>>Female presenter: Welcome. I'm delighted
to be here with Alice Walker. I've spent the
last couple of hours with her already and
I promise you, this will be a delightful session.
Pulitzer Prize winning author, poet, activist.
She grew up in Eatonton, Georgia, where, during
a time of great struggle for the black community
and lots of racism. So, I think it is no secret
that a lot of her inspiration has come from
that time in the world around her. We've been
talking about how she spent two years at Spellman
College, where she became very active in the
Civil Rights Movement and had the pleasure
and the fortune to meet Dr. Martin Luther
King, Jr. and hear the "I Have a Dream" speech
in person. Ms. Walker went later to Sarah
Lawrence, where she graduated and really honed
her writing skills, and more importantly,
it was at this time or during this time where
a lot of her writing became not just about
the world around her, but also about her personal
experiences. We're just delighted to have
her here today and those of you who got here
early enough, got a copy of her new book,
"Hard Times Require Furious Dancing," which
really, I think, is a catalog, I think, the
way they described it of her life, her challenges
and some of her struggles. And we're just
delighted to have her here to talk about some
of that, her book and her influences around
her. So, welcome.
>>Walker: Thank you.
[applause]
>>presenter: I have two housekeeping items.
First is technology related and that is cell
phones on silent or vibrate, please, and laptops
down. Anyone who works in my group also knows
when I have meetings, laptops are also down,
so it shouldn't be unfamiliar to you. Second
is also technology related. For those who
are on VC, video conference, you can submit
questions on the Dory page, which is up here,
goto Alice Walker, and then we have Belinda
here, in the audience, who will help go ahead
and ask some of those questions for you. For
those who are here in the room, in Tunis,
you can obviously queue up here in line where
the mic is when we get to go to Q&A. So, I
know there's lots of burning questions in
the room, but I have some of my own--
>>Walker: Good.
>>presenter: so I'm gonna start there. And
then we can move to the questions from the
group. So, Ms. Walker, you have your own blog
through Blogger. You also have your own YouTube
channel, Alice Walker Videos, so thank you
for being an avid Google user. We all thank
you for that.
[Walker laughs]
[clapping]
But, you've used that medium in a really powerful
way and I've heard you refer to it as "the
people's medium." So, can you talk a little
bit about how you've seen new media, or the
Internet, really change the way people can
use writing as a literary tool?
>>Walker: Well, I started, first of all, I'm
really happy to see you and it's really amazing
to be here. I work on a computer all the time.
I use Google all the time and I never think
of where it comes from.
[audience laughter]
So it's lovely to see all of your faces. I
started on a website on the day that Barack
Obama won the election and I'm not sure exactly
why I did it that way, but in case, I did
and so part of the reason was that I wasn't
permitted to use some of my poetry, my previously
published poetry, on the Internet. And I was
so annoyed that I decided to write new poetry
and to put it on the Internet first because
I wanted to go directly to people. You know
when you publish a book; it takes a whole
year, usually, for it to see the light of
day. You write it, you send it in, they keep
it and they do various things with it and
there's a whole program, but it takes a year
for it to come out. And by the end of the
year, you've forgotten why you wrote it,
[chuckles]
where you were, who you were, everything.
And so, a lot of the joy is lost and it just
seemed to me to be a wonderful thing, a great
idea, to publish directly on the Internet
so that people could see the poems. Because,
I don't know poets there are in the room,
apparently a lot, but when you write a poem,
the feeling is of instant of wanting to share
it because you, automatically I think, think
of poetry as medicine. And this is the medicine
that comes to you in that moment and you just
want somebody else to have it. So, in that
sense, the Internet is really wonderful and
I haven't missed the old way, although, as
I was mentioning earlier, what has happened
is that as soon as I put my work on the Internet,
then there appear these publishers who wanted
to publish it anyway.
>>presenter: Hmm.
>>Walker: So, it hasn't been a difficulty
of any sort. It's just been a pleasure.
>>presenter: It's helped. That's great.
>>Walker: Mmm-hmm.
>>presenter: Last year, you went to Gaza for
International Women's Day and you later wrote
"Overcoming Speechlessness," which was a book
not just about your time over there, but in
other places you've been around the world.
And in this book, you drew a lot of analogies
between slavery and the Civil Rights Movement
and what's happening today. Can you talk a
little bit about some of those analogies and
tell us a little more, what have we learned?
