In 1969, when Alice Echols went to college, everybody she knew was reading "Soul on Ice," Eldridge Cleaver's new collection of essays. For Echols, who now teaches a course on the '60s at the University of Southern California, that psychedelic time was filled with "The Autobiography of Malcolm X," "The Golden Notebook," the poetry of Sylvia Plath and the erotic diaries of Anaïs Nin.
Forty years later, on today's college campuses, you're more likely to hear a werewolf howl than Allen Ginsberg, and Nin's transgressive sexuality has been replaced by the fervent chastity of Bella Swan, the teenage heroine of Stephenie Meyer's modern gothic "Twilight" series. It's as though somebody stole Abbie Hoffman's book -- and a whole generation of radical lit along with it.
I'm not out to prove Charles wrong. In fact, when I see former classmates' facebook statuses that read "So and so is... in love with Edward Cullen," it makes me puke a little bit. And then there's the whole mess of cleaning off my keyboard and changing shirts which is just a pain. You know, it even makes me a little nauseous just knowing that I know who Edward Cullen is (an abstinent vampire? Come on!).
I guess what I want to know is why people like me and my friends are never polled for these articles. I'm their demographic, aren't I? I'm a 22 year old college student and I own three bookshelves worth of books and they range from graphic novels to Milton to Bronte to "The Autobiography of Malcolm X" to, yes, Harry Potter. And most of the people I spend time with have bigger and more eclectic bookshelves than I do.
Charles makes a point that our generation is lacking a voice like that of Kerouac (honestly, the Beats can keep him). Maybe, but what about popular and smart writers like David Sedaris or Jonathan Safran Foer? What about Jhumpa Lahiri? Chuck Klosterman? Chuck Palahniuk? Certainly all of these authors say something about the current generation, but what they're saying is different from what Ginsberg and Kerouac had to say. The authors of the 60's were rebelling against the rigidity and social expectations of the time. Now we're put in a position to rebel against our parents' generation, a generation that expects and, to some extent, respects rebellion.
He also writes:
According to the Chronicle of Higher Education, the best-selling titles on college campuses are mostly about hunky vampires or Barack Obama. Recently, Meyer and the president held six of the 10 top spots. In January, the most subversive book on the college bestseller list was "Our Dumb World," a collection of gags from the Onion. The top title that month was "The Tales of Beedle the Bard" by J.K. Rowling.
First, if you don't think The Onion offers commentary on who we are as a generation you're drinking stupid sauce. Secondly, who is to say that reading Barack Obama now is any less valuable than reading Malcolm X then? Are they not comparable in literary worth? Sure, Malcolm X's life is more intense and filled with sordid details, but either represents important movements in history. And you know what? The Harry Potter series was great and encouraged millions of kids to turn off their TVs and read. Twilight? Beyond being a vampire enthusiast (note: not fetishist), I obviously have problems with it, but more for it's deeply rooted sexism than for its popularity.
We should also note how many more forms of media are effecting us now. We have blogs, viral videos, and the ability to download movies straight on to our personal computers. We have TV shows like The Wire, Mad Men, 30 Rock, etc. We have podcasts. I'm not going to get on a high horse and say that all of this technology is bad. If anything, we should accept that new forms of media are influencing us and look for movements and voices within these forms.
Lastly, and I'm not sure if things were any different then, academics have crushed my ability to read for pleasure, at least while the semester is going. In the last two months, I've probably read 15 authors and none of these were simply because I wanted to. After hours of reading for curriculum, who can blame me for wanting to curl up in front of The Office rather than with a copy of Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance or read blogs over The Sun Also Rises?
I just realized that I have no idea what this entry is about. Sorry for the ranty-ness, internet.
No comments:
Post a Comment