Schoolteachers and college authorities are becoming aware of increasing reading difficulties. Colleges have been forced to make reading classes available to their freshmen. Universities have instituted special courses which are actually nothing but remedial-reading courses, despite their high-sounding titles: "Communications," etc.
This low-grade literacy shows also in the fact that many people say they have no time to read a book, instead of giving the real reason: that they cannot read one. According to The Authors' League Bulletin, one-third of the people who leave school before high school never open a book for the rest of their lives.
The responsibility of comic books for reading disorders is manifold.
They have prevented and are preventing early detection of reading difficulties, by masking the disorder and giving parents the impression that the child can read.
They aggravate reading difficulties that already exist.
They cause reading disorders by luring children with the primary appeal of pictures as against early training to real reading.
They attack the child just at the age of six or seven when basic reading skills ought to be developed, and again at pre-adolescence when on a higher level good reading habits should be fostered.
Discerning teachers are well aware of this.
There is not a single good psychological study based on scientific data that would show that comic books may help children to read. An article published by a member of the Board of Experts of the Superman publisher is based on elaborate word-counts and statistics. It comes to the conclusion that comic books "provide a substantial amount of reading experience" and "may have real value for the educator." What he describes as a "reading experience" is in fact mostly a non-reading experience. It evidently has not occurred to this Superman expert that most children do not read the many words which he has counted.
The general statement has been made that comic books might be helpful for children "who will not read anything else." That is certainly pedagogically unsound. Of course, there are children who have been corrupted by comic books so that they do not want to read anything else, to the detriment of their ability to acquire proper reading habits. But is it sound to advise that addiction to comic-book reading be cured by addiction to comic-book reading?
While comic books harm children in acquiring the basic skills of reading, they harm them even more on the higher level of learning to appreciate and like the content of good reading matter. This has been recognized by literary critics and by librarians. Julia Todd Hallen, writing in the Tacoma Times says, "Too many fail to realize that with a child's first books his appreciation of good books is begun."
In questioning hundreds of children, I have found that comic-book reading and reading good books for pleasure are for all purposes opposites. Actually, many children nowadays do not know what the word classic means; they think it means a "classics" comic book. For many children, the entire concept of book is concerned with comic books.
I have yet to see a child who was influenced to read "classics" or "famous authors" in the original by reading them in comic-book versions. What happens instead is that the comic-book version cuts the children off from this source of pleasure, entertainment and education.
Typical is the case of the eleven-year-old boy of superior intelligence, from a good social and economic background, who exhibited the "classics" comic-book version of Robinson Crusoe with these words:
"Why should I read the real book if I have this? If I had to make a report I could use this. It would leave out all the boring details that would be in a book."
What is the experience of librarians? Ida M. Anderson, of the Providence Public Library, has written: "Many parents and educators have expressed to me their agreement with us on the stand that such reading of comic books has a pernicious effect on the reading habits of children... That comic books encourage the reading of books is contrary to the experience of librarians. Circulation of juvenile books in libraries all over the country has decreased greatly since the reading of comic books has become so popular... The representative of a comic-book publisher suggested that libraries have stimulated the circulation of children's books by posting a sign: 'Superman Recommends These.' The Providence Public Library tried this, but the chief result was a request for Superman rather than for the books listed."
What the comic books of "classics" and "famous authors" do shows our disregard for literature or for children or for both.
In the comic books which go to millions of children, these mutilations are advertised with such phrases as
"Told in the Modern Manner"
"No longer is it necessary to wade through hundreds of pages of text . . . preserve all the excitement and interest . . . if it's thrills you want, then you'll find them a-plenty . . . Ask your parents if they think you should read Shakespeare . . ."
Macbeth is offered to your child
"Stream lined for Action"
"... a dark tragedy of jealousy, intrigue and violence adapted for easy and enjoyable reading. Packed with action from start to finish . . ."
Shakespeare and the child are corrupted at the same time.
By looking at the pictures and reading sporadically a title or an exclamation, a child can follow to some extent the plot of one of these versions of "great stories," or at least what the editor and the child think the plot is. A fourteen-year-old boy in the eighth year at school, with a second-grade reading level, says that he has read the "classics" version of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde: "It is called The Mad Doctor. He makes medicine. He drinks it and turns into a beast. He kills a little girl. The cops chase him. Then he changes into a man. He comes to a famous home and falls in love with a girl. He keeps changing. Finally he gets shot. While dying he changes back to a human being. I like when he comes to the little girl and hits her with a cane.
Speaking of Remedial Reading…
Here’s that book I’ve been working on since 1996. Be among the first to subscribe. (In fact, you might be the ONLY one to subscribe.)
Fred’s Video Collection
Before I sink
Into the big sleep
I want to hear
I want to hear
The scream of the butterfly