What haven't we learned as a society?
>>Walker: Well, the thing that struck me going
into Gaza, first of all, crossing through
the Rafah Gate in Egypt was interesting because
the Israelis were still bombing along the
border and it gave me a moment to really consider
my life. And I think that this is one of the
reasons we go to scary places. They help us
hone in on how we're living. So, when I got
into, going into Gaza on the bus, what struck
me was how much it reminded me of going into
segregated Georgia. So, it was actually like
going into my past and just being in that
situation where the, it was basically apartheid
where there's an apartheid system and the
Gazan's don't have rights; they can't even
leave their, that little strip. It was so
much like going back into the past and it
not only, our past in Georgia, Mississippi,
Alabama, Louisiana and Texas, but the past
of South Africa. And it just, it had a double
effect. Part of it was great horror and distress,
but it also felt comforting because I understood
that. Because I had grown up in an apartheid
system that people in those horrible situations
can also pull together and they can actually
be quite strong and they can develop some
layers of feeling that many people miss. And
for instance, we went to visit the women because
it was International Women's Day and we're
sitting in a little, little library room that
they had there, that hadn't been bombed, and
they were telling me about the children and
parents and uncles and everybody that they
had lost. And there was just such grief. And
one woman, she was mourning the death of her
daughter and she was holding a picture of
her daughter and she couldn't speak. She just
got close to my chair and I put my hand on
her arm. So, as we were telling these, I was
listening to these stories and feeling this
grief, at some point it just got so intense
that we realized, almost like in a body, that
there wasn't much we could do to help each
other. And somebody said, one of the women
said, "Let's go next door." And we put on
some music and we just started to dance and
we danced through tears and wailing and grief
and incredible loss and that was our response
to somehow be together to express all of that
that was really so awful, but in a way that
was not violent and a way that was revivifying
of the spirit.
>>presenter: That's very powerful. One of
the, when I watched you interview on Democracy
Now, you talked about the way to bring awareness
is really about just coming and going to see
for yourself. And that's possible for some
people, but not possible for everyone. So,
what are some of the other ways that you're
doing now just to bring awareness to some
of the global issues around human rights that
you care personally about?
>>Walker: Well, first of all, I think that
all travel is not physical. I feel that I
have spent many a day in the 18th century,
and many a week in the 12th century. I mean,
you can, I have a niece who was telling me
that she couldn't imagine what we had been
through and I was struck by that because,
to me, imagination is what takes us into all
the places that we can't otherwise visit.
So, I think that, when I was 13 years old,
my favorite book was Jane Eyre. And I read
Jane Eyre for, every year for I don't know
how long. I love it. I love Charlotte Bronte.
I love all, I love Thomas Hardy, and all those
writers who basically take your imagination
and you and you go there where they lead you
and you experience what is happening to the
people. And then, on the basis of what you
learn about what is happening to the people,
you act where you are. So, that's my understanding
of how there's no excuse ever for not some
kind of-
[clears throat]
some kind of movement because you can always
visit people. I think, even before I went
to Gaza, I mean, it's true; I like to personally
go and be there embodied as somebody that
the people can hug and I can hug them and
we can share a meal or try to find food-
[clears throat]
because sometimes there isn't any. But I also,
when I cannot do that, I try to keep an awareness
by reading, or by the Internet or by some
way because it's important for people not
to feel alone. The junta in Burma, Myanmar,
their program is to keep us from having contact
with Aung San Suu Kyi, so that when you're
in Burma, even to say her name is punishable
for the local people. But, as people who care
about democracy and who care about injustice,
we visit, we mentally we visit and we stand
with her. And there are all kinds of ways
of letting that be known and letting her feel
that actually, even if they don't let her
get her mail, and even if she can't have a
laptop. And that, it seems to me, is our duty
as human beings; not to let any other human
being that we know of suffer in silence behind
walls and darkness, like the man who just
won the Nobel Prize in China. I think that's
so wonderful, Liu Xiaobo is his, I don't,
maybe that's not the right pronunciation,
but you know who I mean. It's so wonderful
that he is acknowledged by other people outside
of China, who may never, like me, ever get
the pronunciation entirely right--
[presenter laughs]
but in some sense it doesn't matter because
what matters is that he know that he is not
alone as he tries to address the inequities
of China, as we do here, in this country.
