[lit-ideas] Re: On reading Baum's Oz novels
- From: david ritchie <profdritchie@xxxxxxxxx>
- To: lit-ideas@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Mon, 9 Mar 2020 11:01:58 -0700
On Mar 9, 2020, at 10:34 AM, Ursula Stange <Ursula@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Safe travels, John (on your way to Oz)....
On Mar 9, 2020, at 12:40 AM, John McCreery <john.mccreery@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Coming late to the party, grabbing a few minutes from preparations for a
flight from Japan to Australia tonight.
[snip]
The daughter wound up a US Naval Academy graduate married to a very large
and masculine Marine Corps jet fighter jock. I have long felt that people
with literary tastes overestimate the influence of the books they happen to
read.
John
Good one, Ursula.
Overestimate and underestimate imply a norm. My experience of college students
suggests that reading as a pastime is waning. Perhaps it will wax again, but
at present they seem little influenced by books.
My first degree was in Literature; my second was in History. One reason for
the switch is that I felt less passion than others about, say, “The Divine
Comedy.” First World War poets engaged me, but the war itself seemed more
interesting as a puzzle.
I have long since brought the two subjects into a balance that works for me.
David Ritchie,
off to read two hundred pages of theses in
Portland, Oregon
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