From: Robin Smith <robinsmith59>
Date: Fri, 23 Jul 2004 21:54:59 -0500

 From Dean Schneider. I'm writing from my wife's address:

In response to Nancy (and to Monica from last week): I agree that story is why we read, but isn't reading more than just a vehicle for story? Katherine Paterson once said that "the book is almost the last refuge of reflection -- the final outpost of wisdom." We read for story of course, but while we are reading, something else is happening, too: our capacities to exist in the solitude of our own minds and to reflect upon what we read are being nurtured. If reading is only for story, I'd worry about how it stacks up against movies and tv. And I worry about the frenetic, distracted nature of our culture. Will people in the near future get off their cell phones or away from their computers and televisions long enough to be able to give sustained attention to books? Perhaps the hope for reading lies in its reflective nature, its requirement of quiet. Reading may offer something not available in our culture at large: a refuge for reflection, a time to detach oneself from frenetic activity and get involved in, absorbed by, a story. Not just to watch a story as a spectator in a movie theater or a living room, but to be absorbed in the way only reading words seems to encourage. Besides story, this reflectiveness, this ability to have a bit of solitude in one's life, is a gift reading offers.


Dean Schneider Ensworth School Nashville, Tennessee robinsmith59 at comcast.net
Received on Fri 23 Jul 2004 09:54:59 PM CDT