I want to talk today about how reading can change our lives and about the limits of that change. I want to talk to you about how reading can give us a shareable world of powerful human connection. But also about how that connection is always partial. How reading is ultimately a lonely, idiosyncratic undertaking.
Danas želim da govorim o tome kako čitanje može da nam promeni život, kao i o granicama te promene. Želim da vam govorim o tome kako čitanje može da nam podari zajednički svet snažne ljudske povezanosti. Međutim, i o tome kako je ta veza uvek delimična. Kako je čitanje, naposletku, usamljen, individualan poduhvat.
The writer who changed my life was the great African American novelist James Baldwin. When I was growing up in Western Michigan in the 1980s, there weren't many Asian American writers interested in social change. And so I think I turned to James Baldwin as a way to fill this void, as a way to feel racially conscious. But perhaps because I knew I wasn't myself African American, I also felt challenged and indicted by his words. Especially these words: "There are liberals who have all the proper attitudes, but no real convictions. When the chips are down and you somehow expect them to deliver, they are somehow not there." They are somehow not there. I took those words very literally. Where should I put myself?
Pisac koji mi je promenio život je veliki afričkoamerički romanopisac Džejms Boldvin. Dok sam odrastala u zapadnom Mičigenu tokom 1980-ih, nije bilo mnogo azijskoameričkih pisaca zainteresovanih za društvene promene. Zato mislim da sam se okrenula Džejmsu Boldvinu kako bih ispunila prazninu, kako bih bila rasno osvešćena. Međutim, možda zato što sam znala da nisam Afroamerikanka, njegove reči su me izazivale i osuđivale. Naročito ove reči: „Postoje liberali sa potpuno ispravnim stavovima, ali bez stvarnih ubeđenja. Kada karte padnu na sto i nekako se ponadate se da će da deluju, oni se nekako izgube.“ Nekako se izgube. Ove sam reči shvatila krajnje bukvalno. Gde da se smestim?
I went to the Mississippi Delta, one of the poorest regions in the United States. This is a place shaped by a powerful history. In the 1960s, African Americans risked their lives to fight for education, to fight for the right to vote. I wanted to be a part of that change, to help young teenagers graduate and go to college. When I got to the Mississippi Delta, it was a place that was still poor, still segregated, still dramatically in need of change.
Otišla sam u Deltu Misisipija, jednu od najsiromašnijih oblasti u Sjedinjenim Državama. To su mesto oblikovale jake sile istorije. Tokom 1960-ih, Afroamerikanci su rizikovali živote da bi se izborili za obrazovanje, da bi se izborili za pravo glasa. Želela sam da budem deo te promene, da pomognem tinejdžerima da maturiraju i da se upišu na fakultet. Kada sam stigla u Deltu Misisipija, mesto je i dalje bilo siromašno, i dalje rasno podeljeno, i dalje je čeznulo za promenom.
My school, where I was placed, had no library, no guidance counselor, but it did have a police officer. Half the teachers were substitutes and when students got into fights, the school would send them to the local county jail.
Moja škola, u koju sam smeštena, nije imala biblioteku, nije imala pedagoga, ali je imala policajca. Polovina nastavnika su bili zamene, a kada bi se đaci potukli, škola ih je slala u lokalni okružni pritvor.
This is the school where I met Patrick. He was 15 and held back twice, he was in the eighth grade. He was quiet, introspective, like he was always in deep thought. And he hated seeing other people fight. I saw him once jump between two girls when they got into a fight and he got himself knocked to the ground. Patrick had just one problem. He wouldn't come to school. He said that sometimes school was just too depressing because people were always fighting and teachers were quitting. And also, his mother worked two jobs and was just too tired to make him come. So I made it my job to get him to come to school. And because I was crazy and 22 and zealously optimistic, my strategy was just to show up at his house and say, "Hey, why don't you come to school?" And this strategy actually worked, he started to come to school every day. And he started to flourish in my class. He was writing poetry, he was reading books. He was coming to school every day.
