/lit/ - Literature

There's a documentary about exactly this called A Touch of Greatness (filmed by Robert Downey no less). It suggests that it's never too early to introduce students, or children, to great works. Obviously there's limits, you can't hand a child War and Peace, but if you can't distill what makes a work of Shakespeare special for a children I'd say that the failure of the teacher. These are universal themes of humanity--it shouldn't have to be hard.

Kids generally don't have so much problem with books as with pressure of trying to figure out what will please their teacher. It's true that for a lot of works they lack experience, but there is still plenty of books that can be used to practice understanding humanity.

>>21345389
I’ll try to watch this documentary. I can’t help but think though that you’d have to ‘sell’ the kids on Shakespeare by dilluting the works down to their level. Instead of creating an incorrect idea in their heads about the nature of a work, why not give them something that’s simpler to start with?

Richard Feynman's dad used to sit and read him an encyclopaedia every night, I think something like that would be much more important than forcing a kid to read classics, it would open their mind up to new concepts that they otherwise wouldn't encounter until maybe even their adult years. During their teenage years however, when they're trying to form "their image", giving them classics to read will give them better perspective than whatever they read on the internet or in pop-lit

>>21345367
Yes every (Male) child should be forced to read the Iliad as early as possibe. And the forced to read it again in their final year.

>>21345367
Depends what you mean by classics. From what I've seen american schools hardly do any prepwork for classics.
Before we do anything here in Poland there's stuff to be done. Before touching anything from the greeks we are made to read "mythology" by Parandowski which is a 250 page summary of basicaly all important myths greeks had. The probable origins of greek religion, their practices and what happened to those beliefs when romans took over. If school functions properly at the same time in history class we'll be working through basic history of greece. History of athens, who Drakon was who Pericles was, Greek-Persian wars, peloponesian war, Conquests of Filip Conquests of Alexanader.
And then we go on to read Sapho, Tyrtaeus and excerpts from Illiad and Oddysey.
Now take that basic idea of reading some old ass book but with additional information necessary to understand it and expand it to entire history of literature (well chosen pieces of it, medieval lit gets no love we just read Genesis, Job and Ecclesiastes some little bit of inferno and move on to renaissance lmao)
I was tought this way and i consider myself well versed in literature. It clearly showed me what I like and what i find an absolute chore to read (fuck Positivism btw). So whats the value beyond that? Idk it pretty cool if you ask me

>>21345538
Please ignore the first sentence of this post. I must have had what's commonly reffered to as brainfart.

For every well-read adult I've met who was inspired by school-mandated reading, I've encountered ten who were completely turned off from reading by the same. Being forced to read stuff they don't (yet) care about just gives people bad associations, and leave them thinking that all classics are nothing more than essay-fuel.

>>21345367
>What is the value of [forcing] kids to do X

It's a great way to make a retarded kid

>>21345367
>aesthetic appreciation
that's the point. reading "classics" when you're young fosters a deeper appreciation to authorial choice. the depth of harry potter is nowhere near comparable to, say, the catcher in the rye. the only problem is that schools often pick benign, agreeable books (to kill a mockingbird) or books that are obviously poorly written (fahrenheit 451).

>>21345367
I read Julius Caesar when I was 13 and I got a tremendous amount out of it. The experience fundamentally changed how I read and interpret literature, since then I look for things like double entendres and "liminality" of words (that sound like or suggest another) along with looking for parallelism between sub content of the story and the story. There's more of course but these are lessons I can directly recall and attribute to this experience. I remember thinking how clever Shakespeare was for all the small comments on the nature of names, and how thinking about it neatly answered my question of "why is this play called Julius Shakespeare? He barely has 5 lines, it should be called Brutus instead'. They kill Caesar but not his name, which in effect extracts vengeance against the conspirators with all its power.

You don't need to eke out 100% of a work's greatness to appreciate it and expand your views.

>>21345367
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEPDLFSUPe0

>>21347601
Based Bloom. I weep for the canon without him to defend it.

>>21345367
kids should be encouraged to read because they can understand some of it (even if they obviously won't understand all, how are they supposed to learn to understand without interacting with the material?), but not forced because it creates the opposite effect and makes them hate literature.
I used to love books as a kid, all books, including classics, only except those classics they forced us to read and write stupid character analyses and tests about the author's birth date and shit. I don't think kids will even enjoy Harry potter or The Hobbit if they are forced to read it.
encouraging children to read in a way that makes them really interested >>>>> not making them read classics at all >>>>>>>>>>>>>> forcing them to read Moby Dick

>>21347676
>I don't think kids will even enjoy Harry potter or The Hobbit if they are forced to read it.
Seconding this. I was made to Hunger Games and Maze Runner in high school, and didn't enjoy either even a little, and this is coming from someone who unironically read Twilight at the time.

>>21345367
Kids generally don't have so much problem with books as with pressure of trying to figure out what will please their teacher. It's true that for a lot of works they lack experience, but there is still plenty of books that can be used to practice understanding humanity.

Is everyone here retarded?
Kids have to read classics because the classics have an insanely large vocabulary, and reading those combines the teaching of vocabulary (in an ENGLISH class) with overall education and knowledge of those classics (something you wouldnt get from newer books with big vocabulary). It got nuffin to do with the contents.

>>21348473
>insanely large vocabulary
Not really, and what words they might pick up exclusively from classics would soon end up forgotten for the simple fact no one is using them anymore in everyday conversation.
There is definitely far more benefit from analyzing situations than language.

>>21348473
I used to have an advanced technical vocabulary as a little kid since my picture books had all kinds of tools, employees, power plants, train stations, harbors, airports, etc. sections in them. I can barely tell what a French key is today.