This book challenges the current penchant in United States education for "dumbing down" and anthologizing literature for secondary learners. The book provides a rationale for teaching the classics to all high school students. It offers a wealth of ways for English teachers to do what they yearn to do in their own classrooms: teach "the good stuff." It presents ways to engage students, to make classics and youngsters come alive. The book also offers practical suggestions for overcoming the problems teachers face when teaching the classics: length, challenging vocabulary, complex syntax, alien times and settings, and student disaffection. It also deals with issues such as assessment and censorship, and offers many lists of suggested titles and a sampling of student writings in response to the classics. Following a foreword by James Strickland and an introduction, chapters in the book are: (1) Creating a Context for the Study of Classical Literature; (2) Warning Students of the Obstacles in Reading Classics; (3) Negotiating Story Structures; (4) Rethinking What We Ask Students To Do; (5) Of Excerpts and Allusions; (6) Learning from the Inside Out How Stories Work; (7) Testing That Teaches; (8) Film Versions of the Classics: To View or Not To View? (9) Readers with Roots and Wings; and (10) Book Lists of Classics, an Eclectic Collection. (Contains 53 references.) (NKA)