I posit that there's absolutely zero things wrong with not teaching teenagers classic literature.
Keep that for college courses for someone who's interested in it.
Nothing will be lost if we don't have 14 year olds read Romeo and Juliet or Gatsby.
I disagree strongly. Teaching art and literature and culture is important for rounded development.
Most of them aren't doing the reading to begin with, so, like I said, nothing will be lost.
I'll meet you halfway if we get rid of just Gatsby, how's that?
Gatsby is excellent, topical, and short
Why get rid of it over, say, Canterbury Tales or The Odyssey?
Topical to what, exactly? The struggles of the upper socialites of the 1920s? You could theoretically work it into a combo lesson plan with The Great Depression but lol @ that ever happening.
Man it is 6:30 in the goddamn morning, don’t make me come up with an articulate defense of Gatsby’s exploration of the moral emptiness and ennui of the decadent upper class
the book would probably have a lot more traction for young people if we weren't afraid to talk about capitalism
I posit that there's absolutely zero things wrong with not teaching teenagers classic literature.
Keep that for college courses for someone who's interested in it.
Nothing will be lost if we don't have 14 year olds read Romeo and Juliet or Gatsby.
I disagree strongly. Teaching art and literature and culture is important for rounded development.
Most of them aren't doing the reading to begin with, so, like I said, nothing will be lost.
I'll meet you halfway if we get rid of just Gatsby, how's that?
Part of the reason we teach the classics and the same history set and the "common core" as it were, is so that everyone has the same basis of information to relate to. Part of our school system is indoctrination. Giving the same basis of knowledge helps with that. Also it allows for us to frame knowledge with specific context, and being able to understand literature reading and critical thinking helps with writing those fucken college papers and essays, because being able to read at a high school graduate level, does not cut the mustard when you get into college.
Honestly I think we should be doing high school and an associates degree as a base set of knowledge, and wait till 3rd year in college or trade schools before we start specializing.
thatassemblyguyJanitor of Technical Debt.Registered Userregular
I've definitely read Great Expectations and The Great Gatsby. The rest I never read in entirety, but remember reading excerpts for various classroom activities.
I think sometimes people think a book is boring when they're just kind of bad at reading books. It's a skill, like any other, that can be practised and deepened and improved. Sure, you probably know how to read by the time you're ten, but reading a book isn't just about reading and understanding the open meaning of a sentence: it's about appreciating the aptness of a simile, recognising symbolism and allegory when it arises, reading widely enough to be able to tell good writers from bad, and why, and seeing how little one writer can put down to evoke an image or how much another can put down to establish the right mood.
The more and more widely your read the better you get at it, until you die, at which point you're still not done because you were probably halfway through a book.
That isn't a post about anyone here in particular, or their judgement of any book in particular. But "it's boring" is a thing i know kids say about stuff they just don't want to engage with.
With the depressing state of copyright law today, teaching children classic literature is a moral imperative, if for nothing else than keeping our shared culture from being wholly owned by cooperations.
life's a game that you're bound to lose / like using a hammer to pound in screws
fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
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ShivahnUnaware of her barrel shifter privilegeWestern coastal temptressRegistered User, Moderatormod
That isn't a post about anyone here in particular, or their judgement of any book in particular. But "it's boring" is a thing i know kids say about stuff they just don't want to engage with.
It's hard to judge them for not wanting to engage, because it is definitely boring.
I'd definitely have children/teenagers read The Great Gatsby, Huckleberry Finn, and To Kill a Mockingbird for examples of great (and readable) American literature.
I'd also throw in 1984, Pride and Prejudice, and (abridged) The Count of Monte Cristo.
Those are all very readable and entertaining books.
That isn't a post about anyone here in particular, or their judgement of any book in particular. But "it's boring" is a thing i know kids say about stuff they just don't want to engage with.
I posit that there's absolutely zero things wrong with not teaching teenagers classic literature.
Keep that for college courses for someone who's interested in it.
Nothing will be lost if we don't have 14 year olds read Romeo and Juliet or Gatsby.
I disagree strongly. Teaching art and literature and culture is important for rounded development.
Most of them aren't doing the reading to begin with, so, like I said, nothing will be lost.
I'll meet you halfway if we get rid of just Gatsby, how's that?
Gatsby is excellent, topical, and short
Why get rid of it over, say, Canterbury Tales or The Odyssey?
Topical to what, exactly? The struggles of the upper socialites of the 1920s? You could theoretically work it into a combo lesson plan with The Great Depression but lol @ that ever happening.
Man it is 6:30 in the goddamn morning, don’t make me come up with an articulate defense of Gatsby’s exploration of the moral emptiness and ennui of the decadent upper class
Not really something a 14 year old will comprehend.
