A Post about a Book about Books: Practical Classics

I decided to go with Practical Classics: 50 Reasons to Reread 50 Books You Haven't Touched Since High School. I like the fact that each essay is a few pages long, and I like the fact that the author writes very personally about his responses. What I don't like is that the author does not, to my mind, have a thorough command of the conventions of written English; he'll use structures like "both... also," and sometimes his flow of thought is not very clear. I wish I'd had a few hours with this book and a red pen before it went to press.  Aside from that, I do like the whimsicality of his choices and juxtapositions... last night I was intrigued by the description of Labyrinths, a short story collection by Jorge Luis Borges, then completely turned off as he summarized The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath. I never had to read either of these books in school, and none of the students I'm working with now have ever mentioned either one, but I certainly have heard of them both, and I'm glad to know more so I can make a decision about whether they are worth my time. Borges sounds like my kind of thing; Plath sounds like my kind of instrument of torture. I would rather read about badminton than subject myself to another narrative of madness at this point in my life, and the more effectively done, the less interested I am. But that's just me.

 I'm glad he included Sherman Alexie and Phillip K. Dick, too. From Alexie he chose Reservation Blues. I think you can't go wrong with this funny, honest, insightful Native American magical realist, but the one the kids are actually required to read is The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian, which is his YA novel. For Dick, he chose Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, mainly, I think, so he could compare it to Bladerunner. I was glad to read that discussion, because I personally got so frustrated with the lack of relationship between the two that I ended up turning the movie off halfway through. But apparently that's just me. By the way, I've never had a student tell me that Philip K. Dick was required-- possibly because of his scatalogical name-- but I would make every highschooler read A Scanner Darkly, concluding with some kind of ceremony in memory of the author's list of drug abuse victims and any others the students or teacher knows. I've never seen the movie, but the book left me in tears as I remembered those I have lost.

 If you want to know more about any of these books, here are the links. You don't have to buy anything!