Though I Walk Through the Valley of the Dolls
by Linda BevilacquaJanuary 22nd, 2013
Many years ago, when my now-grown daughter was in fifth grade, I had a brief exchange with her teacher that left me very concerned. I am sad to say those concerns are still with me. It was the zenith—or nadir—of whole language in that particular public school, but my daughter had already overcome that barrier to learning to read. She was in a “gifted” class and, like me, was a voracious reader. At a parent-teacher conference in the fall, the teacher told me that her approach to teaching reading was to let the kids select whatever they wanted to read in class, including Archie and Superman comic books. I tried (as diplomatically as I could) suggesting that perhaps it would be worthwhile for her to offer some challenging literature for classroom instruction. I knew all was lost when she firmly shook her head “no” and told me she had never liked to read until she discovered Valley of the Dolls as an adult. (While this book about barbiturates has been wildly popular, I feel confident saying it will never enter the canon.)
I was reminded of this exchange while reading Michael Shaughnessy’s interview of Carol Jago, former president of the National Council of Teachers of English and current