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
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AtomikaLive fast and get fucked or whateverRegistered Userregular
I think sometimes people think a book is boring when they're just kind of bad at reading books. It's a skill, like any other, that can be practised and deepened and improved. Sure, you probably know how to read by the time you're ten, but reading a book isn't just about reading and understanding the open meaning of a sentence: it's about appreciating the aptness of a simile, recognising symbolism and allegory when it arises, reading widely enough to be able to tell good writers from bad, and why, and seeing how little one writer can put down to evoke an image or how much another can put down to establish the right mood.
The more and more widely your read the better you get at it, until you die, at which point you're still not done because you were probably halfway through a book.
People underestimate the need to learn how to engage with various types of media in general.
That isn't a post about anyone here in particular, or their judgement of any book in particular. But "it's boring" is a thing i know kids say about stuff they just don't want to engage with.
Wuthering Heights is melodramatic and inane
I mean if you wanted to describe [chat] with two words you've done a bang up job.
I think sometimes people think a book is boring when they're just kind of bad at reading books. It's a skill, like any other, that can be practised and deepened and improved. Sure, you probably know how to read by the time you're ten, but reading a book isn't just about reading and understanding the open meaning of a sentence: it's about appreciating the aptness of a simile, recognising symbolism and allegory when it arises, reading widely enough to be able to tell good writers from bad, and why, and seeing how little one writer can put down to evoke an image or how much another can put down to establish the right mood.
The more and more widely your read the better you get at it, until you die, at which point you're still not done because you were probably halfway through a book.
I generally agree with your point, but now and then I've met someone who tries to tell me something like Finnegan's Wake is the pinnacle of Western literature and I Just need "to get it" so I can finally experience it properly.
That isn't a post about anyone here in particular, or their judgement of any book in particular. But "it's boring" is a thing i know kids say about stuff they just don't want to engage with.
Wuthering Heights is melodramatic and inane
Children should love it then!
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simonwolfi can feel a differencetoday, a differenceRegistered Userregular
Count of Monte Cristo has the best readability:oldness ratio of any book I know.
life's a game that you're bound to lose / like using a hammer to pound in screws
fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
That isn't a post about anyone here in particular, or their judgement of any book in particular. But "it's boring" is a thing i know kids say about stuff they just don't want to engage with.
Counterpoint, a lot of the extant English canon could be replaced with more modern works that touch the same themes without having the albatross of dated English as a gatekeeper for students
Sometimes things are just boring
Like, Moby Dick is a great, important book
It's also stuffed full of chapters that don't matter (an entire chapter on incorrect whale biology??? Woooo) and is written in an old enough dialect to require more work to extract meaning than should reasonably be expected of a high school student
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Spiders are bugs, right?
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Incidentally, I've never told a lie in my entire life
...wait is that a bit fucked up
fite me
I don't get mad Bogart
I get spiders
And put them in your house
Oh my god he’s terrible
Honestly I think we should be doing high school and an associates degree as a base set of knowledge, and wait till 3rd year in college or trade schools before we start specializing.
daisy miller
yuuuuuuuuuuup
- Great Expectations
- A Christian Carol
- Oliver Twist
i remember loving a tale of two cities but i tried re-reading it recently and it is utter dreck
wharton kicked miller in the ballsack in the matchup
hard counterpick
The more and more widely your read the better you get at it, until you die, at which point you're still not done because you were probably halfway through a book.
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He might have been an important figure in terms of unreliable narration and sort of moving toward modernism, but Henry James is unpleasant to read.
I wonder if I'd feel the same now
Fuck everything that guy wrote
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fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
It's hard to judge them for not wanting to engage, because it is definitely boring.
I'd also throw in 1984, Pride and Prejudice, and (abridged) The Count of Monte Cristo.
Those are all very readable and entertaining books.
Oh wait sorry no I've read them all. Of course.
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Wuthering Heights is melodramatic and inane
Not really something a 14 year old will comprehend.
*glaring intensifies*
Oh but he also had that self pitying woe is me I’m not as good as those euro Supermen
People underestimate the need to learn how to engage with various types of media in general.
I mean if you wanted to describe [chat] with two words you've done a bang up job.
Choose Your Own Chat 1 Choose Your Own Chat 2 Choose Your Own Chat 3
I generally agree with your point, but now and then I've met someone who tries to tell me something like Finnegan's Wake is the pinnacle of Western literature and I Just need "to get it" so I can finally experience it properly.
Children should love it then!
That's the dopest shit
I really liked Wuthering Heights when I read it in high school, but I have a strong feeling I wouldn't be able to read it at all now.
Another I would put in that bucket is All The Kings Men.
fuck up once and you break your thumb / if you're happy at all then you're god damn dumb
that's right we're on a fucked up cruise / God is dead but at least we have booze
bad things happen, no one knows why / the sun burns out and everyone dies
Counterpoint, a lot of the extant English canon could be replaced with more modern works that touch the same themes without having the albatross of dated English as a gatekeeper for students
Sometimes things are just boring
Like, Moby Dick is a great, important book
It's also stuffed full of chapters that don't matter (an entire chapter on incorrect whale biology??? Woooo) and is written in an old enough dialect to require more work to extract meaning than should reasonably be expected of a high school student