Robinson Crusoe is Shipwrecked. (Sept 30, 1659)

Basically, Crusoe gets stranded on this island for 28 years.  Yeah. 

The English major among us wants you to know that Robinson Crusoe is often credited as being the first real novel (as opposed to epic poems and all that) and that telling straight narrative this way was so revolutionary that it was disguised as a true-life memoir for years.  So there’s your educational component for the month. (Thanks, Haley!)

How to Commemorate

• Build anything in your yard (or a friend’s yard).
• Address every stranger as “Friday.”
• No bathing.

*Share your photos and celebrations on our Facebook or twitter pages.

Works Cited    

Robinson Crusoe

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Mr. Collins arrives at Longbourn (29 Sept)

On Michaelmas the condescending clergyman Mr. Collins arrives at Longbourn to stay with his relatives the Bennets. Oh, and choose one of them to marry since he is slated to inherit the house when Mr. Bennet dies and marrying would keep the house in the family.  It’s complicated.

How to Commemorate:

• Choose which of your cousins you would marry--and then (because we're not gross) choose one of their neighbors for real!
• Write down some compliments that you could use at a future time to lighten someone’s mood.
• Pick one person you know, and kiss their ass.  Like, a lot of ass.
• Eat a goose.  It’s not really mentioned in the book, but it’s a Michaelmas tradition, I promise!

*Share your photos and celebrations on our Facebook or twitter pages.

Works Cited    

Pride and Prejudice (book)

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Pride and Prejudice (movie)(Just the BBC one because it’s the best, obviously.)

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Banned: Call of the Wild

In honor of Banned Books Week, we are repurposing some reflections one of our team members wrote.  Though not exactly bringing fiction into the everyday, we think that celebrating banned books is an important way to honor the value of all kinds of books in our lives.  Even--and especially-- if we disagree with them.

Call of the Wild
I’ve been told that I have a special characteristic that makes me able to enjoy American literature. Tolerance. I'm not sure how others get turned off to American writing, and I'm the first to admit that it is not necessarily the best in the world all the time. But for a nation so young, I think we've done alright so far.

To my thinking, Call of the Wild is just about as American as it gets. It's about a dog named Buck who is kidnapped from his home in California, and sent to pull a dog sled in the Klondike gold rush. The setting of the story is very "Manifest Destiny", and the Klondike gold rush was something that author Jack London experienced for himself firsthand. As for the plot, what's more American than an adventure to seek treasure in the unexplored regions of our continent? London's book is short, his writing crisp.

And let's not forget the other thing Americans love: dogs. During the course of the story, Buck changes from a simple domesticated dog to something of a wild animal. He increasingly draws on a fierce strength buried somewhere beneath his persona until finally this wildness beckons him away from the human world altogether and back into the life of a wolf. As this prehistoric consciousness arises in Buck, London elicits a similar sort of feeling in the reader. We, like Buck, have an ancient strength underneath our skin, bristling to get out.  As I read the book, I wondered if I, like Buck, have become domesticated over time, and maybe I should tap into that ancestral ferocity.

Of course, London's message that humanity may have lost something crucial to our identity flies in the face of the idea that humanity is gradually improving. Maybe that's why the Nazis burned Call of the Wild in 1933. Getting off the evolutionary track doesn't exactly create a super-race. Instead, Jack London proclaims that we used to be something great, and that greatness is still within us.

Works Cited
Call of the Wild by Jack London

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Banned: To Kill a Mockingbird

In honor of Banned Books Week, we are repurposing some reflections from one of our team members.  Though not exactly bringing fiction into the everyday, we think that celebrating banned books is an important way to honor the value of all kinds of books in our lives.  Even--and especially-- if we disagree with them.

To Kill a Mockingbird
Now here is a book that deserves to be banned. To Kill a Mockingbird has it all--bad language, rape, racial discrimination, violence against children, and the list goes on. When most groups have challenged this book, they cite all these factors, and say that the book promotes them.
 
Now, I get why parents object to the "profanity and racial slurs" in To Kill a Mockingbird.  I turn the channel on TV at home when language gets harsh and my five-year-old daughter is sitting next to me. I want her to have virtues to aspire to, not vices to hold her back. The real question about depicting discrimination and vulgarity in literature is what affect it has on us or on our children. We don't want the book to stand up these behaviors as exemplars. The N-word is not okay to come out of our mouths, and we want our children to know that.

To Kill a Mockingbird doesn't set that behavior as an example, however. Author Harper Lee merely paints the picture of a small Alabama town as it was in the earlier part of the 20th Century. Lean close now, and I'll whisper you a secret: White people in the South didn't always treat African-American people properly or with respect. Shew. I'm glad I got that off my chest. Don't you feel better too? Hiding the negative potential common to all people doesn't change historical fact, and it doesn't prepare our children for facing these dangers when they arrive.

Readers and especially challengers need to keep in mind that just because a behavior is in print, that behavior isn't necessarily being set forth as a role model. The truth is that we learn a lot about people from choices they make, and we learn more from their bad choices, bad words, and bad behaviors than we do from their good ones.

