This week on Weekly Geeks...
How do you feel about classic literature? Are you intimidated by it? Love it? Not sure because you never actually tried it? Don't get why anyone reads anything else? Which classics, if any, have you truly loved? Which would you recommend for someone who has very little experience reading older books? Go all out, sell us on it.
Not just one loaded question but a whole host of them. So much here depends upon how one defines "a classic." Is a classic a work that has simply stood the test of time? Does it have to be well known? Is a classic something that sits only in the hallowed halls of academia or could it have been the New York Times bestseller of its day? If an author has written a number of works commonly acknowledged to be classics does that author's entire body of work then become identified as classic. For instance, are all of Hemingway's books classics? Sorry to complicate today's fun, but one could write all day to address the queries posed above.
Of course I love classic literature in whatever way we choose to look at what that may comprise. I grew up in a house full of books, many of them the classics of literature inherited from my grandfather's library. When this is the case, kids just read with little need to make the same distinctions of quality that adults love to make. Kids read what interests them. And I read and read and read until I developed a very clear idea of what interested me in a book or in life in general. Classics played a huge role in this development most likely because classics, or books that have stood the test of time, endure because they travel the entire expanse of human experience. So they represent not only what is familiar to you but the possibilities that you had never conceived of prior to picking up that book. Or in today's politically correct language, an education or reading life well-versed in classics lends an appreciation for "the other" that may have otherwise been lacking. Or if you are a child, they may very well point the way to everything you might become.
Obviously, I need to put the brakes on this line of thought because any conclusion (if indeed possible to conclude such a line of thought) is hundreds of pages away from this point. What I would like to suggest (and plug as the questions encourage) is that we all seek out a "classic" that has endured the test of time but out of the spotlight. The mosaic I placed at the top of today's post is comprised of four different cover designs for the same book - The Damnation of Theron Ware by Harold Frederic. All four are current editions and yes, that is a Penguin Classics edition in the second spot. This book has remained in print here and in the UK (where it was published under the title Illumination) since its original publication date in 1896. It's popularity has come and gone in small quiet bursts but here it is today introduced by noted academics and Joyce Carol Oates as one of the most worthy additions to the American canon, a gem of American literary realism.
This is one of my favorite books and maybe I will blog about it soon, but for now, just know that this story of a young Methodist minister that loses his way addresses questions of the reconciliation of faith and intellect, the role of organized faith, and the perils of self-deception that still resonate today. Check it out for free at Project Gutenberg.
What unheralded classic is among your favorite reads?
Let's say you're vacationing with your dear cousin Myrtle, and she forgot to bring a book. The two of you venture into the hip independent bookstore around the corner, where she primly announces that she only reads classic literature. If you don't find her a book, she'll never let you get any reading done! What contemporary book/s with classic appeal would you pull off the shelf for her?
Going with the "books that have stood the test of time" idea here, I would say that A.S. Byatt, Umberto Eco, and Gabriel Garcia Marquez will live on in their words long past their lifetimes. Safe bets for dear cousin Myrtle.