Why do we read fiction? (Hint: we need to...)

It was a great idea to take a personal day yesterday; the weather was lovely, and I got a ton of things accomplished. It's been a long time since I have felt like I've got my house/ yard in some sort of order. My mental house, well...that's going to continue to be a work in progress, but that, too, got some needed dusting. That all said, it's raining, and it's Tuesday, and I am headed back to work. 

In British Lit, we are reading Dickens' Hard Times; I hope that they see some connections between the social inequities in the novel and in our own times. And in American Lit, we are continuing to work with literature written by historically marginalized people; today, we will (I hope) be talking about Toni Morrison's Recitatif, and (again, I hope) they will be making some valuable connections between what we are reading and some of the issues we are facing in our own time and communities. 

Isn't that why we read fiction? It's not always escapism, though that is both pleasurable and necessary. But the greater reason is to find patterns, to see that human beings in the larger sense don't change; only the date does. What we hope, then, is to create situations for change, starting with our own mind-set. If the works do not challenge what we think, then they are almost useless. And that is the real danger of banning books in schools-- this intentional and institutionalized dumbing-down of a generation of potential thinkers. If we reinforce our own biases and don't choose to challenge what we have been lead to believe, then we don't grow. Often, after a challenge, our beliefs hold up--but we don't know if they are valid and useful to us unless we have taken the time to fully inspect what we expect from the world and of ourselves. 

Wish me luck. I'm hoping to shake a few brain cells today.

C