Writer. Contributing Editor at The Discarded Image. Digital Content Strategist. Here's where I publicly explore the books I'm reading, the projects I'm working on, and other current interests. Suggestions for teen’s reading list
Occasionally I get letters from one of you fellow bloggers or a new friend who has discovered one of my publications. Since you ask such good questions which I try to answer thoughtfully, I’ve decided to post some of them here once in awhile for the wider benefit of our lit blogging community. Feel free to weigh in with your comments, too.
Dear Mindy,
The youngest of our three children is 16, going into her junior year at an American international school in Cairo, where we live. She will be taking Advanced English and has to read several books before the school year starts. I’ve looked through the titles recommended and they are so dark and full of images and events she just doesn’t need to be exposed to yet. The Color Purple is one example; I know it has many good points, is well-written, and is an interesting read, but it’s also rife with incest, rape, and lesbianism. Does a 16 year-old need to fill her head with this? I’m hoping I can find some novels to replace those.The school’s requirements are that the books be: advanced reading (college level), post WWII, and a US author. Do you have any suggestions? I’m not saying they can’t have difficult themes, but she is at a very impressionable age. Thanks for your suggestions!
Mom in Cairo
Dear Cairo:
How exciting to hear from a reader living in one of the top places on my list of foreign cities to visit someday—mostly inspired by Elizabeth Peters’ Amelia Peabody mystery series about a family of Victorian-era Egyptologists!
First let me say that, in general, college level reading is almost necessarily going to contain college level themes, including the items you mentioned. This is because, of course, literature is meant to portray the realities of the human condition including the dark and tragic. The best literature does not shy away from this, but does present it in a way that helps us learn vicariously that there is a right way and a wrong way to respond to such darkness and that we face consequences in life if we choose poorly. In that regard, reading adult-themed literature can be helpful for a maturing young person who is beginning to encounter (personally, via friends, or via news reports or television, etc) the darkness of the world, especially if he or she has a parent to discuss it with afterward (and I recommend this kind of interaction). In other words, I believe that literature can be one of the most appropriate methods of introducing young people to such issues, because it is a controlled setting that you as the parent can present at the right time and guide. The trouble is knowing where the line is between vulnerable child and maturing adolescent, since that will depend on the individual. I was reading adult literature at 16, but I also know some 16-year-olds that I wouldn’t recommend it to, at least without the active guidance of a parent. I suspect that your daughter is already fully aware of the existence of these issues, but obviously only you know if she is mature enough to assimilate such information in a helpful rather than harmful way.
Having said that, I suggest a couple titles that I think fit both the school’s criteria and yours. Start with Chaim Potok’s The Chosen (written after WWII, but the story happens during and after the war) about two high school boys, one a secular Jew and one a Hasidic Orthodox Jew, who become friends despite their strikingly different Jewish cultures. This book appears on a lot of college first-year American lit reading lists. See also Potok’s remarkable My Name is Asher Lev, about a Jewish artist who must make excruciating choices to follow his calling; I rank this in my top 5 novels of all time! Another suggestion is Hemingway’s The Old Man and the Sea (published 1952); it is interesting to read and re-read in search of all the imagery of Christ’s crucifixion. Flannery O’Connor is a great Christian post-war American author, and I can’t thing of any graphic sexuality in her stories and books, but she does address adult themes in her own way, using bizarre characters and settings (what she calls the “grotesqueâ€) to demonstrate how warped human existence is without God—-I recommend that you read these works with your daughter and perhaps take advantage of Cliffs notes or an online critical guide to help you unravel O’Connor’s meanings.
Hope those ideas get you started!
Happy reading,
Mindy
