Revisiting the Classics

My number one, most revered author is Anna Quindlen. I absolutely adore her and everything she stands for. She writes with such conviction, and with an eloquence that I could only dream of ever having and know I could never, ever achieve. She's that wonderful. Her Pulitzer should be a surprise to no one.

Recently I watched an interview of her by Charlie Rose which was posted online. It was about the time in 2010 when her then latest novel, Every Last One, had just come out. The interview was about this new novel, her inspirations, motherhood and loss as topics that define her, and a variety of other subjects. But at one point she touched upon a well known novel, Moby Dick, and on revisiting the classics.

Charlie Rose made a reference about how some people say that maybe you shouldn't read War and Peace until you're at least in your thirties because you just won't get it. She agreed, saying how there's a beauty in not getting things and then getting them. She went on to mention how she first read Moby Dick back when she was in college and didn't care for it much, but how her oldest son insisted she revisit it that year because, as he told her: "Mom, you're just wrong about Moby Dick". And she conceded that he was right. But furthermore, she enjoyed the realization that she was now developed enough to appreciate something that she didn't some thirty-plus years ago - 'an incredible maturation process', she called it. And it occurred to me that this makes perfect sense.

When we're young - high school, junior high, perhaps - we're made to read some of the most impacting works by some of the most important literary minds of our time. Shakespeare, Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra, Hemingway, Austen, Poe, Fitzgerald, Whitman, Tolstoy, Salinger, Melville..... This list could quickly turn endless. We read them because the teacher said so. We read them because we had to write a book report, because we were going to be tested on them, because our grade depended on it. We read them because we had to. Introducing students to literature was part of the curriculum, part of our education. I mean, most 15-year olds probably don't read Shakespeare for kicks.... right?

By high school graduation I was impacted by four books in particular. In sixth grade I read Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird.  More than anything else about the book what I remember most is my reaction when I turned the last page. Because I connected to it so deeply, becoming so emotionally attached to characters and story alike, when I reached the very end and turned that last page only to find it blank, devoid of any more story, I burst into tears. Oh how I sobbed and sobbed. The tale finished, the characters were suddenly no longer alive. I was distraught. I will forever list To Kill A Mockingbird as my favorite book. What a beautiful story of sympathy and understanding in the face of bigotry and hatred. There I was, a little 11-yr old girl, sobbing at the end of a book. That reaction will remain etched in my mind forever. 

Later on in high school when it came time to read the works of none other than William Shakespeare, two in particular became clear favorites: A Midsummer Night's Dream - so magical, with such a whimsical air of fantasy, just pure fun; and my number one Shakespeare favorite: Julius Caesar. In fact, I remember I liked Julius Caesar so much that I read it twice. 

But when it comes to world-renowned works read in high school, none was as meaningful, as beautiful, as one of the pillars of literature, Don Quijote de la Mancha. What a story, so full of irony, puns, comedy, but yet with such a deep philosophical message. The beautiful story about the most famous dreamer that ever was. What a special book that was for me to read. And what a privilege to have been able to read it in its original language, Spanish.

But inasmuch as I enjoyed these works of literary art at such a young age, did I really get them? Did I really absorb the profound significance of their message? Could I? Were the authors' intentions for them to be read by such an inexperienced, budding audience in the first place?

Time goes by, we age, we experience love, heartbreak, career success, failure, parenthood for some, divorce for others, and with all of this new-found experience life has bestowed upon us comes the need to re-experience these classics. It's imperative that we go back and revisit these literary works. Imagine the richness twenty-plus years later, with all this acquired wisdom casting a light down on the rereading experience. Indeed, the classics need to be re-experienced in that bright renewed light, the light of knowledge, maturity, worldliness, understanding, awareness. The pages will become brighter, the print sharper, the message deeper and clearer and we will come to really get them when we shine upon them that warm, steady glow acquired by us all courtesy of the passing of time.

Just like Anna Quindlen re-experienced Moby Dick as a mature woman and realized how perhaps she didn't really get it when she was in college, perhaps I'll start with To Kill A Mockingbird, just to see if I'll have the same reaction as that little girl had when she turned that very last page. Although somehow I think that that little girl did get it after all.