Why the Dead Poets Society Sucked

[@WriteConscious]

🚀 Do you want help finishing Infinite Jest? Or want a complete guide to follow while reading? Join my Infinite Jest Course and Book Club here: writeconscious.substack.com 📚 Explore over 400 of Wallace’s favorite books in my free guide to his favorite books Access here: writeconscious.ck.page/8956ce90fc 📖 Want to WRITE better? Join my free writing school: www.skool.com/writeconscious Insta: instagram.com/writeconscious 📕My Best Books of All-Time List: writeconscious.ck.page/355619345e 🔥Want to READ my wife’s fire poetry? Go here: marigoldeclipse.substack.com 🤔David Foster Wallace’s Favorite Book on Writing amzn.to/4eVmjAI

[@plan9fromsyracuse]

I saw the movie in 6th grade, and the scene where he has the boys lean into the glass and look at the faces of the young men from the past century, and says "one day you will be dirt" and those boys were all like them and now gone. It's never left me. I look at old movies, photos, records, and never forget that scene. Poet and author Jack Grapes, says in any work, if you can give one moment that never leaves a reader, viewer, listener, you have a great piece of art. So that's why I consider Dead Poets a great movie...the scene never left me.

[@JohnICX]

“Religious parents don’t want you to touch the humanities because it’s the quickest way to become a nonbeliever” T.S. Eliot, Flannery O’Connor, Walker Percy, Dostoevsky…

[@andynowicki4532]

CS Lewis

[@WadeOhWells]

L'Engle, Schweitzer, Chesterton, Wendell Berry, Donne, Hopkins

[@jasonsmith1155]

I have to add Graham (Russian Roulette) Greene.

[@yishmoosa1234]

​@@andynowicki4532 Tolkien, Suzanne Collins, Judy Blume, S.K Ali, Hafza Faizal, etc.

[@ye_zus]

I'd be interested to hear what you think of Harold Bloom's criticisms of mainstream fiction (Harry Potter is the famous example). He did not agree with the argument that "appreciation" or "enjoyment" are the primary concern for young readers, those who think "getting new readers" is important, by whatever entertaining means. But Harold Bloom said: "they aren't really reading," when they consume mass market commercial fiction. Much like every book discussion group I've been a part of, most people just "enjoy" the prose, feel some vague semblance of "deep" meaning, maybe connect with the characters, and don't delve any deeper. Very rarely were people interested in close reading or thematic analysis or symbolic deconstruction etc. Partially because most YA/commercial fiction don't have any real themes. Dead Poet's Society is veering towards this same anti-intellectual conformity. Despite Dettmar coming off like another stodgy old suit, he is right about the film. Their club is just a veneer, an aesthetic, of literary appreciation. They aren't really reading the texts, rather, listening to Keating's own opinions (and who can blame them, they're just high school students). There is a qualitative difference between "reading" and "reading". Simply reading a poem and going "wow what beautiful language," is a surface level, empty take away. An honest emotional experience? Sure. But you are no closer to deriving any non-temporal subjective meaning from the text. So, I do agree with you that stoking the fire of loving literature is a worthy goal and great start. But as a teacher, one must go further and actually start them on a journey of free, critical thinking, and creative analysis. This process is a discourse, between peers, between academics, etc. Talking about texts, debating, disagreeing on the meaning, THAT is where passion lies, and how reasoning and reading skills are developed.

[@NOPE.S.P.]

The frontline in the battle of our souls is the division between fact and truth. Facts can fit neatly into phonebooks, ledgers, and encyclopedias. But, truth can only come from the illumination we experience when faced with something that ignites our sense of awe and wonder. Without the facts, we may lack clarity and direction, but deprived of the light- we are blind and mindless meat being puppeteered by gravity into a meaningless grave.

[@greblaksnew]

Dead Poets Society is really a fantastic movie, and world famous. I live and work abroad, and whenever the discussion of great movies comes up, DPS is always mentioned by non-Americans as one of their favorite movies, especially men, particularly young men.

[@andrewjenkinson8948]

No, it's garbage.

[@aj_fry3339]

Please do tell why it is garbage

[@TheTrueRandomGamer]

Not surprised most of your class disliked it. My experience has been that high school kids have very poor taste.

[@WriteConscious]

Lol, lil osama uzi verti milly drake the third is the greatest rapper eva and is the highest display of artistic talent eva! ON GAWD

[@jakfan09]

@@WriteConscious I feel your pain. I tried showing my mom Barry Lyndon and she fucking hated it. One of my favorite movies. She didn't even appreciate the cinematography or the locations!

