A Lie's Poison as Illustrated in Billy Collins The History Teacher

What if you found out that everything you learned in school was a lie? The entire time you sat learning math, in vein, all of the facts about the government only a softened truth, the wars that were fought to make America a great country all lies. Well in this poem “The History Teacher” by Billy Collins, he shows what the consequences would be in sugar coating a serious subjects, not just in school but in daily life. Even though you’d want to spare someone the hard truth it would be best to tell them the truth.

In this story the main character is a teacher, this teacher doesn’t want to introduce his students to the hard truth of History therefore he finds different ways to making things friendlier for kids as to not desensitize them, or traumatize them yet still teaching them about history. The outcome of him softening the truth, his kids go out into the playground area and pick on the kids that actually knew the real story because, they thought that the other kids were wrong, which the teacher had to deal with because he couldn’t tell the kids other wise and ruin their “innocence”. I understand how the teacher wants to preserve the kids innocence but their education isn’t something to compromise.

Collins poem brings to light the harm that not telling people the whole truth, and /or keeping others in the dark can pose. I can empathize with the teacher because, as a teacher it is your job to teach kids about life, the past, present, this is also basic skills so if you don’t teach them correctly then it’ll be hard for them to learn the truth later in life.

After that I realized that even though he was sparing the children their child hood he was also creating a problem for other kids that knew that what he was teaching wasn’t true because his kids would “torment the weak and the smart, messing up their hair and breaking their glasses”(Collins). These kids are now posing a threat to the other kids at the school due to their oblivious ignorance.

In the end of the poem the teacher walks home thinking of new ways to lie to the kids tomorrow. The fact that astonishes me the most is that he sees that the kids aren’t learning anything, and their ignorance is indirectly harming other kids yet he doesn’t make any effort to stop it or rethink his methods.

The meaning of this story is that it would be better to reveal the truth to someone rather than lying to them and letting them roam this cruel, uncompassionate world oblivious to the truth. Not telling people the truth, yea it can be sometimes for their own good, or maybe just to keep your conscience clear but eventually someone is going to tell them the truth or they are going to have to experience the hard truth and all your effort of preserving their “innocence” would be in vein there for in order to spare yourself the embarrassment and spare them the hard realization because, let’s be really real no one can stay innocent forever. Everyone has to eventually face the truth in life therefore let not one moment of truth be spared because it could be vital to their growth as a human being, to sum it all up Just tell people the truth and save others trauma and drama.