Why teenagers shouldn't read adult books
Jun. 8th, 2014 10:23 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
author_by_nightWhat has become of the literary world?
It is truly offensive to my senses that more and more, you have teenagers read adult books. It completely ignores the fact that fiction is narrow - certain people are supposed to like certain things. If you are not in the intended group, or even in the supposed intended group (as some would argue), the book is not for you. So why, then, are we allowing this absurdity?
Teenagers cannot understand the deep issues presented in adult literature. Let's take To Kill a Mockingbird. The only saving grace of the novel for teens is that the main character ages from six to nine, so not too far from the simple minds of sixteen year olds. There is much to be said for To Kill a Mockingbird, but what do teenagers know of hate, of injustice? There is nothing in it for them. They aren't capable of that level of depth, because not one single thing in their lives and the world that surrounds them might make them harken back to the novel, either while reading or after they close the book and go on to other ventures.
Teenagers also do not understand social hierarchy, so a novel such as The Great Gatsby is lost on them. Especially the age of Facebook and social media, how on earth could they possibly understand a story about a man who invents himself, who invites hundreds of people into his life, but doesn't really know them, nor do they know (or truly care about) him? Romeo and Juliet is similarly lost on them; two groups of people who hurt each other, which ultimately results in the death of their children, over some feud nobody even appears to remember means nothing. That sort of thing simply does not occur in the world of The Teenager.
Romeo and Juliet also involves love and loss, something teenagers don't know anything about. They haven't ever questioned how real their love for someone is (in the way you might question how in love Romeo and Juliet really were), and what do they know of loss? Of pain? They don't, because they're shallow. They haven't even had to flush a beloved goldfish town the toilet. There is nothing there that any intelligent adult could ever possibly relate to, and vice versa.
Some may argue that while many teenagers might indeed dismiss these novels, others, not so much. They might somehow be able to relate to them, they might be able to see the points I just made - some of them exactly, some of them not so much, but still, people would argue, they'd understand and appreciate them. Besides, not all adult readers enjoy those books either! But that isn't the point. The point is that books were written to be enjoyed by a narrow set of human beings; that's why there aren't any copies of the Bible in languages other than Latin. Let teenagers stick to Sweet Valley High and Gossip Girl; we've got it covered.
(For those of you who might be utterly lost right now, this is a response to an article criticizing adults who read Young Adult literature. For some reason I can't find the link, but I think it's been passed around the internet enough that you should be able to find it somewhere.)
It is truly offensive to my senses that more and more, you have teenagers read adult books. It completely ignores the fact that fiction is narrow - certain people are supposed to like certain things. If you are not in the intended group, or even in the supposed intended group (as some would argue), the book is not for you. So why, then, are we allowing this absurdity?
Teenagers cannot understand the deep issues presented in adult literature. Let's take To Kill a Mockingbird. The only saving grace of the novel for teens is that the main character ages from six to nine, so not too far from the simple minds of sixteen year olds. There is much to be said for To Kill a Mockingbird, but what do teenagers know of hate, of injustice? There is nothing in it for them. They aren't capable of that level of depth, because not one single thing in their lives and the world that surrounds them might make them harken back to the novel, either while reading or after they close the book and go on to other ventures.
Teenagers also do not understand social hierarchy, so a novel such as The Great Gatsby is lost on them. Especially the age of Facebook and social media, how on earth could they possibly understand a story about a man who invents himself, who invites hundreds of people into his life, but doesn't really know them, nor do they know (or truly care about) him? Romeo and Juliet is similarly lost on them; two groups of people who hurt each other, which ultimately results in the death of their children, over some feud nobody even appears to remember means nothing. That sort of thing simply does not occur in the world of The Teenager.
Romeo and Juliet also involves love and loss, something teenagers don't know anything about. They haven't ever questioned how real their love for someone is (in the way you might question how in love Romeo and Juliet really were), and what do they know of loss? Of pain? They don't, because they're shallow. They haven't even had to flush a beloved goldfish town the toilet. There is nothing there that any intelligent adult could ever possibly relate to, and vice versa.
Some may argue that while many teenagers might indeed dismiss these novels, others, not so much. They might somehow be able to relate to them, they might be able to see the points I just made - some of them exactly, some of them not so much, but still, people would argue, they'd understand and appreciate them. Besides, not all adult readers enjoy those books either! But that isn't the point. The point is that books were written to be enjoyed by a narrow set of human beings; that's why there aren't any copies of the Bible in languages other than Latin. Let teenagers stick to Sweet Valley High and Gossip Girl; we've got it covered.
(For those of you who might be utterly lost right now, this is a response to an article criticizing adults who read Young Adult literature. For some reason I can't find the link, but I think it's been passed around the internet enough that you should be able to find it somewhere.)
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Date: 2014-06-19 12:43 am (UTC)(One of the books I keep meaning to buy on this subject is highbrow/lowbrow: http://www.amazon.com/Highbrow-Lowbrow-Emergence-Hierarchy-Civilization/dp/0674390776/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1403137879&sr=1-1&keywords=highbrow+lowbrow. I haven't gotten around to it yet.)
My husband suggests that I (and a friend) probably experience fiction a bit differently than the people who write articles talking about how we need to read deep fiction. So, you probably cannot get me to read the Mayor of Casterbridge. It was on the syllabus of an English class I took in college, but we didn't get to it. (I would have read it if required, but, given I escaped that, I'm not going to bother.) I probably wouldn't jump at Tess of the d'Urbervilles, either.
I identify very strongly with viewpoint characters in fiction. If I find them unlikable, I don't want to read the book. Given that I identify with them, I don't like to see them suffer. (If they suffer and get a happy ending, I'm okay. If they get a happy ending and book 2 brings them back to more suffering... not so much.) So, I really don't find "how someone deals with suffering" or "seeing how bad the world is" to be a valid reason for me to read a book; I don't find it uplifting, I find it depressing and exhausting. I can take a non-viewpoint character suffering, because there's more distance. ...But, again, I don't really want to read fiction to see how miserable the world is.
If I want to see how someone deals with suffering or how bad the world is... I read nonfiction. That allows me more distance. I can still empathize with the real people, of course, but I don't get as trapped in it as I do in fiction.
I will occasionally read biographies, but I'm not clear why biographies are of particularly more value than any other nonfiction. Am I supposed to pattern my life after someone in a biography? Admire them because they are great? See how we are similar or dissimilar? I really don't get why they're specifically more valuable than anything else.