[@TheDnegDegen]

@@WriteConsciousI’m sure I’m just preaching to the choir, but u think that the kids are a reflection of culture or try to in the best sense because high school is a status game and having the most “high status” or in this case cool status. Which brings Wierd paradigm where is it even possible for “high status” culture to be self aware content. It seems that where status is a cultural currency, defined by how you are perceived by others, it would be contradictory to make that status relative to how well you view yourself. where if we live in a world where self awareness gives you the most status in the eyes of others it would inevitably become fake. Making it impossible to live in a world where culture revolves around self-awareness and status. How are we to get rid of status? Is it even possible? Is it even a problem? It would seem like self awareness and more of it is a good thing. But would it not lead back to the same status game played by everyone who can.

[@adambycina1817]

Dead Poets Society is a Hollywood film of the 80's, at the height of an era which embodied the false narrative in America that good always triumphs over evil and despite the challenges one faces in life, anything can be accomplished with a "positive-thinking" attitude. Suburban life in White America endorsed this value system whole-heartedly. We now know that this was a narrow, rose-colored view of the world, and that life is much more complicated than this. That being said, it was a worthwhile endeavor to create and produce a film like Dead Poets Society, because movies not only show us how life is but also how life can be- they are the collective dreams of mankind. The film, with it's mantra of "carpe diem", was inspiring to my 17 year old former self. I felt culturally and even spiritually isolated growing up in the suburbs in the 1980's and the characters in this film, led by their "captain", gave me a sense of hopefulness that art and literature had the power to change the world for the better. I still to this day believe art in all its forms has the power to propagate the highest ideals in mankind. While this film has a naive world view in 2024, it offers a distinct counterpoint to the saturated market of hopeless dystopian films that flood the marketplace in our current world. Why not dream for a world where art still has the power to change human minds for the better? At the end of the day, it's all a dream anyway.

[@skyko]

Sounds like AI

[@adambycina1817]

@@skyko It's not. Or is that what AI would say to "prove" it's not?

[@skyko]

@@adambycina1817 😏 Ya never know. It's getting to be a weird world out there... You post just sounded a little too complete and polished I suppose.

[@adambycina1817]

@@skyko I agree. I work hard on my writing but it is a little discouraging that chatgpt can outwrite me now. I think there are alot of great writers who will never be able to make any money because of the times we are now living through.

[@skyko]

@@adambycina1817 Nothing can replace you, your viewpoint, your experiences or your insights. AI can only assemble things that have been written online by real people. Maybe this will push us to live more deeply so we can override this new "organizational" system?

[@themanydrippedgod7355]

I remember Louis Rossman discussing how if Shakespeare was around today, he would be rolling in his grave at the sight at how his work is shoved down students throats. I wonder if the authors of older times value the way their work is being pursued academically and politically in the current day. Was their work being politicized something these authors would have anticipated? And how would they have the exposition to be carried out?

[@Dino_Medici]

I went to the woods because I wished to live deliberately

[@thesickdope1349]

more than anything, you sound like a really great teacher. An interesting note imo is who Ethan Hawke became. For quite a while now he has been a champion of art: "Art's not a luxury; it's actually sustenance. We need it." Hawke said that, but it's easy to imagine Keating saying it. I wonder if acting in the film had an ever-lasting impact on Hawke--which creates a fun irony given the essay writer's nod to Hawke's work as an adult.

[@ramshaka]

Oh, I don't know, let's all just be overtly overly analytical about a dated movie, who's entire point is how cold analytics ruin the soul of art. The movie is a masterclass on engagement, and it's star literally couldn't be any other actor. You talk about nuclear phallic theory, but what about audience engagement phallic theory? In this arena, Robin Williams is basically at a John Holms level of legendary. And Dead Poet's Society is basically his persona's critique of the rigidity of intelligence, when his big secret is flexibility. Even though that's sort of a cliché among intellectual giants, and savants of their respective fields. People can take the mold, and kiln harden themselves into the forms that were subjectively deemed useful at some point, by some group of people. Or they can learn to be come formless, shapeless, and infinitely adaptable to any form, or any shape. By being able to remove their ego, and to take a more objective look at things, from any perspective. To pluck and gather roses from steaming heaps of manure scattered throughout the intellectual zeitgeist, breed them into something novel, and to start one's own unique garden. What too many seem apt to do, when approaching critique, or critical thought, is to either self-apply, or to step back, and apply those same principles from a meta-perspective. To be able to bend or change the rules, and reconfigure the entire landscape in their mind, to apply that perspective free from biases, and to consider deeply if this new perspective lends any more sense to the world at large... Or, you know... Maybe just don't be so damn serious all the time for crying out loud...

