first of all, thanks to everyone who commented on friday’s post and was willing to shame themselves cinematically as well as literally (LITERALLY).
i had a great time compiling the results via a spreadsheet, cos i am a nerd. seriously, though, organizing data can be fun!! esp. when it means you get to analyze the cultural habits of yr friends and consequently discover trends amongst our generation, blah blah blah.
in putting together these results, i became less interested in shaming people (there’s enough blogs doing that already) and more interested in *why* we regard these books and movies as “classics.” this isn’t exactly new territory, but i found it fascinating in the context of pants world.
first, though, here are the results! keep in mind that i tabulated everyone’s responses based on the info they gave me, so some people just mentioned one book while others responded in full (i.e. this is not rocket science, and i’m ok with that, cos rocket science is hard, and i don’t get paid for this).
* * * * books * * * *
books almost everyone has read, i.e. homecoming king & queen: “great expectations” and “hamlet.”
the only person who hasn’t read “hamlet” is moody.*
*moody, i know you haven’t read any of the books, but i didn’t feel like i could remove yr response from the list due to data purity concerns, etc.
besides moody, the only person to escape high school without reading “great expecations” is kristen. KRISTEN. how were you an english minor without reading this book?!! NO, “a christmas carol” does NOT count cos that’s, like, something you read for the holidays so everyone behaves and doesn’t act bratty when they don’t get the present they want cos tiny tim can’t even WALK you guys.
the book that eats lunch in the bathroom stall, i.e. NO ONE HAS READ: ulysses.
i am totally ok with this.
books that would never win the vote for student council president: jane eyre and catch 22.
in case you’re curious about who read the most books on my list, here’s a rundown (the number in parenthesis is the number of books they HAVEN’T read):
sofia (2), celina (3), jessica & john & sarah (4), olivia & kristen (6), jen (7), matt & becky (8), trish & randy (9), moody (13).
* * * * movies * * * *
here are the movies that everyone has seen, i.e. the homecoming court:
wizard of oz, big, star wars, titanic, jurassic park, matrix
yeah sorry i’m too lazy to use quotes anymore.
the movie that sits alone at the cafeteria: taxi driver
only three people have seen it. even though this film is like, an american icon, i can see why people haven’t seen it (myself included). it came out before most of us were born (1976), and it has “mature” themes, meaning it’s not really junior high slumber party material.
the movie that might get beat up if taxi driver isn’t there that day, i.e. one point above it: clockwork orange.
i think it’s funny that the two movies (this one and taxi driver) that inspired about 75% of the posters i saw in college are the two films snubbed by pants world. ooh maybe i should have asked you guys about scarface. i bet that would further prove the inverse relationship between Dorm Room Poster and Pants World Viewership.
a (little) shame spotlight:
becky is the only one who hasn’t seen *any* “lord of the rings” movies. which makes sense, i guess, since she claims “art geek” status versus regular “geek” status.
olivia is the only person hasn’t seen E.T. OLIVIA. come ON. i don’t need yr childhood excuses. this movie has a cute alien! reese’s pieces! adorable tiny drew barrymore! put down yr high class russian literature and BE AMERICAN.
olivia and sofia are the only folks who haven’t seen ANY of the harry potter movies. because they obviously hate magic and awesomeness and everything good about this world.
here’s the list of people in order of who’s seen the most movies (remember, the number is the movies they haven’t seen):
jessica (1), brian (2), talena & sofia & kristen & celina (3), moody & randy & sarah (4), jen (5), matt & olivia (6), becky (7), trish (8).
trish, i’m sorry to tell you that sing-alongs don’t count as “classic” films. but that’s ok, cos they’re awesome.
