Bildungsroman

I've always been annoyed with people who feel the need to have a personal connection to what they read. That mentality has always bugged me, and I know many people who subscribe to it: "It doesn't apply to my life, I couldn't relate to the main character at all" is a common complaint when I loan books to friends. For one thing, that's just lazy- you can always find something to relate to if you try really hard and if you're pretentious/narcissistic enough- and second of all, nothing limits you more in your reading life than making random declarations that you will not read anything which doesn't impact your life personally. 

I've come across this in my time with the exact opposite nature- I haven't felt a connection with books that I felt the similarities were there. This is a genre known as "Bildungsroman," or the coming-of-age story. (It's always fascinated me and made me sort of proud that most teenagers my age can define 'bildungsroman.') A short list of books with this theme I've read include:

1. A Separate Peace by John Knowles

2. The Catcher in the Rye by J.D. Salinger

3. Good Times Bad Times by James Kirkwood

4. Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

5. The Chosen by Chaim Potok  

6. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky 

7. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

8. Siddhartha by Herman Hesse

9. Anne of Green Gables by Lucy Maud Montgomery 

I liked most of the books on the aforementioned list, and felt very moved by some of them, especially The Catcher in the Rye, Good Times Bad Times and The Perks of Being A Wallflower. But I didn't like the books because I felt any sort of relation, even though I'm currently at the age where 'coming-of-age' should maybe mean something to me, being on the brink of adulthood and leaving home for the first time. I liked the books because they were funny or interesting, or had likable characters and an interesting plot. (Except for Anne of Green Gables, which I found terribly maudlin, and Siddhartha which I felt was dishonest.) 

I'm currently trying to read The Promise by Chaim Potok, and that's what got me thinking about bildungsroman. It's the sequel to the aforementioned The Chosen. I loved the first book, and am a little afraid the sequel will ruin my fondness for how the story ended. I have only read one chapter, and I think it'll be okay, but we'll see.

I think it's a tricky thing in books, when you want your character to get somewhere, and come to some sort of resolution without being cheesy or worse, dishonest. This is a big theme in bildungsroman books, and it is important to the story I suppose, but it's difficult to do it well. Having that great "moment of clarity" is something I've seen in many books (Eat Pray Love comes to mind- a book I would not recommend) and it always seems disingenuous to me. I think The Catcher in the Rye does it well, and Perks of Being A Wallflower came close to being very cheesy but managed to be moving instead, at least for me. 

I think I'm simply too stressed out by school right now to feel the full weight of truly "growing up," plus I have a few months. And I really don't think there's going to be one moment in my life where I feel like everything has changed. Life's nice in that everything moves in increments, and except for moving day, I'm not going to have to face a ton of change right at once. At least that's what I hope. I could never handle a "moment of clarity" where I realize everything is different and I'm a different person. Plus, I don't really want to be a different person.