After watching the videos (interviews and speech) of James Baldwin, I really got a chance to admire him and his piece, The Fire Next Time. I don’t know what it is, but there’s something about listening to the voice of a writer or watching a video of them in their natural habitat. The writing itself can tell a whole lot about a writer, but there’s something about hearing their voices, seeing how they’re dressed, if their hair is messy, how they talk, and their gestures, which make them easier to understand. After seeing the videos of James Baldwin, I could understand his text a lot more. I was able to put a face to name, a voice to a name. I mean, how many of you were expecting him to speak the way he did? A Harlem-born African American with somewhat of an English accent? I surely didn’t expect that.
I guess this is why I find it nice to put a face to name. You uncover so many secrets, you get to learn a bit about their personalities, strengths, and weaknesses. Yet, what I find even more important, is the fact that it can make you appreciate the work more. Not just in English class, but in other classes, we tend to get assigned these pieces of writing, which we know absolutely nothing about, snoring at our syllabi. The teachers, after studying these works for so long, are usually extremely excited to share these texts with us. But, there’s no context, really, but a paragraph long blurb that tries to sum up an entire human being. So what do we do? Well, in rare cases, most of the class reads it and the students start a discussion with questions about what they read. Most cases aren’t rare. So what do we really do? Maybe some of us read (which technically doesn’t really count as reading if you’re just smacking syllables together in your head and forget everything the second you’re done), while a majority of the class couldn’t get past the first phrase “Four score and seven years ago,” without Instagram-ing (is that even a word?) their feet or checking Facebook. Anyways, you get the point. It’s helpful to see and hear what you’re about to read. I know that watching actors or singers give an interview usually changes the way I view them. I guess if we get a chance to hear what they have to say, we will be able to understand their work more.