* * * * scientific conclusion and further questions * * * *
first, i want to ask all of you if there really is a book or movie that you are *truly* ashamed of not reading/seeing. obviously this is a subjective thing, and i’m curious about why you might be embarrassed if you haven’t seen, say, “the royal tennenbaums.”
i am honestly embarrassed that i haven’t read “anna karenina.” i guess this is due to the fact that i haven’t read ANY russian literature, and that makes me feel like less of an intellectual.
second– as mentioned previously, i wonder why we, as a society, hold up certain movies and books as classics. why do we teach these books in school? my guess would be that these books gives us a greater understanding of the history and culture of various time periods, not to mention literary techniques.
but are there better ways, better books, to teach these things?
based on the responses, a lot of you didn’t seem to particularly enjoy some of these books. if you didn’t like them, does that mean you didn’t learn anything from them?
what books do you think *should* be on high school reading lists?
personally, i actually do really love some of the classics, like “les miserables” and, forgive me, “a tale of two cities.” i’m glad i read them (more than once DORKTOWN), but i’m also glad we read more contemporary books in school. “the house on mango street” comes to mind as a well-written book that sheds some cultural insight while addressing adolescent issues.
but i would also add more recent, well-written YA books that focus on important aspects of life and growing. isn’t part of the point to get kids interested in reading? to show them that a book can be exciting and understandable and not just something to wade through in order to pass a test?
the other (brief) rant i wanted to include concerns female authors. on one hand, i don’t care if guys like jane austen or not. everyone has their own taste, as evidenced by this survey. BUT… do girls complain when they’re forced to read hemingway or really, any book told from the perspective of a guy, which is like, most of the high school curriculum? i don’t think the girl equivalent is nearly as common. is it jane austen’s female perspective that turns guys away? this issue really bothers me… the “issue” not limited to jane austen but more to a lack of female writers in english curriculums.
anyway
this entry has no pictures so i hope you guys made it all the way through.
also please answer my questions! i am a serious researcher seeking the truth.
thus ends my SCIENCE FOR THE DAY.
LINKS
dude. this list of 20 abandoned buildings/places is creeeepy. the amusement park? the BRAIN LAB? EEEEEEE.
did you know there are pyramids in china?!!!
more movie news from comic con (looks like “wolfman” is gonna be good, “spirit” not so much).
remember that 12 year old fashion blogger i linked to the other day? and i wasn’t sure if she was totally for real? well, looks like we’ll find out via her upcoming interview with the NYT (thanks to trish for the link!).
speaking of trish, homegirl has a preview of the new pixar movie on her blog!
have you guys seen the trailer for oliver stone’s “w.”? um… wow.
Darn, I was too slow. Oops.
I haven’t seen Big or Titanic.
I’m commenting instead of working on the spreadsheet project ‘I’ need to work on tonight (a 30 some page document about which devices work with this particular medical device. REALLY exciting).
I think that I more often run in to movies that I’m ashamed that I haven’t seen than books that I haven’t read. That might just be because of the circles I run in. I can imagine some of my indie music friends running into the same sort of thing. “WHAT, you HAVEN’T HEARD OF HUMPERDINK AND THE WHALES!? WHO ARE YOU!”,
At least with books, unless you specialize in a particular genre, there are just too many things to be consumed. How do you focus on what you need to have read to be considered a ‘finished person’. There’s too much to be consumed and so there’s not as much shame that one wouldn’t have been able to read everything that they’d needed to read. Combined with the fact that unless you’re a speed reader, books take longer to consume, again, you’re limited in what you can check off your list compared to seeing a movie.
Thinking about it though, I guess I am kind of ashamed that I hadn’t checked as many of the books on that list. Maybe I have valid excuses, but I think they’re books that an ‘intellectual’ ought to have read. That might be because I’m always trying to have my intelligence validated. Because of relocation and trying to accomplish too much while I was working on my Bachelors (a double major in Business Administration:Marketing and Studio Art: Graphic Design with a minor in Religion and a membership in the Honors Society) I’m somewhere short of a degree and only have my Associate of Arts in Broadcast Communications (Brown Institute in the Hizouse! Woot! Woot! heh) Will I get around to checking them off? I don’t know that I will. Partly it’s a time thing. If you didn’t read them in high school, I imagine it gets more and more difficult. Right now, I’m lucky to squeeze time in for a movie between working the day job and doing freelance gigs at night.
Cinema though, is easier to digest. Because of that, and because it’s not nearly as old of an art form, I think there’s a little bit less of an excuse to not have seen most of the movies deemed canonical by say the AFI. If one wanted to work through AFI’s 100 years 100 movies, it would take a couple hundred hours, but that would be less time than it would take to run through the top 100 novels of all time. Ultimately though, the only person you should ever have to report to about feeling a certain way with regards to having consumed something or not, is yourself. (that was a wordy mess of a sentence, wasn’t it?)
