by Wendi Capehart
Why do we use old books? We live in the 21st century after all!
In general, well written older books use richer vocabulary, more complex sentence structure, and contain more ideas per page than modern books. Recently written books, by contrast, use watered down language, weaker, less complex, sentence structures and if they have any meaningful ideas, they either sandwich them between pages and pages of fluff, or they club the reader over the head with the message.
C. S. Lewis, in his introduction to Athanasius, advised that moderns needed to read more old books and fewer new books. He explained:
In general, well written older books use richer vocabulary, more complex sentence structure, and contain more ideas per page than modern books. Recently written books, by contrast, use watered down language, weaker, less complex, sentence structures and if they have any meaningful ideas, they either sandwich them between pages and pages of fluff, or they club the reader over the head with the message.
C. S. Lewis, in his introduction to Athanasius, advised that moderns needed to read more old books and fewer new books. He explained:
Every age has its own outlook. It is specially good at seeing certain truths and specially liable to make certain mistakes. We all, therefore, need the books that will correct the characteristic mistakes of our own period. And that means the old books. All contemporary writers share to some extent the contemporary outlook—even those, like myself, who seem most opposed to it. … To be sure, the books of the future would be just as good a corrective as the books of the past, but unfortunately we cannot get at them.
We can see the blind spots of previous generations, but it is harder to know our own. Older
books that we use have stood the test of time. They have been read for generations and
will be read for generations more.
It's too early to tell which of our currently published, modern crops of books will
still be communicating to readers outside of the
culture and time that produced them a hundred years from now. Those who are contemporaries of the authors are the worst judges of that timeless quality, because we cannot step outside our own time, culture, and assumptions to see which are merely passing whims and which are timeless, not with any certainty, anyway.
The marginalizing of old books as though truth and beauty have expiration dates reflects modernity's disconnect with the past, something David McCullough addressed, pointing out:
The marginalizing of old books as though truth and beauty have expiration dates reflects modernity's disconnect with the past, something David McCullough addressed, pointing out:
Learning about history is an antidote to the hubris of the present, the idea that everything in our lives is the ultimate.Former President Harry S. Truman once remarked that the history we don’t know is the only new thing in the world. Picking up on a related theme, the late Daniel Boorstin, an eminent historian, Librarian of Congress, and friend of mine, wrote that planning for the future without a sense of the past is similar to planting cut flowers and hoping for the best. Today, the new generation of young Americans are like a field of cut flowers, by-and-large historically illiterate. This does not bode well for our future.
A sense of the past is not just a matter of knowing dates and events and being able to put them in order. It's about coming into contact with some of the best minds of the previous centuries, not mere decades. It's about reading their ideas and stories in their words, getting a feel for Truth, justice, mercy, faith, friendship, charity, loyalty, courage, these are ideas and traits that are timeless.
While Mason did use some books which were newly published in her day, she relied more heavily on great books of the past. In volume VI, she explains that the children read literature which was published in the same historical time period they are studying. She mentions Milton, Pope, Sir Walter Scott, Goldsmith- and of course, they were not 'modern' in her day, either.
While Mason did use some books which were newly published in her day, she relied more heavily on great books of the past. In volume VI, she explains that the children read literature which was published in the same historical time period they are studying. She mentions Milton, Pope, Sir Walter Scott, Goldsmith- and of course, they were not 'modern' in her day, either.
She explains:
The object of children's literary studies is not to give them precise information as to who wrote what in the reign of whom?––but to give them a sense of the spaciousness of the days, not only of great Elizabeth, but of all those times of which poets, historians and the makers of tales, have left us living pictures. In such ways the children secure, not the sort of information which is of little cultural value, but wide spaces wherein imagination may take those holiday excursions deprived of which life is dreary; judgment, too, will turn over these folios of the mind and arrive at fairly just decisions about a given strike, the question of Poland, Indian Unrest. Every man is called upon to be a statesman seeing that every man and woman, too, has a share in the government of the country; but statesmanship requires imaginative conceptions, formed upon pretty wide reading and some familiarity with historical precedents.
