Reading things that are relevant to the facts of your life is of limited value. The facts are, after all, only the facts, and the yearning passionate part of you will not be met there. That is why reading ourselves as a fiction as well as fact is so liberating. The wider we read the freer we become.
Interpretation
Reading fiction allows us to explore deeper emotions and experiences beyond our factual lives.
Jeanette Winterson highlights the importance of engaging with literature that expands our understanding of ourselves and the world. While facts are essential, they do not capture the full essence of our human experience. By reading both fiction and facts, we can liberate ourselves and gain a broader perspective, encouraging personal growth and deeper emotional connections.
In practice
In a book club discussion about the importance of diverse literature.
What is remembered is not a deed in stone but a metaphor. Meta = above. Pheren = to carry. That which is carried above the literalness of life. A way of thinking that avoids the problems of gravity. The word won't let me down. The single word that can release me from all that unuttered weight.
I have a list of titles that I leave at the [library] desk, because they are bound to be written some day, and it's best to be ahead of the queue.
Woolf wanted to say dangerous things in Orlando but she did not want to say them in the missionary position.
In that house, you will find my heart. You must break in, Henri, and get it back for me.' Was she mad? We had been talking figuratively. Her heart was in her body like mine. I tried to explain this to her, but she took my hand and put it against her chest. Feel for yourself.
History is a string full of knots, the best you can do is admire it, and maybe tie it up a bit more. History is a hammock for swinging and a game for playing.
I cannot assume you will understand me. It is just as likely that as I invent what I want to say, you will invent what you want to hear. Some story we must have. Stray words on crumpled paper. A weak signal into the outer space of each other. The probability of seperate worlds meeting is very small. The lure is immense. We send starships. We fall in love
Our youth should also be educated with music and physical education.
The aim of totalitarian education has never been to instill convictions but to destroy the capacity to form any.
People don't know how to listen, and it's not their fault. In school, we learn how to read, we learn how to write - but nobody teaches you how to listen.
Teach your daughters, teach your granddaughters, everybody has to have something that they're good at where they can earn a living.
I think that what we need to do is say, 'Reading is going to really affect your life.' You take a black man who doesn't have a job, but you say to him, 'Look, you can make a difference in your child's life, just by reading to him for 30 minutes a day.' That's what I would like to do.
Intense study of the Bible will keep any writer from being vulgar, in point of style.
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