Don't Be a Sheep When You Read 'Excellent Sheep', Though William Deresiewicz Eventually Has One or Two Good Points

I recommend that you skip Excellent Sheep by William Deresiewicz altogether, even though there's a decent section in the middle (but I'll give you the scoop on that). Here's the rundown:

First, this retired Yale professor blames the general worsening of mental health in this country on the curricula of the Ivy League schools! I suppose he really is focusing on Ivy League students, but he seems unaware that mental health is worsening across the board for young people, especially--and of course those under high pressure are going to experience some of the brunt of it. He doesn't acknowledge causes like the rampant use of technology, especially screen time, endocrine disruptors in our environment, or a myriad of other potential causes. Instead, Dr. Deresiewicz is ready to dismantle the rigorous curricula that some of the most brilliant minds in our country have developed over centuries, when that's precisely what these students are there for!  They've worked so hard to get there, to receive that education, yet he seems to advocate undoing that Ivy League rigor when instead they could just ease the grading system (see below, 4th paragraph from the end for more on that). Sure, the curricula are not static; they've changed over time and must continue adapting as necessary, but I repeat: a rigorous education is what students are there for in the first place. Perhaps it's simply not for everyone--and certainly there will be individual courses that are completely unreasonable in their demands and far too stressful, but these should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. And of course the schools should do their best to provide adequate mental health services for their students, especially given the pressures they are under.

The tirade that Dr. Deresiewicz let out against parents of Ivy Leaguers was frankly offensive, and I'm not even one of them! He speaks as if they are all atrocious parents and in the wrong.  Hmm.  Apparently he spent too many years listening to his students' frustrations with their parents and being annoyed by their intrusions upon himself--and he lets it out here in a way that I suspect is fed by his own ingratitude towards and resentment towards his own excellent parents. I found it rather intolerable to listen to. Talk about 'privileged'!  He's rarely been around students, I suspect, whose parents were neglectful or uninvolved. Not to say that he doesn't have a point that the kids' feelings of worth are perhaps too wrapped up in their success and GPA and such, but he is coming from such a place of bias that it's difficult to swallow his contempt for these remarkable parents. (I say they're remarkable because of how spectacular their kids have turned out--despite the students' sometimes endless complaints about mom and dad, no doubt--and not remotely because of anything this professor said.)

The book does get better, briefly:

Around the middle of the book, he begins to discuss the value of reading, and so of course I'm jolted on board, at least for a bit! He refers to a quote that majoring in English is like majoring in finding yourself, or something lovely like that. To be honest, however, as much as I adore novels, I never took the first English class in college, as I'd placed out with AP credits.  My daughter has a strange aversion to taking English courses herself, saying that she doesn't want anyone else selecting what novels she reads.  Hah, so while I meant to praise what he had to say there, I'm not sure my experience reflects how it relates to college life and curricula, exactly.  Even he says that we should curate our own reading lists, as only we know what we are drawn to, what will connect for us.  I'm paraphrasing broadly. [Note that he actually does have another book out about getting A Jane Austen Education, and I actually did read all her books one summer while in college, so perhaps he wouldn't have curated my reading list too far off!]

He also talks about the value of the liberal arts in creating well-rounded thinkers.  I've heard this before, but suddenly it hit home.  Perhaps it was how well he expressed and supported it.  Perhaps it was because he cited figures that suggest that businesses are looking for those thinkers, actually preferring them oftentimes. He discusses how it takes years and years to obtain that broad background, to learn to think constructively, whereas hard skills can be taught pretty quickly.  If his statistics hold up, then they should allay some of our worries about the liberal arts degrees not being so 'practical'--though I'd still want to do some of my own research on that, if practicality and a high income are truly the priority. [On this note, I'd like to interject that he also has a book out called, The Death of the Artist: How Creators Are Struggling to Survive in the Age of Billionaires and Big Tech. Just sayin'.] [Also, knowing how complex entire fields of science are, with so much depth and breadth, it's hard for me to understand how liberal arts majors could possibly just 'step into it'.  I'm aware that some do, going straight to medical school with their English degrees, but I'm convinced they must be geniuses!]

Personally, I was both a science major AND advocate a liberal arts education. I'm particularly keen on the social sciences, in retrospect. I was so zoned in on my biochemistry major that I only took social science classes to meet the core liberal arts requirements, yet it turns out they were some of the most world-view-changing courses in my undergraduate career--especially World Religions and Anthropology (I didn't even know what a hunter-gatherer was before that course!). While we'd like to think we did most of our educational rounding-out in childhood, I, for one, very much needed that liberal arts college curriculum.