Ovo je škola u kojoj sam upoznala Patrika. Imao je 15 godina i dva puta je ponavljao, pohađao je osmi razred. Bio je tih, introspektivan, kao da je uvek duboko zamišljen. I mrzeo je da gleda druge ljude kako se svađaju. Videla sam ga jednom kako upada između dve devojke koje su se potukle, i oboren je na zemlju zbog toga. Patrik je imao samo jedan problem. Nije dolazio u školu. Rekao je da ga škola ponekad prosto suviše deprimira jer se ljudi stalno tuku, a nastavnici daju otkaz. A i njegova majka je radila dva posla i prosto je bila suviše umorna da ga natera da dođe. Pa je to postala moja obaveza da ga navedem da dođe u školu. Kako sam bila luda 22-godišnjakinja i žarki optimista, strategija mi je bila samo da se pojavim kod njega kući i kažem: „Hej, zašto ne bi došao u školu?“ A ova strategija je zapravo delovala, počeo je svakodnevno da dolazi u školu. I počeo je da blista na mom času. Pisao je poeziju, čitao knjige. Dolazio je u školu svakodnevno.
Around the same time that I had figured out how to connect to Patrick, I got into law school at Harvard. I once again faced this question, where should I put myself, where do I put my body? And I thought to myself that the Mississippi Delta was a place where people with money, people with opportunity, those people leave. And the people who stay behind are the people who don't have the chance to leave. I didn't want to be a person who left. I wanted to be a person who stayed. On the other hand, I was lonely and tired. And so I convinced myself that I could do more change on a larger scale if I had a prestigious law degree. So I left.
Otprilike u isto vreme kad sam shvatila kako da se povežem s Patrikom, primljena sam na pravo na Harvardu. Još jednom sam se suočila s pitanjem na koje mesto da se stavim, na koje mesto da stavim svoje telo? I pomislila sam u sebi kako je Delta Misisipija mesto na kom ljudi sa novcem, ljudi koji imaju šanse, da ti ljudi odlaze. A ljudi koji ostaju su ljudi koji nemaju šansu da odu. Nisam želela da budem osoba koja je otišla. Želela sam da budem osoba koja je ostala. S druge strane, bila sam usamljena i umorna. Pa sam ubedila samu sebe da mogu da donesem veće promene, većeg obima ako steknem prestižnu pravnu diplomu. Pa sam otišla.
Three years later, when I was about to graduate from law school, my friend called me and told me that Patrick had got into a fight and killed someone. I was devastated. Part of me didn't believe it, but part of me also knew that it was true. I flew down to see Patrick. I visited him in jail. And he told me that it was true. That he had killed someone. And he didn't want to talk more about it. I asked him what had happened with school and he said that he had dropped out the year after I left. And then he wanted to tell me something else. He looked down and he said that he had had a baby daughter who was just born. And he felt like he had let her down. That was it, our conversation was rushed and awkward.
Tri godine kasnije, kada je trebalo da diplomiram pravo, nazvao me je prijatelj i rekao mi je da se Patrik potukao s nekim i da je ubio nekoga. Bila sam razorena. Deo mene nije verovao u to, ali deo mene je takođe znao da je to istina. Odletela sam da vidim Patrika. Posetila sam ga u zatvoru. I rekao mi je da to jeste istina. Da je ubio nekoga. I nije želeo više da govori o tome. Upitala sam ga šta se desilo sa školom, a on je odgovorio da se ispisao godinu dana nakon što sam otišla. A potom je želeo da mi kaže još nešto. Pogledao je u pod i rekao da ima kćerkicu koja se tek rodila. I da oseća kako ju je izneverio. To je bilo to, naš razgovor je bio zbrzan i nezgrapan.
When I stepped outside the jail, a voice inside me said, "Come back. If you don't come back now, you'll never come back." So I graduated from law school and I went back. I went back to see Patrick, I went back to see if I could help him with his legal case. And this time, when I saw him a second time, I thought I had this great idea, I said, "Hey, Patrick, why don't you write a letter to your daughter, so that you can keep her on your mind?" And I handed him a pen and a piece of paper, and he started to write.
