What's So Great About It?

The cleverness of my titles never ceases to amaze me. But then again, neither do shiny objects.

As I try to make myself more literately well-rounded (and oddly enough, all that sitting around reading might be making me literally well-rounded), I am forcing myself to approach those texts that they foisted off on us as literature during high school. While I do believe it is the mission of high school English teachers to expose their students to things they wouldn’t normally read on their own, certain books have found their way into the curriculum despite the limited connectivity to a teenagers life. Even though I personally can’t stand Catcher in the Rye, the fact that Holden Caufield is a troubled and alienated youth (I was going to write “alienized,” but apparently that lacks a certain wordosity) – in other words, a teenager – there is a protagonist that is readily identifiable. “Readily” is important because we are talking about the toughest, hardest-to-please critics in the world. All they know is like/dislike.

While getting my teaching degree (which I put to such great use as I don’t teach), my professors stressed that questions like “Do you like the book?” or “What do you think of the book?” will bring an immediate and universal response of “It’s boring” (or in slightly “edgier” schools – “It sucks”). This is regardless of whether the kids think it’s true or not. Once “It’s boring” has been disseminated, the game is virtually over. The reason is the same reason for pretty much every action by students: herd mentality, aka “peer pressure.” How is the shy kid who did like the book supposed to argue with the gregarious one who declares it “sucks.” Although the “universality” of this is slightly exaggerated, the point is teachers are taught to save opinion questions until the very end, and utilize levels of questioning when initially engaging the book, because for the most part, high school students do not have the skill-sets to critically analyze literature in a meaningful way – and high school English courses are not necessarily designed for the development of these skills. Please thank your local Congressman for funding “No Child Left Behind” (as espoused by a man who “doesn't read”).

But most books are not Catcher in the Rye(thank God! – seriously, is there a more overrated book? Want to know why Salinger is/was (is he still alive – not sure I care) a recluse? Because he’s afraid people will ask him about his books and realize he’s a hack! Sorry, it’s going to take a lot of convincing to prove his “talent” to me. And I’ve read Catcher a number of times since high school. Ooooh, curses). Therefore, most books we read in high school do not have those readily identifiable traits and/or characters. While in grad school in St. Louis, I noticed that many high schools taught The Awakening, ostensibly because Kate Chopin was originally from Webster Groves, a suburb in St. Louis County. Perhaps “ostensibly” is not the right word; perhaps “blatantly” would be more appropriate. Because that can be the only reason to expect high school students to enjoy that book.

--“But school isn’t about enjoyment; it’s about learning!”

--“Correct, but these students are learning reading is boring.
“Great lesson.”

And here’s the problem: These books were not written for a teenage audience. I’m not trying to belittle the reading level of teenagers, but many of these novels deal with experiences teens simply cannot connect with. In the movies, they would call these “adult situations.” Mind you, sex is it’s own category, and on most teens probably could identify pretty strongly with that.

All that said, and I still believe most of these books are great (or at least, not terrible). Heck, without them, we’d probably never inspire kids to become English majors (I assure you, a dearth of which would be a bad thing, because there is a need for college-educated men and women to work in middle management – and for other reasons as well). On the whole though, they are being read by the wrong people at the wrong time.

“Two wrongs” and all that.

Just like food, the literary palate develops over time. For food, taste buds actually die over time, making the intense flavors that were so disgusting to you as a youth less heinous the older you get. Which is why foie gras, caviar, and truffles are considered delicacies, but kids wouldn’t touch them with a ten-foot pole (unless said delicacies were in a piñata, and the kids weren’t told that before hand). For literature, it’s the opposite: your mind and literary palate expands, whether it’s because of more education or other, less noble reasons.

Such as wanting to impress a girl.

Such was the case with myself and The Great Gatsby (now my title’s starting to make a little more sense). When I read this in eleventh grade, I didn’t think it was actually possible to pen over 200 pages of ennui. Boy was I wrong. Half the book is people sitting around saying how bored and hot they are. While perhaps accurate to a summer on Long Island and New York City (yes, everyone, it’s hot – this is not groundbreaking news), it does not exactly make for captivating scenes.

But then I met a girl who loved Gatsby, and as I thought it might be nice if this girl liked me, I read it again. And, lo and behold, it was a lot better than I thought. In fact, it was actually really good. After being pissed off for a hot-second (because that’s the way I am; when’s the last time you enjoyed being proven wrong?), I simply realized that Fitzgerald, in creating the ennui, is doing so purposefully. The characters are unable to have excitement because their lives have reached a point where excitement doesn’t make sense anymore. With everything possible, adventure is no longer novel. Tom’s affair, Daisy’s rejection of Gatsby in the end, Gatsby’s murder: they are all practically non-events. And the language, while languid, is also very poetic.

That said, I still don’t believe it should be taught in high school. How do you teach “boring is good” to a student whose only desire is to not be your classroom (this last statement is based on education psychological studies – even in the best teachers’ classes, the students, when asked, would rather not be in class than in)? Fitzgerald’s style comes from an era that most kids don’t understand. The dialogue, while almost completely natural, is odd – probably because it’s completely natural. Conversations are non-linear moments for the characters, and they often jump from topic to topic without a care for what the other person is saying. Daisy is such a flighty character, and her whims move her dialogue all over the place. While superb in execution, it can be disorienting for a reader who is generally reading for understanding, and not critically. Character and plot always come first to high school readers, and then it’s up to the teacher to bring in narrative elements into the equation. If the reader has trouble understanding basic elements of the story though, then how are they supposed to understand things like symbolism, imagery, or metaphor?

That’s the crux of my argument. What’s more important to English teachers: getting students to read “classics” or getting students to read? I know many would claim “both,” but I don’t think that’s generally the option. Yes, in certain ideal situations, you can find students you can teach a book like Gatsby to. But even then, I think what you’re getting is committed students and not committed readers. And that’s a shame.

So's the fact that it didn't work out between me and the girl. But that's another story.