The summer before my teen daughter started high school, she was faced with a no-win situation: either read David Copperfield or drop out of Honors English before she even started it.
At the time (with graduation looming, it seems so long ago), I was upset on her behalf. First of all, I think our kids are thoroughly over-scheduled and have too much homework all year. It would have been nice for her to have a summer vacation that actually was a summer vacation. Second, I was disappointed that a course which attracts so many more girls than boys (estimating the percentages to be about 80/20 wouldn't be far-fetched) selected a book by a man rather than a woman. And, third, I worried that Copperfield, which is neither short nor easy, read without the benefit of a helpful instructor, would turn my daughter and her friends off Mr. Dickens — thoroughly and forever. Wouldn't Great Expectations have been a better choice?
For the record though, I never had anything against the title or the author as worthwhile literature. In fact, as I watched my daughter reluctantly read that summer, I realized that my own Dickensian education was not where it should be. I had been assigned maybe half a dozen of his novels in high school and college. And, that insignificant sampling was missing some of his most important titles.
Whether it was out of familial solidarity, an English major's guilt, or temporary insanity, I vowed to go back and read all of his works. I found an antique set of 30 volumes on eBay and began with The Pickwick Papers. When I told people about my project, I usually received a one-word response.
Some people said, "Wow."
But, most said, "Why?"
And, that "Why" wasn't an actual inquiry into my reasons for the undertaking. It was more like an abbreviation for "Why in God's name would you ever even consider that?" and accompanied by a distasteful wrinkling of the nose as if the person smelled rotting fish somewhere on a dark and foggy nineteenth century London pier.
From Pickwick Papers, I moved right into Oliver Twist (a story I was familiar with from countless childhood viewings of the 1968 musical; I had a crush on Jack Wild as the "artful dodger"). But, I found keeping track of a new list of colorful characters a little confusing. After I finished, I decided to intersperse contemporary titles (sometimes two or three ... or ten) between the different Dickens novels. Of course, I realized that this would take a lot longer, but it's not like I was going anywhere.
Some of the most famous titles I read (or re-read) were just marvelous, like Bleak House (which was featured in a course I once took called "Images of Women in Great Literature") and A Tale of Two Cities, Little Dorrit and Nicholas Nickleby. I disrupted my chronological progress a bit so that I could savor A Christmas Carol during the holidays. I struggled through a couple (okay, maybe more than a couple) of absolute snores. And then completely fell in love with Dombey and Son, whose heroine Florence was so pathetic that she made The Old Curiosity Shop's Little Nell seem like a Kardashian.
Last week, I completed The Mystery of Edwin Drood. Except, of course, I didn't and couldn't actually "complete" it because the great Mr. Dickens became the late Mr. Dickens before he gave the novel an ending. Apparently, he was done. And so, apparently, was I.
For those of you who asked, "Why?," I can in all honesty say that I enjoyed the exercise a great deal, most of the time. And, even when a particular title (or particularly long and boring passage) was a challenge, I got through it and was generally rewarded for my effort.
For those of you who said, "Wow!" ... well, I quite agree.
Now, I'm putting the set back up on eBay for some other enthusiastic peruser. And, I'm moving on to The Complete Works of William Shakespeare.
My daughter, who (as I predicted) will never be a Dickens fan after her summer with Copperfield (alas, she was one of the people who asked "Why?"), leaves for college in three months, three weeks and four days.
I expect to have a lot of time for reading very soon.
If you've enjoyed this post, I invite you to order the book Lovin' the Alien here.
To begin my post with the beginning of my post, I record that my daughter has finally finished David Copperfield.
For those of you who were not literature majors, the above is a humorous (I hope) allusion to the opening of that famous and famously massive tome. Dickens' semi-autobiographical novel was my teen's summer assignment for high school freshman Honors English.
If you ever want to hear a fourteen-year-old piss and moan, make them read a 950-page book written in long-winded nineteenth century language, during their vacation. The pool is open, the beach may beckon, but — alas! — throughout our town, young people were mired in the sooty streets of London, trying to keep track of countless characters with names like Clara Peggotty, Uriah Heep, Tommy Traddles, Wilkins Micawber, Steerforth, Ham and Little Em'ly.
Help! It's enough to make you throw in the towel and watch Pretty Little Liars on demand.
If the school's purpose was to separate the academic wheat from the chaff, then they may well have succeeded. We already know at least one girl who had qualified for and planned to take Honors English but is dropping out.
Sadly, if their plan was to permanently dissuade students from ever picking up a Dickens volume again, they may have accomplished that as well. Wouldn't these, already acknowledged bright, kids have been better off reading a shorter option (Great Expectations comes to mind)? Wouldn't they have appreciated it more if they had waited until school started so that a teacher might have guided them through it?
I am seriously annoyed that an entire generation will view the writings of Charles Dickens as an ordeal to get through rather than the incredibly rich — and often quite funny — masterpieces they are.
Nevertheless, the assignment was the assignment and my little scholar persevered. Out of curiosity, I looked into the required reading for sophomore, junior and senior years to see what future summers had in store. Here's what I found:
Freshman Honors English: David Copperfield
Sophomore Honors English: Dracula
Junior Honors English: Slaughterhouse Five
Senior Honors English: Heart of Darkness
What's conspicuously missing from this list? Books by and/or about women.
Across the country, female high school students are "overrepresented" in Honors and AP courses. This is particularly true in subjects that are humanities and language-based. I did a quick local reality check with my daughter.
"Are there more girls or boys in Honors English?" I asked.
"Girls, duh," came the eye-rolling reply.
So, why all the macho material? I am reminded (painfully reminded) of the way Hollywood approaches the funding of feature films. The major studios claim that they have to produce more male-centric films (despite the fact that women represent more than 50% of moviegoers) because:
"Women will go to men's movies. But, men won't go to women's movies."
Extend this theory to the summer reading list. I can only assume that the list is heavy on the testosterone because teachers or school administrators or the state believe that girls will read boys' books, but boys won't read girls'.
Remember, these are not so-called "reluctant readers" who must be coerced and bribed with graphic novels. These are high-achieving high school English students. Would it really hurt for the (minority of) boys to read about a woman's life for a change? Clearly, no one is worried about the girls throwing a hissy fit when they must read hundreds and hundreds (and hundreds and hundreds) of pages about the opposite sex. Why are we coddling the boys? And why are we ignoring so many amazing works by women?
I think my only option is to create an adjunct English literature reading list for my daughter. I'll fill it with Jane Austen, the Brontës, George Elliot and Mary Shelley. She will read these classics and love them and know that men weren't the only ones writing great works.
Assuming that, after her long drawn out and deadly dull date with Mr. Copperfield, she ever cracks a book again.