Kada sam zakoračila iz zatvora, glas u meni je govorio: „Vrati se, ako se sad ne vratiš, nikad se više nećeš vratiti.“ Pa sam diplomirala pravo i vratila se. Otišla sam da posetim Patrika, vratila sam se da vidim da li mogu da mu pomognem u pravnom smislu. A ovaj put, kad sam ga videla drugi put, pomislila sam kako imam sjajnu ideju, rekla sam: „Hej, Patriče, zašto ne napišeš pismo svojoj kćerci kako bi ti bila na pameti?“ I dodala sam mu olovku i parče papira, a on je počeo da piše.
But when I saw the paper that he handed back to me, I was shocked. I didn't recognize his handwriting, he had made simple spelling mistakes. And I thought to myself that as a teacher, I knew that a student could dramatically improve in a very quick amount of time, but I never thought that a student could dramatically regress. What even pained me more, was seeing what he had written to his daughter. He had written, "I'm sorry for my mistakes, I'm sorry for not being there for you." And this was all he felt he had to say to her. And I asked myself how can I convince him that he has more to say, parts of himself that he doesn't need to apologize for. I wanted him to feel that he had something worthwhile to share with his daughter.
Međutim, kad sam ugledala papir koji mi je vratio, bila sam zapanjena. Nisam prepoznala njegov rukopis, pravio je proste pravopisne greške. I pomislila sam u sebi kao nastavnik, znala sam da đak može drastično da napreduje za veoma kratko vreme, ali nikad mi nije palo na pamet da đak može drastično da nazaduje. A dodatno me je zabolelo ono što je napisao kćerci. Napisao je: „Žao mi je zbog mojih grešaka, žao mi je što ne mogu da budem uz tebe.“ A ovo je sve što je smatrao da ima da joj kaže. I zapitala sam se kako da ga ubedim da ima više da kaže, o delovima sebe zbog kojih ne mora da se izvinjava. Želela sam da oseti da ima nešto vredno deljenja sa svojom kćerkom.
For every day the next seven months, I visited him and brought books. My tote bag became a little library. I brought James Baldwin, I brought Walt Whitman, C.S. Lewis. I brought guidebooks to trees, to birds, and what would become his favorite book, the dictionary. On some days, we would sit for hours in silence, both of us reading. And on other days, we would read together, we would read poetry.
Svakog dana narednih sedam meseci, posećivala sam ga i donosila knjige. Moj ceger je postao malena biblioteka. Donosila sam mu Džejmsa Boldvina, donosila sam Volta Vitmana, K. S. Luisa. Donosila sam vodiče za drveće, ptice i knjigu koja će mu postati omiljena, rečnik. Nekih dana, sedeli bismo satima u tišini, oboje čitajući. Drugih dana bismo čitali zajedno, čitali bismo poeziju.
We started by reading haikus, hundreds of haikus, a deceptively simple masterpiece. And I would ask him, "Share with me your favorite haikus." And some of them are quite funny. So there's this by Issa: "Don't worry, spiders, I keep house casually." And this: "Napped half the day, no one punished me!" And this gorgeous one, which is about the first day of snow falling, "Deer licking first frost from each other's coats." There's something mysterious and gorgeous just about the way a poem looks. The empty space is as important as the words themselves.
Započeli smo čitajući haikue, na stotine haikua, varljivo prosta remek-dela. I zatražila bih: „Podeli sa mnom omiljene haikue.“ A neki od njih su prilično smešni. Ovaj je od Ise: „Ne brinite se, pauci, održavam kuću nemarno.“ I ovaj: „Dremao sam pola dana, niko me nije kaznio!“ I ovaj prelepi, koji je o prvom snegu: „Jeleni ližu prvi mraz jedan drugom s krzna.“ Ima nešto tajanstveno i očaravajuće u samom izgledu poezije. Prazan prostor je jednako važan kao i same reči.
We read this poem by W.S. Merwin, which he wrote after he saw his wife working in the garden and realized that they would spend the rest of their lives together. "Let me imagine that we will come again when we want to and it will be spring We will be no older than we ever were The worn griefs will have eased like the early cloud through which morning slowly comes to itself" I asked Patrick what his favorite line was, and he said, "We will be no older than we ever were." He said it reminded him of a place where time just stops, where time doesn't matter anymore. And I asked him if he had a place like that, where time lasts forever. And he said, "My mother." When you read a poem alongside someone else, the poem changes in meaning. Because it becomes personal to that person, becomes personal to you.