Towards the end of the book, Dr. Deresiewicz actually does start to convince me that the Ivy Leagues may not provide the best education for our brightest students, and it's specifically when he talks about the pressure on professors to do research and publish.  I have seen that for myself, that professors' priorities are often not the students, and they increasingly use professional jargon in their teaching, rather than plain speak.  It's a bit akin to doctors working for the insurance companies, not the patients.

However, these bright points in the very middle of the book almost belie the rest of the manuscript. Though he talks about the benefits of a liberal arts education here, he later insists that these hard-working students are in no way truly brighter, superior, more deserving, any of it...  and while, of course, every person has inherent worth, and grades are not everything, he seems to be maligning their accomplishments out of resentment of their self-conceived 'superiority'. In fact, he relates how he would tear them down if he were their commencement speaker (he doesn't call it that, but if you listen to what he says, that's what it is).  Not that it's not good to be mindful of all the ways we are lucky and blessed, and that could be a component of it, but I do hope he is never invited to deliver a commencement speech, as those hard-working students do not deserve his contempt, especially at their very graduation ceremony.

I don't agree with Dr. Deresiewicz about the quality of the students not being a draw at the Ivy Leagues [for goodness sakes, he was even pointing out how Harvard dropouts Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerburg made important connections that helped them professionally while there--and I wouldn't cry if they'd been my son's roommates at college, either!], but I certainly feel that he has a point about some of our smaller universities having wonderful instructors more focused on the students. His recommendation to look at some of the better liberal arts colleges struck me as excellent advice for equipping our college students to face life with a broad knowledge base and the ability to think and interact intellectually--and without such pressure. This was not actually a motivating force in considering colleges for my own children, and I may have viewed the college choices a bit differently if I'd heard this audiobook when we were considering colleges for them.  That said, once that nice liberal arts foundation has been assured at a good school, I still think rankings do matter--mostly in view of the other students our own children will be around, their influences.

I am frankly alarmed by his insistence that we 'even the playing field' by not crediting students with any achievements that their parents' money helped to acquire. He talks about handicapping their applications while giving extra points to needier students, willy-nilly.  For all his insistence on not feeling superior, on not demeaning the 'other', he sure isn't very sympathetic to the hard-working Ivy League candidates that come from families that were able and devoted to supporting them. 

In fact, I find it telling that he bemoans these 4.0+ GPA high school students averaging 3.3 GPAs at their Ivy League Schools, as if they don't deserve it. First he's so alarmed about them being pushed too hard, wailing about their mental health, but then he wants to push them even harder, undeservedly?  No, I really don't think he is an advocate for his former students much at all, aside from those who serve his purpose by resenting real and perceived deficits of their Ivy League educations and experiences.  I'd personally suggest that the Ivy Leagues actually shift to a Pass/Fail system, since they have already ensured that their students are top-notch.  My graduate school did this, and it certainly took a tremendous pressure off both me and my instructors:  I stopped worrying about arguing if I thought I should get credit for a question or two, so concerned about that 'A'.  Instead, I glanced at my test, saw that I did fine, and moved on with my life (and the teacher could, too!).  It helps reduce stress immensely. I was also more free to focus on my areas of interest.

He disparages the idea of charity 'service' as a superiority mindset--an argument that may have some merit, though hopefully students and listeners are not dissuaded from still trying to do good, from participating in important charity work. Instead, he suggests students transfer from the Ivy League schools to state universities and take service jobs, like working in restaurants. What terrible advice, at least the first part. However, he does have a point that perhaps one of the best ways for privileged young people to develop true empathy and a better sense of equality with those who do manual labor and service work is to do at least a stint of it for themselves.  I have seen this be eye-opening more than once.  So... it might not be the worst idea to require such service-industry work from nearly every Ivy League student, probably no more than part-time for a semester, but I think it would improve their consideration for service-industry workers in general, at least.  So, it seems there is a seed or two of wisdom amidst Dr. Deresiewicz's overall bad advice.

