February 21, 1999
After hearing him shouting in the bathroom, two sixth-grade students witnessed their English teacher, Mr. Abernathy, reading aloud to himself in front of the urinals. The book in question was Paradise Lost.
According to the students, Mr. Abernathy then encouraged them to read from Milton as well, offering the part of Satan to one student and then the other.
Both declined.
Then Mr. Abernathy positioned himself between them and the door, reciting several long passages from Book IX where Satan tempts Eve in the Garden.
The students described his characterization of Satan as “kind of dumb” and “weird-sounding.”
Satan: Also Rejected by 6th Graders
At this point the students asked Mr. Abernathy if they could leave the bathroom.
He said no, and that they should “wait until I finish, goddammit!”
Mr. Abernathy then read for several more minutes before telling the students “You should know Milton. Everyone should know Milton.”
Following this “lecture,” Mr. Abernathy let the students leave the bathroom.
A meeting was held with Mr. Abernathy, Principal Stowe, and the students’ parents.
He was suspended for two days without pay and apologized to each student individually, confessing that his reading of Milton in the bathroom was recommended by a literature professor he “admired very much” back when he, Mr. Abernathy, “still believed he could make something wonderful of his life.”
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Love it. Now I want to read The Screwtape Letters.