I have always wondered what makes a book "important". When I was younger, I was a greedy reader who befriended books rather than socializing with children of my age(which works the other way around now). My favorite book was of course Harry Potter series, thinking that not only does it provide entertainment, but it also has educational values. It didn't take me too long to realize that it is considered commercial, not "literary". Such realization came to me as a great disappointment. Are fun and interesting fantasy fictions not part of the "importance"?
Fortunately, this year in AP Lit class, we get to learn about literary merit. It solved a mystery of which books are claimed to have literary merit and which ones do not; complexity and the truth, creative plot, engaging questions, exploring human nature, the craft of the text--all of these mattered in the world of literature, to be named a work of true art. Now I understand it, and can accept it. It has become more interesting to open a book since I get to figure out if it offers a literary value, as if I am a intellectually mature scholar.
-Chloe K.
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