One last bit of truth to Dr. Deresiewicz's book is this: that the Ivy Leagues like to tout their selective acceptance rates, so they market to loads of young people that they know don't stand a chance, just to achieve those numbers.  Frankly, though Dr. Deresiewicz doesn't himself go over it, I learned from an admission officer's book that you can't just be a perfect student with perfect scores--you either must be obviously disadvantaged or have achieved something truly remarkable [or simply 'remarkable' if it fits a specific niche that they're having difficulty filling] or be from a legacy family; yet even she didn't acknowledge the cruelty of marketing to and wasting the time and resources of the very best and brightest across the country--and of disappointing them. If they believe they actually stand a chance of getting in, if they've been actively recruited to apply, then they are going to feel acute rejection when they are rejected by this dream school, when there actually was no true rejection, as they never stood a chance in the first place.  It's a cruel trick and one to be mindful of if we're truly concerned about their mental health.

So, my advice is to skip this book and probably to skip the Ivy League application as well, unless you are a celebrity or a minority (with a perfect academic record) or a potential legacy student, something of that nature, anyhow.  My best takeaway from this book is to seriously consider a liberal arts college no matter the major, 'practical' choice or not.

Literary Titan Thrice Honors 'Silk', Too!

"[I]t’s important to try to understand where others are coming from, to develop empathy—even for those with bats in their belfry, as Anne would say." -from my interview for 'Silk' with Literary Titan.

Check it out https://literarytitan.com/2022/06/25/a-dramatic-re-interpretation/

This pretty medallion on the right joins Silk's collection, which I'm none too sad about.

Pleased as punch with their review of 'Silk', too:

“Dr. Conner and Clayton Bell are prime examples of the class differences in the Carolinas… readers will be torn between who is the favorite and who should end up with Caroline. It is a whirlwind following the three of them and watching Jessie maneuvering in the background… There is never a dull moment in the plot. The descriptions are vivid, and you feel like you are there in the old south, experiencing the changes in the society as they happen.” -Literary Titan, 5-star review.

Read the full review at https://literarytitan.com/2022/06/17/silk-carolines-story/

One Year In, So Much Love!

Here are some of my favorite professional review snippets and awards for Silk and Tapestry thus far...

'Northanger Abbey' by Jane Austen, a Mother of Novels and a Timeless Reflection of Human Nature

Jane Austen

Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen has been interpreted as a parody on the popular Gothic novels of her day, which it may be at times… but not utterly.  Part of the quintessential charm of Jane is that she mocks everyone to a degree, since we all can be so ridiculous, but in Northanger Abbey she takes that mockery up a few notches. Meanwhile, she inspires not just generations, but centuries of future writers!

Listening to Northanger Abbey specifically reminded me of plot lines used by other cherished authors:

Emily Brontë

Most notably, there’s Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights: both Catherines (the novels' female protagonists) grow up rather wild and are only recently civilized, though Wuthering Heights’ Catherine makes a feistier adult. I suspect that Emily Bronte took Catherine’s gothic-parody ideas and ran with them, showing just how powerful gothic elements can be! The wild weather, haunted-seeming gothic estate, etc. set the mood.  Austen's Henry has purchased a nearby estate, as does the brooding Heathcliff. The similarities go on.

Then there's Anne of Green Gables. Austen’s Catherine is chaperoned in Bath by an older neighbor friend, a Mrs. Allen who is quite indulgent and pleasant.  Well, Anne Shirley also has a Mrs. Allen mentor friend that she adores—so perhaps LM Montgomery’s Mrs. Allen was inspired by this element of Northanger Abbey.

I was even reminded of The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett in Northanger Abbey's garden bit with a mystery about the mothers.

Northanger Abbey seems to have inspired elements of innumerable amazing novels, of both witting and unwitting authors!  Or perhaps I’m just a bit quick to draw corollaries. Maybe I'm not the only one:  A recent reviewer also recognized parallels between my first novel, Silk: Caroline’s Story, and Northanger Abbey, which is what sent me back to revisit this long-forgotten novel. I’d read an omnibus of the complete Jane Austen novels, including Northanger Abbey, while in college, one lazy summer when I was about 20 years old; now that I’ve just listened to it on audiobook, I'll say that while Silk seems not to have quite the acerbity of Jane Austen, she may have influenced my writing more than I knew.

For example, I found myself relistening to a striking section that just made me laugh—Austen forgets the novel entirely, ranting for pages in a tirade about authors maligning novels and novel-reading in their own writing. With biting wit, she leaves her own novel behind entirely, that whole ‘breaking the fourth wall’ technique.  It’s great.  The third time I listened, I made my Austen-hating husband join me.  His evaluation?  “That was badass.”  So now I’m convinced that even though he still refuses to listen to her, he couldn’t possibly hate her as much as he says he does.

