What's wrong with Huckleberry Finn?

What's wrong with Huckleberry Finn?
Absolutely nothing except that few colleges are requiring freshman to read Huckleberry Finn. Or, for that matter, books that cover classical antiquity, the Renaissance, the Enlightenment or that were written by such masters of American literature as Hawthorne, Melville, Whitman or Faulkner.

At least that's the conclusion of a rather cranky report released by the National Association of Scholars, which warns that colleges are forcing freshmen to read the kind books that Oprah Winfrey promotes.

Here are some of the popular books on college reading lists that the National Association of Scholars thinks are no better than "Beach Books," which is the title of its report.

• Enrique's Journey by Sonia Nazario
• Outcasts United by Warren St. John
• Dream from My Father by Barack Obama
• The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan
• The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind by William Kkamkwamba
• This I Believe: The Personal Philosophies of Remarkable Men and Women, which is a compilation of essay broadcast on NPR.

After looking at the reading lists of 290 schools, the association made these conclusions:

• Most of the assigned books promote liberal political views.
• The titles were largely contemporary.
• The books offered a "surprisingly" low level of intellectual difficulty.

• Frankenstein by Mary Shelley (Texas Tech)
• Walden by Henry David Thoreau (Ithaca College)
• The Communist Manifesto by Karl Marx (Indiana University at South Bend)
• Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (St. Mary's College of Maryland & Le Moyne College.)

This whole literary controversy reminds me of the push back against Nancy Drew books when I was a kid. My library in St. Louis, like many others, refused to carry Nancy Drew books because the librarians didn't consider the titles literature. Millions of Nancy Drew fans, who grew up to be avid readers, know how foolish this was.

Here's my tip to the scholars: Lighten up.

American literature image by Zitona. CC 2.0.