Feb. 16 Flashback: ‘The other, of course, involves orcs’

Jeremy Piven-in-Grosse Pointe Blank voice: “Twenty years, man. Twenty years.”

From February 16, 2011, “Honors English“:

I like the idea of my daughter taking honors English. I do not like the idea of my daughter taking honors English from someone who regards The Fountainhead as worthwhile. I do not like the idea of her studying literature with a teacher who doesn’t like literature and who seems intent on infecting students with her distaste for it.

Set aside the appalling themes and juvenile narcissism of the book’s pseudo-philosophy. It’s dull. Numbingly, claw-your-eyes-out dull. It’s horribly written, yet it’s horribleness never manages to be horrible in an entertaining way. This is the sort of book that can ruin reading — the very idea of reading — for months or years afterward.

And beyond that, an honors English course is supposed to prepare students for college. Slogging through The Fountainhead does nothing to prepare a student for college. No one needs to read this book in preparation for college. No one needs to read this book in college.

… We can’t read everything. Most of us won’t get around to reading most things and we’ll wind up leaving inspiring, insightful, beautiful, life-enhancing books on the shelf. Time spent reading repetitive dreck like The Fountainhead is time spent not reading those other books — books that actually deserve to be read, the reading of which will enrich us and maybe even improve us.

Reading The Fountainhead does not enrich or improve. It stupefies. Time spent reading this book would be better spent watching television. Time spent reading this book would be better spent watching a Jersey Shore marathon on television. That execrable MTV program would do just as much to prepare a high school student for college. And Snooki is a better role model — a better person — than Rand or her protagonists.

If the honors English teacher actually did require students to watch a Jersey Shore marathon, I would suspect that this wasn’t a very good class. But I would be less suspicious of that teacher than I am of this one.

Read the whole post here.