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The Tangled Leaves of Anniseed

The Tangled Leaves of Anniseed

Tag Archives: Reading

Teen Killers: Life Without Parole

26 Saturday Apr 2014

Posted by Anniseed in Musings

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Crime, Prison, Reading, Real Lives, TV

Last night I found myself accidentally watching a documentary on BBC3 which has left me with some profound feelings, so I wanted to share it – it also links to one of my previous posts about the prison system in Britain. It’s part of the channels Crime and Punishment series, and this installment featured several young men in American jails, who have been sentenced to life imprisonment without parole.

It was a very disturbing film (and my only complaint is that I could have done without the stylised mortuary shots of the victims, which was very voyeuristic). The young men talked of their crimes and how they felt about themselves and their future. Some had experienced that long dark night of the soul in which they had confronted their inner demons, taken responsibility for their actions, and finally understood why they were in prison. Others had not. But one story in particular made me cry.

Sean Taylor was sentenced to life imprisonment for shooting dead an innocent bystander caught up in gang violence. In prison, he continued to live the life of a gang member, viewing the world through that narrow prism and getting into constant trouble with the authorities. But Sean was fortunate. An older inmate decided to look out for him, and every day would approach him and ask him a particular question. Here Sean leans forward and shares the question that was to save him:

“What have you read today?”

So Sean started reading. And it opened up his eyes to whole new worlds, made him delve into his own inner self, and make the tremendously brave decision to change his life. Through reading, he discovered Islam, and this showed him another path. He gathered his fellow inmates together and told them he was no longer going to be a gang member – he was going to live a better life, even though he was incarcerated, and he would help anyone else who wished to do the same. His transformation was to change not only his life, but the lives of many others. And the State Governor was moved to commute his sentence to parole.

Now Sean lives back in his home community, working with young people to try and stop them from getting involved with gangs, and to steer them away from lives of violence. It’s impossible to know how many lives his actions have actually saved, but his brave effort to pay back society for his own crimes were admirable. He spoke as an intelligent, committed and articulate man, and his story moved me greatly. I am inspired.

Proof, if any be needed, that reading can change lives.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b041yb2b

 

Celebrating Freadom

27 Friday Sep 2013

Posted by Anniseed in Musings

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Banned Books, Censorship, Reading

Well, it’s Banned Books Week again in America. It’s a curious phenomenon – adults refusing to allow young people to read. But it happens all the time. And many of the books that adults try to ban are simultaneously judged to be classics – Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger, The Lord of the Flies by William Golding, Brave New World by Aldous Huxley… even Eric Carle’s masterpiece The Hungry Caterpillar has run into trouble!

Joining this impressive list in 2012, the top ten of most frequently “challenged” books included Captain Underpants by Dav Pilkey, Fifty Shades of Grey by E.L. James (perhaps unsurprisingly!), The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini, and Beloved by Toni Morrison (yet again).

As a librarian and bibliofiend I find the whole concept of stopping children reading utterly bizarre and totally pointless. I suppose it’s all about control – trying to meld young minds into a particular world view that wide reading simply explodes. I passionately believe that young people have the right to read.

In literary criticism, reader-response theory argues that the act of reading is active, not passive; that the reader themselves constructs the meaning of a text based upon their own experience, understanding and psychology, and that this interpretation of a text can change over time. The text itself is a catalyst for a unique individual experience rather than an end in itself, and there is no “right” way to experience a text. I feel that this is particularly true of young readers who have a very different experience of the world than adults. They often apply different meanings and have different reactions to a text than an adult may, due to less reading and life experience and less awareness of the wider world and the complex interrelations and contexts of the “adult” world. So, should we be navigating this burgeoning awareness for them? It’s a tempting and laudable aim, but I think it’s dangerous territory. It’s too easy to unconsciously impose our own viewpoints at this critical stage and to make value judgements about what young people read, and by extension, about young people themselves. Conversely, encouraging independence in reading is demonstrating trust and facilitating openness. If a young person is affected by what they’ve read, then talk to them about it, address their worries and help them put content into context.

