There was a time not so many scores of years ago, that reading novels was considered a worthless activity for a serious Christian. Those who know me well know that I love to read a wide variety of books, including novels. Thus, I would like to suggest a different reality related to one aspect of reading fiction. Why was The DaVinci Code so popular, or The Shack? If we knew the answer to this question, we might understand something about the worldview around us. {Incidentally, I enjoyed both of these books as novels, but they definitely had some bad theology.} As a child, I often heard about a grid that we all have: imagine it as a sieve through which we filter all the data we receive. But each time we deeply interact with a new culture (or sub-culture) there will be strings that are added to or removed from our sieve, creating an adjusted filter. Now, this ties into literature, because I have found that reading literature from cultures other than my own will reveal to me different aspects of truth as well as deepening my understanding of how other cultures see the world they live in.
This may not be obvious, but it is true: American literature tends to be continually optimistic. Not all American writings have happy endings; (The Light in the Forest shocked me when it didn't). However, Americans generally expect hope at the end of even a dark book. But in reading some foreign novels, I realized that not everyone has this expectation: Ismail Kadare's "The General of the Dead Army," an Albanian novel, and Orhan Pamuk's Turkish novel "Snow" demonstrated this to me. These are sad, dreary novels that tended to leave almost depressed. But, they opened for me a window into the thinking of their nation which I might not have gotten so easily in any other format.
Fictional literature tends to tell the reader about the national culture, mentality, and even history. Thus, some of my favorite authors are British and reflect very similar cultural background to the American one that I am most familiar with: Alistair MacLean, Arthur Conan Doyle, Agatha Christie, and Jeffrey Archer. I learned much of ancient thought reading Norse mythology and Homer's Odyssey.
On the other hand, nonfictional works can be just as illuminating about culture equally unintentionally. Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion, Watchman Nee's The Normal Christian Life, or Marx's The Communist Manifesto each reveal something about the author's national identity.
Finally, both history and the news are better illuminated from the variety of perspectives that can be provided by other nationalities. The First and the Last is a fascinating perspective on WWII by a high-ranking Luftwaffe pilot. Or, Justo González provides a fabulous Story of Christianity from a Cuban background. The iPINIONS Journal is one of my favorite news sources because of the independent perspective of the author as a lawyer from the Caribbean who lives in the US.
Due to all this, I am planning to try to enrich my knowledge of some of the cultures that I am interacting with or am planning to by reading their literature, particularly the Turkish, Hispanic, and African-American books.
In closing, a favorite poem by a Polish writer which provides light on his world and which I want to help inform mine:
If china, then only the kind
you wouldn’t miss under the movers’ shoes or the treads of a tank;
if a chair, then one that’s not too comfortable, or you’ll regret getting up and leaving;
if clothes, then only what will fit in one suitcase;
if books, then those you know by heart;
if plans, then the ones you can give up
when it comes time for the next move,
to another street, another continent or epoch or world.
Who told you to settle in?
Who told you this or that would last forever?
Didn’t anyone ever tell you that you’ll never
in the world
feel at home here?
(I have read all or part of all of the books mentioned in here and would recommend them, though some certainly need a heavy dose of discernment.)
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