The most important tribute any human being can pay to a poem or a piece of prose he or she really loves is to learn it by heart. Not by brain, by heart; the expression is vital.
George SteinerRead
To starve a child of the spell of the story, of the canter of the poem, oral or written, is a kind of living burial. It is to immure him in emptiness.
Interpretation
Stories and poetry are essential for a child's development; depriving them of these experiences stifles their growth.
In this quote, George Steiner emphasizes the vital role that storytelling and poetry play in a child's life. He suggests that to withhold these forms of expression and imagination from a child is akin to burying them alive, as it deprives them of the richness and vibrancy that literature offers, leading to a sense of emptiness and stunted emotional and intellectual growth.
In practice
During a parent-teacher meeting, a teacher could quote this to emphasize the importance of reading to children at home.
The most important tribute any human being can pay to a poem or a piece of prose he or she really loves is to learn it by heart. Not by brain, by heart; the expression is vital.
Every language is a world. Without translation, we would inhabit parishes bordering on silence.
I have every reason to believe that an individual man or woman fluent in several tongues seduces, possesses, remembers differently according to his or her use of the relevant language.
It took 10 months for me to learn to tie a lace; I must have howled with rage and frustration. But one day I could tie my laces. That no one can take from you. I profoundly distrust the pedagogy of ease.
The letter kills the spirit. The written text is mute in the face of responding challenge. It does not admit of inward growth and correction. Text subverts the absolutely vital role of memory.
Books are in no hurry. An act of creation is in no hurry; it reads us, it privileges us infinitely. The notion that it is the occasion for our cleverness fills me with baffled bitterness and anger.
We need all hands on deck, and that means clearing hurdles for women and girls as they navigate careers in science, technology, engineering, and math.
You have got to keep autistic children engaged with the world. You cannot let them tune out.
I went to a bookstore to try to find a book. The bottom line is, it all comes by trial and error. It was scary and exciting at first you don't know what to expect. But once you look into your child's eyes, you forget about that.
When I write, I'm still imagining a kid reading it on paper. I read e-books when I travel, but in general I still prefer holding an old-fashioned book in my hands. There's a special, tactile experience.
School has become the world religion of a modernized proletariat, and makes futile promises of salvation to the poor of the technological age.
The appeal of reading, she thought, lay in its indifference: there was something undeferring about literature. Books did not care who was reading them or whether one read them or not. All readers were equal, herself included. Literature, she thought, is a commonwealth; letters a republic.
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