Čitali smo ovu pesmu od V. S. Mervina, koju je napisao nakon što je ugledao suprugu kako radi u bašti i kada je shvatio da će da provedu ostatak života zajedno. „Dozvoli da zamislim da ćemo opet biti tu kad poželimo i da biće proleće. Nećemo da budemo stariji nego što smo ikad bili. Izlizani bol će da popusti poput ranog oblaka kroz kojeg jutro polako dolazi sebi." Upitala sam Patrika koji mu je omiljeni stih, a on je rekao: „Nećemo da budemo stariji nego što smo ikad bili.“ Rekao je kako ga podseća na mesto na kom vreme prosto stoji, na kom vreme više nije važno. I upitala sam ga da li on ima neko slično mesto na kom vreme traje zauvek. A on je rekao: „Moja majka.“ Kada čitate pesmu s nekim drugim, pesma promeni smisao. Jer postaje lična za tu osobu, postaje lična za vas.
We then read books, we read so many books, we read the memoir of Frederick Douglass, an American slave who taught himself to read and write and who escaped to freedom because of his literacy. I had grown up thinking of Frederick Douglass as a hero and I thought of this story as one of uplift and hope. But this book put Patrick in a kind of panic. He fixated on a story Douglass told of how, over Christmas, masters give slaves gin as a way to prove to them that they can't handle freedom. Because slaves would be stumbling on the fields. Patrick said he related to this. He said that there are people in jail who, like slaves, don't want to think about their condition, because it's too painful. Too painful to think about the past, too painful to think about how far we have to go.
Potom smo čitali knjige, pročitali smo toliko knjiga, pročitali smo memoare Frederika Daglasa, američkog roba koji je samog sebe naučio da čita i piše i koji se domogao slobode zahvaljujući svojoj pismenosti. Odrastala sam smatrajući Frederika Daglasa herojem i ovu priču sam shvatala kao optimističnu i punu nade. Međutim, njegova knjiga je uspaničila Patrika. Opterećivala ga je priča koju je Daglas ispričao o tome kako su za vreme Božića gospodari davali robovima džin kako bi im dokazali da ne mogu da podnesu slobodu. Jer bi se robovi teturali po poljima. Patrik je rekao kako se pronalazi u tome. Rekao je kako postoje ljudi u zatvoru koji, poput robova, ne žele da razmišljaju o svom usudu jer je suviše bolan. Suviše je bolno misliti na prošlost, suviše je bolno misliti o tome koliko još vremena preostaje.
His favorite line was this line: "Anything, no matter what, to get rid of thinking! It was this everlasting thinking of my condition that tormented me." Patrick said that Douglass was brave to write, to keep thinking. But Patrick would never know how much he seemed like Douglass to me. How he kept reading, even though it put him in a panic. He finished the book before I did, reading it in a concrete stairway with no light.
Omiljena rečenica mu je bila sledeća: „Bilo šta, šta god, samo da se otarasim razmišljanja! Trajno razmišljanje o mom usudu me je mučilo.“ Patrik je rekao kako je Daglas bio hrabar jer je pisao i nastavio da razmišlja. Međutim, Patrik nikada neće saznati koliko me je podsećao na Daglasa. Jer je nastavio da čita, iako je zbog toga bio uspaničen. Pročitao je knjigu pre mene, čitajući je na betonskom stepeništu bez svetla.
And then we went on to read one of my favorite books, Marilynne Robinson's "Gilead," which is an extended letter from a father to his son. He loved this line: "I'm writing this in part to tell you that if you ever wonder what you've done in your life ... you have been God's grace to me, a miracle, something more than a miracle."
A onda smo pročitali jednu od mojih omiljenih knjiga, „Galad“ od Merilin Robinson, koji je prošireno pismo oca sinu. Svidela mu se ova rečenica: „Pišem delimično da ti kažem da, ako se ikad zapitaš šta si postigao u životu [...] za mene si bio božja milost, čudo, nešto više od čuda.“
Something about this language, its love, its longing, its voice, rekindled Patrick's desire to write. And he would fill notebooks upon notebooks with letters to his daughter. In these beautiful, intricate letters, he would imagine him and his daughter going canoeing down the Mississippi river. He would imagine them finding a mountain stream with perfectly clear water. As I watched Patrick write, I thought to myself, and I now ask all of you, how many of you have written a letter to somebody you feel you have let down? It is just much easier to put those people out of your mind. But Patrick showed up every day, facing his daughter, holding himself accountable to her, word by word with intense concentration.
