Emma Hair
Staff Writer

A few weeks ago, I was in the “Required Reading” section of Barnes and Noble, trying to locate one of my summer reading books. As I scanned the shelves searching for it, there was one book I saw that I just couldn’t resist picking up – Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen.

I have read the book more than once, but it is the kind of book that excites me every time I spy a copy somewhere. This time, though, it was different.

Instead of that warm, fuzzy feeling I usually get, I was sad and disappointed. I was seeing one of my all-time favorite books in the school section, yet I was not being required to read it. While I was being forced to endure 65 agonizing pages of Walden, there were students getting to read such an amazing piece of classic literature.

I began to wonder why Jane Austen was not one of the authors that I was subjected to in high school, so I decided to ask English department head Kim Pearce.

Before speaking with Pearce, I was under the impression that Austen is not read at Coppell High School because the teachers did not want it to be, but regardless of their opinions, college professors would expect Austen’s books to be something we had read.

As it turns out, I was utterly mistaken.

The school reading books are chosen by the English department based on specific criteria that must be met; they have to be complex enough as to require a teacher to help guide the students in analyzing the deeper meaning, and the teachers have to find value in the book. Both of these guidelines made perfect sense to me, because there is no point to reading a book like Twilight that does not really have anything of value in it; there is no deeper meaning to be found, therefore there is nothing to be gained by reading or dissecting this book.

Also, if the students are capable of reading and understanding the deeper meaning of the novel on their own, there is no point in having a teacher help conduct discussions about the book.

As for the comment about the college professors, I found out that instead of being expected to have read a lot of books, including Austen’s, you just need to be able to recognize the writing styles of the many authors.

Furthermore, while Pearce agreed with me on the fact that Pride and Prejudice, Emma and Sense and Sensibility were all wonderful pieces of literature, they are criticisms of the time period in which Austen lived, and most high school students simply cannot relate to England in the early 1800s.

While I recognize that these are all valid points, Austen novels, or at least Pride and Prejudice, should be added to the required reading list of CHS. Austen’s books do have value. Her books were criticisms of the society in which she was living, so you can imagine how badly people during that time would have taken to that; most people do not recognize the validity of a criticism until sometime after it has been said.

English teachers need to make sure that these books are read by students everywhere, simply because Austen deserves to have her books remembered and read by all generations. This woman took a major leap of faith and wrote her view of the people that lived around her and that should be enough to get at least one of her books on the list of required school reading. Plus, most students probably haven’t heard of Jane Austen and won’t think to read her books.

In fact, I bet you that less than 100 people at our school have read her books, and I don’t suppose that many of them will end up reading Austen before they graduate, which is just sad; especially when you consider how many crazed girls have obsessed over Twilight and haven’t even considered trying to read some of the best romance novels literature has to offer.

So, I would like to encourage you all to read at least one of Austen’s many pieces. You literally can’t go wrong with the classics – they’re classic.