It Matters: Rhythm, Writing, and... DVRs?

"I wish there were a knob on the TV to turn up the intelligence. There's a knob called 'brightness,' but that doesn't work." ~Gallagher


When I was in kindergarten my mom started reading me novels. By first grade, I was reading them to her. For years, we sat, every night, on my mom's bed, and read to each other, indulging our imaginations and filling our minds with the words, sentences, paragraphs, and chapters of stories that neither of us ever wanted to desert. By middle school, life was too complicated and our nightly ritual was too extracurricular to carry on, yet I still found solace in that world of literature, learning from those years, and my mom, that a book is the greatest companion for any occasion, and that one's list of future literary pursuits is infinitely long.

In class we have been talking a lot about the rhythm of words, the excitement of writing, and the importance of literature. Although, I fear, that many of my classmates don't find it useful or interesting, our analyzing of the works of great authors, and our examination of their technique, fuels my mind, body, and soul. The careful craft and deliberate placing of sounds, words, and phrases is fascinating and eye-opening. All of those years that I felt an intense love for the writing that I was reading, but couldn't place my finger on the reason, are beginning to make sense. It's this "stuff" that we're being educated on that induces the, what I like to call, "Paperback Coma" one sinks into after putting down an intricately and artfully constructed novel, one that makes you mystified, yet leaves you contemplating anything and everything you already know.

On the other hand, in our world today, this new generation, my generation, rarely reads for pleasure. And if we do, it's not the craft and meaning that matters, it's the ending. Terribly written novels are lounging atop the best-seller list because the plot is so ridiculous that you never see what's coming next, as exemplified by the Twilight phenomenon. These novels have neither rhyme, rhythm, nor reason, the very things that, as we are learning, make a book a masterpiece. In fact, literature is being reduced to such diminutive crap that anyone can write a book, including Kathy Griffin. Novel writing is no longer an art; it's a hobby, or a way for people, who no one cares about, to tell a story... about something that no one cares about.

Thanks to television, our attention spans are shrinking so steadily that these "horror stories" are all that we can handle when regarding written word, that is if people are even sitting down to read something. It seems like people are more concerned and interested in the new season of "Gossip Girl", who Paris Hilton's new BFF is, and whether or not that blond girl dies on "Grey's Anatomy," than what Khaled Hosseni is trying to say about modern Afghanistan in The Kite Runner, or how How To Kill a Mockingbird is a microcosm for an important part of American history. Television has become the major focus in peoples' lives, a space that was previously occupied by family, religion, enlightenment, or social obligations. These LCDs and flat screens have hounded our intelligence into such prostration that our minds will only accept novels like The Clique or television shows about celebrities. I'm not trying to say that watching TV and reading Twilight is going to kill you or render your status as a functioning member of society false. But if all you do is sit in front of the screen and have never read Shakespeare in your life, a not so uncommon fate, I can't say the same... Some critics will argue that television is a great invention. I agree, it is. They will say that it doesn't hurt you. Depending on the amount and how you spend the rest of your life, not really. But I will ask them, are we smarter because of TV? No. Are we happier? No. Has it, that little black box we love so much, caused a demise in the quality of written word and our thirst for it? Absolutely, one-hundred percent, yes.

If you take a poll of ten high school students I bet you any money that at least seven of them don't like to read. I'd say that eight of them have never heard of Jane Austen. Four of them probably don't know that The Da Vinci Code was a book before a movie. And you know what? I feel bad for them. I pity them because they are missing out on the wondrous, illuminating world that is great literature. If, in thirty years, my generation has achieved world peace and ended poverty because we watched television and read Red Carpet Suicide by Perez Hilton, I'm going to eat my words. But, on the other hand, in thirty years, if our world falls apart at the seams because my generation was too addicted to television and blinded by appalling literature to read War and Peace, I'm going feel at fault for not stopping us on our destructive path. In the meantime, I'm going to continue my literary and scholarly quest to greater knowledge and understanding, while a lot of my compadrés watch "Whose Line is it Anyway?". I may not have all the answers for the world yet, but for right now I'll busy myself with writing a letter to my mom, explaining to her why the most important thing she ever gave me was her love of reading good books. It will start something like this: Dear Mom, I am so glad that my happiness does not depend on the competency of our DVR...