[@di380]

Totally agree with you. Is there really a right way to interpret art?

[@1m2a3t4t5]

“Were gonna skip because hes just rambling to fit the word count of the Atlantic” had me laughing

[@IndieAuthorX]

Everything by Peter Weir is awesome.

[@itsallgoodman4108]

right? Picnic at Hanging Rock is excellent

[@mikelpelaez]

0:59 Is it common in the United States having that many people in classes?

[@FourEyedFrenchman]

All at once? No. Those students are broken up into smaller classes who are in Mr. WC's room for about an hour every day. Each class is probably somewhere between 25-30 students, which is pretty average for an American classroom. I had a few university courses that were in big lecture halls that seated in upwards of 200 students, sometimes more. Those were low-level general education courses, though. More advanced courses tend to have smaller classes at the university level.

[@mikelpelaez]

@@FourEyedFrenchman OK, that makes more sense

[@_g_r_u_m_p]

The audacity to display your suffering on the wall in a framed certificate can only come from years in academia…

[@cybertron1000s]

Literature and poetry is a responsibility of the people and the culture irrespective of universities or academia. When Americans realize this and stop whinging at academites failing to understand anything beyond what they're paid to defend, they'll understand their cultural malaise.

[@Hagen-s7y]

Poetry is magick.

[@toddjacksonpoetry]

I'm gonna get my PhD I'm a teenage lobotomy! - the Ramones

[@genghisgalahad8465]

1:18 I had no idea that "hung" was colloquially and geographically differentiated and valid as "hanged," which I guess is almost but not quite like the manner of speaking "pled guilty" to the more formal "pleaded guilty." In any case, peace to the near and dear left behind by the passing of DFW.

[@cyberburnzy]

I liked the Dead Poet Society when it came out but I have put off going back to watch it. My Dad supported me when I took art classes and had small parts in musicals and plays during highschool and college. It's hard for me to fathom a parent would freak out when he finds out his son is in a play. So it seems like a typical Hollywood script to make the parent pretty much a one sided evil character that destroys his son's will to live. I should probably watch it again though. Also, watching Dettmar, he comes across like the AA meeting character on page 367 of Infinite Jest - "pretending to be at ease... dying to be liked... unspontaneous, rehearsed, the host crowd gets embarrassed for him."

[@ryansamuel8007]

"It was good that God kept the truths of life from the young as they were starting out or else they'd have no heart to start at all."

[@markuswierschem2576]

What the humanities are too often lacking today is a bit of shared humanity, of humanitas. We're increasingly focused on ever feeding the narcissism of minor differences. I'm old fashioned in the sense that I believe that the great works, rightly read and felt, are truly able to touch a bit of those experiences that we can all share in. In part, it may be because of that why they are often derided and torn down by the latest academic or socio-political fashion, ever obsessed as they are with the production and performance of difference. Ironically so, for where we can lose sight of and can no longer perceive the unifying core of that which we share as humans, we also loose the foundation against which our differences become meaningful, rather than just empty performances feeding our vanity. Or, to quote one of my favorite aphorisms of René Girards: "The desire to leave the beaten path forces everybody into the same ditch."

[@irshadazeez4764]

12:04 It's the nafs. The S is pronounced at the end as well. NA-FS

[@blurredlenzpictures3251]

It's pretty amazing when we look back at Robin Williams' career. He played so many serious roles. Almost like he used the medium to live out his melancholy. ADHD helps a person keep learning throughout life.

[@blurredlenzpictures3251]

@mazolab for sure. There's always something been left on the back burner. Will it burn the house down, or will I come back to it? Who knows, certainly not me, thank you ADHD.

[@brendanmcnamara6212]

You're a really good dude.

[@KalleVilenius]

This was my middle school gym teacher's favorite movie and I ended up watching it on his recommendation. Always enjoyed that scene where they're in the cave chanting about The Congo, it felt like they really were falling into the love of poetry just like Keating said he had. Never knew I should've been shuddering because of their horrid racism lol.

