Blog #6 Readicide

Gallagher's discussion in "Readicide" is very interesting and I believe that he brings up many valid ideas. One of the many questions that arises from his argument is whether or not genre fiction is "less worthy" than Literary Fiction, and therefore whether or not it should play a role in school. In my opinion, looking at things from a purely artistic standpoint, genre is fiction is less worthy in terms of skill and craft. Not to say that genre fiction writers are not talented; Dan Brown, Stephen King, Michael Crichton, etc. are genre writers and are still considered among many to be great. However, genre writing in general is more about storytelling talent than it is about writing talent; an important distinction to note. If schools want to teach their students how to be good writers, how to read and interpret skillful writing, and expose them to skillful writing in a general sense, then Literary Fiction should definitely be the focus.

Gallagher suggested as a possible solution to "Readicide" that schools should teach Literary and Genre Fiction is a 50/50 manner. I believe that Gallagher is correct in suggesting more Genre Fiction in school curriculums; however 50% seems to be heavy-handed. A 2/3 split in favor of Literary Fiction would be better in my mind because it would allow the focus of the learning to still be geared towards the more skilled and intelligent writing, and it would also prevent schools from having to entirely overhaul their current English curriculums. However, schools definitely need to be more inclusive of Genre Writing. As Mr. Coates said in class, can you actually name a school book that would be considered Genre Fiction? Something such as Lord of the Flies or Life of Pi probably could be considered Genre Fiction, although they both still contain many literary merits. The point is that when schools only incorporate the "proper tasting", "Thumbs up from the historians' literature, students are missing out on an entire part of the literary spectrum. By offering both Literary and Genre Fiction, schools can teach the sophisticated writing/reading crafts, but also provide students with the popular culture that is needed to thrive in the modern world.