Let children read for THEIR pleasure
A sort while back, the headteacher of a prominent UK school wrote an article in The Guardian explaining that he was seeking to 'improve' his students' reading habits by removing from the school library children's fiction which he considered unworthy of their attentions. It is an attitude found amongst a good number of teachers, and indeed parents, although, of course, not all. I am not referring now to the fine and difficult distinctions between child protection and censorship, which is another whole can of worms. Rather the case here is of trying to discourage or even prevent children from reading books which are considered 'too young', 'too easy', or of insufficient 'literary merit'.
I do, one one level, understand where these adults are coming from. It is a vital part of a teacher's role to seek to develop and extend children's range of reading, their ability to access, appreciate and enjoy fine writing. There are however many ways of doing this, through example, through sharing enthusiasms, and, not least, through reading aloud to students. However, none of this needs to involve preventing them from continue to read what they currently enjoy. We say we want children to read for pleasure. It is therefore vitally important that we allow them to do exactly that - to read for their pleasure. There are many reasons for reading and they are not mutually exclusive. Escapist and 'comfort' reading have a valuable function for any of us, and children not the least. Life can be a stressful business, including theirs. There is also a very true truism that any reading is better than none. We do need to be careful that our actions do not backfire. Nurture and encouragement are all, but forcing a child to read Jane Eyre when what they want, and perhaps need, is to read is Percy Jackson can do more harm than good.
Series books
The Ghostfaces is the sixth and newest book in John Flannagan's Brotherband series. However this is itself a follow-on from his Ranger's Apprentice sequence, which comprises twelve original books together with another two more recent prequels. That brings us up to twenty linked book, and counting. That's some series. Inevitably there is some variability in quality across so many titles. However to dismiss them too lightly would be a mistake. They are highly readable and enjoyable books. With a loose 'Dark Age' historical background, but without any pretentions to authenticity (the Brotherband books have a Viking-ish feel), they are page-turning adventures, full of battles and losses, crises and triumphs. For their genre, they are extremely well written. Deservedly they have huge international popularity. Despite strong boy leads, they also have a fair representation of adventurous and heroic girls scattered through their pages , so their appeal is wide. More than anything, though, they do what the best of such extended series do, they provide their readers with escapism at the same time as making them feel secure and safe. They are 'comfort reads'. And these are indeed amongst the very best.
It may seem strange for books which contain so much fighting to provide comfort reading, but they do. This is partly because, underneath their battles they are really quite soft centered. They are just as much about friendship and loyalty as are, say, Enid Blyton's books - and with actually far more sympathetic and human characters. But more than anything they are essentially about familiarity. Once 'into' them (and this is quickly achieved as they do not provide particularly difficult reading in the first place) their world, their characters, even their writing style become old friends. They feel like a particularly comfortable pair of well-worn shoes, they fit you perfectly.And therein lies their strength. They do not greatly challenge, rather they reassure. They provide the adventures that many of their readers wish they had and allow them to temporarily be the people they wish they were They allow them to escape the stresses of their own lives, they entertain and distract, but most of all they soothe. They are the reading equivalent of Linus's thumb and blanket in the Peanuts cartoons. And that is where John Flanagan's great skill lies as the author of this type of series book. It is one that he shares with writers like Rick Riordan and Derek Landy, although he is undoubtedly one of the greats of his kind. He can continually move his series, his stories and his characters on, maintain momentum, interest and excitement. whilst still keeping everything feeling familiar, as expected, just as it should be.
Writing by the likes of John Flanagan should not be dismissed too lightly. He has a great deal of authorial skill, not least as a compelling storyteller. If children, or even teens, seem 'stuck' in series fiction we should not necessarily worry. It could well be what they need at that time. Of course, we need gently to try to move them on, as and when appropriate, but that does not need to mean moving them off. Certainly to dismiss children's current reading as 'rubbish' or a 'waste of time' is potentially very harmful, and may well not even be accurate. It could well be that one of the reasons students' reading for pleasure falls off at secondary school, is that they are no longer encouraged to read for their own pleasure at all, but required to read what is 'good for them' instead.
Reading can be many things
For many of us, including children, many different 'levels' of reading can comfortably coexist. Just like food, our reading diet is probably best when varied and balanced. Appreciating fine dining does not stop us from enjoying baked beans once in a while. And, of course, many children would choose the baked beans any day. I distinctly remember reading The Dandy and The Beano (usually on the loo), The Secret Seven (whilst sick in bed) and the Lone Pine books (as an escape from 11+ revision) during the same period as I enjoyed Alan Garner, Rosemary Sutcliff and, indeed, Isaac Asimov. I will even admit to dipping back into these childhood reads during adolescence, at the same time as deeply appreciating Shakespeare, Kafka and Racine (in the original French). Reading development is not always linear or hierarchical. Taste can be eclectic - and often is. Comfort reading performs an important function; it is comforting. Please don't deny that comfort to our children. Reading for pleasure should mean just that.
Oh . . . and is that a complete set of Malcolm Saville's Lone Pine series I spy still lurking on my shelves? Such trash.
