For entertainment, enjoyment, and, for learning. From fiction? Sure, why not. I’ve as much faith in a good author’s presentation of life as I do in the media, perhaps more.
And facts? Well I may not get the details of a war, but I’ll get a feel for how it affected its society as a result. Facts are rarely completely unbiased in that they depend upon human beings to report them. Perception is a large part of our awareness, thus colors all that we experience. How else can we have half a country want one candidate and the other half, the other. How can the same statement, clear and in print, be interpreted in two such opposite ways.
My feeling is that novels of import are those that will teach something of which can be found in textbooks, whether it be history, sociology, philosophy, or psychology and at its best, a story can offer a little of each. I like to see several different viewpoints of the same human experience and see them in an entertaining way that makes it more interesting than flat information gleaned from a textbook. Can a case described in clinical terms in a psychology textbook leave as lasting an impression as a character drawn by Marquez or McCarthy? Can we understand mental deficiency by its textbook statement of signs and characteristics any better than we can via Faulkner’s Benjy? It depends upon what level of knowledge we are seeking and for what purpose.
For me, what I learn from good writers is more relevant to my own life than what I would find in a classroom statement.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology
Would it be fair to say though that the classroom can expose the reader to the fiction. It’s an important resource.
You betcha!
I see them as working in conjunction with each other rather than one replacing the other–though as an alternative when higher education in unaffordable, books are available for free (at a library).
Western Civ at your own campus included Epic of Gilgamesh, Goodbye to All That, Candide, and Meditations. They were completely read and enjoyed by the majority of the students whereas I’m sure the textbook was merely skimmed.
A textbook is required to cover a topic or stretch of time that novels do not (though 100 Years of Solitude among many is more encompassing of an era). The element of character and specifically, a protagonist, in a novel creates more interest in that it takes in the human side of history and teaches action and reaction.
Lastly, as you point out, students who have not had the benefit of parents who have inspired in them the love of reading need guidance, as do all readers perhaps in the actual business of how to read.