This is not an entirely serious question, but I wouldn't be surprised if people actually have some passionate opinions about introductions in classic books.

What inspired this was a video I saw the other day, where a man complains about how every single classic he reads "needs to have 30 pages before it gets to the actual book" (the book he is holding is Wuthering Heights.) He goes onto say, verbatim: "I don't care if the author stubbed their toe when they were twelve and that's why the character is a bad person. If I wanna know that stuff, I'll look it up on my own! If I have to flip more than five pages to start reading something relevant, your forward is too long."

Now... I'm taking what he's saying with a grain of salt, because it's probably just him trying to get content out with engagement bait. I can respect the hustle. But it really makes you think! How many people really think this about classic introductions?

It's a little disheartening to see someone say this (assuming he's being completely serious), because the solution to his problem isn't actually hard. All he has to do is not read the intro — skip past it. He seems to forget about this nice invention called the Table of Contents, which, in my version of Wuthering Heights, is literally two pages into the book... It's a little strange to see someone complain about introductions as if, because he dislikes them, all introductions are useless and should be removed from classics entirely. Unfortunately for him, the world doesn't work exactly to his preferences.

I can understand where he's coming from, to an extent. I don't think introductions are useless. Sometimes I read them, sometimes I don't. It depends on if I want to read the classic more for the plot or for the themes! One gripe I have, personally, but that's just me. A girl can dream, but I don't expect that to change. In any case, I can look it up if I care enough at the time. Some classics actually do add spoiler warnings, I believe! I can understand it's frustrating when I read an intro and it completely spoils the ending for me...

Many classics are really difficult reads, you might need the introduction to — well, introduce you to the book. Classics introductions can also let you in on themes and questions you might want to be asking yourself while reading, in case you're someone who likes to analyze the book while you read it. I know that a lot of people have misunderstandings about classic book introductions, and they end up getting overwhelmed or intimidated when they open the book. Some book publishing houses even cut back on introductions! So, if you don't like the intros, you can buy those houses.

Regarding the "I don't care if the author stubbed their toe..." comment, this annoyed me a bit, even though I know he's being hyperbolic. Introductions aren't there to give you useless, trivial information like he makes it out to be. I feel like this is just scaring new readers! 😣 Intros can give you a lot of good insight about the author and why they wrote what they wrote!

For example, in Wuthering Heights, the preface tells you that this book had been seen as a monstrosity for years, because of how the author's sister, Charlotte Brontë, purposefully made Emily Brontë out to be a childish, rebellious, simple woman who had little responsibility in writing her book — albeit, she was trying to save her sister from critique. It even tells you that Charlotte even made her out to be an "unthinking vessel through which 'Fate or Inspiration' pours." Isn't that so fascinating? Not even Emily's own sister could bear the fact that her own kin wrote such a terrifying story filled with unredeemable characters. The introduction, afterwards, continues to provide keen insight into the upbringing of the Brontë sisters and how that inspired Emily's works.

TLDR: Introductions in classic are so important to add context to the book's themes and creation. But, even without them, the classic still stands strong by itself.

What do you guys think??