Annie Dillard, An American Childhood
Young children have no sense of wonder. They bewilder well, but few things surpass them. All of it is new to young children, after all, and equally gratuitous. Their parents pause at the unnecessary beauty of an ice storm coating the trees; the children look for something to throw. The children who tape colorful fall leaves to the schoolroom windows and walls are humoring the teacher. The busy teacher halts on her walk to school and stoops to pick up fine bright leaves to �show the children��but it is she, now in her sixties, who is increasingly stunned by the leaves, their brightness all so much trash that litters the gutter.
I suppose all is cleared up when we consider children, not as unillumined spectators who clap between movements, but as part of the concert.
4 replies on “A Criticism of Children”
I don’t know, Ruben. Ever read Hawthorne’s “Artist of the Beautiful?” I think Ms. Dillard would like it.
No, I’ve been almost entirely successful in avoiding Hawthorne.
Pity.
Oh, I don’t know. I read one story, which was all right; but obviously it didn’t draw me in for more.