I feel ashamed that I haven’t read many of the books in the list because, as I mentioned above, I’ve struggled for a long time with people perceiving me as some sort of intellectual. Does it make me any better or lesser of a person? Negligibly. The same with film. Film matters to me because I’m a film geek. It’s a badge of honor to say that I have a pretty comprehensive grasp of film history and film production. That (like many books that I’ve read) influence me, but not in a way that people would necessarily see right off the bat.
I’m not entirely sure how to close this off. Going back and reading your post again, I don’t think I answered any of your questions. Oops. Guess I’m Blathery McBlatherpants tonight.
I don’t think there’s one book in particular that I feel more ashamed about not having read. It’s a general malaise at not having read more classics.
With regards to Jane Austen, I was mostly joking around in my previous post. I’ve never gotten around to reading her books because they were never really high on my list of things to read RIGHT THIS MINUTE. I would imagine that some of that has to do with the flowery notion of victorian romance that doesn’t appeal to the sixteen-year-old high school kid more interested in reading (unsuccessfully) Dante’s Inferno. After that? Too much other stuff to do. There might be something to be said for the accessibility (or perceived accessibility) of the language. I imagine I might have stayed away from it in high school because I didn’t particularly like trying to decipher Shakespeare’s plays and (erroneously) believed that Austen’s books might be similar. I know that I wasn’t opposed to female viewpoints in my literature though. If anything, when I was in high school I was actively interested in trying to see things from the other viewpoint (if only to try and get a girlfriend. Someday I’ll need to tell you about getting the coveted “I have to wash my hair” excuse from a potential prom date). I remember reading “Are you there God? It’s Me Margaret” at some point in elementary school or later. I didn’t even think about the fact that it was a female author writing a female book because it was accessible to my mind at the time.
I’m stopping for the moment because I’ve written WAY TOO MUCH. Must get back to freelance. blah.
I have never seen Goonies. I’m really ashamed - mostly because I think of myself as pop culture competent. Definitely not an expert, but I can hang. And I feel like this movie is probably referenced a lot.
So, first of all, I saw all the movies. I don’t know why I didn’t receive praise.
I’m not okay with nobody having read Ulysses.
I love classic books too, but I HATE Jane Austen. And it’s nothing to do with her gender. I just don’t think she’s any good, and I find her work boring and utterly, utterly dreadful. Two books I really like by women off the top of my head are Wuthering Heights and Frankenstein. Not amazing examples maybe but I’m just saying.
So…
1) I’m ashamed I haven’t read Ulysses. It’s one of the classics of modern literature. I’ve never read The Great Gatsby, which I also wish I had. I mentioned The Catcher in the Rye already. I guess I have this inherited list of ‘classic’ books I feel I should have read. Oh yeah, War and Peace. The list could go on actually.
I’ve never seen a Billy Wilder movie. Ashamed isn’t the right word, but I would have liked to have seen one by now. In my more immediate circle of friends it’s embarrassing that I have yet to see a Halloween movie.
I guess my criteria for why or why not I think I should have read/seen something is based on a mixture between what I was raised to believe were ‘classics’ (i.e. Penguin Classic collection vibes) and what I think is ‘cool’ now based on what my friends like and what gets referenced in stuff I read/watch.
As to what makes the ‘classics’ in school, there are a number of reasons from a European-originated concept of “high-brow” art (remember Pells, Sarah?) and more recently, the best examples of works of non-European literature. Of course, is our criteria still European?
Anyway, this is WAY too long already, I’m sorry. You’re on a roll with the blogs, Sarah!
“I have never seen Goonies.”
Holy Freaking Crap. Get this guy a DVD, stat. (Is that the proper terminology? - I haven’t seen ER in a long time.)
Similar to Brian, I think I’m more ashamed of having an overall lack of knowledge of classic literature, in general, as opposed to a certain book. I don’t know how I got out of Creek without reading To Kill a Mockingbird, but I did. I’m not ashamed of it, although everyone I spoke to really liked it.
Part of the problem is I wouldn’t know where to start reading to make up for lost time. Another problem is that I’m getting ready to begin Grad School, so I’ll be reading more books than I ever have at a fast clip and none of them will have been on a pop culture list.
