To my right, my copy of Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice lies open on page 57.
To my left, my own brown leather journal sits with my own personal writings currently hidden.
In front of me, a channel is playing Dead Poets Society- a movie speaking on the importance of peoples writing and words, along with their ability to impact people.
I've always loved words. I love listening to people speak, how they talk, what they're saying. I love reading poetry, stories, prose. I love lyrics, plays, musicals. I love seeing all the ways that words can be strung together to say something... to say anything.
I've just started reading Pride and Prejudice. I got a set of Austen's famous novels from my brother for Christmas, and 57 pages in I can already tell that I really like it. In all honesty, I haven't really read many classical novels such as P&P-so the change in language style is very interesting to me. Usually, I tend to find simplicity in communication beautiful- small and simple statements with big and complex impacts. But I'm finding that with the classical literature and the much more formal style of writing, is just as beautiful. In high school, I read a book for my AP Literature and Composition class called Tess of the D'Uberville's written by Thomas Hardy. Hardy writes in the same style as Austen, so I continuously am comparing my experiences with the two. I'm enjoying finding commentary from the authors hidden between paragraphs that the audience is meant to connect with- I'm relating sometimes consciously or subconsciously- either way... I'm finding myself not feeling so distant from these stories from years past. It's a beautiful realization that these words and these stories have lived through decades upon decades of people and literary trends- the words I'm learning to love were loved far before I was a thought, and will be
As for my own writing, I've been rather quiet. My words have been muffled these past few months due to a complete lack of connection to my own self. I've been basically on auto pilot since probably October. Reading through my entries of the summer, I've learned a lot about my own style and what I find important or satisfying with writing. I enjoy rhythm and simplicity, as I stated earlier. But I also want to challenge myself this year to try new things- new styles, new words.
Dead Poet's Society is new to me, old to everyone else, but all around extremely profound. I find the fact that with just the simple introduction to the power of words, an entire group of people found a new found confidence that they never would have seen before. This movie also highlights one of my favorite aspects of words- performance. Speaking in front of other people, especially to entertain, to me is something that is so breathtakingly beautiful that I can hardly piece words together that will be enough to give it half as much meaning as it deserves. Passion is an intoxicating emotion and the fact that we can give it away through our words? It's something that I just can't begin to comprehend. I don't really want to question, though. Clearly for years it's worked with no objections, so who am I to try and crack the code.
I'm surrounded by words and I'm filled with hope that this year I'll be able to read, listen, and create more of them.
