Books & Culture Reviews Best American Nonrequired Reading
Books & Culture has this to say about Sufjan’s introduction to The Best American Nonrequired Reading 2007:
Some readers will pick up this collection just for the introduction by acclaimed indie artist Sufjan Stevens. Those who do so will be rewarded. Entitled “How I Trumped Rudolph Steiner and Overcame the Tribulations of Illiteracy, One Snickers Bar at a Time,” Stevens’ short essay far exceeds the rather perfunctory gestures of the typical celebrity intro. Stevens recounts his passage from a textually challenged, finger-knitting second grader in the Waldorf system to a third grader deciphering Edward Gibbon’s The Decline and Fall and the Roman Empire. How did he conquer Rudolph Steiner? He transferred from the nonrequired reading curriculum of the Waldorf system to the public schools, where literacy was forced upon him. As Stevens puts it, “I only needed the brash brainwashing of civilization, a crash course in modern society, capitalism, free enterprise, pop culture, Mickey Mouse, the Hardy Boys, Ronald McDonald. I needed the chlorinated conditioning of the modern world, with its pageantry of products, its multimedia of stimulation—television, TV guide, Little Debbie, Garfield, Peanuts, Cocoa Puffs.”
Read the full review: Optional by Necessity, Dave Eggers’ latest anthology of “Nonrequired Reading.”
October 16th, 2007 admin