As for film, I’m ashamed of not having seen Taxi Driver, but have no desire to see Clockwork Orange - even though it’s a classic. Outside of your list, I’ve never seen Raging Bull - and I need to. I also feel I should see at least one Buster Keaton film, along with a Charlie Chaplin, to consider myself a film nerd.
Although it would be difficult to regulate, if you could build a similar list for music, I’d likely fail miserably and would not even comment on my ignorance.
ps ‘W’ looks like crap.
I was always a poor reader and mildly dyslexic, so reading was never fun for me. It has to be an easy read or a really engaging story to keep me interested enough to finish a book. I read the things I had to read for high school but, until the past few years, not much beyond that. And even in high school it was tough for me (a dyslexic procrastinator makes for *excellent* book reports.) The last few years I think my tastes have matured, and therefore I’m more willing to go back and read the things I hadn’t before, like Jane Austen. Even so, when I did read language wasn’t much of a factor for me. I may have occasionally switched the order of the words, but I knew what they meant. And I continue to thank my 9th grade English teacher (an eccentric, leather mini skirt clad, middle aged woman named Mrs. Kvikstad) for my love of all things Shakespeare. The summer after my 9th grade year I got to see the Royal Shakespeare Players perform Much Ado About Nothing in Stratford on Avon, England which was the highlight of my high school life.
That said, I think my source of geek pride comes more from what I have seen than what I haven’t. I haven’t seen Taxi Driver, but I know the cultural references and significance of it so it doesn’t really bother me. But I don’t know many other people in my immediate circle who have seen Kiss Me Deadly - a major guilty pleasure film on my part. It’s kind of like Brian (my husband, by the way) said of our indie music friends. “What, you don’t know (insert name of obscure indie band here.)?!?!?!” They take more pride in their knowledge of the obscure than they would in any potential knowledge of the obvious.
Age makes a difference as well, as with your example of Taxi Driver having been made before most of us were born. Most of my close friends being older than I am, I have a tendency to feel like the ‘young one’ and occasionally don’t get the cultural references made to events before my birth. But on top of that I think having older friends helps influence my tastes for the better as well. On the flip side, I manage a coffee shop and definitely feel like the ‘old one’ a lot. Especially when my 16-18 year old employees haven’t even seen “The Princess Bride” and their favorite movie is “Dude, Where’s My Car?” Once I had an employee who didn’t even know the *name* David Bowie. It makes me feel sad for the younger generation.
now i’m all in a dither before bed, because i’m really highly opinionated about all of what you just wrote.
i’m really embarrassed whenever i haven’t read a book, because i’m perceived as pretty well-read, so anything that won the pulitzer or hovered on a bestseller list means i should have read it.
WHICH LEADS ME to my VERY STRONG OPINION about reading in schools. let me first address that the concept of classics in a modern-day urban school exists only with teachers/admins who are set in their ways about proper literature. on the other side of the pendulum exists educators who believe in teaching reading SKILLS ONLY by reading excerpts and things… yeah. i know. the idea of reading a true piece of literature is reserved for schools in better socioeconomic settings, which is where i was educated, and where i bet a lot of your readers were, too.
i won’t go into my opinions on art, because i’ll just lose some friends, and i don’t get riled up about it like i do about education. but i will say that, more than the underrepresentation of female writers, i am bothered by the lack of diverse writers. female writers weren’t even given proper credit until recent history, and so we don’t have that many authors to read. but the lack of asian, african, and hispanic writers in the classroom is STAGGERING. i have to dig dig dig for my kids, and it takes me hours of extra time that i don’t have, but i do it, and i make tons of copies. because i’m awesome.
so, do i teach my kids the classics? hell, no. not right away, anyway. i introduce them to names and concepts because they will need them–i mean, some of my kids don’t know who shakespeare IS, and i’m sure you remember me telling you about my holocaust polling at the beginning of the year. jeeeeez. in a world where my students confuse martin luther king and abraham lincoln, i’m more concerned with helping them understand how literature works. and while that doesn’t exist in education everywhere, that is where education is headed.
some people will be upset that our kids aren’t drilled with dickens and shakespeare and all of the victorians when they graduate. that’s fine, because most of my kids aren’t white, and those people have no relevance to them. let those people be angry, and i’ll let my kids decide which “classics” interest them when/if they get to college. because, i am HELLBENT on my kids seeing college as an option, and making them read classics without any regard for their ability or interest level is NOT the way to do it.
end soapbox. i’m not sure if you can tell that i’ve had this conversation before… heeee.
