If you read good books, out of that will come good writing – and good thinking. The ancient orator Quintilian said an impressive or persuasive speaker is “a good person who speaks well.”
Last week, a friend of mine wrote on Facebook, “In the wake of this election cycle, consider the state of our public discourse. We seem only to be able to digest bombastic platitudes of no more than 140 characters. I believe the result of this election and the choices faced by voters, not to mention the general trend of our political environment, owe themselves in part to a weakness of our national conscience. This is why I educate my children using a classical curriculum. My hope is that they learn to think well, ask good questions, and recognize truth, goodness, and beauty. Encourage the reading of ‘boring’ books, for much wisdom lies there.”
He’s right! I would add that there is something to be said about boredom. In many cases, it simply doesn’t exist anymore, what with all the devices we have. There are so many “distractions” these days that peoples’ span of attention has diminished. And it is getting shorter each and every day. Look at the length of articles in Time Magazine and compare them with years ago. They are much shorter these days.
As a result of less (and shallower) reading today, there is also less critical thinking.
Former President Richard Nixon, in his book In The Arena, which I highly recommend (regardless of what you think – or thought – of him as a president), said “It became racist to teach Shakespeare to Hispanic children, racist to teach traditional English to inner-city black children, racist not to teach white children Latin American literature or not to teach non-English speaking children in their own language.”
He went on to say “Each student should leave twelfth grade reading English at a twelfth-grade level or better. He should have read great English writers such as Shakespeare, Dickens, the Brontës, and, in translation, great Russian writers such as Tolstoy, Spanish writers such as Cervantes, Latin American writers such as Borges. Black students should know something about Hobbes, Locke, and Rousseau, and white students should know about Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr.”
Wow! That sounds pretty ambitious! But why not? We send kids to school to learn to think. Often all they learn are what the latest fashions are and that they don’t particularly like school.
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Why read fake news? There is plenty of good solid reading material in your local library in the form of books. Dust off one of these classics and dig in. Many of them are as relevant today as they were when they were written.
You could argue that Nixon, Truman or any of the 44 presidents we have had so far were great or awful. But. if that is your opinion, at least you would have some basis to defend your point, other than what television tells us. Turn off the TV and read! And, while you’re at it, you may as well read good books!
Do you agree?
What do you think?
