3rd grade. Then tghe choices become much more narrow. And they push kids to read well above their grade level. The problem is that the tests the kids are required to take are on the grade level of the book, obviously. So a talented fourth grader who is reading at 9th or 10th grade level may understand the words but is in no way mature enough to grasp the concepts. They fail a lot of the tests for this reason, which discourages them even further.

During summer reading the kids are so relieved when we tell them we don't care what they read as long as they have fun doing it. If they want to read picture books or Tolstoy, it's their choice. we have to make kids understand that reading for recreation is fun, not a ordeal.

I've had kids all but tell me I'm lying when I tell them I read for fun.

While I'm ranting, I want to add that people need to understand that it's ok not to like a book or author. Just because some critic or educator decided that James Joyce was brilliant and should be read by teenagers doesn't mean that said teenagers are dumb or unsophisticated because they don't like him. Shows they have good taste, as far as I'm concerned. Give modern kids modern authors to read. Give them books with settings, plots and characters they can relate to and learn from. Let them dangle their infinitives!

Oh, goody. Can I rant awhile, too?

I agree about not dictating what kids read. Even though my experience with librarians was the polar opposite of what you describe.

Twelve years old, and finally able to take advantage of a public library. Riches unfold. My mom gets a family card.

Librarian: 'The young people's books are over here, dear.'

I wait until she's not looking. Then I sneak out of the library ghetto. Get my books and my mom's card. So there. (The librarian did not approve.)

I don't know what kind of books teenagers relate to. I was never much good at being a teenager. I worked in the school library, and 'age-appropriate' appeared to mean 'Funny Car Summer' or some romance thingy. I found this patronising to the patrons. (I took one of the librarian's favourite books home once, something by Georgette Heyer, probably. My mom enjoyed it, but said it was 'a waste of time' when I told her there was more where that came from. )

Then the younger English teachers came out of the 60s Revolution determined to be 'relevant', and forced 'The Great White Hope' on my sister. She didn't know where to put it. Nor 'Johnny Got His Gun'. On the subject of Beckett, Sis was scathing - my sister should have been a theatre critic. ('Garbage cans! They were standing in GARBAGE CANS!') She didn't think it was relevant to *her*.

I think what everyone means is, don't force the sound-bite generation to read complex-compound sentences. I think that is a good idea, having tried to teach people about them.

Dickens was *interesting* once. So interesting that a huge crowd gathered at the docks in New York when the ship came in with the newspapers. Someone on the boat shouted down, 'Little Nell is dead!'

A groan went up from the crowd. That's engagement.

I think Kurt Vonnegut, Jr, could inspire modern readers much as Dickens did. Or Ewan MacEwan, for that matter. And that's not kiddie stuff. Of course, if they have to read about other teenagers before they consider it 'relevant', I'm sure somebody's updated 'Funny Car Summer'...

Let students read modern English - but without any dangling whatsits. To be effective, English ought to be clear. It really does pack more punch when the infinitive gets up on the right side of the lettuce bed.

I'll shut up now.

Parents can put kids of reading too. A woman came into ask our Children's Librarian about books for her 'gifted' 9 year old. She asked about a particular author she liked in the 70s (assuming because she liked them, her daughter would). We had some of his works but they were all out. She then proceeded to pooh-pooh all of the CL's suggestions because they weren't advanced enough for her daughter, or she wouldn't like that sort of thing.
The daughter by the way, wasn't there! She was on school camp, and the mother was panicking needing to have a book for her as soon as she got back.

Really! I think kids should be encouraged to read stuff they enjoy regardless of whether it's at their reading level, above or below. If they enjoy it, it's not going to be a chore.

Reading is fun

I have always loved reading. Sadly my eyes can no longer help me.
I remember on my last visit to France before the war and in my grandparents home I found a copy of Lady Chatterly' Lover. I asked my Maman if I could read it and she had a cadenza. Anyway I found where she had hidden it and took it up to my favourite "sapin")pine tree) climbed it and hid it in my special branch hiding place. I read it but never undersdtood a word of it. !!

Thanks for reminding me of that.

Funnily enough I well remember reading The ascent of Everest as a child which of course had hot yet been successful. That is why when eventually the conquerors of Everest came and gave a talk in Salibsury S,Rhodesia now Zimbabwem I hurried and bought a ticket to go to it although I certainly could not afford the sum of the ticket.
As a student I always felt that my best friends were librarians. !! I really love them. They work with such wonderful living things which give so many people so much pleasure. It is really a tragedy for me not to be able to read any more.