Hi, my name is MSW, I was an English major, and I’ve never read Hamlet OR Great Expectations.
Loves me some Jane Austen, though. (Confessions of a Jane Austen Addict was a quick, easy summer read that I recommend for you.) And I HAVE read many other Shakespearean works (plays and poetry). I’ve seen A Clockwork Orange but not Taxi Driver, and I too feel like a lesser intellectual for never having read any Russian Literature (I totally bought Anna Karenina when it was Oprah’s Book Club pick. I am maybe a geek with a flair for the mainstream.)
I find it interesting that the female authors I remember reading in high school were Asian: Pearl S Buck and Amy Tan.
I don’t think I actually have anything that I am ashamed of not reading or seeing…
One of the classics that I would say my middle schoolers enjoy the most (I can’t say for certain as I am not their ELA teacher) is the Outsiders, other than that and the Diary of Anne Frank, I don’t recognize most of the books they read for class.
Great blogs, Sarah. I also have not seen Goonies. In fact, I think I lived in some kind of cultural black hole, reading only Halfpenny Linda or something, because I only ever even heard of it in high school, I think. Maybe not even then.
I know, I know. I am geeky and not in a cool way. And yeah I will see E.T. at some point; maybe even before I see Wall-E or whatever that movie is.
The thing is, I actually really like films, but I just got into the whole pop culture game late, so I’m always catching up! It’s not my fault! I usually found out about anything cool going on on TV from the American Family Association newsletter, which told you about all illicit love scenes in all TV shows every month so you could boycott the advertisers… or in my case, just read about it and get excited thinking about kissing at age 8.
It’s not an excuse but it was entertaining, right?
I’m a bit ashamed I haven’t read Ulysses, and Brothers K. Actually here, I’ll ‘fess up (and I know I’m ashamed of this because I didn’t want to admit it): I also haven’t read Anna Karenina, really–not all of it–despite having taken a course on Tolstoy. But actually I really hate Tolstoy so I don’t feel regretful so much as embarrassed. I have gotten into many drunken arguments on the Dostoevsky v Tolstoy question, but honestly Sarah: I wouldn’t do Anna K. I’d do another one; we can discuss this at another point.
I am mostly embarrassed about having not read Ulysses because my brother, a smarty-pants who is much more dedicated and hard-working than I and AN ENGINEER/lawyer(!), has read this book, so I feel dumb I haven’t. Sibling rivalry is a good shame generator.
With movies, I’m ashamed I haven’t seen E.T. but proud I haven’t really seen Star Wars or Harry Potter. I know, sorry, but it’s true.
On to your general point about those classics: I would say that okay, they’re good markers for “important” books, but they aren’t the whole picture. I recently read this book by Zamyatin called We, which 1984 is kind of based on, and I would say it’s at least (maybe more) important than 1984, but it’s not got the same cache in the literary canon. That doesn’t actually make it a worse book, right? So those lists are good to point you in a direction if you’re looking for something to read, but a lot of those books are things I don’t consider “good.” Or at least books I didn’t find appealing when I read them.
On teaching classics, I agree with Jessica on the lack of diversity in the reading lists in schools, and I agree with Sarah there should be more YA books to get people interested in literature. But sometimes something that’s good that you wouldn’t find elsewhere can change everything for you; for me, that was T.S. Eliot’s “Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” which almost made me cry when our teacher read it aloud in 11th grade. I suddenly loved poetry and that soul-stirring from good words that evoke this whole feeling. I was hooked, and that had never happened before; I’d always liked English, but I didn’t “get” it, really, until that moment. I think, when you’re young (and always, really), you should be reading things that will inspire you and knock you out of your chair/normal way of thinking, and there’s a much wider variety of things that will do that than the classics, but some of the classics aren’t a bad place to start.
