Nerdy Quote of the Week

The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who cannot read them.
Mark Twain

There has been a lot of emphasis lately on getting kids to read "anything, just so long as they're reading." While I think it is important to find books that people like, I think we are focused so much on reading what is popular and new that we have forgotten the idea of quality in literature. I think it's a shame that teachers are pushing Twilight and The Hunger Games to get kids to read when there are plenty of well-written books out there that would probably interest them just as much without subjecting them to so much poor phrasing, bad plot development, and cardboard characters. We all love junk food, but we would think that someone who eats nothing but junk food was not only unhealthy, but missing out on a lot of the good things in life. If all you eat is Snickers bars, think of all the steaks you'll never taste.

I want a steak now.

Anyway, I guess I'm just saying that I find it depressing that in an age when we have easy access to the greatest works of all time, most of us are choosing instead to read a steady diet of rubbish.

Let's make the choice to limit our junk book intake and read good books more often! If we don't, our literacy is doing us no good.