With affection

Christiane.
AR80

Sunday 4th December 2010 6.15 GMT

Sorry I forgot to date that memory!1

It was of course WW2, and I was eleven years old turning 12. It was therefore in 1939. Long before any of you were even thought of. !!

With affection,

CME
3.XI/2010 6.30 GMT

Dear Christiane,

What a wonderful memory!

Elektra and I read all the naughty books, such as 'Fanny Hill' and 'Lady Chatterly', at university. Elektra even got credit for this! One of the books had just been allowed publication in the US for the first time.

The reason was one of my professors from the German Department. He was teaching a course in comparative literature, on the question of controversial literature. We read the books in order to understand questions of censorship. (We decided that 'Fanny Hill' was probably pornography. It was certainly boring.)

My favourite reading from that course was the introduction to 'Ulysses'. US editions of that book always include Judge Woolsey's decision in the case United States v. One Book Called Ulysses. It makes great reading and includes the lines:

'But my considered opinion, after long reflection, is that whilst in many places the effect of Ulysses on the reader undoubtedly is somewhat emetic, nowhere does it tend to be an aphrodisiac. Ulysses may, therefore, be admitted into the United States.'

Of course, that was the first time Ulysses was published anywhere.

So...here's to safe hiding places for good books, and to freedom of thought.

Thanks for sharing your memories,

Dmitri

Ranting is always permitted in my journals, encouraged actually.

Christiane, your reminiscing is always a joy to read. And it points out a truth concerning children and books. (Adults and books, also.) The more forbidden a book is, the more we want to read it. Controversy and attempts to censor and ban books from libraries and classrooms has the opposite effect of what the objectors want. More people wind up reading the books, not fewer. And that's as it should be. Poetic justice in action.

Sunday, December 5.

"People 'died' all the time...Parts of them died when they made the wrong kinds of decisions - decisions against life. Sometimes they died bit by bit unil finally they were just living corpses walking around. If you were perceptive you could see it in their eyes; the fire had gone out...you always knew when you made a decision against life.... The door clicked and you were safe inside - safe and dead."

- Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Now, that quote just makes me wonder what she was talking about.

Monday, December 6.

Saying on a t-shirt:

"If a Republican speaks in the forest and no one hears him, is he still wrong?"

, indeed. I like that one.

Hi Dimitri and Ekektra,

Well, I am going straight off to read Ulysses....

Thanks for that information. He was Greek I think.

CME
AR80

Tuesday 7th December 2010 7.30 GMT

Hi Hypatia,

What an extraordinary quote from Anne Morrow Lindberg. Was she related to the famous Lindberg the aviator? Why was she so sad?

It takes me ages to write and edit my postings so please forgive me if I only do one or two a day.

With affection and do please let me know about that quotation.



Christiane.
Ar80

Tuesday 7th December 2010 7.35 GMT

Good morning, Christiane. Anne Morrow Lindbergh was the wife of Charles Lindbergh. You can read a short biography of her here:

http://www.answers.com/topic/anne-morrow-lindbergh

The quote I used is from a poem called "Decisions". I think she was trying to point out the importance of moral clarity, emotional control and the dangers of making poor choices in our lives. Be true to yourself, otherwise you aren't fully living nor are you living up to your potential. Don't take the easy way out if it means compromising your principles. That leads to a slow, living death, to the death of the spirit even though the body still lives.

There's a line that is generally left out when this particular quote is used about a cock crowing to warn us when we are about to make a poor decision. I'm not sure why it is eliminated so often. Perhaps the symbolism is too Biblical to suit her admirers.

Tuesday, December 7.

"The first casualty when war comes is truth."

- Hiram Johnson

I'll add to that what Ron Paul said this week regarding a certain whistleblower website affair (that I can't even read news articles about while using a government computer):

"In a free society, we are supposed to know the truth. In a society where truth becomes treason, we are in big trouble."

Amen, CZ. And the hypocrisy of it all turns the stomach. I'm old enough to remember the tirades about a controlled press in the Soviet Union and China. Explain how we're any better.

Holy Alanis Morissette!

U.S. to host World Press Freedom Day in 2011.

Irony, thy name is U.S. Department of State.

http://www.state.gov/r/pa/prs/ps/2010/12/152465.htm