Why Teach? by Peter Shull

review

a real life photograph of this novel taken by yours truly

I bought Why Teach? knowing, at least, what I was going to get.

I was so glad to discover Peter on Substack because I feel like he and I are, in some ways, kindred spirits. We both like to write about—as he put it to me once (forgive my paraphrasing

Peter Shull

)—‘men trying to be men and stubbing their toes’. We both eschew common literary settings for small town (ahem, sorry, small city locales). We both have a healthy respect for the bigger themes portrayed in small ways.

So I must admit I already knew I would enjoy Why Teach?.

Honestly, I finished Why Teach? a while back. While I did sticky-note the heck out of it, whenever I read something I know I will review, I like to let it sit for a while; this way, the most important parts about it come to the fore as time goes on. If my mind doesn’t return to it at all, well—then it must not have been very good.

I do still find myself thinking of Why, Teach? quite often, although not always in the context of teaching. Why Teach? is, at its core, a novel about a young man trying to navigate the doldrums of the young adult years. These are seas I once navigated, and the comparisons between myself and Will Able are there to be had, which may factor in to my enjoyment of the novel.

I would stress that these similarities are not so much one of situation or profession. Too often these days, I think, do we equate surface level situations with relatability. You perhaps don’t even need to identify as male to recognize the liminal zone between “where I am at” and “what’s next” when it comes to the synchronicity of career, life, and circumstance, although many of the concerns are male-centric: the financial envy of male friends and colleagues, the beleaguered miscalculations of a woman’s affections, the expectations of your father.

Should he get into sales and make money, like his friend? Should he follow in his father’s footsteps and become a lawyer? Or stay within the infuriatingly unjust and broken education system that insists upon its wayward methods and try to change it from the inside?

For that is what William Able is—a bit directionless, wondering what the next step in his life will be. Someone like he could easily get pulled into the undercurrents of blame that ripple through society seeking to examine why he, someone with every advantage of race and privilege and class, could have their life trajectory stymied by anything other than themselves. As Rene Girard would argue, blame is the byword of our times, as well as scapegoat; too often, in order to avoid blaming ourselves, we blame the Other. Too often, to avoid blaming the Other, we blame ourselves.

A potential answer presented by Peter Shull in Why Teach? is simply to not blame, and too many young men find themselves between the Scylla and Charybdis of self blame and societal blame instead of simply sailing straight through. The solution, as Peter Shull presents through Will Able, is to seek peace and meaning within society’s frustrations and change it from the inside. As Will does in one of the book’s final (and my favorite) scenes, the strongest thing a man can do is walk away from the rich guy in a hot tub full of boobs and alcohol, and to not look back.

He decides to give back to the society that gives him so much. Instead of looking with disdain upon the high school and his Kansas habitat at large, instead of looking upon himself with disdain, much like Hamlet, Mr. Able finds to be, or not to be? reductive and simplistic: really, you don’t need to be or not be; you should just keep being, the best you can be, and be grateful for it.

The novel, in my opinion, very much tackles the idea of sacrifice in the face of privilege. Will Able doesn’t need to teach to survive, even though he lives an existence without much money. It’s not existential for him—his father’s house on the golf course will always be there. The opportunity to become a lawyer will always be there.

Why Teach? begins with the tragic loss of one Will Able’s former students in one of the sort of senseless and tragic ways that often befalls young people in small towns. In my opinion, the story is very much about potential lost. Will redeems his own potential in the best way possible.

Perhaps, to some, Why Teach? and its protagonist will seem unremarkable. Another introspective novel about an introspective young guy stuck in his own head, living in flyover country. The same complaint could be levelled at my own novel.

But I believe novels of these sort are needed more than ever. We lament the directionless young men these days comparing themselves to worthless purveyors of unsavory masculinity and poisoning the general well of society, but so rarely present them with modern alternatives to the culture that leads them down those paths in the first place. We take it for granted that the paths available to them are clear and limitless, that they will—and should—figure it out on their own.

Will Able is a character of such example. He avoids temptations of all manner and handles himself in a righteous way, resolves his quarter-life crisis in a way befitting of the modern man. In the end, Will decides to teach.

Why? Because he is willing and able.