Some thoughts on the books

Some of the books we have read in this class are a little less than classic literature (I am thinking of Admission here), but I think that they have all given us some insight into the college experience that we might not have had otherwise as well as serving to facilitate discussion about our own experiences. Initially, I was a little disappointed that only one or two of the books focused on college through the perspective of the student, but I think I wouldn't have gotten as much out of this class if they had. I think that reading about professors has made them more approachable for me and reading Admission (soap opera that it was) gave us a chance to talk about the process of choosing a college, and how we all wound up here. I think that it was OK not to read about other students, but I would have liked to have at least one contemporary experience to compare mine to more directly.

I thought that the books were all readable and I didn't have trouble understanding them. My favorite book was The Professor's House. This book probably had the least to do with the actual college experience, but it was really easy to read and thought provoking which made it entertaining for me. I tend to enjoy books that focus on characters, which is probably another reason why The Professor's House appeals to me.

I also really liked Wonder Boys. The whole book is just so fast-paced and Chabon dedicated a lot of effort to documenting the change in Grady's life. The book made me think about what it means to be a writer and what it means to work in college education. I think the view that we get of Grady also helped me think about professors as people outside of their work and their lecture halls. I still don't think that my professors go out and smoke pot, but I wouldn't be totally shocked if they had. On Beauty sort of reinforces that idea when we have this picture of the professors both cheating on their spouses and squabbling over intellectual issues and university politics. I guess I sort of had this idea, kind of like Zora did, that professors are sort of this weird intellectual breed of people that read books all the time and always thought high spotless thoughts that they passed along to their students, or helped students figure out for themselves. It's a more common delusion that people have about teachers than you might think.

Apart from challenging my conceptions about professors I think I got a more round view of what it means to be a Carnegie Mellon student by being in this class. We are all running in sort of different circles and It is nice to see those come together in a way that reflects the different experiences individual students are having, and how really very similar they are, and how our different backgrounds have shaped our experiences.