HOW TO SURVIVE IN YOUR NATIVE LAND

by James Herndon ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 1, 1971

At one point Mr. Herndon was thinking of calling this book ""Son of"" and/or ""Return of The Way It's Spozed to Be"" which is as good a definition as any since it's as hard to immobilize as the salamanders a youngster brings to school -- but then life isn't meant to stand still and kids aren't either. The book (much spottier and scrappier than the first) is a sort of continuity about schools and youngsters and teaching -- teaching EGYPT and ""playing some kind of idiot role which everyone knows is an idiot role"" like the idiocy of EGYPT until here and there you manage to communicate. . . or learn. Maybe that some hard-line underachiever who can't add can do a pretty good job as a league scorer in the local bowling alley, or that the dumbest boy in the dumb class can read The Book of the Dead. There's a really nice inset on a two-hour elective he and another teacher gave called Creative Arts with no grades and no Permanent Hall Passes and no EGYPT; there's a funny one on the circulation of pubic parts pictures via the local photomat booth for rapid identification; and there are lots of Explanatory Notes, #1, #2, etc., etc. which might deal with the real nittygritty of the system (Winning or Losing) or Flax which is what school is all about -- ""Only in the school, only from the geography book, only from the teacher, could you learn about flax."" As for Mr. Herndon, who raps in a funny, spontaneous, committed fashion, you can learn a lot about teaching in the context of life where you may ""recognize for an instant the foolishness and absurdity of our ways through the world and feel the impact of the great, occasional and accidental joy which would be our only reward along those paths."" These are wonderful instants.

Pub Date: April 1, 1971

ISBN: 0867094087

Page Count: -

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1971

Categories: NONFICTION