Nešto u vezi s ovim jezikom, ljubav, čežnja, njegov glas, probudili su u Patriku želju da piše. I ispisivao je svesku za sveskom pismima za svoju kćerku. U ovim prelepim, detaljnim pismima, zamišljao je sebe i kćerku kako u kanuima plove niz reku Misisipi. Zamišljao je kako pronalaze planinski potok sa savršeno bistrom vodom. Dok sam posmatrala Patrika kako piše, pomislila sam u sebi, a sada pitam sve vas koliko vas je napisalo pismo nekome za koga ste osećali da ste ga izneverili? Prosto je mnogo lakše otarasiti se svih tih ljudi iz glave. Međutim, Patrik je svakodnevno bio prisutan, suočavajući se sa kćerkom, pozivajući se na odgovornost pred njom, reč po reč, intenzivnom usredsređenošću.
I wanted in my own life to put myself at risk in that way. Because that risk reveals the strength of one's heart. Let me take a step back and just ask an uncomfortable question. Who am I to tell this story, as in this Patrick story? Patrick's the one who lived with this pain and I have never been hungry a day in my life. I thought about this question a lot, but what I want to say is that this story is not just about Patrick. It's about us, it's about the inequality between us. The world of plenty that Patrick and his parents and his grandparents have been shut out of. In this story, I represent that world of plenty. And in telling this story, I didn't want to hide myself. Hide the power that I do have.
I sama sam želela u svom životu da rizikujem na taj način. Jer taj rizik otkriva snagu nečijeg srca. Dozvolite za trenutak da odstupim i samo da vam postavim neprijatno pitanje. Ko sam ja da pričam ovu priču, u smislu Patrikove priče? Patrik je taj koji je živeo s ovim bolom, a ja u životu ni dana nisam gladovala. Mnogo sam razmišljala o ovom pitanju, ali želim da kažem da ova priča nije samo o Patriku. Ova priča je o nama, o nejednakosti među nama. Svet izobilja iz kog su Patrik, njegovi roditelji i njegovi baka i deka bili isključeni. U ovoj priči, ja predstavljam taj svet izobilja. A pripovedajući je, nisam želela da se skrivam. Da skrivam moć koju imam.
In telling this story, I wanted to expose that power and then to ask, how do we diminish the distance between us? Reading is one way to close that distance. It gives us a quiet universe that we can share together, that we can share in equally.
Pričajući ovu priču, želela sam da razotkrijem tu moć i da onda pitam kako da umanjimo razdaljine među nama. Čitanje je jedan od načina da se premosti ta razdaljina. Pruža nam tihi svemir koji možemo da delimo zajedno, koji možemo da delimo jednako.
You're probably wondering now what happened to Patrick. Did reading save his life? It did and it didn't. When Patrick got out of prison, his journey was excruciating. Employers turned him away because of his record, his best friend, his mother, died at age 43 from heart disease and diabetes. He's been homeless, he's been hungry.
Verovatno se sad pitate šta se desilo sa Patrikom. Da li mu je čitanje spasilo život? I jeste i nije. Kada je Patrik izašao iz zatvora, njegov put je bio iscrpljujući. Poslodavci su ga odbijali zbog njegovog dosijea, njegov najbolji prijatelj, njegova majka, umrla je sa 43 godine od srčane bolesti i dijabetesa. Bio je beskućnik, bio je gladan.
So people say a lot of things about reading that feel exaggerated to me. Being literate didn't stop him form being discriminated against. It didn't stop his mother from dying. So what can reading do? I have a few answers to end with today.
Dakle, ljudi govore razne stvari o čitanju koje se meni čine preteranim. Pismenost nije sprečila da ga diskriminišu. Nije sprečila smrt njegove majke. Dakle, šta čitanjem postižemo? Imam nekoliko odgovora kojima ću danas da završim.
