There's a lot to absorb here. I followed most of it, though I had trouble focusing on folktakes and the relation between Akan and English. Your autobiographical reflection are interesting, makes me think about what influenced me positively and negatively--what you call a sentimental education. My mother has always read several books a week, not the same as I do, but she was always a reader, and I was a fanatical reader since early childhood. I'd even bring a bag of books with me to summer camp. I don't think I identify with as many things as you do, but I do remember some instances of writers who had an impact on me because their mentality though not life circumstances seemed just like mine ... This was the impact Richard Wright had on me as a teenager, for example. I never had the slightest interest in fairy tales or folktales or folk wisdom or religion. My childhood influences were literature--fiction, biography, science; television--The Twilight Zone, and I suppose some movies, though I don't remember which except for one I saw in high school--NOTHING BUT A MAN, which made me angry at racial oppression because I already hated people being treated like that. There are two constants in my reception of everything--my mind or emotions have to be stimulated, I hate just being entertained. You've got to feed my mind or emotions, or else you've got to leave me alone.
Ralph, the important thing is to have been exposed to these imagined worlds from early on. That is what expands our imagination. I was lucky to also be exposed to folktales and fairytales, many of which I also regaled my children with. But in the end it is what you are now that really matters, not what you happen to have been as a child. So, just keep reading. . .
Really interesting and original analysis!
Thanks, Delphine!
There's a lot to absorb here. I followed most of it, though I had trouble focusing on folktakes and the relation between Akan and English. Your autobiographical reflection are interesting, makes me think about what influenced me positively and negatively--what you call a sentimental education. My mother has always read several books a week, not the same as I do, but she was always a reader, and I was a fanatical reader since early childhood. I'd even bring a bag of books with me to summer camp. I don't think I identify with as many things as you do, but I do remember some instances of writers who had an impact on me because their mentality though not life circumstances seemed just like mine ... This was the impact Richard Wright had on me as a teenager, for example. I never had the slightest interest in fairy tales or folktales or folk wisdom or religion. My childhood influences were literature--fiction, biography, science; television--The Twilight Zone, and I suppose some movies, though I don't remember which except for one I saw in high school--NOTHING BUT A MAN, which made me angry at racial oppression because I already hated people being treated like that. There are two constants in my reception of everything--my mind or emotions have to be stimulated, I hate just being entertained. You've got to feed my mind or emotions, or else you've got to leave me alone.
Ralph, the important thing is to have been exposed to these imagined worlds from early on. That is what expands our imagination. I was lucky to also be exposed to folktales and fairytales, many of which I also regaled my children with. But in the end it is what you are now that really matters, not what you happen to have been as a child. So, just keep reading. . .