Anton Talarico | Significant Lit. | Susan Orlean's "The American Male at Age Ten''

Описание: Welcome to another Episode of Significant Lit!

In this article, "The American Male at Age Ten," Susan Orlean is a 30-something journalist that spends quality time with a male counterpart that she is trying to get to know intimately: a ten-year old boy named Collin Duffy. It was originally published in Esquire Magazine in Dec., 1992.

This piece gets awfully nostalgic for me as a grown man who at one point in my life grew up in the 90's, just like Collin Duffy, and the world that is recreated here - through the authors observations, interviews that she conducts, and other ruminations - feels uncanny. Oh, if I could take you back in time to the arcades of old and put our quarters up for the next game of Street Fighter II, we may actually be verging on paradise on earth. But I digress...

However, for adolescents, growing up in the 1990's - as in any era I would imagine - was pockmarked with all kinds of oddities and peculiar mindsets as we transition from little (possibly awkward) boys and girls into the next ominous stage: young (possibly awkward) adults, and whatever that might entail. It can be scary and confusing growing up in a world that we start to recognize is intimidating and perplexing, and also just downright sad and difficult. It's a lot to take in and make sense of during these formidable and impressionable years, as Orleans demonstrates in this article.

I think one of my favorite parts of this article is the end (no spoilers) if only for the fact that it reminds me - as a grown man at this point in my life - that I once had the kind of imagination that could weave spider webs through my backyard and an unchallenged confidence to see it through. Now, after a bunch of living, I guess I know better...

I hope you enjoy and find the themes of this particular engaging and enlightening! Thank you for watching!

Table of Contents:

Providing a Context & Marriage - 0:00
Superheroes and Athletes - 3:45
A Kid-up - 5:45
Classroom Jobs - 7:50
The Jolts of Reality - 9:20
Street Fighter II: The Greatest (Sexist) Video Game of All Time - 12:05
Danny's Pizzeria & the Idea of Girls - 18:35
Deficits Regarding Relationships for Adolescent Men- 22:48
Collins Opinions on Everything Cool, Including Money - 26:18
Wyoming, a Suburban Kid's Dream & Collins Bedroom - 29:48
Collin's Spider Web - 31:20