[@davidkornblatt851]

Let me say as a lifelong student every PhD is hard earned. Maybe it’s not hard for some, but for others it’s impossible. So I don’t make light of it. However are there PhD people that are wrong about things or concepts outside their field of study…? Hell Yeah! You can have a PhD and be lacking in humanitarianism! So I think Dead Poets is just a good inspirational movie with some old fashioned tropes. It’s of 1989 which shows now.

[@theironkaat]

I was very fortunate this video was more or less clickbait. (Still waiting on Nuclear Phallus theory though)

[@sillythekid7380]

70 pages in 4 months. Thanks to you.

[@Urizen61]

But why didn't your students like the movie?

[@timmellis5038]

I loved Dead Poets Society. I saw Robin Williams in an interview, and he was asked if anyone has ever told him that 'Good Will Hunting' has changed their life. Robin said, "no," but then he said people have told him that about Dead Poets.

[@FrancisGo.]

Japan is an extremely conformist society, but it produces a high number of creative geniuses. Like a chick breaking through its egg needs the resistance of the shell to help it develop its muscles... I lost my train of thought. 😂

[@larrylicavoli]

Look up how many protested Vietnam at the white house. It happened and there were lots of peoole who showed up. Pat Buchanan has a famous quote about it.

[@ye_zus]

He is right about 'The Road Not Taken.' Frost's poem is fully ironic, of which there is lots of textual and historic evidence. It is effectively a parody of sentimentality, regret, and his writer friend Edward Thomas

[@blurredlenzpictures3251]

I imagine schools aren't allowed to teach The Sound and The Fury. But I feel like and Im sure many believe the use of racial language is important to emote the atmosphere and feeling of the location.

[@arhturlegend007]

Brilliant! Thank you. Loved it ❤

[@fireball43]

Adhd exists. It’s both over and under diagnosed. The influx of diagnoses are a result of lowering attention spans separate from ADHD.

[@otherwise10000]

Dead Poets Society does suck. It's clumsy (in its highbrow affect), emotionally manipulative, completely unsubtle, and broad. Your criticism of its criticism seems to simply be that it has a message that is useful or good. I don't even disagree. But that is a different point than a statement of its quality as a work of art/entertainment.

[@mlbbshorts3548]

cry more haha

[@aj_fry3339]

This seems to be a very common comment on the dead poet society why is it exactly “emotionally manipulative” In your words?

[@RJGilman1967]

Loved it.

[@patatoth6646]

that clickbait :D

[@WriteConscious]

Not clickbait! We read a whole article detailing why it sucks :P I just disagree lol!

[@patatoth6646]

@@WriteConscious fair enough :D

[@odumrita95]

lol

[@Misserbi]

I would take it a step further and say do you aspire for privilege or change? Did your thesis pinpoint something that requires others to take notice or did it fill in a gap where you last had nothing there. That is how to approach the humanities? How human are you and what are your real accomplishments? Humanists achieve every day. That question can be viewed as a veiled political move. At any rate the more you develop and pick things up that you dropped is how to judge your own success.

[@robertparsons313]

One of the worst movies I have ever seen.

[@andynowicki4532]

I unironically hate Dead Poets Society. Melodramatic, emotionally manipulative, just bad.

[@KK-sv7pc]

Agreed. To me it’s like “Girls Just Want To Have Fun”, but for rich boys who aren’t much fun, so we get to spend 2 hours watching them try.

[@aj_fry3339]

Agree to disagree

[@willelliot4001]

Rabinwukkiams tradddedy for gay Catholic

[@russellhenrybieber6620]

First comment

[@WriteConscious]

Great job Russell!

[@davidlee6720]

Gave up on lit. not universal, needs but also loses a lot in translation, confined usually to one language and language changes overtime, Shakespeare, Dante, the Greeks etc, limited to their own speech. Cave painting probably more universal . We all understand that. Still read but only occasionally now. At one time I wanted to read everything. Became disillusioned . Sorry.

[@davidlee6720]

@@AleksandarBloom pedant, who is serious on mass media?

[@RasmusKarlJensen]

The scene where that one boy (don’t remember any of the character names, sorry) tries to kiss a girl while she’s unconscious didn’t age well.

[@andynowicki4532]

"OMG, so problematic!!!"😊

[@bernardqblack]

Yeah, um no. It was brilliant.

[@Ochenter]

Never seen that movie because of Robin Williams starring in. Period 🤦🏻😩

[@aniket8350]

Wow I have never seen anyone hating on Robin Williams. Great to finally meet one😊

[@mlbbshorts3548]

As if you're worthy enough