![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
I was thinking about The Phantom Tollbooth the other day and I ran across this interview with the author of the book. It almost makes me want to re-read it ... some of the things he said are just gold. This is my favorite quote.
Milo's not a dysfunctional kid. He's very typical. I kept having to rewrite those sections because I didn't want him to come across as someone who had these deep psychological problems. He just couldn't figure out why he was being oppressed by all these things. When you think about it, kids get an extraordinary number of facts thrown at them, and nothing connects with anything else. As you get older, all these threads begin to appear, and you realize that almost everything you come across connects to six other things that you know about.
The sad thing is, that last sentence didn't become true for me until college. I don't think it was for lack of wanting to learn, either. I was pretty on top of things in high school. (Although I did pay attention in college more ... there was the whole, "Okay, your parents gave you this, now DO SOMETHING WITH IT" mentality.) Also, thinking about all I didn't understand THEN about The Phantom Tollbooth and how much I enjoyed the book ... and then I compare it to kids who can't understand why Harry Potter and Flat Stanley don't have Cliff Notes ... what a great work that was.
Oh, and here's a clip of the Terrible Trivium that I found on YouTube. This bastard sadly does seem to rule my life at work sometimes.
Milo's not a dysfunctional kid. He's very typical. I kept having to rewrite those sections because I didn't want him to come across as someone who had these deep psychological problems. He just couldn't figure out why he was being oppressed by all these things. When you think about it, kids get an extraordinary number of facts thrown at them, and nothing connects with anything else. As you get older, all these threads begin to appear, and you realize that almost everything you come across connects to six other things that you know about.
The sad thing is, that last sentence didn't become true for me until college. I don't think it was for lack of wanting to learn, either. I was pretty on top of things in high school. (Although I did pay attention in college more ... there was the whole, "Okay, your parents gave you this, now DO SOMETHING WITH IT" mentality.) Also, thinking about all I didn't understand THEN about The Phantom Tollbooth and how much I enjoyed the book ... and then I compare it to kids who can't understand why Harry Potter and Flat Stanley don't have Cliff Notes ... what a great work that was.
Oh, and here's a clip of the Terrible Trivium that I found on YouTube. This bastard sadly does seem to rule my life at work sometimes.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
From:
no subject
From:
no subject
From:
no subject
From:
no subject