I have a list, too.
This is the time of year for lists.
This morning, when I woke up and started my usual stuff, I saw this post from Paul Hankins, a teacher of literacy who reads something like 650 books per year. It was about his favorite books for 2011.
Stick is on that list.
I'll put a link below.
It means a lot to me for several reasons. First, maybe I'm a tough-sell, but I have this nagging suspicion that the majority of people who post "Best Books" lists do not read that many books, and the ones they do read often seem to be the buzz books, or ones from the list-maker's favorite author.
Also, it's cool to be on that list with friends of mine. I know it's a good list, because these really are good books. Really. And being on the list alongside people I actually know and have hung out with is really freaking cool. For a moment, I can almost begin to feel like I've gotten somewhere.
Nah.
I have two books that, to me, are the best books that have ever been written about writing. One of them is not Stephen King's On Writing, although I do like that book very much. One of them happens to be a novel -- just one chapter from a novel, but the novel is about a writer and this chapter is about writing -- and the other happens to be an old smarty-pants experimental thing about writing and teaching writing that practically nobody has ever heard of. The book was first given to me by a friend of mine, a guy I sometimes mention on this blog (who is a real person) as SMIK -- the Smartest Man I Know.
SMIK knows how I feel about words.
So here are the reasons I was thinking about a list:
Being a writer is kind of like standing on one side of a noisy river and trying to shout across at people on the other side.
Teachers and librarians are really the bridgebuilders for us. (In that category of Teacher, I would also include Parents -- although, sadly, an awful lot of Parents have deferred this responsibility on to technology and other people). Bloggers and booksellers help to reinforce the structure, but the teachers and librarians are the ones who fundamentally connect kids to words, to books, literacy, and to writers.
Let me tell you how important this job is.
It pertains directly to the future of human civilization.
Reading.
I am not taking potshots here as an outsider. I have been a professional educator for -- ugh -- decades, and I know what I'm talking about.
There is a distressingly large population of teachers being churned out by the standardized credential mills in the country who do not read.
This is true.
Not only do they not read, but they have not read any literature of substance in their entire lives. I spoke to one teacher (who has been in the classroom for something like 15 years) earlier this year who told me that she wished she could get her own teenage children to read books, but she herself did not like to read, and could not remember the last time she'd bought or held a book of her own choosing.
I am honestly not making that up.
There are more Teachers like this than anyone thinks.
This is also true: That particular Teacher is moving up into school administration.
Hooray for the future!!!!
Squee!!!
I've said this before: Everything we know, everything we have ever done or discovered, and everything we ever will find out is a word.
Words are everything.
The vast vacuum of nothingness is wordless.
The war against words is being waged with Number 2 pencils.
So I wanted to make a list of some of my Favorite Bridgebuilders of 2011.
I know bridgebuilder is not a word. I have had lengthy discussions with my editors and copy editor Anne about my inclination toward constructing Germanic-style compound structures on my own.
I can do that.
I am a writer.
So I started to make this list of my favorite Bridgebuilders of 2011, and I realized that there are an awful lot of them. I keep thinking up more and more as I sit here, too.
So let me start with 9 of my most appreciated footsoldiers on the right side of this battle to save humanity (with more to follow... lots more):
Cathy Blackler, California
Paul Hankins, Indiana
Kristen Pelfrey, California
Dodie Ownes, Colorado
Jennifer Sternberg, Wisconsin
Andrew Lawrence, Arizona
Alan Geibe, Arkansas
Jen Rogers Bigheart, Texas
Drue Wagner-mees, California
You can read Paul Hankins' Best of 2011 List here.
Oh. By the way, you notice how I not-so-cleverly avoided giving the titles of those two best possible books that have ever been written about writing?
Yeah.
I did that on purpose.
One day, I may actually give a real class at a real conference that is really about writing.
16 comments:
One of the saddest things for me to consider is the life of a person who does not read. I cannot fathom how dark and full of terror such an existence must be. I even have some people very much in my life who do not read or rarely read. It's very hard to relate to them.
In brighter news, I was talking to my kids last night, because I had recently finished an incredible book, and I wanted to know what they thought I should read next (I know, Rotters, I'll be getting it very soon, I promise). The most wonderful thing happened. They both started clamoring for my attention, and lobbying me to read what they were reading. They both desperately wanted me to enjoy the stories they were enjoying, probably so that we could talk about how much we enjoyed them - together.
It was in that moment that I knew for certain I had done at least one thing right in my journey through the forest.
Hah. Isn't it great?
This is a true story, too: I had my mother-in-law (whom I love very much) over for dinner on Christmas Eve. As you know, we are a talking family. We were sitting around the fire, chatting, and it came to mind that I had a book sitting upstairs (one of my all-time favorite books ever written) that I really wanted my son to read.
I gave it to him, and said, "Have you ever read this?"
We started to talk a little about the book.
My mother-in-law actually started to cry. She could not believe that there were parents and kids who did such things.
My son and I share books and talk about them all the time.
There is hope in that.
