At least I am not on facebook.

 I have been studying voraciously for tomorrow's CLEP test on American Literature and I just really need a break.  This test requires a knowledge of every great American author and an understanding of the plot lines and agendas of each of their major works. Problem is, I have my own opinions on which authors are great and which works should be considered major works.  For one thing, I would totally remove Whitman and Thoreau from every text book and library anywhere with the only exception being Whitman's "Oh Captain, My Captain!". Thoreau was a lazy bum who felt that work was a waste of his mental faculties, so he spent two years camping next to a friend's pond and then proceeded to write down every thought that entered his head during those two years. Whitman's poems were so depraved and immoral that no publisher would touch them and John Greenleaf Whittier threw them in the fire upon reading them. I think we ought to respect the obviously wise judgement of the author of "Snowbound" and do the same.  Poets like E.E. Cummings and Ezra Pound seem to have missed the fact that one writes in order to communicate.  Works that are open to any interpretation are not worth reading.

Then of course, there is the long list of suicides, adulterers, fornicators, mental cases, drunkards, and generally immoral writers.  Honestly, I am tempted to count just how many of these people died of self-induced deaths. There was a great shortage of deaths due to natural causes.  Interestingly, the authors who had the worst outlooks on life were the those influenced by naturalism and darwinism. Some don't seem to have any excuse except for the fact that they are unredeemed. Look at Edgar Allan Poe. The man had a brilliant mind and he spent most of his life drinking it to dullness.

On the other hand, there are some fabulous American authors, ones which I would happily boast about: Hawthorne, Alcott, Stowe, Whittier, Frost, Bradford, Twain. Unfortunately, this is another area where the text book/test writers and myself differ. I think that Louisa May Alcott was probably the best American fiction writer aside from Twain. Longfellow was the best poet ever period, and Harriet Beecher Stowe was an amazing woman as well as a writer.  Alcott and Longfellow are barely nodded at by my study materials and Stowe is made fun of for her sentimentality, Christian belief, and for having a large family.  Can you tell that I don't like my text book a whole ton? It is quite the jump to go from Abeka literature to a liberal curriculum.

I really am enjoying my studies, even if you cannot tell that from this post. I understand the importance of knowing where the differing world views came from and how they developed and why. I've even discovered a few more authors whose works are great! Anna Bradstreet and Phillis Wheatley are two such poets. As I study, I am keeping a running list of works I want to read soon. Wonder when I will have time to read for pleasure? My next test is English Lit, than Humanities after that. I think I'll wait to tackle my reading list until after all my Literature tests are done. Hopefully I will still feel like reading by then.