What reading slowly taught me about writing
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0:01 - 0:04A long time ago, there lived a Giant,
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0:04 - 0:09a Selfish Giant, whose stunning garden
was the most beautiful in all the land. -
0:10 - 0:12One evening, this Giant came home
-
0:12 - 0:15and found all these children
playing in his garden, -
0:15 - 0:16and he became enraged.
-
0:17 - 0:20"My own garden is my own garden!"
-
0:20 - 0:22the Giant said.
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0:22 - 0:25And he built this high wall around it.
-
0:26 - 0:31The author Oscar Wilde wrote the story
of "The Selfish Giant" in 1888. -
0:32 - 0:37Almost a hundred years later, that Giant
moved into my Brooklyn childhood -
0:37 - 0:38and never left.
-
0:39 - 0:41I was raised in a religious family,
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0:41 - 0:44and I grew up reading
both the Bible and the Quran. -
0:45 - 0:48The hours of reading,
both religious and recreational, -
0:48 - 0:51far outnumbered the hours
of television-watching. -
0:51 - 0:54Now, on any given day,
you could find my siblings and I -
0:54 - 0:57curled up in some part
of our apartment reading, -
0:57 - 0:59sometimes unhappily,
-
0:59 - 1:03because on summer days in New York City,
the fire hydrant blasted, -
1:03 - 1:06and to our immense jealousy,
we could hear our friends down there -
1:06 - 1:08playing in the gushing water,
-
1:08 - 1:11their absolute joy making its way up
through our open windows. -
1:12 - 1:15But I learned that the deeper
I went into my books, -
1:15 - 1:17the more time I took with each sentence,
-
1:17 - 1:20the less I heard the noise
of the outside world. -
1:20 - 1:23And so, unlike my siblings,
who were racing through books, -
1:23 - 1:25I read slowly --
-
1:25 - 1:27very, very slowly.
-
1:28 - 1:31I was that child with her finger
running beneath the words, -
1:31 - 1:36until I was untaught to do this;
told big kids don't use their fingers. -
1:36 - 1:40In third grade, we were made to sit
with our hands folded on our desk, -
1:40 - 1:44unclasping them only to turn the pages,
then returning them to that position. -
1:45 - 1:48Our teacher wasn't being cruel.
-
1:48 - 1:49It was the 1970s,
-
1:49 - 1:52and her goal was to get us reading
not just on grade level -
1:52 - 1:54but far above it.
-
1:54 - 1:57And we were always
being pushed to read faster. -
1:58 - 2:01But in the quiet of my apartment,
outside of my teacher's gaze, -
2:01 - 2:04I let my finger run beneath those words.
-
2:04 - 2:07And that Selfish Giant
again told me his story, -
2:07 - 2:11how he had felt betrayed by the kids
sneaking into his garden, -
2:11 - 2:13how he had built this high wall,
-
2:13 - 2:15and it did keep the children out,
-
2:15 - 2:18but a grey winter fell over his garden
-
2:18 - 2:20and just stayed and stayed.
-
2:21 - 2:23With each rereading,
I learned something new -
2:23 - 2:27about the hard stones of the roads
that the kids were forced to play on -
2:27 - 2:29when they got expelled from the garden,
-
2:29 - 2:32about the gentleness of a small boy
that appeared one day, -
2:33 - 2:35and even about the Giant himself.
-
2:35 - 2:38Maybe his words weren't rageful after all.
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2:38 - 2:40Maybe they were a plea for empathy,
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2:40 - 2:42for understanding.
-
2:42 - 2:46"My own garden is my own garden."
-
2:48 - 2:50Years later, I would learn
of a writer named John Gardner -
2:50 - 2:53who referred to this
as the "fictive dream," -
2:53 - 2:54or the "dream of fiction,"
-
2:54 - 2:58and I would realize that this
was where I was inside that book, -
2:58 - 3:01spending time with the characters
and the world that the author had created -
3:01 - 3:03and invited me into.
-
3:03 - 3:06As a child, I knew that stories
were meant to be savored, -
3:06 - 3:09that stories wanted to be slow,
-
3:09 - 3:14and that some author had spent months,
maybe years, writing them. -
3:14 - 3:15And my job as the reader --
-
3:15 - 3:18especially as the reader who wanted
to one day become a writer -- -
3:18 - 3:20was to respect that narrative.
