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Advice to Parents on their Children’s Media
For several years now I have carried around a little pocketbook called “One Hundred and One Famous Poems with a Prose Supplement.” This book has prompted many a conversation as I read a poem or a short prose selection from the book. The Covid-19 scenario has put a major damper in the number of opportunities for me to bring out this book, as I along with many others have curtailed our social lives. Being that as it may, I decided to share the following from the book: In choosing books for children these rules, recently laid down by an author of books for boys, are worth the consideration of parents: “Read your children’s books yourself. Or better still, get your boy or girl to read them aloud to you. Ask yourself during the reading: Does this book lay stress on villainy, deception, or treachery? Are all the incidents wholesome, probable, and true to life? Does it show young people contemptuous toward their elders and successfully opposing them? Do the young characters in the book show respect for teachers and others in authority? Are these characters the kind of young people you wish your children to associate with? Does the book…
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Emile or On Education: Book Review
Title: Emile or On Education Author: Jean-Jacques Rousseau Introduction, Translation, and Notes: Allan Bloom Published: New York: Basic Books, Inc., 1979 (Originally published in 1762) About the Author[1] Jean-Jacques Rousseau, a Genevan philosopher and music theorist, was born June 28, 1712 and died July 2, 1778. His father was a watchmaker and his mother was the niece of a Calvinist minister who died a few days after giving birth. In 1728 he converted to Catholicism and the next year joined a seminary. He dropped out of the seminary and taught music to girls of wealthy families. In 1745 he commenced a relationship with Thérèse Levasseur who was the chambermaid of the hotel where he was staying. They had five children together and all of them were sent immediately to the local foundling home. He married Thérèse in a civil ceremony in 1768. He worked with the Encyclopedists, Diderot and d’Alembert, writing all the articles pertaining to music for the Encyclopédie. In 1754 he reverted to Calvinism and again became a citizen of Geneva. His more famous literary works are Julie, or the New Heloise (1761), Emile, or On Education (1762), The Social Contract (1762), and The Confessions of Jean-Jacques Rousseau…
