anghara (anghara) wrote,
anghara
anghara

The grim and the glorious

And another Wiscon begins to fade into the sunset, as it were - these weekends VANISH, simply vanish, between running into a bunch of old friends I haven't seen for a year and meeting new folks whom I'll be running into NEXT year, no doubt, and going to or taking part in program items with fiercely intelligent and articulate people (as someone pointed out at the rasfc breakfast on Sunday morning, only at Wiscon can you go to an early-morning panel (8:30) on a Sunday of a convention and have people discussing aspects of Jungian psychology and it makes sense to everyone), and having pure unadulterated fun (this year's GoH speeches were a gem). I've already signed up for next year. Possibly a full report will follow when I get home and find the time to do one.

That's the glorious.

The grim... Well, I'm one of those, you know, WRITER folks. Articles like this freeze my marrow.

I write. I like to think people READ. And here, in this magic cocoon, in the glory that is Wiscon-world, it's easy to believe that. Reading an article like that one on the Monday morning, the tail end of the convention, is a cold shower of a reality check - THIS is the world I'll be going back to tomorrow morning, the world where "less than half" American adults still read for pleasure.

THe idea of burning books makes me shudder. The idea of burning books because *nobody wants them* makes me weep. I see all those word ghosts wisp out of the bonfires, tiny smoke-translucent things, and my heart clenches within me.

Words are what I live by. Wiscon makes me believe anew. Book burning makes me afraid.

From the grim to the glorious, as always.
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