Reading the classics is learning the state of civilization, learning the breath of human cruelty and understanding why it is essential to the human experience,

Reading the classics is learning the state of civilization, learning the breath of human cruelty and understanding why it is essential to the human experience, essential to progress of the species, and is essential to the structure and formation of justice and law. The classics give one the background why things are they way they are, and why as messed up as things appear to be, they are the best we can manage. If one is not at least exposed to a few of the classics, I wonder what value foundation one has beyond their potential one sided religious up bringing. Without exposure to the classes, one is adrift in a sea of unknown pop cultural references, only picking up the severely watered down and over exploited Classic Themes when they appear on popular TV, film, and comic book quality regurgitation of their ideas. I tend to consider myself "over read" - I have read everything published by my favorite authors, their followers and their students. When I find a voice I like, I'll finish that entire school of thought. But I'm also very extreme in my reading. I started reading very early, isolated in Christian rural Iowa as a youth, I had a severe stutter, and read the library rather than engage in the other kids I could not manage to converse without sounding stupid. So, I sorta ignored "childhood" until the end of elementary, after which I was the oddest over intellectualized little shithead one could encounter. Why read the classics? They locate you in time and space to understand the state of society. That pretty valuable.