Reading charged his inner life with mystery, with imagination, with beauty. Reading gave him images that gave him joy: mountain, ocean, deer, frost. Words that taste of a free, natural world. Reading gave him a language for what he had lost. How precious are these lines from the poet Derek Walcott? Patrick memorized this poem. "Days that I have held, days that I have lost, days that outgrow, like daughters, my harboring arms."
Čitanje je obogatilo njegov unutrašnji život tajanstvenošću, maštom, lepotom. Čitanje mu je podarilo slike koje su ga veselile: planine, okeane, jelene, mraz. Reči koje imaju ukus slobode prirodnog sveta. Čitanje mu je podarilo jezik za ono što je izgubio. Koliko su dragoceni ovi stihovi od pesnika Dereka Volkota? Patrik je napamet naučio ovu pesmu. „Dani koje sam grlio, dani koje sam izgubio, dani koji su prerasli, poput kćerki, moje brižne ruke.“
Reading taught him his own courage. Remember that he kept reading Frederick Douglass, even though it was painful. He kept being conscious, even though being conscious hurts. Reading is a form of thinking, that's why it's difficult to read because we have to think. And Patrick chose to think, rather than to not think. And last, reading gave him a language to speak to his daughter. Reading inspired him to want to write. The link between reading and writing is so powerful. When we begin to read, we begin to find the words. And he found the words to imagine the two of them together. He found the words to tell her how much he loved her.
Čitanje ga je podučilo ličnoj hrabrosti. Setite se da je nastavio da čita Frederika Dagalsa, iako je bilo bolno. Nastavio je da bude svestan, iako svesnost boli. Čitanje je oblik razmišljanja, zato je teško čitati jer moramo da razmišljamo. A Patrik je odabrao da misli, a ne da ne misli. I, konačno, čitanje mu je podarilo jezik da razgovara sa svojom kćerkom. Čitanje ga je inspirisalo da piše. Veza između čitanja i pisanja je toliko moćna. Kada počnemo da čitamo, počinjemo da nalazimo reči. A on je pronašao reči da zamisli njih dvoje zajedno. Pronašao je reči da joj kaže koliko je voli.
Reading also changed our relationship with each other. It gave us an occasion for intimacy, to see beyond our points of view. And reading took an unequal relationship and gave us a momentary equality. When you meet somebody as a reader, you meet him for the first time, newly, freshly. There is no way you can know what his favorite line will be. What memories and private griefs he has. And you face the ultimate privacy of his inner life. And then you start to wonder, "Well, what is my inner life made of? What do I have that's worthwhile to share with another?"
Čitanje je takođe izmenilo naš odnos. Pružilo nam je priliku za prisnost, da vidimo izvan naših tačaka gledišta. I čitanje je ukinulo nejednakost i pružilo nam trenutnu jednakost. Kada upoznate nekog kao čitaoca, upoznajete ga prvi put, na nov, svež način. Ne postoji način da znate koja će da mu bude omiljena rečenica. Kakva sećanja i lični bol nosi. I suočavate se sa krajnjom privatnošću njegovog unutrašnjeg života. A onda počinjete da se pitate: „Pa, od čega je sačinjen moj unutrašnji život? Šta ja to posedujem što je vredno deljenja s drugima?“
I want to close on some of my favorite lines from Patrick's letters to his daughter. "The river is shadowy in some places but the light shines through the cracks of trees ... On some branches hang plenty of mulberries. You stretch your arm straight out to grab some." And this lovely letter, where he writes, "Close your eyes and listen to the sounds of the words. I know this poem by heart and I would like you to know it, too."
Želim da završim nekim od meni omiljenih rečenica iz Patrikovih pisama njegovoj kćerci. „Reka je senovita na nekim mestima, ali svetlost prosijava kroz pukotine drveća [...] Sa nekih grana visi obilje dudinja. Ispružiš skroz ruke da zgrabiš neke.“ I ovo ljupko pismo u kom piše: „Zatvori oči i oslušni zvuk reči. Ovu pesmu znam napamet i želeo bih da je znaš i ti.“
Thank you so much everyone.
Hvala vam svima.
(Applause)
(Aplauz)