2008 Woodie Awards
The Power of Words
The Importance of Raising a Well-Read Nation
By Sara Post
4/18/07 - Editorials
"I hate reading" "Reading is hard" "I don't want to do work in my free time"
Sound familiar? I'm sure you've heard someone say something to that effect, or said it yourself. Have you ever thought about why that is?
I'm going to admit this right now: I love to read. I've been a hopeless bookworm since the age of six. So I do not understand, at all, what people could hate about reading. Is it boring? Not at all - I have been so absorbed by a book that I haven't had any idea what was going on around me. Is it hard? No, or at least I don't think so - the scenes I create in my mind are more vivid than any movie I have ever seen, and they are effortless, not to mention free. So what is it?
We were all required to take English (or Language Arts, or Literacy) classes, probably starting in middle school or earlier. What happened in those classes? Well, there were grammar lessons, there were papers, and there were reading assignments. That's right - reading assignments. That doesn't sound strange to you?
Allow me to clarify something: writers do not write so that teachers can ask questions about their work. Writers write because writing is an art, a form of expression unique to those societies that have a written language. Writing accomplishes all the things that music, art, sculpture, and dance have accomplished, all in one act - that of putting pen to paper and examining something. That something could be anything: a scene, a person, an emotion, a moment in time. It is merely the responsibility of the reader to make the words before them into something for themselves. And that is the purpose of art. Make it into something for yourself.
Internalize it, if only a little tiny part of it, and carry it with you for the rest of your life. I'm sure there's something you've seen, or heard, or felt, that you will never forget. If you read something, and you create the image in your mind, and the literature is powerful enough, you will never, ever forget it, because you will have seen it, or heard it, or felt it, in your own head, after reading it on the page. And that is what an author is trying to do - show you what they've imagined, or seen, or felt, and make you imagine it and see it and feel it.
Sound familiar? I'm sure you've heard someone say something to that effect, or said it yourself. Have you ever thought about why that is?
I'm going to admit this right now: I love to read. I've been a hopeless bookworm since the age of six. So I do not understand, at all, what people could hate about reading. Is it boring? Not at all - I have been so absorbed by a book that I haven't had any idea what was going on around me. Is it hard? No, or at least I don't think so - the scenes I create in my mind are more vivid than any movie I have ever seen, and they are effortless, not to mention free. So what is it?
We were all required to take English (or Language Arts, or Literacy) classes, probably starting in middle school or earlier. What happened in those classes? Well, there were grammar lessons, there were papers, and there were reading assignments. That's right - reading assignments. That doesn't sound strange to you?
Allow me to clarify something: writers do not write so that teachers can ask questions about their work. Writers write because writing is an art, a form of expression unique to those societies that have a written language. Writing accomplishes all the things that music, art, sculpture, and dance have accomplished, all in one act - that of putting pen to paper and examining something. That something could be anything: a scene, a person, an emotion, a moment in time. It is merely the responsibility of the reader to make the words before them into something for themselves. And that is the purpose of art. Make it into something for yourself.
Internalize it, if only a little tiny part of it, and carry it with you for the rest of your life. I'm sure there's something you've seen, or heard, or felt, that you will never forget. If you read something, and you create the image in your mind, and the literature is powerful enough, you will never, ever forget it, because you will have seen it, or heard it, or felt it, in your own head, after reading it on the page. And that is what an author is trying to do - show you what they've imagined, or seen, or felt, and make you imagine it and see it and feel it.
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Paul
Paul
posted 4/18/07 @ 6:55 PM MST
You may have a good point, but you missed your chance to drive it home. I am glad that you like to read. I will join you lamenting the English classes that tried to crush my soul. (Continued…)
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