When I look at the world of adults around me, it can get a bit depressing.
Here's to the hope that the Kylies, Trevins, Madisons, and Chiaras of the world will do all the things we should've (I would toast this, but I had to come into work one day this week).
All the best stories are true.
Word. It is a fact that I would not be read without teachers and librarians. The fact that my audience usually cannot afford to buy books means they rely on these folks to get books to them. It also means I will never be a bestseller, but I love when librarians tell me that my books get stolen alot. At least some kid somewhere now owns a book.
I don't read Stephen King but his book On Writing is the only one about writing I could relate to. Now Stephen Sondheim's book Finishing a Hat also taught me a thing or two. Who knew the American Musical and YA was so connected?
I took a class during one of the many years I subjected myself to college. It was a literature class I was excited about. I loved literature classes. One semester I took 6 at one time. Anyway, I waited for class to start, got my syllabus and the professor began to lecture. He told us that he would be telling us the proper interpretations of all the stories. Now HOW to interpret them, but WHAT those interpretations were. Our job was not to argue, not to dissect, but to memorize what he told us and prove to him via regurgitation into a little blue book that we'd paid attention.
I got up, left the room, and never went back to that class.
I had another professor whose favorite thing was to learn from his students. He taught us methods of thinking and using our brains. I never saw him happier than when one of us uncovered a way of looking at a story that he hadn't considered. I learned more from that man than any other person on this planet.
Also, since you spoke so highly of it, I read ROTTERS. I have never loved and hated a book so much at the same time. Certain aspects didn't sit well with me, but the explorations of the various father/son dynamics was absolutely mind-blowing. I don't think I've read a better book about fathers and sons.
Any other books you want to recommend?
All the books on Paul's list are terrific, but if there was one book I had to choose as the best book of 2011 (and I really should not do this, but it's in the comments section which nobody reads) is Amy's book. A.S. King -- Everyone Sees the Ants. Now I will go into hiding.
EVERYONE SEES THE ANTS deserves to be at the top of every list.
Don't go into hiding for recommending books. Otherwise I might have to start using a Ouija board to find out what to read.
Andrew, I am gobsmacked. To be among luminaries like Paul has me floored and a little bewildered. Thank you.
So much in this post. Part of the Revolution is getting my colleagues to read. I gave one of our US History Teachers a copy of In the Path of Falling Objects. I gave one of our Assistant Principals a copy of Wintergirls, and I have plans to get Everybody Sees the Ants into the Health teachers lesson plans. Soon I will be posting--and presenting to our staff--a list of books that could be adjunct reading no matter what subject they teach. This is also part of the Revolution. I am angling for space on the agenda in the Spring. Stealth mode.
Teachers who don't read don't belong in the classroom. I don't care what subject or level they teach.
I wrote a post the other day about stupid and cruel stuff adults say. They need to stop this shit.
I make time to write. I make time to read. Because the kids are more important than the hours spent watching t.v.
Full Disclosure: I will watch Game of Thrones and am dedicated to The Walking Dead. But that's it.
Well. Whisky all around.
It still boggles my mind thinking of parents who don't participate, encourage, bribe - something - to get their kids to pick up a book and read it. it starts at home.
Wow...just wow.
Andrew, Nigel is embarking on a backpacking trip through Europe in a couple months and says he may stay. As a parent, I think you can share that bittersweet moment. What to give him...what to give him? My 1891 edition of Leaves of Grass. Tears were shed in my house too. A little piece of my heart was given away in that moment.
Oh... I can definitely empathize with that, Bridget. But doing things like that will make Nigel's life so rich. At least, it worked for me.
This—what you're doing here, celebrating people who bring people to books—is so great. I think of my daughter's awesome 4th grade teacher, who showed her her secret tattoo from the cover of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I think of Rebecca, the awesome librarian at Jefferson Market Library in NYC, who has brought more kids to incandescent joy than just about anyone I know. Yes to Bridgebuilder as word (though I feel like you might want to throw a few more consonants in there for the whole Germanic thing).
Most people I know think it is ridiculous how much I love books. They do not genuinely believe people like us--YOU AND ME--exist on a large scale.
I tend to wonder what planet these people live on.
Also, I was incidentally pondering the other day something strange in a family at my church. The mother reads fervently, has told me stories of her long-time relationship with reading and with libraries, which started for her, like so many of us, as a child. She has three daughters, none of whom read. This, of course, was odd to me becaue their mother is very controlling in nearly every aspect of these girls' lives. The girls are 25--married with two kids--23, and 15. None of them read.
Is this odd to anyone else? Besides being tragic?
It's the "very controlling" part of the description, Adam. All I can say is that when I was a teen, I resisted anything that seemed like control. Who would expect those young women to want to be just like their mother?
I hope, I pray those girls read, and mom just doesn't know it.
Bridgebuilder? One of your foot soldiers? Honored doesn't begin to describe how I feel about seeing my name on this post. I have, and will continue to, cheer you on from the side lines. You just made this girls day...
Best,
Jen
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