I love to read; this is a given. I’ve always been a big reader and I try to keep that habit up. But lately I have found it difficult to stay engaged with a book for longer than the first few chapters. It’s not that my attention span has been destroyed by TikTok (no really it hasn’t), but it’s just harder and harder to read something that doesn’t feel full of cliches and tropes that I’m sick of. If I can predict the twist in the first act, I don’t see the need to continue reading. But I still think that I know the value of a story, even if it’s one that I don’t necessarily want to finish. This understanding of value is something that I do not see in people around me and it’s honestly so disheartening. I do feel the need to say that I’m not trying to seem all high and mighty because I can power through a book that I think is boring; I can only use my personal experience to get this point across.
I’m an English major and it’s relatively common knowledge that English majors have to read a lot of books, particularly a lot of “classics.” The term “classic” is debated among literary scholars because we don’t really know what should be included in the literary canon anymore or if there should be a canon at all. If we decide as a society to stop reading classics and stop introducing them in the education system, we’re going to completely lose any iota of a common knowledge base. The classics are so incredibly important to us and we desperately need to keep reading them. Not just because they tell us about the human experience and whatnot, but because they keep humanity connected. We live in a crazy time period of communication and we’re able to read things from all over the globe and understand why they matter to us now. Also references to classic literature are so deeply ingrained in pop culture that it’s almost impossible to read a book or watch a movie and not come across one. Adaptations of Shakespeare are still being made today! Anyone But You, the romcom with Syndey Sweeny and Glen Powell, is an adaptation of Much Ado About Nothing and I kept seeing TikToks and articles about people not really understanding the point of it. They liked the movie, but didn’t get it. That’s because we’re losing our common knowledge base!!
I don’t know if this is just something I notice in people around me or if it’s universal, but it feels like everyone around me is misunderstanding the need for classic literature. I read Portrait of a Lady by Henry James for a class and the comments people made in discussion were worrying. They didn’t seem to understand why a man would write a book about a woman with suitors who ends up in a terrible marriage. They didn’t understand that the historical context is incredibly important and they didn’t seem to care. This is coming from people who say they love to read but whose Goodreads are full of Colleen Hoover and smutty hockey romances. There isn’t anything wrong with having a particular taste in books, but if you’re claiming to love reading and yet are not willing to try and understand why or how the classics allowed for you to read mafia romance then what are you doing? The writings of the past opened doors for people to write today, and we have to appreciate them more. Maybe this is a bit of an elitist opinion; I can acknowledge that. But there are so many rich novels that are equally as entertaining that people don’t want to read because they were written two hundred years ago. Just give one a try!
just please go read a classic, that’s my only recommendation for this week. i’ve been really wanting to reread Hamlet for a while so maybe that can be our book club book idk just a thought. thanks for enduring this rant if you got this far