Though not quite the chuckle-fest that was Daddy Needs a Drink, Tales from the Teachers' Lounge [Delacorte Press, 320 pages, 2007], Robert Wilder’s newest look at the times he lives in still manages some laughter, which is not so easy given that his topic involves the American educational system, teachers, parents, and sullen teenagers everywhere.

If you’re a fan of teachers in general, the book is a relatively sympathetic portrait of their plight. If you’re not so keen on the teachers you come in contact with, the book will also reinforce some of that opinion as well. So, perhaps parents and teacher will agree that Wilder’s an equal opportunity offender. And, he is.

[For the record, I'm pretty pro-teacher (my wife's a PhD), unless it involves my own kid.]

It is possible that the book’s intent is to walk that line between sympathy and polemic, between rant and truthfulness, between poking fun and running down the hall with scissors. Truthfully, where I loved the Daddy Needs a Drink fatherhood tales and glimpses of the everyday truths that we sometimes miss, I found that some moments of Tales from the Teachers' Lounge read as forced commentary and the book is a bit more scatter-shot than its predecessor.

“Either way, I had fifty essays awaiting me like a pile of rusty penile clamps. For the last paper of the semester, I give my students a wide range of options, some barely relating to Hamlet. Some kids choose a critical analysis of women’s roles in the male-dominated Elizabethan era; others film a movie where dogs dressed in tights lick light poles, then urinate on them. I started my chipping away with the more academic projects ….” [page 194]

The humor in these tales is not as comforting. The depiction of others is a bit more labored and, at times, seemingly mean-spirited. It’s a bit harder to feel the warmth here; at times Wilder’s depictions of others and events within the community is too self-satisfied for my tastes. At least, in portions of the book, anyway; it’s a very fine line he walks here.

Making fun of adults is perfectly fine and to be encouraged; pointing out the failures of youth ("get off my lawn") is OK as well, but it has to be done with some finesse. Wilder sometimes falls off the high-wire here.

That said, Wilder remains a keen observer of the day-to-day, a gifted observational humorist, and an experienced hand at describing the daily foibles and successes of parenthood, and in this case, teacherhood. He remains a wise-acre and devoted to his family (wife Lala, their children Poppy and London).

The book walks the line between the personal and the professional here, so perhaps that was where I had some issues with the tone and the general atmosphere of the book. It’s a bit of a mixed bag at work here as so much of Wilder’s experience is intertwined between the professional and the personal. His writing is within that world and his experiences are not always complementary to each. Consequently, there can be a bit of a flash forward, flash backward, and meet in the middle atmosphere to his writing.

Like Daddy Needs a Drink, Wilder’s Tales from the Teachers' Lounge reads as a funny, truthful, honest look at someone’s life experience; in this case a mix of the personal and the professional. This book does have a bit of a more serious tone to it as Wilder discusses the various trials and issues that face the modern-day teacher, from helicopter parents to disaffected, overprivileged youth, to the usual bureaucratic, administrative bunglers. In between there are tales of donuts and stale coffee, teacher conferences and renewal exercises, parental interference and professional frustrations.

And, there are also the stories of his family: his brother’s own career as a teacher until he went back to being a professional turtle impersonator at Disney World, his dad and their continuing dance between father and son connections and missed opportunities, his daughter’s grace, his wife’s patience with him, and his son’s burgeoning ability to say the absolute most honest things at the most inopportune time.

A chuckle-fest? Not quite. But, as with his fatherhood tales, Wilder confesses that there are no easy answers for teachers either. You just have to strive to rise above it. Wilder seemingly manages to do it pretty well. [three stars]

Sources
www.robertwilder.com, www.bantamdell.com


Recommended: Yes