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South Park somehow leads me to my favorite books. (Which scares me, because I'm actually planning to read Atlas Shrugged.) I found my favorite book, Great Expectations because I liked the show's Pip character. And now, through Eric Cartman's plagiarism, Walden.
Well, sort of. I was exposed to Walden in school. Specifically, English Honors II, i.e. the worst English class ever. Our teacher was a nightmare. She thrived on pop quizzes which would ask the most OBSCURE questions so we wouldn't use the Cliff Notes and also asked questions about interpretation of metaphors and expecting us to instinctively know the most common interpretation without first discussing it in class. (Like "Who are the Mockingbirds in To Kill a Mockingbird?") It put me in a real prejudice against American literature. Even recently I've said stuff like "I don't think American literature got good until the early 20th century. Although I don't like him, Mark Twain was a step in the right direction and at least got the Puritan stick out of America's butt." As I keep thinking up exceptions to this rule, I think I might have been too hasty. But this at least puts you in the mind I was in during this class.
I hated the excerpts of Walden I had to read. I thought they were boring, ponderous, digressive and thought Thoreau was a quack. Especially when we had to read the segment on the ant battle. Also, like many students, I felt there was a hypocrisy in claiming "Simplify, simplify, simplify" when you have paragraphs that go on for two pages.
I can't remember what made me think I should give the book another chance. Maybe it was that my Dad came to me after reading Moby-Dick (another book I hated in the segments) and talked about how much he missed in the abridged version he read as a kid. He told me about how the book described whaling and how the sailors had to actually cut pieces off the whale and do it in a certain amount of time before the boat sank and how much work went into just preparing the whale after spending so long catching it and I thought, "Wow, if they told me THAT was in Moby-Dick I would have been more encouraged to read it."
So I borrowed Dad's copy of Moby-Dick (still unread ... d'oh) and put Walden on my wishlist, not expecting too much or even planning to buy it that soon. My co-worker eventually found the wishlist and bought Walden for my last birthday. And now here I am.
( Read more... )
Well, sort of. I was exposed to Walden in school. Specifically, English Honors II, i.e. the worst English class ever. Our teacher was a nightmare. She thrived on pop quizzes which would ask the most OBSCURE questions so we wouldn't use the Cliff Notes and also asked questions about interpretation of metaphors and expecting us to instinctively know the most common interpretation without first discussing it in class. (Like "Who are the Mockingbirds in To Kill a Mockingbird?") It put me in a real prejudice against American literature. Even recently I've said stuff like "I don't think American literature got good until the early 20th century. Although I don't like him, Mark Twain was a step in the right direction and at least got the Puritan stick out of America's butt." As I keep thinking up exceptions to this rule, I think I might have been too hasty. But this at least puts you in the mind I was in during this class.
I hated the excerpts of Walden I had to read. I thought they were boring, ponderous, digressive and thought Thoreau was a quack. Especially when we had to read the segment on the ant battle. Also, like many students, I felt there was a hypocrisy in claiming "Simplify, simplify, simplify" when you have paragraphs that go on for two pages.
I can't remember what made me think I should give the book another chance. Maybe it was that my Dad came to me after reading Moby-Dick (another book I hated in the segments) and talked about how much he missed in the abridged version he read as a kid. He told me about how the book described whaling and how the sailors had to actually cut pieces off the whale and do it in a certain amount of time before the boat sank and how much work went into just preparing the whale after spending so long catching it and I thought, "Wow, if they told me THAT was in Moby-Dick I would have been more encouraged to read it."
So I borrowed Dad's copy of Moby-Dick (still unread ... d'oh) and put Walden on my wishlist, not expecting too much or even planning to buy it that soon. My co-worker eventually found the wishlist and bought Walden for my last birthday. And now here I am.
( Read more... )
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