I found my senior English teacher’s approach really good. We were supposed to read books that we likely wouldn’t like–most notably, Moby Dick. But she was realistic that we may not actually read it, so our assignment for a paper on that book was to write a paper on one chapter. That was awesome because we could still do well without torturing ourselves–how hard is it to read one chapter? And I’ve since gone back and picked up Moby Dick and liked it a lot more as a grown-up, which is likely true for most classics (especially Great Gatsby, which is a book you should definitely read as an adult, even if you already read it before. It’s different than you remember; I can almost guarantee that).
My point is: You should be forced to have a literary encounter with the classics in school, but even having those books assigned could mean an “encounter” and not a forced-feeding session. Our teachers gave us lists and we could pick one book off the list to read, so we felt we were choosing. Or this one-chapter paper idea. Or we could write papers comparing a book we read that year to literally anything else (one student senior year did one comparing something to Eminem). Students’ encounter with literature doesn’t have boring, tedious or terrible.
OMG this is v long. I’m finishing now. Sorry.
It’s not Jane Austen, or the Brontes’, perspectives that turn guys or anyone else away. It’s that they were a product of their time. The subject matter was very narrow and might be considered to some (like say, me) to be antiquted, provincial, and dull. “Oh woe is me, I’m rich but I’m in love with a poor, yet refined, handsome, and passionate would-be suitor!” “Oh woe is me, I’m poor, but I’m in love with a rich, yet refined, handsome, and passionate would-be suitor!” The novels are good in that they reflect the rigid gender and socioeconomic roles of their era. But they’re bad in that they bored me to tears.
But see: other novels by female authoros that were much more interesting; while hitting on these gender roles, also were more modern and varied in plot and points made. Like, Age of Innocence made me want to have my eyeballs removed, but Wharton also wrote Ethan Frome, a romeo and juliet type story with a tragic sledride. Who wouldn’t love that? The Bell Jar is a great psychological study. Kate Chopin’s The Awakening fits with a lot of the victorian themes, but ends totally enigmatically.
In short, there are great female novelists. But I’ll never look at another Austen/Bronte novel, ever again.
I am late to the party, as usual. Can I just reiterate what a fantastic discussion this has been? Nearly as fantastic as “Goonies” (I totally coveted that kid’s seemingly bottomless backpack of gadgets) and Catch-22 (a superb skewering of the insanity of war). As for my own confession, I have tried reading Ulysses several times, but never get past the first few pages and can’t muster the effort to tackle the next several hundred. Also, it took me a long time until I “got” Hemingway and came to respect the power & economy of his prose.
Wow, people are rocking out with intellectual commentary here!
Josh, you gave a very good description of why I also find Jane Austen unreadable.
Jessica, that is pretty interesting. When I went to High School in the Philippines, my second year was all Asian and African literature. It was pretty cool, and I applaud you for going the extra mile!
Those who have not seen the Goonies: I refuse to look down on you, but you need to see that movie. As soon as possible. The best thing about the Goonies is that it’s still awesome. When I watch it now, there’s nostalgia there, but it’s independent from the awesomeness.
If there is one thing we’ve learned from this discussion, it’s that everyone should see The Goonies.
I am so impressed that Olivia got to read “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” in high school! I didn’t read that until college and it changed my life as well. I also really enjoyed “The Wasteland.” Beautiful, lyrical, poignant, witty, educational…I could go on. Also, “Going to Meet the Man” by James Baldwin. That made me cry.
I’m ashamed that I have never read any Tolstoy or Dostoevsky. I have also never read “Paradise Lost” or “Dante’s Inferno” which I feel, having a Masters degree in Poetry, I should have read.
I think it would be good if high school students could read more diverse literature and more poetry. Not your standard Robert Frost and Emily Dickinson, which have their place, but something that would get kids to understand that poetry is not inaccessible or impossible to understand. My favorites would be Mary Oliver, Mark Doty, Naomi Shihab Nye, Adrienne Rich. Just my two cents.
olivia, i like the chapter idea. especially in low-income schools, it’s hard to get kids to read the books. you can give them a list, but then they have to go get the book, and more often, they will just take a zero. what’s nice about a chapter is that it’s an easily duplicated resource that a teacher can acquire for the kids…
i think if i taught high school again, or if i go back, i might try the chapter idea and do some kind of comparison to modern literature or something… i dunno. i like that, thanks for sharing it. it’s an idea to toy with.
and i agree, a student’s encounter with literature SHOULDN’T be terrible, not at all. teaching reading & writing is a really delicate balance; sometimes a difficult book determines whether a kid will give up and drop out or stick around for the book.