As young people approach adulthood they are curious about the world and need a safe environment in which to vicariously experience different aspects of life. Often, reading about “stressful” things can act as catharsis, enabling them to experience and express their worries about all kinds of issues that may be affecting them. Fiction in particular is a uniquely safe forum in which they can explore the world and start to formulate their responses. Dave Pelzer may or may not have written a true story but the popularity of A Child Called It amongst young people speaks for itself. Teenagers want to understand things that they’re worried about.

No teenager, having read Junk by Melvin Burgess, will think that taking drugs is a good idea – but neither will they feel “preached at” or patronised. This book treats them as an individual, an adult, and subtly encourages them to think about the reality of drug-taking. In relation to sex, young people are far more prudish than we might imagine! If they encounter sex scenes in a novel they are more likely to skip them than an adult reader would, or simply not understand the content. And if they enjoy them – of course that’s fine, they’re young adults dealing with a growing awareness of sexuality. How many of us, as teenagers, secretly read our parents’ books, looking for naughty bits?!

It‘s all about context, of course. We often cite context as a reason for censoring a book, but forget that context is often an adult perception. Of course we want to protect our young people from some things – but the reality is that we can’t. All we can do is give them knowledge and the skills to negotiate life’s sometimes difficult path for themselves. As adults we understand the world holistically; we’re more aware of the bigger picture. For example, I can’t watch films or read books which include torture – because as a member of Amnesty International I know that these things are very real. But that’s my response, learnt from my life experience and part of my unique psychology. Other people will have a different response and if I impose my own view upon them, that is unfair. As much as we resist the imposition of other adults’ views on our territory (e.g. a parent complaining about a book on religious grounds), we need to recognise when it’s our issues that are too much at the forefront, too. Even if they are well-meaning, they can still cause damage. I’ve read books that have upset me – but I don’t regret reading them. They’ve enabled me to understand the world more and they’ve become part of me as much as the books I’ve loved.

Find out more about Banned Books Week at http://www.ala.org/bbooks/banned.

 

Kindling Confusion (2): E-readers and oranges are not compatible

10 Wednesday Apr 2013

Posted by Anniseed in Musings

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E-books, Kindles, Luddism, Reading

Okay so I confess – I went and bought a Kindle. Just a bog standard one. (Well, there was an offer on!)

I’ve been experimenting with it for the past few weeks and I admit it’s not as horrendous as I imagined. It doesn’t give me a headache which is good. I can download books instantly, which is great. Some of them are quite cheap, which is also great. It’s not particularly heavy in my bag which is good for my shoulder. It’s okay, really. I’ll use it.

But I have some gripes!

First, you don’t know which exact page you’re on, which I can imagine would be tricky if you needed to cite a reference (that’s the librarian in me).

Second, every formatting error shrieks at me from the screen (that’s the proofreader in me), and I’ve encountered a lot of errors so far. Grrrr!!! Grumpy face.

Third, the default when you connect to Amazon seems to be that the “Buy” button is highlighted so I’ve accidentally bought quite a few expensive e-books by pressing the button for a fraction of a second too long. Good job you can cancel orders or I’d be broke…

Fourth, you cannot read on a Kindle and eat an orange at the same time. You get splatter on the screen which is then on every page. You can’t just turn a page over and the stain goes away….

Fifth, you can’t read it in the rain while waiting for a train. A water-damaged paperback I can read and throw away. A fused Kindle, not so much.

Sixth, and perhaps the most serious problem…. People talk to you less. Random strangers don’t ask what you’re reading. They don’t ask if it’s good. They don’t offer their interpretation of it or give you a spontaneous review. They don’t even spoil the ending for you.

Reading becomes less social.

Some people might prefer it that way, but I like the bizarre conversations reading a book can provoke. So while the Kindle will stay in my bag, it will stay in my bag, if you get me. Print is still my first love.

What You Read is Who You Are

21 Monday Jan 2013

Posted by Anniseed in Book News, Musings

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Reading, Research

I was heartened but not at all suprised on reading the report in The Bookseller which found that children and young people still enjoy reading print books – http://www.thebookseller.com/news/children-still-prefer-reading-physical-books-finds-scholastic.html. The report by Scholastic found that although e-books are on the rise amongst 6-17 year-olds in the USA, the attachment to hard copy remains.

