The Big Read

April is becoming Big Read month in Champaign-Urbana. For the third year in a row, people in our community are coming together to read, discuss and enjoy a great book.

The Big Read is a program of the National Endowment for The Arts. Dismayed by a 2004 report that indicated a "critical decline" in literary reading among all age groups, the NEA decided to launch an initiative that would help "restore reading to the center of American culture." Since 2006, the NEA has funded 800 Big Reads in cities and towns throughout the United States.

In 2009, the NEA published a brochure, "Reading on the Rise," based on a 2008 study that suggested that reading rates had improved, after years of steady decline.

Is the Big Read program helping?

Other factors have been suggested. Oprah's book club and the phenomenal popularity of the Harry Potter books and the Twilight series by Stephenie Meyer are typically mentioned, as is the role of the Internet in luring reluctant readers.

Nevertheless, our local experience aligns with NEA reports: communities that hold Big Reads are successful in getting people to read the chosen title. Our fears about Leo Tolstoy's "The Death of Ivan Ilyich" proved to be unfounded and we were astonished at the number and variety of people who reported that they were inspired to go on and read more Tolstoy, including the Big Ones, like "Anna Karenina" and "War and Peace"!

"The Maltese Falcon," last year's Big Read, was an easier sell, thanks to Humphrey Bogart, and it too inspired people to explore the author (Dashiell Hammett), the period, or the hard-boiled genre and the creepy delights of noir.

This year's title is a little different. "Sun, Stone and Shadows: 20 Great Mexican Short Stories" is a collection gathered and published expressly for the Big Read. The 20 authors featured were all born from 1887 to 1939; their stories, from the first half of the 20th century, illuminate Mexican society and culture during a period of vast change.

The Mexican Revolution, which began in 1911, ushered in democracy, industrialization, economic growth, urbanization and an unprecedented flowering in the arts. Prior to the revolution, the dictatorship of Porfirio Diaz had looked outward for models of modernization and growth; the cultural riches of Mexico's past were of no interest.

After the revolution, Mexico again looked inward for inspiration and success. Artists in particular sought to restore the heritage of the past to its rightful position. As Octavio Paz said in his 1990 Nobel Prize acceptance lecture: "The temples and gods of pre-Columbian Mexico are a pile of ruins, but the spirit that breathed life into that world has not disappeared; it speaks to us in the hermetic language of myth, legend, forms of social co-existence, popular art, customs. Being a Mexican writer means listening to the voice of that present, that presence."

At the same time, Mexico was finding its place in the modern world and change was inevitable. Rosario Castellanos (1925-1974) the first woman in Mexico since the poet Sor Juana Ines de la Cruz to receive literary distinction, was a champion of the culture and folklore of Chiapas, where she grew up. At the same time, her work focused on the role of women and sought to free their voices from the stranglehold of the machista tradition.

Castellanos wrote my favorite story in the collection, "Cooking Lesson," in which a newly wed woman stands in her kitchen contemplating the changes in her life and status and the incredible complexities of producing an acceptable dinner:

"The kitchen is shining white. É My place is here. I've been here from the beginning of time. É I wandered astray through classrooms, streets, offices, cafes, wasting my time on skills that now I must forget in order to acquire others. For example, choosing the menu. How could one carry out such an arduous task without the cooperation of society — of all history?"

And that is just the beginning! There is much more to be learned once Fancy Broiled Beef is chosen. There are 19 more stories to enjoy. You may not like all of them, but you're bound to love at least one.

Luis Urrea, the author of "The Hummingbird's Daughter," which I reviewed in an earlier column, will be giving the keynote address for Big Read 2010 today at 2 p.m. at the Champaign Public Library. Don't miss it!