Silas Marner
Eliot's touching novel of a miser and a little child combines the charm of a fairy tale with the humor and pathos of realistic fiction. The gentle linen weaver, Silas Marner, exiles himself to the town of Raveloe after being falsely accused of a heinous theft. There he begins to find redemption and spiritual rebirth through his unselfish love for an abandoned child he discovers in his isolated cottage.
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- "Journey to the Edge of Reason, The Life of Kurt Gödel", by Stephen Budiansky. Even though it contains an introduction to his proof of the Incompleteness Theorems, you won't learn all too much about logic or mathematics, but it sure paints an interesting picture of the people involved at the start of the 20th century.
"Silas Marner" by George Eliot. Has redefined humor for me.
"Reinforcement Learning and Stochastic Optimization" by Warren B. Powell. I'm still not entirely sure what to think of his claims about unifying many scientific disciplines, but it sure is packed with a lot of information and theory.
- Silas Marner by George Elliot. Changed the way I parent my children.
- I'm on my fourth George Eliot novel this year, Adam Bede, which was her first published novel. I started with Middlemarch and proceeded to read Silas Mariner, Romola, and Daniel Deronda. The 1985 film adaptation of Silas Marner is very good and faithful to the novel. The 1970 Daniel Deronda film is similarly faithful and well-acted but the 2002 version is neither.
- It might also be epilepsy. (That “falling unconscious in a church” reminded me of Silas Marner chapter 2… but then again, the author wasn't a doctor.)
- I don't disagree with you. When I was in school (and still now, really) if there wasn't a dragon or a spaceship on the cover, I wasn't interested in it. I remember more about Where the Red Fern Grows, but not much (a kid gets mail order dogs to hunt with and (spoilers) the dogs die ... because the dogs always die). The only thing I remember about Silas Marner is that he buried his money and it was stolen (not a spoiler, that's like chapter 1).
Something to know about English classes in particular (but also History and other liberal arts/non-science classes) is that isn't not about "the books", but critical thinking and discussion. In fact, it's likely that the mandated standards don't specify specific books to read. It turns out, though, that in a class of 30+ kids, it's easiest (or even possible) to have a critical discussion if everyone reads the same books at the same time.
Also, if the kids think they are being "taught the book" but the teacher is trying to teach "literary literacy" using "the book" as an example, that's when you get arguments like "I didn't learn anything!" and "This is a waste of my time!" and "This other book is better!". Those arguments are besides the point. You should have been talking about why the author made the literary decisions they made, what were the themes? Whose point of view was it told from? How was the book impactful (or not)?
These are the standards in Texas. Other states should have this information publicly available and I assume they will be very similar.
https://tea.texas.gov/sites/default/files/ch110c.pdf
For English II these are the skills a student should learn (notice no specific books are mentioned, but "traditional", "contemporary", "classical", and "diverse" are used to describe the books)
- The student develops oral language through listening, speaking, and discussion
- The student uses newly acquired vocabulary expressively
- The student reads grade-appropriate texts independently.
- The student is expected to self-select text and read independently for a sustained period of time.
- The student uses metacognitive skills to both develop and deepen comprehension of increasingly complex texts
- The student responds to an increasingly challenging variety of sources that are read, heard, or viewed
- The student recognizes and analyzes literary elements within and across increasingly complex traditional, contemporary, classical, and diverse literary texts
- The student recognizes and analyzes genre-specific characteristics, structures, and purposes within and across increasingly complex traditional, contemporary, classical, and diverse texts
- The student uses critical inquiry to analyze the authors' choices and how they influence and communicate meaning within a variety of texts.
- The student analyzes and applies author's craft purposefully in order to develop his or her own products and performances.
- The student uses the writing process recursively to compose multiple texts that are legible and use appropriate conventions
- The student uses genre characteristics and craft to compose multiple texts that are meaningful
- The student engages in both short-term and sustained recursive inquiry processes for a variety of purposes
Much like learning a foreign language is about more than learning vocabulary, but you can't learn how to talk in a restaurant if you don't know the restaurant related vocabulary. English class is about more than reading books, but you can't have those discussions if you haven't read the books. Or, it would be much more difficult to effectively "analyze literary elements" in a classroom setting with 30 kids that all ready 30 different books.
Sure, teachers can be better or worse (or very, very bad) at teaching the material, or conveying what is being taught. But if you view English class as equivalent to "sitting under a tree and reading a book" (that was another commenter's words, not yours) then you're missing the forest for the tree and it won't matter how good the teacher is, you will be fighting them the whole way (which is maybe your point about not being able to challenge someone that doesn't want to be challenged)
- But there is an ever-growing amount of good writing online, much of which suffers from its proximity to these low-rent neighbors.
I'm not entirely sure why good writing 'suffers more' from proximity to a direct-marketing campaign - acai berries, belly fat, whatever - than it would from, say, an ad for a Ford Focus or The King's Speech. Both offer an equivalent amount of visual distraction.
The author here doesn't understand that online advertising is fairly efficient - the 'get four auto insurance quotes' advertisements show up because more-familiar brand advertisements simply don't work well in those spots. People reading good writing online aren't particularly valuable to advertisers, so they get to see no-risk-to-the-advertiser cost-per-acquisition advertisements. Got to try and monetize somehow.
I suspect there's a certain bit of class snobbery here - the reader is engaged in something literary, so how dare he be subjected to an ad so déclassé, it belongs on a gossip site? Obviously he, a refined soul, deserves more tasteful commercial distractions!
There are two solutions here. The reader could be extensively and thoroughly tracked, so we know enough about him to show him an ad for that off-Broadway adaption of Silas Marner he's been jonesing for. But that approach is currently under attack from all parties - and besides, when people are tracked, the ads best suited for them are often less sophisticated than they'd anticipate.
I prefer the more direct solution: if you don't like the ads, pay for the content through some other means, and eliminate the need for advertising altogether.
