Taking Sides

Reading all the good books is like a conversation

with the finest people of past centuries. 

~ Rene Descartes

It may seem strange to a person who is more extroverted and less of a bibliophile, but I often feel as if an author is a personal acquaintance of mine, and that reading their works is like carrying on a conversation with them. The author may be dead, or even if they’re alive they may not live in the same country or speak the same language. There is a great unlikelihood* that I will ever have an actual face-to-face conversation.**

This very feeling of closeness, even kinship, with an author, is part of what prompts me to want to read so much. When you are friends with someone, you want to talk to them as much as possible, and if reading is a conversation, then you want to read as much as possible for the same reasons. 

A real complication arises from this, though: when you’re having a conversation with a real person, it goes without saying that sometimes this conversation becomes an argument. And if this argument takes place between you and a book—or even worse, between two books—it’s a bit hard to know how to react.

What happens, for instance, when you love Jane Austen, and you also love Jane Eyre, and then find out that Charlotte Bronte was pretty harsh with Austen? You feel like two of your closest friends are in a fight, and you’re in a tug-of-war between the two. Who are you to trust? You always thought Austen was pretty romantic and funny, and here Bronte is calling her heartless and without passion. 

“Charlotte,” you say to your book in a chiding tone of voice, “You’re putting me in a bit of a difficult situation. And since Jane was dead by the time you called her passionless, she can’t even defend herself. And now you’ve got Mark Twain agreeing with you; it seems like you guys are ganging up on the elder generation.”

Because Charlotte is also dead as you’re talking into her autobiography, she can’t expound on her opinions, either. 

It’s a bit easier when the authors in question were alive at the same time.  In A Preface to Paradise Lost by C.S. Lewis, I found myself reading his reaction to some things T.S. Eliot said about poetry. Actually I was surprised with how much I liked Preface; I confess I usually pass on reading prefaces or introductions because I’d rather form my own opinions on the works they’re prefacing and introducing, but I saw C.S. Lewis’ name on it at a library book-sale and thought I’d take the risk. And as I said, I’m surprisingly glad I did.  Not only does Lewis talk about John Milton’s epic poem and its themes and structure, he talks about a lot of different things like what defines epic poetry and how we as readers should assess it. I especially like the part where he illustrates the difference of “expected” and “unexpected” storytelling by comparing it to Disney’s Snow White.***

But while I really connected to the things Lewis was talking about, how we read and understand poetry, I came across Lewis disagreeing with T.S. Eliot—one of my favorite poets of all time. Lewis disagrees with an opinion Eliot voiced, that non-poets can’t judge poetry, including Milton’s epic, at all. Lewis goes into a long philosophical discussion of, “how do I find a poet, then?  Unless I have a concept of what good poetry is in the first place, how do I know who to ask to help me understand poetry?  But if I have a concept of what good poetry is in the first place, why do I need a poet to help me understand poetry?” He goes on, and it’s a bit complex to summarize here, but it was all very thought-provoking.

“Jack,**** you’re putting me in an odd position here,” I say to Preface, “See, I do agree with you, but I’m kinda besties with Tom, and I feel like you’re being a little hard on him. Not that I want to put words in his mouth, but I think he was probably referring to that we can’t really understand poetry from the EXACT SAME perspective of the poet who wrote it.”

That’s one of the many wonderful aspects of reading. Often there are posters in the library or schools or the internet, proclaiming READING EXPANDS YOUR WORLD. That’s true, and it’s because reading is like holding deep conversations (skipping all the small talk about the weather and traffic) with a wide variety of people from all times and countries and worldviews, taking in their opinions and, using your own reason, forming your own worldview into one as well-rounded and wise as possible.

*Especially if the author in question is in fact deceased, unless either I buy a Delorean or cloning becomes a legal and ethical practice.

**Although I found out after the fact that during the tenure of my patronage of my local library there was an opportunity to meet Gerald Morris, author of my beloved Squires Tales books. This is an unfortunate event that causes me heartbreak to this very day, and makes me want to quote Robert Frost’s “The Road Not Taken” out of context. 

***That’s not something I’d expect from the author of The Chronicles of Narnia, but then I remembered Snow White came out 1937 and the events of The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe take place sometime after 1938 during World War II. Maybe it’s because of the constant “remastering” and re-releases of the movie, and the fact that Snow White shows up constantly in current Disney Princess merchandising, that made me feel as if the movie was much more recent.

****Because I'm a nickname basis with C.S. Lewis.