-
3:21 - 3:27Long before there was cable
or the internet or even the telephone, -
3:27 - 3:32there were people sharing ideas
and information and memory through story. -
3:32 - 3:35It's one of our earliest forms
of connective technology. -
3:36 - 3:38It was the story of something
better down the Nile -
3:38 - 3:41that sent the Egyptians moving along it,
-
3:41 - 3:43the story of a better way
to preserve the dead -
3:43 - 3:46that brought King Tut's remains
into the 21st century. -
3:46 - 3:48And more than two million years ago,
-
3:48 - 3:52when the first humans
began making tools from stone, -
3:52 - 3:54someone must have said, "What if?"
-
3:54 - 3:57And someone else remembered the story.
-
3:57 - 4:01And whether they told it through words
or gestures or drawings, -
4:01 - 4:04it was passed down; remembered:
-
4:04 - 4:07hit a hammer and hear its story.
-
4:08 - 4:09The world is getting noisier.
-
4:09 - 4:11We've gone from boomboxes
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4:12 - 4:16to Walkmen to portable CD players
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4:16 - 4:18to iPods
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4:18 - 4:20to any song we want, whenever we want it.
-
4:21 - 4:24We've gone from the four
television channels of my childhood -
4:24 - 4:27to the seeming infinity
of cable and streaming. -
4:27 - 4:32As technology moves us faster and faster
through time and space, -
4:32 - 4:35it seems to feel like story
is getting pushed out of the way, -
4:35 - 4:38I mean, literally pushed out
of the narrative. -
4:39 - 4:42But even as our engagement
with stories change, -
4:42 - 4:48or the trappings around it morph from book
to audio to Instagram to Snapchat, -
4:48 - 4:50we must remember our finger
beneath the words. -
4:50 - 4:53Remember that story,
regardless of the format, -
4:53 - 4:56has always taken us to places
we never thought we'd go, -
4:56 - 4:59introduced us to people
we never thought we'd meet -
4:59 - 5:02and shown us worlds
that we might have missed. -
5:03 - 5:07So as technology keeps moving
faster and faster, -
5:07 - 5:09I am good with something slower.
-
5:10 - 5:13My finger beneath the words
has led me to a life of writing books -
5:13 - 5:16for people of all ages,
-
5:16 - 5:18books meant to be read slowly,
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5:18 - 5:19to be savored.
-
5:20 - 5:24My love for looking deeply
and closely at the world, -
5:24 - 5:27for putting my whole self into it,
and by doing so, -
5:27 - 5:30seeing the many, many
possibilities of a narrative, -
5:30 - 5:32turned out to be a gift,
-
5:32 - 5:34because taking my sweet time
-
5:34 - 5:37taught me everything
I needed to know about writing. -
5:37 - 5:41And writing taught me everything
I needed to know about creating worlds -
5:41 - 5:44where people could be seen and heard,
-
5:44 - 5:48where their experiences
could be legitimized, -
5:48 - 5:51and where my story,
read or heard by another person, -
5:51 - 5:54inspired something in them
that became a connection between us, -
5:54 - 5:56a conversation.
-
5:56 - 5:59And isn't that what this is all about --
-
5:59 - 6:04finding a way, at the end of the day,
to not feel alone in this world, -
6:04 - 6:08and a way to feel like
we've changed it before we leave? -
6:08 - 6:11Stone to hammer, man to mummy,
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6:11 - 6:15idea to story --
and all of it, remembered. -
6:17 - 6:20Sometimes we read
to understand the future. -
6:20 - 6:23Sometimes we read to understand the past.
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6:23 - 6:27We read to get lost, to forget
the hard times we're living in, -
6:27 - 6:30and we read to remember
those who came before us, -
6:30 - 6:32who lived through something harder.
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6:33 - 6:35I write for those same reasons.
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6:36 - 6:40Before coming to Brooklyn, my family
lived in Greenville, South Carolina, -
6:40 - 6:43in a segregated neighborhood
called Nicholtown. -
6:44 - 6:46All of us there were
the descendants of a people -
6:46 - 6:49who had not been allowed
to learn to read or write. -
6:50 - 6:51Imagine that:
-
6:51 - 6:55the danger of understanding
how letters form words, -
6:55 - 6:58the danger of words themselves,
-
6:58 - 7:02the danger of a literate people
and their stories. -
7:04 - 7:07But against this backdrop
of being threatened with death -
7:07 - 7:09for holding onto a narrative,
-
7:09 - 7:11our stories didn't die,
-
7:11 - 7:15because there is yet another story
beneath that one. -
7:15 - 7:17And this is how it has always worked.