That rant reminded me of a section of Silk in which Caroline goes on in praise of her cheap dime novels; she’s impatient with her brother John’s penchant for Shakespeare—as with Austen, customary literary regard is flipped on its backside. Could this be because I absorbed Austen’s sharp sermon when I was twenty?  And Caroline does go on more than I expected her to (inexplicably, to my authorial dismay), akin to Jane Austen’s strange detour from her story to have that rant.  Austen was impatient with well-done novels being looked on as fluff or silly, saying instead that novels are some of the most astute, insightful perspectives on human nature. I don’t recall exactly how she put it, but go, Jane!  She also talks about other writing being perceived as more high-minded when it really isn’t.

Given this rant of hers, I'm hesitant to cast Northanger Abbey as a full-on parody of the Gothic novels of her day. Austen merely illustrates a girl who is a bit swept away by fanciful notions of murders and hauntings, no doubt mocking some of her own thoughts after reading some popular Gothic novels. She was capturing human nature there, laughing at herself and others. There's an analogy to be had for this situation (demanding respect for novels while mocking the Gothic novels) in Silk as well, as what my Caroline fervently insists a novel should do in her diatribe… well, Silk does not necessarily do.

Then there's a situation in Northanger Abbey where Catherine worries about a carriage’s safety, and her antagonist blows off her concern, creating an expectation in me that there would be a terrible accident at some point in the novel. I waited and waited for it. I’m sure I had the expectation the whole time I was reading the novel the first time, and that expectation may have been fulfilled with Sam’s accident in Silk. There’s a mistreated horse, too, in Northanger Abbey, so like I said, many hints of Silk there. Anyhow, I’m delighted with the Jane Austen comparison, though the books have notable differences, even in genre.  Catherine is smitten with this Udolpho novel in Northanger Abbey, one of those completely sensational thrillers (she says horror), and Silk is perhaps more of a hybrid that way than a strict Austen-style book, as mine has ‘the detritus [of Jessies’ jealousy] littering the Lowcountry landscape”.  Arson, murder, etc.! 

Such interesting corollaries for generations of unwittingly inspired authors, even as the number of authors trying to write Jane Austen spinoffs is already mind-boggling. I suppose there’s an eager market for them, though! But regardless… what an honor for my first novel to be compared to Jane Austen’s first novel (albeit one of her last ones published—posthumously, in fact)—and to then see the similarities for myself, to my own surprise!

All this said, I should share at least one critique of this novel—or, I should say, of Catherine's character in the novel. At the beginning of the story, she is charmed by and befriends beautiful Isabella, who alleviates Catherine's boredom and demonstrates many characteristics of a true friend.  They become attached, spending their days together.  Later, when ill fortune befalls Isabella, much of it through her own poor choices, Catherine has no compassion whatsoever for Isabella.  I could understand better if Catherine were torn about it and finally decided to spurn Isabella anyhow, but Catherine seems to have no qualms whatsoever about turning her back on her unfortunate, flawed best friend—not even seeming to miss her—and I ended the novel liking Catherine far less than I had throughout the rest of it, wondering if she'd ever had any true affection for her friend. Isabella had actually shown herself to be a far truer friend than Catherine. Perhaps General Tilney delivered a sort of retribution (energetically-speaking) when shortly afterwards he mirrored Catherine's judgmental spurning and kicked Catherine out of his house after having so doted on her. You have to wonder about such times when people were so quick to turn their backs on their friends and loved ones, when proper conduct mattered far more to them than friendship or affection. Yet... I'm not so sure that human nature has changed so much in the past couple of centuries, so I'll conclude yet again that this is not so much a statement of the times as it is a timeless reflection of human nature, unfortunately.  [Note: I am discussing the book here, not the film adaptations. Isabella might be depicted a bit differently in the films!]

An illuminating aspect of Austen’s writing is that it is contemporary for her time, so when she describes their notions and ideas, habits and surroundings, I don’t have to wonder, “Does she have that right for the period?” Wonderful how writers can speak to us through the centuries. For example, General Tilney is constantly consulting his watch, so watches are apparently not anachronistic to the early 19^th century. Her contemporary status also cleared up another confusion: I've heard that Jane Austen is one of the earliest popular novelists, but her character Henry Tilney argues that he’s read hundreds of novels. Even Sophia Dorothea (a century before Jane Austen, another of my protagonists) had novels to read, and I’m relieved to hear just how very prevalent they were by Austen’s time. I suppose one might point out that Jane Austen actually is one of the earliest still-popular novelists, though!

