About this Blog

Emily Whitten
The Behind the Bookcase blog is part of my website (www.emilywhitten.com) for parents and educators of young adults--as well as readers of any age. Part diary, book club, and reading/writing workshop, Behind the Bookcase will cover one classic YA book a month (with a few exceptions) from January to December of 2010, with one meaty blog entry on the Tuesday of each week.
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Blog Summary

In Amsterdam during World War II, Anne Frank passed through a small door hidden by a bookcase. Behind that bookcase, she began a life of hiding which allowed her to escape Nazi ideology for a time.


Literature I read as a youth, not least Anne Frank's diary, provided a hiding place for me as well. Against Nazi-like laws of science, morality, and social hierarchy, Literature opened a profound vision of empathy, mercy and love. Yet that early privileging of mercy over truth led me down a well-worn path to a postmodern, pluralistic view of truth.


As a Reformed Christian today, I don't believe literature offers a sufficient hiding place from the Nazi within each of us. I have found only one hiding place, one Architect, who can uphold both mercy and morality, in whom "mercy and truth have kissed each other."

Yet by this faith--not in spite of it--I also see extraordinary value in the "deconstructive" literature of American culture and my own youth. And it is this tension I hope to explore as I retrace my steps through the hiding places of my adolescence--with the hope that readers of any faith or philosophical stripe may find value in such a journey.

Read Along

Reading Schedule

  • January—In Search of a Hiding Place

  • February—The Home Christendom Built: Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery

  • March—A Wall of Mercy: The Diary of Anne Frank by Anne Frank

  • April—Tearing Down Walls of Race: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee

  • May—Tearing Down Walls of Greed: A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith

  • June—Tearing Down Walls of Religion: The Scarlett Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne

  • July—Tearing Down Walls of Gender: The Yellow Wallpaper by Charlotte Perkins

  • August-- Tearing Down Walls of Nature: The Bear by William Faulkner

  • September—Tearing Down Walls of Language: A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess

  • October—Tearing Down Walls of Selfhood: The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac

  • November—Beyond Deconstruction: Death to Self in The Guide by R. K. Narayan and Paul's Letter to the Romans

  • December—Conclusion: A New Architect?

Saturday, October 3, 2009

How You Can Help

  • Take the Read Along Challenge: Make your own journey through the selected texts. Create your own reading club, create a blog devoted to the subject, or simply post your own insights in the comments section of this blog.
  • Sing Along (or paint or draw, etc.): Interact with the subject matter in a creative way, and I'll try to post it in the Sing Along section of my website. A great place to find and be found by other artists and readers.
  • Join the Email Update List: Get an email update when I post each week.
  • Join the Facebook Group: Coming soon!
  • Recruit a Friend: If you value this project, why not tell a friend?
Posted by Emily Whitten at 3:03 PM 1 comments
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