We are all taught the classics in school, so what’s the problem with reading only canonical literature? What is the value in going outside of your comfort zone, literary or otherwise? And why might moving outside that zone be necessary to understanding the world in all its fullness and complexity? On stories and power, and how that power shapes us . . .
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I’m less interested in these questions, however, than I am in what these concerns demonstrate clearly to me: how effectively novels help us learn and empathize. Studies have shown that reading literature helps us practice empathizing with characters and then leads us to better, more empathetic practices in our daily lives. To Kill a Mockingbird takes this a step further, making empathy a crucial part of its message.
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In which we announce some important changes to The Notebook and begin a new “Required Reading” series. We discuss what we’ve been preoccupied with this past week, weaving in Jane Franklin’s biography, Abigail Adams, Frank Lloyd Wright, Langston Hughes, Sybil Ludington, and even “A Firework’s Point of View.”
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Capria Jaussen, our Operations Coordinator, reflects on her history with books and the power of reading a variety of interesting texts. She writes, “What I hear from people participating in Books@Work seminars continues to solidify my belief in the power of a book’s great characters, meaningful concepts and challenging writing to transform readers.”
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Again and again, at Books@Work we hear from employers that Daniel Goleman’s concept of Emotional Intelligence (EI) is important for creating a positive workplace culture and improving companies’ bottom lines. We also hear that Books@Work can be one part of a toolkit to improving EI among employees. Given a current controversy over the value of EI, we consider the various impacts of EI in the workplace, and the potential for companies to help employees improve EI.
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In a recent interview published in the New York Times Magazine, editor Joel Lovell made a trip to Syracuse, New York to meet with the much acclaimed novelist and short story writer George Saunders. The article’s title, “George Saunders Has Written the Best Book You Will Read This Year” sums up the basic tenor of the piece: a reverent ode to Saunders’ talent and success. Saunders’ work is a bizarre mix of nerdy science fiction à la Kurt Vonnegut and trendy post-modernism in the style of Jonathan Franzen and David Foster Wallace. The article is peppered with conversations about death, capitalism and the negative effects of western society. To end, however, Lovell writes, “The last time we met, Saunders waited in the cold with me until the bus for New York came along. We were talking about the idea of abiding, of the way that you can help people flourish just by withholding judgment, if you open yourself up to their possibilities, as Saunders put it, just as you would open yourself up to a story’s possibilities.” Suddenly any conversation over the evils of free market economy is erased. The ending refocuses Saunders at the very base of his craft and reveals that, beneath whatever the trend of the day is, fiction has, and continues to, concern itself with the basic question of empathy.
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