It is not that her students never read modern books for literature, it's just that Mason did not see a need to emphasize them. She wrote that sometimes the oldest students' studies touched on:
It is also true that we at AO appreciate about older books is that they are in the public domain. Now, many, many public domain books are still twaddle, so that alone won't qualify a book for AO. But once we've found a really well written book we love it when it's also public domain. This means they are available on line as etexts, *and will remain available.* I can't tell you how frustrating, how much gnashing of teeth it causes the Advisory when a book goes out of print. When we put together the curriculum (and when we revise it), it was and is the result of truly, thousands of Mama-hours (these are worth more than man-hours, right? Just Joking!) researching books.
current literature in the occasional use of modern books; but young people who have been brought up on this sort of work may, we find, be trusted to keep themselves au fait with the best that is being produced in their own days.
It is also true that we at AO appreciate about older books is that they are in the public domain. Now, many, many public domain books are still twaddle, so that alone won't qualify a book for AO. But once we've found a really well written book we love it when it's also public domain. This means they are available on line as etexts, *and will remain available.* I can't tell you how frustrating, how much gnashing of teeth it causes the Advisory when a book goes out of print. When we put together the curriculum (and when we revise it), it was and is the result of truly, thousands of Mama-hours (these are worth more than man-hours, right? Just Joking!) researching books.
We
amazed our librarians with the number of books we
checked out from the
library and put on interlibrary loan. When all
else fails, we actually, gulp, spend money on a book if we can't find
it to review it any other way. We scan excerpts of different books
into our computers and pass them on to each other to compare
and contrast. We look at the wording, the breadth and scope of
coverage, the illustrations (if any), topics covered (and just as
important, topics not covered), and then, after devoting months
of our lives to this project, we finally pick the best book of all
those available and proudly and gleefully share it with the world. Then it goes out of print and we all have to go on anti-depressants and
receive hours of pastoral counseling. Okay, that last part was an
exaggeration. We don't go on medication. Seriously, though, the
newer, in-print books have a Very High turnover rate. They very
quickly become newer but now hard to find and out of print books, and
thus, of no use to us.
Individual
homeschoolers can use and benefit from those books, of course. Some of them may
actually be better than any given book we
have listed. But a book that may be perfect for
your family (or mine) is not perfect for AmblesideOnline if it's out of
print but not online.
Here's are some reasons why out of print but not yet in public domain books are not very useful to us:
We want to share our vision of what a Charlotte Mason education might look like put into practice, and at the same time, we want to make that vision available to as many people as possible who might want to benefit from it.
We want to share our vision of what a Charlotte Mason education might look like put into practice, and at the same time, we want to make that vision available to as many people as possible who might want to benefit from it.
We
specifically want to consider the unique situations and needs of missionaries, military, and
other expat families overseas, as well as parents and educators around the world who love their kids; single
parents; families without access to a decent
library, a good bookstore, or inexpensive shipping; families who
travel often and so
cannot cart thousands of pounds of books around;
and fellow homeschoolers all over the world. We want to recreate
a solid, sound, and beautiful rendition of what a CM curriculum might look like today, and we want that
version to also work for all those different families I mentioned. The
best way for us to do that is to rely strongly on public domain
works that can be used as etexts, whenever we find etexts of excellent quality..
This is
not the only way to implement Charlotte Mason's ideas and principles. These are not the
only books worth using. But these
are the books that best fit the criteria we set
for ourselves at the
start of this project. We want to offer a model
of what a real living book looks like. We want to share a curriculum based on excellently written books, packed with informing ideas rather than
twaddle and barren facts, in living language that engages the mind (often with some effort required, which is also an important part of a CM education), and so we have chosen what
we believe to be the cream of the crop from those books that are
online or still in print, and in some cases, worked hard to get that oop book available online, or convinced a publisher to republish.
We share this freely, and we try to keep costs down because we believe in Miss Mason's vision of 'Education for all.'
We share this freely, and we try to keep costs down because we believe in Miss Mason's vision of 'Education for all.'