Gerald Graff

Alex Hall

Gerald Graff wrote a short autobiography about himself and is eventual love for literature and how he came about loving it. Growing up he disliked literature and reading history. It was always boring and had no real relation to his life. Growing up I always felt the same way. Whether I was reading a book of no real literary merit or Grapes of Wrath, reading never interested me. Graff although had it a little different. He grew up in a city were people frowned upon you for being intellectually smart. It was beyond the norm to read books; in fact people would threaten you if you read novels. In the early ages of middle school it was never “cool” to read or be smart. People would think it was cool if you got a C on a test and never read a page of the assigned reading. I fell right in the middle of those kids.
Now college is in my present and future and unfortunately I still do not have the drive to read assigned reading. I love reading books, but only the ones that interest me. Graff went into college and decided on an English major because of his background and his family. Now, sixty years later things are a lot different. You don’t need to have a background to decide to be a business major, which is what I am. As an English major he obviously took more rigorous classes in the English department than I am. In his first few years, even as an English major, I still relate to him completely. He said in his short autobiography that when he read the assigned reading, he didn’t know what to say about the books or why people became so intrigued by them. I feel the exact same way. I have a problem with looking deep into novels that don’t interest me.
Graff main experience that really made him fall in love with reading was the discussion that he acquired with his class about the novel The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and its very controversial ending. After reading the novel once, he stated that he reread the novel with the discussion in mind and was looking and waiting for something, and that’s the reason why the novel became so interesting for him. For me, I am reading a biography on John Lennon. I am an avid Beatles fan and everything about them interests me. When I read the novel I know so much about them already that I am always anticipating something to come in the future of the book. That is the drive that keeps me wanting to read more. Unfortunately I do not have that drive with most books. Graff said that the best teaching is when you “Just put the student in front of a good book, provide teachers who are encouraging and helpful, and the rest presumably will take care of itself.” To me, that is the best advice I have heard with teaching because if I am in front of a good book with many discussions up for grab, the rest will take care of itself.