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7:17 - 7:19For as long as we've been communicating,
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7:19 - 7:21there's been the layering
to the narrative, -
7:21 - 7:25the stories beneath the stories
and the ones beneath those. -
7:25 - 7:29This is how story has and will
continue to survive. -
7:29 - 7:34As I began to connect the dots
that connected the way I learned to write -
7:34 - 7:35and the way I learned to read
-
7:35 - 7:38to an almost silenced people,
-
7:38 - 7:43I realized that my story was bigger
and older and deeper -
7:43 - 7:45than I would ever be.
-
7:45 - 7:48And because of that, it will continue.
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7:49 - 7:51Among these almost-silenced people
-
7:51 - 7:54there were the ones
who never learned to read. -
7:55 - 7:59Their descendants, now generations
out of enslavement, -
8:00 - 8:01if well-off enough,
-
8:01 - 8:04had gone on to college,
grad school, beyond. -
8:05 - 8:08Some, like my grandmother and my siblings,
seemed to be born reading, -
8:08 - 8:11as though history
stepped out of their way. -
8:12 - 8:15Some, like my mother, hitched onto
the Great Migration wagon -- -
8:15 - 8:18which was not actually a wagon --
-
8:18 - 8:20and kissed the South goodbye.
-
8:20 - 8:23But here is the story within that story:
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8:23 - 8:26those who left and those who stayed
-
8:26 - 8:28carried with them
the history of a narrative, -
8:28 - 8:33knew deeply that writing it down wasn't
the only way they could hold on to it, -
8:33 - 8:37knew they could sit on their porches
or their stoops at the end of a long day -
8:37 - 8:40and spin a slow tale for their children.
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8:40 - 8:45They knew they could sing their stories
through the thick heat of picking cotton -
8:45 - 8:46and harvesting tobacco,
-
8:46 - 8:50knew they could preach their stories
and sew them into quilts, -
8:50 - 8:54turn the most painful ones
into something laughable, -
8:54 - 8:57and through that laughter,
exhale the history a country -
8:57 - 8:59that tried again and again and again
-
9:00 - 9:01to steal their bodies,
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9:01 - 9:03their spirit
-
9:03 - 9:04and their story.
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9:06 - 9:10So as a child, I learned
to imagine an invisible finger -
9:10 - 9:13taking me from word to word,
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9:13 - 9:15from sentence to sentence,
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9:15 - 9:18from ignorance to understanding.
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9:19 - 9:22So as technology continues to speed ahead,
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9:22 - 9:24I continue to read slowly,
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9:26 - 9:30knowing that I am respecting
the author's work -
9:30 - 9:32and the story's lasting power.
-
9:32 - 9:36And I read slowly to drown out the noise
-
9:36 - 9:39and remember those who came before me,
-
9:39 - 9:46who were probably the first people
who finally learned to control fire -
9:46 - 9:48and circled their new power
-
9:49 - 9:53of flame and light and heat.
-
9:54 - 9:58And I read slowly to remember
the Selfish Giant, -
9:58 - 10:00how he finally tore that wall down
-
10:00 - 10:02and let the children run free
through his garden. -
10:03 - 10:07And I read slowly to pay homage
to my ancestors, -
10:07 - 10:10who were not allowed to read at all.
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10:10 - 10:13They, too, must have circled fires,
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10:13 - 10:16speaking softly of their dreams,
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10:16 - 10:19their hopes, their futures.
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10:20 - 10:25Each time we read, write or tell a story,
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10:25 - 10:27we step inside their circle,
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10:28 - 10:31and it remains unbroken.
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10:32 - 10:35And the power of story lives on.
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10:36 - 10:37Thank you.
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10:37 - 10:40(Applause)
- Title:
- What reading slowly taught me about writing
- Speaker:
- Jacqueline Woodson
- Description:
-
Reading slowly -- with her finger running beneath the words, even when she was taught not to -- has led Jacqueline Woodson to a life of writing books to be savored. In a lyrical talk, she invites us to slow down and appreciate stories that take us places we never thought we'd go and introduce us to people we never thought we'd meet. "Isn't that what this is all about -- finding a way, at the end of the day, to not feel alone in this world, and a way to feel like we've changed it before we leave?" she asks.
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDTalks
- Duration:
- 10:54
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for What reading slowly taught me about writing | ||
Oliver Friedman edited English subtitles for What reading slowly taught me about writing | ||
Brian Greene approved English subtitles for What reading slowly taught me about writing | ||
Brian Greene edited English subtitles for What reading slowly taught me about writing | ||
Camille Martínez accepted English subtitles for What reading slowly taught me about writing | ||
Camille Martínez edited English subtitles for What reading slowly taught me about writing | ||
Joseph Geni edited English subtitles for What reading slowly taught me about writing | ||
Joseph Geni edited English subtitles for What reading slowly taught me about writing |