I recently purchased and read Alan Jacobs' book titled The Pleasure of Reading in an Age of Distraction. I was immediately rewarded when in the first section of the book Jacobs took canonical reading lists to task for turning reading into a task to be completed a certain way, with certain rules and certain materials. Read for whim, Jacobs advised. Jacobs does acknowledge a hierarchy in literature. He won't give you a reading list to work through. But he also doesn't like the idea that a reader might consign themselves to penny dreadfuls.

Why?

Because reading is not just entertainment. The activity of reading requires attention. You can't sit down and turn on a book while you space out. You have to engage the book by turning the pages, even if those pages are now electronic. Your imagination has to fire to life and display images and situations.

Attention or attentiveness is a muscle that grows as it is used. Jacobs tells us that we exercise this muscle not out of obligation but pleasure:

This is why attentiveness is worth cultivating; not just because it is good for you or because...it can help you "organize your world," but because such raptness is deeply satisfying."

Jacobs notes that

Our educational models have traditionally valued what [N. Katherine Hayles] calls "deep attention," while todays students are proficient in mobile, flexible, fast-twitch "hyper attention." Deep attention she identifies as..."characterized by concentrating on a single object for long period...ignoring outside stimuli while so engaged, preferring a single information stream and having a high tolerance for long focus times.

Jacobs understands that the modern world needs, demands, and very effectively persuades, us to cultivate "hyper attention". He cites the story of a Rhode scholar who boasts in the dearth of his literary exploits. There is no hand-ringing or shed tears. No call to arms to defend the virgin bride of literary attentiveness against the lecherous hordes of the impending Armageddon of hyper attention that is surely already in our midst, Facebook, twitter, and iPhones, their insidious weapons of mass destruction.

Not every person is a reader. That is ok. Most of the world is going to survive if they never read a single "classic". Lots of people will gain immense satisfaction from reading popular novels. Some people will fall deeply in love with reading. They will get so caught up in the beauty of language and the tension of the plot and the tragedy of the character than they will forget about sleep, food, and friend. It might start with any book. But they will get more and more hungry for an author who is able to strike the central cord of the human experience. This is what the classics truly are. Not must-read list to show off your smarts. No, a much-loved list. A list in open revision as new readers join the community that spans generations. You might never love Dickens. But they never loved Cormac McCarthy. That is ok.

Lane Severson is a recovering child-prodigy, father, and Anglican. Follow Lane on Twitter @ljseverson