Racism in To Kill a Mockingbird is not given 'prescriptively'. It's not telling us how things ought to be. Rather, the racial divisions are given 'descriptively', simply telling us how things were at the time. It is a regrettable fact that racism, incest, and violence against children did happen. However, banning the book for discussing these topics is like banning The Killer Angels because its depiction of the Battle of Gettysburg shows our country in a state of division.

To Kill a Mockingbird presents very accessible, likable characters (I'm looking at you Jem, Scout, and Dill) who help readers to explore the depth of humanity that can be encountered, even in the most common life, the life of a child. I think Harper Lee's master stroke, though, is in the last page. As the events of the book wind down, and Atticus tucks Scout into bed, she recounts a story he had been reading to her of a group of boys who set off after someone who had been vandalizing their clubhouse.

"Yeah, an' they all thought it was Stoner's Boy messin' up their clubhouse and throwing ink all over it an'... they chased him 'n' never could catch him... an' Atticus, when they finally saw him, why he hadn't done any of those things... Atticus, he was real nice." His hands were under my chin, pulling up the cover, tucking it around me. "Most people are, Scout, when you finally see them."

Most people are nice when you finally truly see them. That's the book's lasting message; that's why I still read To Kill a Mockingbird. That's why I'll read it with my kids whether it's allowed in their school or not.

Works Cited
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

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Banned: Fahrenheit 451

In honor of Banned Books Week, we are repurposing some reflections from one of our team members.  Though not exactly bringing fiction into the everyday, we think that celebrating banned books is an important way to honor the value of all kinds of books in our lives.  Even--and especially-- if we disagree with them.

Fahrenheit 451

I read Fahrenheit 451 as part of my school's summer reading program when I was 16 years old. The story is set in the future, where books have become illegal, and America employs firemen to find books and burn them. Author Ray Bradbury provides a convincing and relatable near-future, making the book terrific as science-fiction alone. In this future city, the trains are pushed by currents of air, the fire department uses a lethal robot to help it track criminals, and televisions have grown to wall-size. But, Bradbury goes beyond science fiction by providing insights into the inherent value of books.

The main character, Guy Montag, is a fireman who begins to wonder if he and his colleagues aren't missing something when they set books on fire. What is it in these books that make their owners risk their lives by housing them?  There must be something. Guy's questions lead him to understand exactly how his culture got this way. In Bradbury's perhaps-prescient future, books were not done away with by the government or some oppressive hierarchy as in books like Brave New World or 1984. Instead, people gradually chose to remove books from their culture. Books raise questions, state problems, cause trouble, and who really needs all that trouble anyway?  Better to just do away with them and be happy.

Fahrenheit 451 didn't strike me as amazing right away. Clearly, it was a good book, but that was all.  Then, over the following years, I saw things and heard things that reminded me of the story. I watched extreme sports begin and grow. I heard a woman talk about going for a voluntary C-section, just to have the baby out of the way. And of course, I saw televisions get bigger and better until they evolved into the plasma, high-def., blue ray wonder we now see in stores.

The future comes; there's no stopping it. The real issue is what we face the future with. Bradbury suggests that we take the accumulated body of human wisdom and stop making the mess of things that we generally do. As one character says: "We know all the ... silly things we've done for a thousand years and as long as we know that and always have it around where can see it, someday we'll stop making the ... funeral pyres and jumping in the middle of them."

Bradbury says that books are the reminders of what we as human beings have been, whether good or bad. That's why the real danger in banning books is that when we discard them, we also discard a part of ourselves, leaving us less prepared for the inevitable future.

How to Commemorate

• Read a banned book.  Bonus points for reading out loud.

Works Cited
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury

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As much as some of us around here at Today in Fiction think of The Goonies as their go-to pirate story (you know who you are!), the more literate of us hold up Treasure Island.  This is the literally classic tale of a boy who finds a map and a journal and goes in search of buried pirate booty.  Besides being an adventurous tale with loads of colorful details, the story was one of the earliest ones to provide a sense of complicated morality in children’s literature.  Hello, Long John Silver.  Anyway, this is a book for the ages. Of all ages.  You know.

(And, yes, we say book even though it’s been made into a bajillion movie versions.)

How to Commemorate:

• Read from the book.
• Watch one of the adaptions (We suggest Muppet Treasure Island and Treasure Planet.)
• Look for buried treasure.  (Again, there’s plenty out there!)

Works Cited    

Treasure Island

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Pirates of Pezance Day

(Sure, maybe The Pirates of Penzance should be celebrated on February 29^th, but that’s hard to come by.)  This delightful musical follows Frederic, a pirate apprentice, who is released from his apprenticeship and promptly falls in love with a general’s daughter. However, their love becomes complicated when Frederic learns that he was born on a leap day and so he owes another 63 years of service to the pirates!  How will he be faithful to his oath and his love?

How to commemorate:

• Sing all the songs! (spotify)

Works Cited    

The Pirates of Penzance

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Talk Like a Pirate Day (Sept 19)

Today is the day when we celebrate the dialect that we all have heaaarrrrrrty feelings about--Talk Like a Pirate Day!  This international event has celebrations all over the earth (though, strangely, all on land…).  Check out their website to find a pirate party or make one of your own known.

