of writing about writing about books there is no end

some thoughts on The Elite College Students Who Love Percy Jackson And Aren't Afraid To Say It

Couch, Jonathan (1877) History of the Fishes of the British Isles, London: George Bell & Sons

When I applied to colleges back in [the distant past], one of the applications asked me to write an essay about a book that had influenced me (or something like that). I felt any book that had truly influenced me would have to be a book I read when I was very young; therefore, I wrote my essay about The House at Pooh Corner.¹ After reading my draft, my parents kindly but firmly told me that I could not send in an essay about The House at Pooh Corner. So I wrote my essay about Beowulf.

I loved Beowulf (and still do) but did not feel, in my heart of hearts, that it really met the criteria. I felt that to be influenced by a book would mean to be shaped by it on some pre-rational level.²

I thought of that when reading the recent Atlantic article about the college kids who…