Phil’s Comments (group member since Apr 15, 2016)

Phil’s comments from the Classics for Beginners group.

Snurre wrote: "I'd love a list of which books one should read as a young adult and which books are better to read after you've had children."

Hey, middle school reading teacher here. I'd say the following:

The Outsiders
To Kill a Mockingbird
Of Mice and Men
A Christmas Carol
Huckleberry Finn (more of a high school book)

All but Christmas Carol are very American, so if you're in another country, maybe they don't apply as much.

Annerlee wrote: "Im never sure how far everyone is and what tolook outfor when im reading."

I feel the same way. I don't want to read a thread until I'm finished because I'm avoiding spoilers. On the other hand, sometimes I like to comment while I'm in the earlier parts of the book.

Some groups resolve this by having a spoiler thread for people who've finished and a non-spoiler thread for first impressions and non-spoiler overall comments.

Great questions, Emily! I wish all groups would ask that from time to time.

1) What do you like about the group? What would you like to change?

I like that the group reads classics. I wish that the discussions were richer and had more participation.

2) Can you give any suggestions on how to improve the participation in the group discussions?

It's hard. I've lead discussions in other groups that I thought were going to go well, and I was underwhelmed by the result.

The main thing is to have a discussion leader who reads the book either during or right before the discussion. In some groups, the moderator is always the leader. In other groups, the nominating member is the discussion leader.

The discussion leader's jobs, (as far as I can make out) are:
*Read the book right before or alongside the other members
*Ask questions about personal taste and theme
*Create a reading schedule if the book is long
*It sometimes helps to read secondary sources on the work, the author, other works by the author, or related works

Even if you do all those things, the discussion doesn't always fly. I'm not sure why.

3) Do you participate in the group nominations and voting? Why or why not?

Nominations- no, because my reading schedule is already full.
Voting- if it fits my schedule and interests, I'll usually vote for it. I only vote for books I honestly intend to read.

I think some people vote for a book because they read it five years ago and liked it, but they don't actually intend on reading it for the monthly read. That's annoying.

4) Should we continue to have a tri-monthly read?

Probably not.

Kirsten *Dogs Welcome - People Tolerated" wrote: "Thinking of using my Audible credit to buy this one."

It's free on librivox.

https://librivox.org/ghost-stories-of...

☯Emily wrote: "I loved this book when I was a middle school girl!"

I could use more middle school girls like you. I can't get mine to put down John Green and Marissa Meier long enough to try it.

I'm excited to see the group's response! Middle school boys continue to read and enjoy this book with no interference from their teachers.

Karen wrote: "I thought it might help me understand boys better."

It was Twain's concept of an idealized boyhood, which says as much about Twain as it does about boys.

Scarier than Poe, for sure. Some of the stories are quite gruesome in the body-horror sense. There are a lot of stories of people being forcibly transformed into something grotesque and less than human.

Favorite stories of mine include:
Herbert West: Reanimator
Shadow over Innsmouth
The Dunwich Horror

I suppose I'd have to mention "The Call of Cthulhu," which I would call the "purest" Lovecraft tale, but not in my opinion the "best."

Nina wrote: "Has anyone a recommendation for one or several of the movie adaptation?"

I think the 1936 version gets the best reviews.

I watched the '90s Tom and Huck movie with some students after they read the book. It was really entertaining! They got a lot of the setting and characters right, but completely missed the plot. It was fun to watch and tear apart.

We have this conversation a lot in the fantasy genre. Many of the big name series- The Sword of Shannara, The Eye of the World, The Chronicles of Thomas Covenant, the Unbeliever, etc. are based closely on the plot and characters of Lord of the Rings. Personally, I feel cheated if I read a book that is clearly built on another I've already read, but many people say that the formula makes them happy, so why change it?

Often, self-published authors get huffy and join the conversation by claiming that it is the only possible formula for a fantasy novel. Joseph Campbell is their go-to authority for this excuse.

The Power and the Glory is my favorite non-sci fi book of all time. Some people prefer The Quiet American or The Third Man.

Nobody talks about Graham Greene. Wow, I love his writing.

Susan wrote: "I must confess, I'm not comfortable writing long reviews for any literature. I'm much more comfortable reviewing non-fiction because I've read it for years. Because of that I tend to just give a ra..."

