Imagination is Dwindling-Imagine That: part 3

By Contributing Writer, Bria Crawford

Television and the computer aren’t the only things that keep us from wholesome literature and imagining for ourselves. We can become avid readers, but are we reading the kind of books that actually cultivate knowledge? Are they wholesome, and do they ooze quality and wisdom? Or do they simply entertain us and just add fluff and nonsense to our mind?

“An excellent book has life; it releases something creative in the mind of the reader. The author has captured reality, the permanent stuff of life, and something enduring is planted in the heart.” -Honey for a Teen’s Heart

Reading a book can be slightly compared to watching a movie. Does it just entertain us for a while? Or does it challenge our thinking? Does it make us ask questions? Does it widen our gaze of what the author is driving at?

“A good writer has something worth saying and says it in the best possible way and respects the reader’s ability to understand. Language is used well. The word choices make us see feel, hear, taste, smell, decide. The action of the story and the descriptions have a crisp leanness because strong verbs and simple descriptions are used. The Bible is a model for this kind of writing.”

” A wholesome and wonderful story has characters of depth, not superficial stereotypes; they inspire the inner life of the reader.” -HFTH

Some might argue though “Can I not ever read for fun?” I don’t think it’s wrong to moderately incorporate some fiction, as long as it does not become the only standard for our reading habits, and as long as it is time worthy. I have made a habit of  picking up what I dub as ‘pleasure books’ only at night after my full day of work and school and after reading more challenging, useful books. I feel like I don’t waste precious time in that way, and it’s somewhat of a reward when you only get those books once in a while.

“Sometimes our standards are not high enough; we are content with books that don’t say anything really important but seem safe…the best hope of promoting quality lies in the better education of the reader. When we give a child a taste for what is really good reading, I don’t think that child will acquire an appetite for what is not.”  -HFTH

I am grateful that my mother implemented this concept with all of us children. As a result I have enjoyed good literature from an early age. It’s the same concept as food…feed a child only junk and he will likely not reach for healthy food.

Other must reads and suggestions: 

Orthodoxy, by G.K. Chesterton

The New Science of Politics, by Eric Voegelin

The Abolition of Man, by C.S. Lewis

In the Shadow of Plenty, by George Grant

Mere Christianity, by C.S. Lewis (Anything by Lewis is amazing)

The Lord of the Rings, by J.R.R. Tolkein

The Real Lincoln, by Thomas DiLorenzo

For Whom the Bell Tolls , by Ernest Hemingway

The Man who Never Was, by Ewen Montagu

The Divine Comedy, by Dante Alighieri

The Canterbury Tales, by Geoffrey Chaucer

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