That is all the National Parks are about. Use, but do no harm.
Wallace StegnerRead
Are you a reader? If you aren't a reader, you might as well forget trying to be a writer.
Interpretation
Reading is essential for becoming a successful writer.
This quote by Wallace Stegner emphasizes the importance of reading as a foundational skill for anyone aspiring to write. It suggests that without exposure to written works and an understanding of different styles and ideas through reading, one cannot develop the skills necessary to be an effective writer themselves.
In practice
In a writing workshop, to emphasize the importance of reading, I might say: 'Remember, as Wallace Stegner said, if you aren't a reader, forget about being a writer.'
That is all the National Parks are about. Use, but do no harm.
Touch. It is touch that is the deadliest enemy of chastity, loyalty, monogamy, gentility with its codes and conventions and restraints. By touch we are betrayed and betray others ... an accidental brushing of shoulders or touching of hands ... hands laid on shoulders in a gesture of comfort that lies like a thief, that takes, not gives, that wants, not offers, that awakes, not pacifies. When one flesh is waiting, there is electricity in the merest contact.
Hope was always out ahead of fact, possibility obscured the outlines of reality.
Young writers should be encouraged to write, and discouraged from thinking they are writers.
I was shaped by the west and have lived most of my life in it, and nothing would gratify me more than to see it in all its subregions and subcultures both prosperous and environmentally healthy, with a civilization to match its scenery.
Most things break, including hearts. The lessons of life amount not to wisdom, but to scar tissue and callus.
This assumption that the blue collar crowd is not supposed to read it, or a farmer in his overalls is not to read poetry, seems to be dangerous if not tragic.
Our global future depends on the willingness of every nation to invest in its people, especially women and children.
Persistent questioning and healthy inquisitiveness are the first requisite for acquiring learning of any kind.
I began going to juvenile prisons. And some of these kids face some very, very tough lives. How do they handle these lives? Do they even know that if their life is bad, that they're still OK? Do they know that? Do they know that someone is thinking the same way that they're thinking?
I tell my students that the single most powerful thing that we have in this country - something that literally harbors no dissent and no questioning - is the all-powerful elite narrative.
A lot of parents today are terrified that something they say to their children might make them 'feel bad.' But, hey, if they've done something wrong, they should feel bad. Kids with a sense of responsibility, not entitlement, who know when to experience gratitude and humility, will be better at navigating the social shoals of college.
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