I just received an e-mail from my book editor and noticed her tagline had a quote from C.S. Lewis: “We read to know we are not alone.”
For sure, but if you think about it, prior to that, we write to know we are not alone. When we write, we’re talking to someone, right? A letter is specifically TO someone, but a blog, manifesto, book, graffiti? Writing. Writing with the desire to connect. Even some of the highest profile anti-social people like the Unabomber weren’t really anti-social. He wrote. To you. To me. To anyone who would listen. Yes, he wrote with deadly anger, but he wanted us to know him. He craved witness to his life, his beliefs. If a person can’t engage someone in love, do they attempt to engage them in anger? As long as they’re still wanting to engage, can it be changed to love? Here’s a Newsroom piece we published in our magazine 10 years ago. With today’s news, I got to wondering this morning if …