Reader Views Review of 'Tapestry' Hones in on Rapunzel Trope

"All that’s missing is her breaking out into song declaring 'Mother Knows Best!'"

Hmm... This reviewer really took to heart the Rapunzel theme in 'Tapestry', though I myself recognized it only in retrospect!

“[A] tale filled with the heartbreak of separated loved ones, the anxiety of growing up in a changing social and material world, altogether while battling demons inside their own home… [A] unique imagining of the classic Rapunzel trope… The lengths [Jessie] will go to accomplish her own goals, even at the expense of those around her (namely her stepdaughters), is both disturbing and shockingly clever… I thought Vivian’s and Gaynelle’s sisterhood in Tapestry was beautifully chronicled.” -Megan Weiss, Reader Views. 

Read the full review: https://readerviewsarchives.wordpress.com/2022/06/30/reviewalexandertapestry/?fbclid=IwAR1KTdbG3dned3PDaBIW6qoIstwrm8d7-5aBJQ1zkDlIhB8zu_11WPKNeJk

Cave Search (a microfiction), plus my trip to Virginia

 

I just completed a wonderful birthday trip (with a longtime friend) to the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia, enjoying the ups and downs all the way from the rocky peaks in the National Park to the vast, deep Luray caverns. In the Grand Caverns, the stratigraphy was particularly interesting because a hill had basically fallen on its side (due to plate tectonics long ago), and instead of the horizontal layers on the walls, there were vertical layers in the ceilings, dripping to create interesting shield formations. I didn't get great pictures of them, but just to the left, on the formation closest to these words, there's a lighter ear-shaped shield jutting towards us, as if listening to what I'm typing here. Thomas Jefferson himself actually visited some of the nearby caverns and drew the first known cave maps in the United States!

The caverns reminded me of a couple of my stories, except there weren't any bats yet. I'd have to wait until wintertime to see them in the caves. The above never-before-published microfiction was actually written about six years ago. I hope the escaped slave, a mulatto girl, made it to safety, but at least she found the cave entrance.

Seems I have a particular interest in caves, as my yet-to-be-released YA Fantasy also begins with Addi, a Vessian princess, hiding out with her wolf-dog in a cave, just near the entrance. It's actually Frix's cave, but you'll meet him later...

In the picture below, taken in the Luray Caverns, a pool mirrors the stalactites above it.  I think it's beautiful, though of course much of the credit goes to how the lights were placed.

Mayan Deities Brought to Life in Silvia Moreno-Garcia's 'Gods of Jade and Shadow'

After reading Mexican Gothic on vacation last year, I was quite pleased to have the audiobook of Gods of Jade and Shadows, also by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, to listen to as I meandered up to the Shenandoah valley of Virginia from Savannah, GA for a vacation this year.  It did not disappoint. The genre is a bit different—instead of Gothic horror, it’s considered historical fantasy, mostly set in Mexico in the 1920s and dealing with ancient Mayan death-gods.  I would recommend the novel for teenagers and adults, especially women, who once enjoyed Rick Riordan’s stories about the gods of various world mythologies and for those who enjoyed the movie Labyrinth, as the antagonist Vucub-Kamé sometimes reminded me of Jareth the Goblin King.  Any lover-of-novels who is curious about Mexico should find it an absorbing story as well.  This is only my second novel by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, but I’m already a big fan. She brings her main characters and Mexico to vivid, surreal life. Her strong, practical female protagonists are dreamers—they’re likeable, relatable. In Gods of Jade and Shadows, Casiopea worries about her reputation, about the teachings of her family and the church regarding how single young women should behave. The author draws a vivid portrait of her village life, of how her defiant spirit is recognized—and brings her trouble—even when she thinks she’s being servile.  The characters are mostly well-drawn, though some of the action-filled scenes have side characters that seem as though they could have been written by Riordan himself, they’re that cartoonish (I still very much enjoy Riordan’s writing, too, let me add!). Hun-Kamé, the god that she is trying to help, feels tangible, though—and his transition to being more human only makes his initial godly persona that much more authentic.  The betrayal by his brother, and the subsequent finding of body parts to restore himself reminds me so much of the Egyptian legend of Osiris and Seth that I find myself quite curious how much of this story is truly Mayan legend, and if it is, whether or not there is some ancient, shared connection with the Egyptian myths.