MADELINE-BY-LINE: Self-Helpified Literature

Growing up in the Baptist-dominated wilds of western North Carolina, I usually watched book burnings with a mixture of perplexity and dismay. Now I understand them. Sometimes, books are so offensive they necessitate bonfires.

Case in point: Mitch Albom’s new bestseller. “For One More Day” tells of what happens when the middle-aged Charley has the chance to have “the ‘one more day’ that so many wish they had with a lost loved one—a day to ask questions, seek forgiveness, and reexamine the life you never had” (a direct quotation from Albom’s website). If that description isn’t sufficient warning, “For One More Day” also has the dubious distinction of being the first book sold across the nation at Starbucks chains. This book needs to be destroyed.

I first encountered Albom’s work in high school. A well-intentioned world geography teacher decided to read “Tuesdays with Morrie” out loud to our class in the hopes of imparting wisdom and decreasing the number of knife-fights that broke out each month. I may still have difficulty locating Namibia on a map, but that class imparted something more lasting than cartographical knowledge: a passionate hatred for the insipid, as embodied in the literature of Albom.

For those fortunate enough to be unacquainted with his work, Albom has found a niche writing inspirational books that invariably involve a soul-searching protagonist grappling with death, either his own or someone else’s. Mix one part terminal illness with one part self-realization and you end up with three books on the New York Times Best Seller List.

You know your friend who always has the sappy, poorly-worded quotes for her away messages? She’s quoting Mitch Albom. As a graduate of D.A.R.E., I can recognize Albom for what he truly is: the gateway drug to bad literature. Far more insidious than mere marijuana, Albom is the slippery slope that leads well-adjusted people to venture into the land of self-help books.

Self-help books were once fair game for public mockery. The perception was that they were primarily read by the audience you imagine watching Lifetime Original Movies—lonely, middle-aged women with cellulite and cats. But last week, when I spotted “Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul” nestled between two Tolstoys on the bookshelf of a seemingly normal friend, it hit me.

At some point in recent years, self-help books have become mainstream. In fact, a large proportion of students at Harvard have presumably read at least one, since the syllabus for Psychology 1504: Positive Psychology included “The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem”.

When did the American public become so reliant upon the advice of others? Actually, it’s not just the Americans. In England the Somerset County Council has introduced a new program in which doctors prescribe self-help books instead of medication for mildly depressed patients. The Weston Mercury , a British local newspaper, quotes Councilman Justin Robinson as saying, “Self-help books have few side effects and invite the patient to empower themselves through reading and learning.”

Self-help books are the new Prozac; the pharmacy is being replaced by the library and the critic by the doctor as the worlds of self-medication and literature collide.

And there are side effects, as the self-help mindset has begun to extend past the advice column and into the other media of popular culture outlets.

To be fair, self-help books shouldn’t be judged by the standards of literature. They are just vehicles for their messages, existing to tell their audience what is wrong with them and how to fix it. However, the rise of the self-help trade has infected other genres of books.

Inspiration-fused memoirs such as “Tuesdays with Morrie” or more recently “The Pursuit of Happyness” may not live in the advice section of the bookstore, but their didactic message and lack of ambiguity are strikingly similar to that “The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem.” It’s undeniable that there’s something alluring about a book where the message is clear and easy; the danger is when it ceases to be a guilty pleasure and becomes the norm.

Literature has always been, in one sense, about self-medication and escapism. It can force the reader to empathize with other people and experiences, even if they are fictional characters and plots. But when self-help and literature merge into one, both complexity and empathy are lost. Readers turn inwards, accept what they are told is wrong with them, and accept the automatic solution.

But if you have been tainted by the touch of Albom, all is not yet lost. The best way to break the self-help habit is to quit cold-turkey: put down “The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem,” turn off Dr. Phil, and stop your correspondence with Dear Abby. If you still feel in need of redemption, go buy Albom’s new book and throw it on the fire. In his own words, “You have to work at creating your own culture.”

—Staff writer Madeline K.B. Ross can be reached at mross@fas.harvard.edu.