How to Commemorate:   

Talk like a Pirate!

If you need help learning the accent and vocabulary, we suggest using Mango, a language learning platform that is available through many public libraries around the US.  If you can’t find it at your library (but seriously, call them first, okay?), you can try the first lesson of any language for free by downloading the Mango app. (Check your app store.)  Mango also has a pirate info page about the course that shows some of the fun.

Watch pirate movies, ye scurvy scum!

• Goonies (1985)
• Pirates of the Caribbean (as many as you can)
• Captain Blood (1935)
• Against All Flags (1952)
• Peter Pan (2003 is one of our favorites)
• Muppet Treasure Island (1996)

Read pirate books, ye unholy ballywag!

• Treasure Island, by Robert Louis Stevenson
• A General History of the Pyrates, by Daniel Dafoe
• Pirates!, by Celia Rees
• On Stranger Tides, by Tim Powers
• Piratica, by Tanith Lee

Search for titles you like at

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Mikey Walsh discovers a treasure map in his attic in Astoria.

In honor of Pirate week (which includes Talk-Like-A-Pirate Day on September 19), we’re featuring stories about pirates to get you in the nautical mood.  For me, pirate movies begin with The Goonies.  On the eve of their eviction from their seaside town, a band of friends goes on a sudden adventure to find hidden pirate treasure and save all of their futures.

Do I really need to say anything more about this?

How to Commemorate:

• Search for hidden treasure (There is still plenty out there!).
• Visit a place that found hidden treasure (like, you know, a museum).
• Invent some gadgets.
• Make a treasure map.
• Quote the movie (especially “Down here, it's our time. It's our time down here!”).

Remember: Goonies never say die!

Works Cited

The Goonies (1985)

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A Monet is Stolen from the Metropolitan Museum of Art (late Sept)

A group of bungling thieves-for-hire sneak into the museum by hiding in a statue of a horse and later pose as security guards to steal a roomful of Impressionist paintings.  The robbery goes sideways almost immediately, however, when a real guard catches onto them and sets the alarm, locking the gallery.  When the gallery is opened, Monet’s famous painting “San Giorgio Maggiore by Twilight,” is missing.  NYPD Detective McCann suspects rebellious and rich Thomas Crown.

 

How to Commemorate:

• Race a sailboat or go gliding or some other luxurious pastime.
• Steal something.
• Put something back.
• Okay, just visit an art museum.

(For those of you who really care about the timing of this post, there is an exchange by two of the security guards who go to investigate the broken air conditioning.  One says, "It would have to be one of the hottest days of the year.”  And the other replies, “Can you believe it’s nearly October?”)

Works Cited

The Thomas Crown Affair (1999)

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On Deck: Pirate Week

Tighten your eye patches and polish your wooden legs--next week we be setting sail for Pirate Week. As we’re sure you know, Sept 19 is Talk Like a Pirate Day, so we will be featuring swashbuckling tales of adventure throughout the week.

But just which pirate tales will they be? You’ll have to tune in next week. Follow us on our Facebook or twitter pages if you want to be kept in the know. And to offer your humble suggestions. We are open to parlay...

Tally and Shay’s 16th Birthday (Sept 9)

Tally and Shay became friends shortly before their 16^th birthdays (on Sept 9th) when they were supposed to have mandatory cosmetic surgery to make them Pretty and afterward live in New Pretty Town and have a life of parties and fun and glamour.  Instead, Shay runs away to Smoke, a haven for people who refuse to believe such concepts of beauty.  Tally follows Shay shortly after but with… mixed motives.

How to Commemorate:

• Sneak into a party.
• Hoverboard (Ok…skateboard).
• Read a fashion magazine.
• Traditional food: SpagBol (Spaghetti Bolognese)

*Share your photos and celebrations on our Facebook or twitter pages.

Works Cited

Uglies, by Scott Westerfeld.

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Harry Potter takes his son to Platform 9 ¾ (1 Sept 2017)

In the final book in the Harry Potter series, we are flashed forward 19 years to the day that we see Harry, Ron, and Hermione (and, okay, Draco too) take their kids to the Hogwarts Express to begin their time at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry. Now it so happens that we know the Hogwarts Express always departs on the 1st of September (at 11 AM) and we know the years that the events of Harry’s Hogwarts time took place (see CinemaBLEND for a thorough delineation), AND SO we know that the Potters and Weasley-Grangers (and Malfoys) arrive at Platform 9 ¾ on 1 September 2017.  THIS YEAR!

We have caught up to the future that JK foretold! See where the whole Hogwarts gang is now (literally NOW) thanks to EW.

How to Commemorate

• Go to a train station. Look for a portkey to Platform 9 ¾.
• Wear your Hogwarts house gear. (You have some, right?)
• Walk into a brick wall. But not.
• Throw a Potter party (especially if you missed his birthday).
• Look up boarding schools to send your children to. (As if you parents haven’t done this a hundred times already.)
• Send a student a care package. Brownies are always acceptable.

*Share your photos and celebrations on our Facebook or twitter pages.

Works Cited

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

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