As a school librarian I carried out my own survey a few years ago and there was a distinct lack of interest in e-books amongst my students, much to my surprise at the time. What, you don’t want gadgets?! Well, no, the students didn’t. They wanted more books. I think the report is right in identifying sharing as an important factor, but with young adults there is also that ever-so-important factor of demonstrating who you are to your peers by showing what you’re reading. Lugging about War and Peace or a dog-eared copy of Fifty Shades of Grey makes a certain social statement! And this is an important part of asserting your belonging to a group – or your rejection of one. (I see a similar behaviour amongst my fellow passengers on the commuter train every day.) An e-reader is also a statement, but a rather bland one, really.

What you read is who you are.

Interestingly the comments on this Bookseller post have raised the argument that reading is a predominantly female activity. The young adult novelist David Almond has risen to the bait to refute this and I totally agree with him; there were always far more boys in my library than girls, and more boys asked me to buy particular books for them; they also talked more about what they read.

One of my favourite moments as a librarian was when I was visiting another college to “booktalk” to fourteen-year-olds. I read extracts from some of my favourite books, and the sessions had gone very well. But as I was leaving, crossing the playground I saw two big boys beating up a smaller one. They saw me and stopped.

“Hey, miss, you’re that library lady. What was that book you were on about? The one with all the swearing and fighting?”

Me: “Oh, er, it was (un)arranged marriage by Bali Rai.”

“Cool, let’s get to the library and get a copy before they’re all gone!” And off they ran, to the relief of their victim (and me, as they were much bigger than me too!).

See, reading is good for you.

Just before I left that job, I asked my students to write me a list of the books they thought everyone should read. We had a long debate about what to call this list and came up with:

50 BOOKS THAT THE “DIFFERENTLY INSANE” SHOULD READ BEFORE THEY DIE

And here it is.

  1. The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
  2. Fullmetal Alchemist (series) by Hiromu Arakawa
  3. Foundation (series) by Isaac Asimov
  4. The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
  5. Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
  6. Cat’s Eye by Margaret Atwood
  7. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
  8. Thomas the Tank Engine by W. Awdry
  9. The Culture (series) by Iain M. Banks
  10. The Black Jewels Trilogy by Anne Bishop
  11. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
  12. Wuthering Heights by Emily Brontë
  13. The Zombie Survival Guide by Max Brooks
  14. Digital Fortress by Dan Brown
  15. Inception by Dan Brown
  16. The Magic Toyshop by Angela Carter
  17. The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter
  18. Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke
  19. Nevermore by Kelly Creagh
  20. Anything by Jasper Fforde
  21. QI: The Book of General Ignorance by Stephen Fry, John Lloyd and John Mitchinson
  22. Sandman (series) by Neil Gaiman
  23. Coraline by Neil Gaiman
  24. Watchmen by Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons
  25. Dune by Frank Herbert
  26. The Woman in Black by Susan Hill
  27. Mein Kampf by Adolf Hitler
  28. Anything by Stephen King
  29. Kick-Ass by Mark Millar and John Romita Jr
  30. Winnie the Pooh by A. A. Milne
  31. How Not to Write a Novel by Howard Mittelmark and Sandra Newman
  32. Scott Pilgrim (series) by Brian Lee O’Malley
  33. Eragon by Christopher Paolini
  34. Discworld (series) by Terry Pratchett
  35. His Dark Materials (series) by Philip Pullman
  36. (un)arranged Marriage by Bali Rai
  37. Mortal Engines by Philip Reeve
  38. Harry Potter (series) by J.K. Rowling
  39. Frankenstein by Mary Shelley
  40. Doctor Jekyll and Mr Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson
  41. Edge Chronicles (series) by Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell
  42. Dracula by Bram Stoker
  43. A Note of Madness by Tabitha Suzuma
  44. Lord of the Rings by J.R.R. Tolkien
  45. The Hobbit by J.R.R. Tolkien
  46. Slaughterhouse 5 by Kurt Vonnegut
  47. The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde
  48. Lemming the Lemming and the Tube of Doom (unpublished) by Max
  49. The Bible
  50. A Dictionary in every language

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Welcome to the world of Anniseed, bibliofiend and librarian, chaos gardener and allotmenteer, who sometimes finds caterpillars in her hair. This is my blog – what I’m reading and what I think about it, plus commentary on the world of books, and occasional rambles into the garden.

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