I Vaguely Remember S.E. Hinton in High School, Then Reread All the Books on My Own, & Now Am Teaching in a YA Lit Course. It's Just...

This is probably the 4th or 5th time I've read The Outsiders. Yes, it was a classic while I was growing up, and yes, all the girls had crushes on the boys who played parts in the movie, and yes, a vast majority of young people read this in school, yada...yada..yada...but truthfully, it's just a rock-solid text. I started rereading Sunday afternoon, and didn't move from my chair. Now I have to think about how I want to go about discussing it as the inaugural text (a classic) I assigned my students to read in the YA course I'm teaching this semester. To be honest, I don't want them to have to listen to what I am thinking. I really simply want to hear them discussing the book and to see if it holds up in their young minds in the ways that it does my own.

I'm also wondering if it would appeal to adolescent readers today - I imagine it would, and is one of the reasons it remains a classic to all. Does the language hold up? Mostly. Can the text be taught in totally new ways given cultural shifts and conversations? Definitely! Can one give a critical, gendered read? Of course. Would it trigger emotions of its readers? I imagine so (especially if it is the first time one reads a book that hits the soul like this one does). 

Yes, "Stay Gold," resonates, but this time reading through, I love the moments that follow Johny's death. Now, this morning, I know I'm going to go on a nerdy hunt to read academic articles of yesteryear I missed for the ways this story has been discussed and theorized by others (as if I have time) (as if it matters)

And I also know I'm a writing guy who lives in YA worlds for inspiration. Literature, to me, is to inspire other writers, and not to "tie up to a chair and demand a confession" of it to allude Billy Collins. I would much rather write with the books than micro-analyze them in the ways I've been trained. 

Ah, we shall see. This is what today will be all about.