美国国家公共电台 NPR What Can We Gain By Writing A Letter By Hand?

What Can We Gain By Writing A Letter By Hand?

GUY RAZ, HOST:

And that hat, by the way, could be especially useful if you're as busy as Lakshmi Pratury.

LAKSHMI PRATURY: I go back and forth¹ between the Bay Area and Bangalore.

RAZ: Lakshmi works² in the Bay Area a lot. But she's still got family back in India, where she runs a big conference every year.

How long is that flight?

PRATURY: Twenty-four hours.

RAZ: (Laughter) All right, OK.

PRATURY: Give or take (laughter). Give or take.

RAZ: It would be better if it was faster, wouldn't it?

PRATURY: I don't know. I know sometimes I enjoy my quiet time on the plane. For those 24 hours, I don't talk to anybody. Nobody can call me. I can't call anyone. And it sort of separates me from all the crazy rush, rush, rush, stuff³ that we do all the time.

RAZ: Another way Lakshmi likes to slow down, by writing letters.

PRATURY: As I write, I feel like there's an artwork happening on this piece of paper. Nobody else writes like that. It's nobody else's signature. It's only mine.

RAZ: Now, Lakshmi didn't always feel this way. Back when she was in college, her father would send her letters every week.

PRATURY: Oh, yeah, you know, he would mail them regularly to me. I mean, I lived in America. My dad lived in India. And every week he'd write a letter to me, I mean, without fail.

But I was in my busy life, working, et cetera. And I would see this letter and I'd go, OK, he wrote a letter. I'd just skim⁴ through it and put it away and - but never really read them.

RAZ: Yeah.

PRATURY: It was like, oh, OK, Dad. He writes every week. And someday I'll catch up with it.

RAZ: Lakshmi did eventually catch up with all those letters from her father. But it wasn't until many years later after he passed away. And that's when she came to really understand what they meant. Lakshmi explains more in her short TED⁵ Talk.

(SOUNDBITE OF TED TALK)

PRATURY: My father left me a legacy⁶ of his handwriting through letters and a notebook. In the last two years of his life, when he was sick, he filled a notebook with his thoughts about me. He wrote about my strengths, weaknesses and gentle suggestions for improvement⁷...

(LAUGHTER)

PRATURY: ...Quoting specific incidents and held a mirror to my life. After he died, I realized that no one writes to me anymore.

Handwriting is a disappearing art. I'm all for email and thinking while typing. But why give up old habits for new? Why can't we have letter writing and email exchange in our lives?

There are times when I want to trade all those years that I was too busy to sit with my dad and chat with him - and trade all those years for one hug. But too late - that's when I take out his letters. And I read them. And the paper touched his hand is in mine. And I feel connected to him.

So maybe we all need to leave our children with a value legacy and not a financial one - a value for things with a personal touch, an autograph book, a soul-searching letter. So what do I plan to leave for my son? My own notebook.

(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)

RAZ: Your talk is really kind of a parable⁸ for the lost art of writing by hand - right? - because we have to move so quickly - right? People send us emails and just expect to receive a response right away, very, very quickly.

PRATURY: Right, right.

RAZ: And yet, there's something lost about immediate⁹ responses. There's something that we lose when we don't have time to reflect on what it is we want to say and what meaning we want to give to the words that we commit to an email.

PRATURY: Yes. And also, there is something about just waiting. You know, it's painful. But also there is something absolutely beautiful about not knowing when that letter is going to come and that excitement when you receive it. I think when you get things too easy, too quick, your expectations become more.

You know, of course, I do think sometimes that I've been fed too much of Indian movies. So I have this sense of romance¹⁰, this sense of waiting and longing¹¹, et cetera. But I just feel there's something magical about it, to just wonder meanwhile - I wonder what that person is thinking. I wonder what's happening. Will I get this letter?

And by writing, it's just to show that I have taken the time to write to you, which is somehow very, very beautiful.

RAZ: Lakshmi Pratury, she's the CEO of INK Conferences. You can see her entire talk at ted.com.

1 forth   

adv.向前；向外，往外

参考例句：

• The wind moved the trees gently back and forth.风吹得树轻轻地来回摇晃。
• He gave forth a series of works in rapid succession.他很快连续发表了一系列的作品。

2 works   

n.作品，著作；工厂，活动部件，机件

参考例句：

• We expect writers to produce more and better works.我们期望作家们写出更多更好的作品。
• The novel is regarded as one of the classic works.这篇小说被公认为是最优秀的作品之一。

3 stuff   

n.原料，材料，东西；vt.填满；吃饱

参考例句：

• We could supply you with the stuff in the raw tomorrow.明天我们可以供应你原材料。
• He is not the stuff.他不是这个材料。

4 skim   

vt.撇(去)；掠过；浏览，略读；vi.浏览

参考例句：

• It took me an hour to skim the book.我费了一个小时把这本书草草地读了一遍。
• He tried to skim off the best players from the local school teams.他试图从当地学校的球队中选拔出一批最好的球员。

5 ted   

vt.翻晒，撒，撒开

参考例句：

• The invaders gut ted the village.侵略者把村中财物洗劫一空。
• She often teds the corn when it's sunny.天好的时候她就翻晒玉米。

6 legacy   

n.遗产，遗赠；先人(或过去)留下的东西

参考例句：

• They are the most precious cultural legacy our forefathers left.它们是我们祖先留下来的最宝贵的文化遗产。
• He thinks the legacy is a gift from the Gods.他认为这笔遗产是天赐之物。

7 improvement   

n.改进，增进；改进之处，改善的地方

参考例句：

• The doctor noticed a gradual improvement in his patient.医生注意到病人在逐渐恢复健康。
• I can detect signs of improvement in your thinking.我可以察觉出你思考问题方面的进步。

8 parable   

n.寓言，比喻

参考例句：

• This is an ancient parable.这是一个古老的寓言。
• The minister preached a sermon on the parable of the lost sheep.牧师讲道时用了亡羊的比喻。

9 immediate   

adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的

参考例句：

• His immediate neighbours felt it their duty to call.他的近邻认为他们有责任去拜访。
• We declared ourselves for the immediate convocation of the meeting.我们主张立即召开这个会议。

10 romance   

n.恋爱关系，浪漫气氛，爱情小说，传奇

参考例句：

• She wrote a romance about an artist's life in Tokyo.她写了一个关于一位艺术家在东京生活的浪漫故事。
• They tried to rekindle the flames of romance.他们试图重燃爱火。

11 longing   

n.（for）渴望

参考例句：

• Hearing the tune again sent waves of longing through her.再次听到那首曲子使她胸中充满了渴望。
• His heart burned with longing for revenge.他心中燃烧着急欲复仇的怒火。