I had a lot of trouble staying focused on assigned reading in high school. I’m not sure if it was from boredom or maybe some form of rebellion, because I have always loved to read. I was lucky enough to have english teachers that gave us freedom in letting us choose what we could read (from a specific list, of course). I actually also read The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock my sophomore year in high school.
The movies, on the other hand, is something I really should be ashamed of. I just never got around to watching any of those films. Maybe the singalong that interests me will be substituted with a viewing of citizen kane. hmm. . . maybe.
This blog also reminded me of an article in Entertainment Weekly (I know - not a prime resource for intellectual criticism) from a month or so ago about the “New Classics” of the last 25 years. It actually had some interesting lists.
Books
http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20207076_20207387_20207349,00.html
Movies
http://www.ew.com/ew/article/0,,20207076_20207387_20207063,00.html
Maybe they can be fodder for an extension of this blog.
as usual, pants world has answered my questions AND THEN SOME! thank you everyone for contributing v. important information to my scientific research. i love love LOVE hearing yr insight on everything from the books you loved or hated to yr ideas on society and education.
i think the main point from all of this is:
PEOPLE NEED TO SEE GOONIES. FOR THE LOVE OF FANCY MOSES.
Sheesh. Take a couple of days to try to move, and you fall behind in this huge and intense culture debate. Okay, well I’m jumping in anyway, and I’m doing it with a list.
1 - I have read ULYSSES. Read every single word on every single page, but none of it stuck. That’s how MOBY DICK was for me also, but reading both of them was a point of pride in my youth. And it gave me something to focus on so I didn’t have to think about how I was too scared to talk to girls.
2 - Olivia - Dostoevsky all the way. NOTES FROM THE UNDERGROUND was my life-changing literary moment, and I didn’t read it in class, just sort of stumbled on it, then spent the rest of my post-adolescent crazy time devouring Russian literature, and BROTHERS KARAMAZOV totally did stick, as did Nabokov’s entire canon. I didn’t get much into Tolstoy earlier, though, so I’ll have to actually read ANNA KARENINA before we get into a pub brawl.
2a - side note - I did try to read WAR AND PEACE one summer when I was in junior high. Did about 150 pages, but when it was due back at the library I didn’t check it out again, cause there was a new Piers Anthony novel out.
3 - No, John, we shouldn’t just stay in Europe, and you shouldn’t stop reading classics and real literature just because you’re out of high school or you’re not an English major in college. Keep going, and let Murakami and Borges change your life, too.
4 - Oh, but going back to Europe - Kundera should be considered a classic author now also.
5 - Yes, everyone needs to see THE GOONIES. But don’t leave TAXI DRIVER out. Not just because it and all of the other movies from the auteur era of the 1970s are Important Literary Works on their own, but because it’s damned good and not at all boring like stupid ULYSSES. SCARFACE is good fun, but DOG DAY AFTERNOON destroys.
6 - I saw CLOCKWORK ORANGE at a junior high sleepover. It had boobies in it, as well as Ultra Violence, so it became a staple and got passed around my group of friends like a LOL Cat would make its way around Pants World.
Bottom Line - I don’t think there needs to be any cultural shame for anything that we haven’t read yet, but I know that I’m going to use this whole thought process as a wake up call to start tackling some major works again, because as fun as WHEN YOU ARE ENGULFED IN FLAMES is, I miss the days when LOLITA forever altered my perspective. So I’m going to stop by BookPeople this afternoon and pick up 100 YEARS OF SOLITUDE and ANNA KARENINA. It’ll be fun to read literature AND talk to girls (and I promise not to talk like this, unless we’re at SpiderHouse, where I’ll totally go off about my opinions on Russian literature very loudly, just to fit in with the other wankers).
Then I’m going to burn a copy of TAXI DRIVER and mail it to all of you. It’s a perfect movie for election season, too.
In return, I’d welcome a list of other neo-classic authors that don’t get taught in school but we should still keep reading, cause I’m sure I’ll burn through ANNA K. in like a week. Right? Right?
I mean, as soon as I get caught up on GOSSIP GIRL and MAD MEN, it’s totally the next thing I’m tackling.