Susan, I think that's the most useful kind of review. If I'm deciding whether to read a book, I look for the reviews that have no summary and just say whether or not they liked it.

I sometimes appreciate qualifications about the reviewer him or herself. For example, "I have read everything by Thomas Pynchon, and I think..." or "This is the first detective novel I've read, so..."

Myst wrote: "I'm only about 27 pages in (too many holds came in during a 3 day stretch), but since one reason people challenge this book is due to the N word, is there a specific reason that word gets used when..."

The word is used in character dialogue (often Huck's) to refer to African Americans. The references are pretty negative- at one point saying he's fallen so low that he has to eat with the N's, at another point saying that N's always lie, but at least they know magic. There is no counterbalance in the book- Huck's comments are the only view of African Americans provided to the reader.

Honestly, Injun Joe is more problematic than the N bomb. He combines every negative stereotype there is of American Indians. He's drunk, ignorant, violent, lazy, lying, and enjoys torturing people. Near the end, Huck warns the sheriff (or someone) of the threatened mutilation of Widow Douglas. The sheriff doesn't believe him until Huck mentions that it's an Indian, because white people would never do a thing like that.

I teach middle school. I try to go the route of "strongly encouraged" rather than assigned. Here are the books I push the hardest:

The Outsiders- This usually turns out to be the most popular book of the year.
Anne Frank- Goes reasonably well, more appreciated by girls than boys.
Night- Goes well, but it's so grim that few students name it as a favorite.
The Pearl- Very popular
A Christmas Carol- I read it out loud to them, so they have fun with it.
William Shakespeare- We read it out loud in class, so most students have fun with it. Henry IV and Midsummer Night's were the most successful.
To Kill a Mockingbird- Hit or miss. The book is so long and difficult that it separates the strong readers from the ones who've been skating by.
Tales from the Odyssey, Part 1- The Mary Pope Osborne version is the best abridgment I've worked with. It was successful, albeit long.
Mark Twain- I've tried Tom Sawyer, Prince & the Pauper, Jumping Frog, The Invalid's Story, and On The Decay of the Art of Lying, and my students just don't seem to get into it. I think Twain's use of language is so unique and roundabout that it's hard for the students to get behind.

I just finished Looking for Alaska. It reminded me a lot of Tiffany's. I thought it was actually better than Tiffany's in several ways. Has anyone else read both books?

Heather L wrote: "The questions of race, slavery, language and some of the situations/adventures the boys have is why this book, along with its counterpart, The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, are some o..."

Twain gets a lot of credit for being an abolitionist, but a lot of that was after the fact. He actually served briefly in the Confederate army before deserting and developed more progressive views after the Civil War was already over. Don't get me wrong; I have a lot of respect for Twain. I just think it took him a while.

For a great and humorous essay of his mature thinking on these topics, check out On the Decay of the Art of Lying. It's like two pages long, so it's no big commitment.

I'm glad you're enjoying it! I have a love/hate relationship with this book. The pinch-bug chapter is my favorite, and I think you're getting close to it.

Jim is an unpaid African-American servant who gets whipped when he doesn't do as he's told. You probably noticed during Ch. 1 that both boys misbehave, but only Jim gets swatted. The fact that Twain doesn't use the word "slave" says a lot about his level of awareness when he wrote the book.

Twain states in his autobiography that slavery was a fact of life in Hannibal MO, and it didn't occur to him that it was wrong until he got out and saw more of the world. Part of the difference was that slaves in Hannibal were treated less brutally than slaves in New Orleans. This book is largely an idealized version of Twain's childhood, and I think that for Twain to criticize the race issues of his hometown would have felt like a betrayal to him.

I am certain that Jim is a slave, that Aunt Polly is his master, and that Twain tried to push that into the background by avoiding the word "slave," which would have been politically charged in the post Civil War era.

Twain's subsequent works are much more progressive, but he wasn't ready yet when he wrote this one.

Finished the backup stories. I loved the Christmas one and didn't care for the rest of the book. I think I was the wrong audience. I would encourage everyone to check out In Cold Blood if they haven't already. It's very different.

Here's my review.

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...