I've found over the past few years the importance of literature. When I was younger, my mother and father always subtly found ways to make me read more, never forcing, but always suggesting that reading was an essential skill to have. My brother has been and still is an avid reader. I remember when I was younger, I'd often ask him to play with me and get mad when he said he was too busy reading or thinking. At that time, I didn't really understand the importance of solitary thinking and reading for an adolescent. But boy have I learned.
Once you allow yourself to identify with the people in a story, then you might begin to see yourself in that story even if on the surface it's far removed from your situation. This is what I try to tell my students: this is one great thing that literature can do - it can make us identify with situations and people far away.
Chinua Achebe
I started an AP English course in grade 10, more out of a need for a challenge than out of a love for literature. It has been by far the hardest course I've ever taken. I realize I'm a pretty intelligent guy and so when I took it originally I was taken aback by the fact I scored a 26 out of 35 on the first diagnostic essay. Now, I had scored a perfect one hundred on the final last year, so I was confused and disheartened, but seeing as I was always advocating the importance of valuing knowledge over marks to my friends it seemed hypocritical to complain. So I didn't. But I knew in that moment that I was going to "conquer" this class before the end of the semester.
So I set to feverish work, completing, checking, analyzing, and writing like a madman, but within the first week, I understood. This wasn't a class like math or science, it was not a class of logic and comprehension and linear thinking; this was a class of abstract, organic thought. And I loved it. It became my favourite class, and to this day, is.
However, there is a lesson to this anecdote. See, I loved the class because it came to symbolize deeper thought and analysis to me. It became a place for me to understand other thinkers and what they believed about the world and why.
I soon found myself using the skills I learnt in class in the world. I began to view the world through the shades of thought that I gleaned from Achebe, Fitzgerald and Bronte. I looked for the Gatsby's in my own life, I looked for the bright green light that drove me, I looked for the families of Wuthering Heights in my own little moor. And soon after I understood the importance of literature.
It all clicked when my english teacher gave a speech with a key phrase that I will never forget. She told us that "We learn about the world around us through literature." That was it. That was the unarguable truth. You see, we live and learn about life through experience, but when you realize what a limited opportunity we all have in one lifetime to experience life, it seems as though we can never really live. We are but blinks in a universal timeline and to only rely on the teachings of experience makes one a fool, for the billions of humans who have lived before us have always put verse to their experiences and struggles. In accessing their works we multiply our own understanding of the world millionfold, and by studying them, analyzing them and sympathizing with them we grow as though we ourselves have gone through their struggles. We learn the lessons without the pain--well, unless you're really into the novel and you cry a little when the dog dies...
Therefore, before I make any serious posts about why literature is important especially in my journey to manhood, I felt it necessary to share why I've come to understand it as such. Hopefully then, I have been able to put forth a convincing word on literature before I endeavour to make any posts on what I've come to understand its importance for. Thank you.
So I set to feverish work, completing, checking, analyzing, and writing like a madman, but within the first week, I understood. This wasn't a class like math or science, it was not a class of logic and comprehension and linear thinking; this was a class of abstract, organic thought. And I loved it. It became my favourite class, and to this day, is.
However, there is a lesson to this anecdote. See, I loved the class because it came to symbolize deeper thought and analysis to me. It became a place for me to understand other thinkers and what they believed about the world and why.
I soon found myself using the skills I learnt in class in the world. I began to view the world through the shades of thought that I gleaned from Achebe, Fitzgerald and Bronte. I looked for the Gatsby's in my own life, I looked for the bright green light that drove me, I looked for the families of Wuthering Heights in my own little moor. And soon after I understood the importance of literature.
It all clicked when my english teacher gave a speech with a key phrase that I will never forget. She told us that "We learn about the world around us through literature." That was it. That was the unarguable truth. You see, we live and learn about life through experience, but when you realize what a limited opportunity we all have in one lifetime to experience life, it seems as though we can never really live. We are but blinks in a universal timeline and to only rely on the teachings of experience makes one a fool, for the billions of humans who have lived before us have always put verse to their experiences and struggles. In accessing their works we multiply our own understanding of the world millionfold, and by studying them, analyzing them and sympathizing with them we grow as though we ourselves have gone through their struggles. We learn the lessons without the pain--well, unless you're really into the novel and you cry a little when the dog dies...
Therefore, before I make any serious posts about why literature is important especially in my journey to manhood, I felt it necessary to share why I've come to understand it as such. Hopefully then, I have been able to put forth a convincing word on literature before I endeavour to make any posts on what I've come to understand its importance for. Thank you.