Practical classics
Subtitle: 50 reasons to reread 50 books you haven't touched since high school
By: Kevin Smokler
Publisher: Prometheus Books
Published: 2013
Place of publication: Amherst, N.Y
Language: eng
Number of pages: 320
ISBN-13: 9781616146566
Subjects: Books and reading; Psychology and literature; Best books; Psychological aspects
Description: What do the great books of your youth have to say about your life now? Smokler's essays on the classics are divided into ten sections, each covering an archetypical stage of life from youth and first love to family, loss, and the future. The author not only reminds you about the essential features of each great book but gives you a practical, real-world reason why revisiting it in adulthood is not only enjoyable but useful.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 303-320).
Table of contents: title: Youth and growing up. The midlife crisis of "Huckleberry Finn" ; Candide says relax. Then get to work ; "A separate peace" and the dream of best friends forever ; Owners of our lonely hearts ; How the uncaged bird sings; title: Identity. Real Indians play rock 'n roll ; "The autobiography of Malcolm X" : yours and mine ; Edith Wharton : "'Innocence' is for wimps" ; The us yet to come ; Am I a man or an android?; title: The inner and the outer world. If this "Library" is paradise; title: ; Staying out of the "Bell jar" ; You may find yourself trapped in Alexander Portnoy's head; title: ; "Cannery Row" : where everybody knows your name ; My favorite book of them all; title: Love and pain. "Pride and prejudice" : Jane Austen for the clumsier sex ; Marriage counseling from Henrik Ibsen ; "Eyes" on love ; I've been young and afraid, Joyce Carol Oates. Thank you for asking ; "The scarlet letter" : I don't like it either; title: Working. "Bartleby" in the breakroom ; The work/life balance of Sherlock Holmes ; Working at relaxing with David Foster Wallace ; At the office with "'Master Harold'; title: and the boys" ; Burning books : one crappy job; title: Family. Why "To kill a mockingbird" makes a great Father's Day gift ; The ambivalent family of Toni Morrison ; Of wontons, mah-jongg, and time ; A family of giant insects ; "Maus" : a comic book about fathers, sons, and genocide; title: Ideas and learning. The renaissance nerds of "The phantom tollbooth" ; Camping it up with Susan Sontag ; 'The work of art in the age of mechanical reproduction' by Walter Benjamin, notes by Kevin Smokler ; Hello, I'm William Shakespeare ; "Understanding" Marshall McLuhan; title: Violence and loss. Holden Caulfield, that little brat ; Albert Camus, the unsexy "Stranger" ; Shirley Jackson's rituals of violence ; The stone-faced trip of "Slaughterhouse-five" ; An act of violence, a book of forgiveness; title: The shameless case of Walt Whitman ; Emily Dickinson's lessons for success ; Little heroes and "Locust" ; "Visit Tinker Creek." Then keep going ; How to tell a hero story; title: Beware of revolutionaries who look like pigs ; Meet Thomas Pynchon, your driving companion ; The "Remains" of tomorrow ; Four different ways that "Things fall apart" ; A letter.