Sinclair Louis

I recently finished a book by Sinclair Lewis, a Minnesotan author from Sauk Center, called Babbit. It is about a man in the early 1900s who is very discontent with his life and the social demands of his very conformist "friends." It was a pretty good book, but it lacked a solid plot. I read it because my dad recommended it. I am now onto a book called Main Street, also by Sinclair Lewis. I started it the same day that I finished Babbit. I am, however, finding that what I wrote for my blog a few weeks ago, called Picking a Good Book, is once again coming true. While I do like Main Street, I am finding that the writing is so similar that it is almost as if I am reading a sequel to Babbit, that has slightly different characters. For example, Main Street is also about demands of society in which the main character feels out of place. The thoughts of the main character are similar to those of Babbit, and it seems the only difference between the two protagonists is gender. I found out by reading The Winter of Our Discontent, that huge changes in writing style and content can be hard on a reader; now I'm also finding that too little change can also be tolling.

The Internet

This year, as much as any, I have used the Internet to get information instead of other sources like books and magazines. This may not be a good thing, an article published in the July/August issue of the Atlantic titled Is Google Making Us Stupid? argues. It says that because people have gotten used to the quick switching of directions and tasks that the Internet allows, they are not able to read books and longer pieces of literature. I have not noticed this at all, but I've had the Internet at my disposal for as long as I have been able to comprehend the meaning of words. I will never know how I have been adversely affected by the Internet. Perhaps if I had never known of the internet then I would be able to concentrate on longer pieces of literature for a longer time, but even if this is true, would it be worth it? It seems to me that the answer to this question is unequivocally no. The ease with which it is possible to fetch useful information on the web is mindboggling. I have the ability to gain any piece of knowledge at the click of a mouse. I would not give this up in order to be able to read at greater length. But I'll never know if the Internet has cursed me in this way.

The Road

The Road is shaping up to be a great book. I was somewhat dumbfounded and angry when I heard that we were going to be reading a book by an author who doesn't use quotation marks, and as I had heard at the time, used periods sparingly. Dumbfounded because I was sure that a literary work of this description couldn't be considered a literary work at all, and therefore had no place in a language arts program, and angry because I thought that sifting through text rendered meaningless by lack of punctuation would be a waste of my time. Luckily, the rumor of the lacking periods was false (although McCarthy might have been able to pull it off). Surprisingly, I am finding The Road to be quite readable, even one of the most enjoyable books I've read in a very long time.
The lack of appropriate punctuation regarding conversation is something that I am now enjoying. I feel like it forces me to think a lot more while I read, allowing me to gain a deeper understanding of the book, while teaching me something about the variations of writing style. So far, reading The Road has taught me that writing has no limits, and because of this, it can be made your own. It has also taught me not to jump to conclusion about pieces of literature, and to try new and different books that I normally would not read.

The Last One

As the last person on Earth, I would be at a loss to find things to do. I do enjoy many things like reading, practicing saxophone and piano, making and viewing art, biking, as well as various other things, but as the last person on Earth, I would not find any fulfillment in these or other things because I would have nobody to do them or discuss them with. Without anyone to listen to your music, why would you spend time practicing an instrument? With nobody to discuss literature and get perspective on it, why would you read? With nobody to view, discuss, and share art with, why would you spend time learning about it or creating it? With nobody to pay for items or skills, why would you hone your own skills in order to make a profession out of them? Basically, I see almost everything I enjoy doing in life as serving the purpose of bringing me pleasure from making me more able to interact with other people because of skills and hobbies that I develop. An uninhabited world with me as the exception, would demonstrate the hostility of solidarity. Luckily however (or perhaps not....overpopulation is a concern too) the world is filled with people, about 6,740,422,806 acc0rding to www.census.gov. I say luckily because this puts the odds of me being the sole human on earth at 1/6,740,422,806, or about .0000000148358645856% I could keep going but you probably get the point.

Textbooks :(

Reading textbooks is probably close to the most boring reading I have ever had to do. I have great respect for the writers of the books because they are well educated, well meaning individuals, at least I would guess they are; my problem with their product is just how dry and student unfriendly it is . They need a lesson from a good language arts teacher. If they got this, they might be able to produce a product that is slightly more captivating, and readable. I am not naive enough to think that textbooks should be so molded to fit the student that they do not have a professional air, but if they aren't captivating enough to at least keep the readers' attention, they don't accomplish even their primary goal: to make information stick in the heads of the students. A good language arts teacher could show the textbook writers how to use fun and creative word choice to spice up the pros. They could also teach them better sentence fluency, which, besides making the books more fun to read, would also make the meaning clearer. Many times I can recall I have had to comb through a textbook sentence multiple times just to understand its jumbled sentence structure. Textbooks are frustrating reading, but if they teamed up with a good LA teacher, I'm sure some significant progress could be made.

Picking a Good Book

They say that you can't judge a book by its cover. I'd agree. But I also figured out that it is not safe to judge a book by its author either. At least not always. I am a fan of John Steinbeck. My favorite novels written by him are The Grapes of Wrath, Of Mice and Men, and Cannery Row. I recently read The Winter of Our Discontent, and from start to finish, I was discontent. The first three books I mention are filled with adventure, twists and turns, emotion, interesting characters, and endings leaving the reader wanting more. The Winter of Our Discontent, also by Steinbeck, is none of those things. I found it boring, long, uneventful, lacking interesting characters, twists and turns, and most of all, the vivid, meticulously, and beautifully written descriptions that are what I most admire of him as an author. So, for this book project I am not going to pick a book because of previous ones I've read from an author, I'm going to try branching out and finding another author that I like. I'm going to do some research on authors and novels and try to find one that is very me.

Into the Wild

I am currently reading Jon Krakauer's novel Into the Wild. It's about a man in his early twenties who rejects society because of what he sees as its flaws. He decides to go out alone, change his name, and travel all around North America by walking and hitchhiking. He lives an ascetic lifestyle and so far in my reading, I have noticed many similarities between Siddhartha, and Chris McCandless, the main character of Krakauer's book. They are both seeking a deeper understanding of the world, a more intense closeness with nature, and seeking an understanding of where they fit into the world as a whole. Siddhartha tries to understand the world to a fuller extent by gaining knowledge, having experiences, and depriving himself. Chris does almost the exact same. He gives all of his savings to charity and goes penniless, he wanders in hopes of having enlightening experiences, and he reads a lot in search of knowledge. In terms of gaining a closer relationship with nature, Siddhartha goes into the woods and listens to the river. Chris goes into the woods too, and attempts to live off the land and come to peace with himself through nature. It doesn't work out so well in the end; some hikers find him dead and rotting in a van. Finally, they are both trying to find where they fit in the world as a whole. Siddhartha looks for a very long time and doesn't find it unil he meets Vasudeva. Although we can never be sure if Chris had a realization of where he fit in to the world, it is certain that through his wanderings and ascetic lifestyle his ultimate goal was to know where and how he fit into the larger scheme of things, despite his unconventional ways of finding this out.