>>presenter: I think that's really powerful,
particularly around acting where you are and
reading and finding out things about how to
be inspired. What are some of your sources
of inspirations? I think I read somewhere
that Zora Neale Hurston was your literary
foremother. How would you describe that?
>>Walker: Well, she's a literary foremother
of all of us and it was unbearable, really,
that she had given all of this beautiful work
to the world and nobody knew where she was
buried and nobody cared. And who are we if
we're like that? I just, I just am appalled.
I think that, it's interesting though, because
she actually was the kind of person who didn't
care where she was buried; she was really
that free. But aside from what she was like,
there is what we are like and what it means
to receive a gift and to say nothing; to have
no thank you for the person, no awareness
of how they lived or died. But my greatest
wisdom teacher was my mother and this was
because she was someone who was deeply rooted
in nature. She was, like most African Americans,
very indoctrinated into Christianity and was
the mother of the church. So, she had a very
strong role in keeping our church going, but
beyond that, she had a very strong Pagan streak,
which she inherited from her Cherokee ancestors
and her African ancestors, and probably even
her Irish and Scottish ancestors. So, she
was this woman who just radiated this faith
in the natural world and I loved that. And
in a way it has made me someone who cares
deeply about the Earth and who has written
more about the Earth, actually I think, than
about probably anything else.
>>presenter: Mm-hmm.
>>Walker: I think people get distracted when
you write fiction because they're so focused
on the humans and their story, but there's
always this story of nature and what the Earth
is saying and what the Earth is doing. So.
>>presenter: So, I wanna invite the audience
to come up and start to ask some questions.
As you queue up, just, there's a mic here
in the middle. Why don't we start with the
first, maybe Dory question so that the people
watching on video conference can get the benefit
of the first question and then maybe people
can line up behind Belinda.
>>Belinda: The first question, Ms. Walker,
from the Dory page is, "Alice, with a long
history of involvement with struggles for
liberation in the US, you have unique perspective
on our current moment. What is your frank
assessment of the Obama Administration and
the current political climate in the United
States?"
>>Walker: I think that Barack Obama is the
best that we could do now in terms of leadership,
but I think he is completely hobbled, maybe
not completely hobbled, but quite hobbled
by our recalcitrant Republican opposition.
And also, on the Democratic side, not nearly
enough boldness and courage and just standing
for what you believe in and not worrying so
much about your job. I think--
[applause]
Thank you. I think, I think the planet is
in for such a, well actually, the planet will
be fine because she will just sail along forever,
but we, as humans, are in the direst situation
humans have ever been in. We, we're losing
the planet. We're losing a place and we may
well become extinct and actually, would not
be a bad thing seen from the perspective of
the planet. And I, more and more, see life
from that perspective because I think we have
not acted in a way that shows we love the
Earth or that we deserve it. So, and also,
I know we care about our country, but in a
sense, the whole idea of separate countries
is obsolete and we should really only be thinking
constantly of the whole thing so that if you
have a huge flood somewhere, say in for instance,
Pakistan, you don't just shut it out of your
mind because it's way over there. Because
it's not way over there, it's in your house.
This is a, this is a collective house and
we should be thinking more and more like that.
And whatever gets in the way of the survival
of the planet, itself, we have to get rid
of it. It's our lives and I know we're not
used to thinking so much in this fashion,
but it will come to that because people will
see that in order for us to survive, we have
to change almost everything. We, we're losing
our top soil, we're losing our water and in
the cities the air is pretty much gone. So,
it calls for some very different responses
and this is going to mean a lot of rebalancing
within each of us. Those of us who are deeply
nonviolent, for instance, how is it, how,
what is our way in getting through this period?
Will we be able to actually save not just
our country, but the whole, the whole system,
the whole world system? And by that, I don't
mean political system, I mean rivers and oceans
and forests.
[pause]
[small laughter]
>>Belinda: Does anyone have a question?
>>Female member #1: I saw you speak in Oakland
last year, and after you returned from Gaza
and you inspired me to go to Gaza later that
year, so thank you for that. But that day
the moderator mentioned something you had
said about being taught, about the importance
of keeping records, and if you keep records
then no one can ever tell you that something
didn't happen. So, are the tools that we have
now, like Blogger and the Internet, keeping
enough records about things like Burma, like
Palestine? Can we do more? What, what do you
feel like that's still an issue today-- the
issue of keeping records?
>>Walker: I feel the biggest danger is too
much information. TMJ, or is it TM--
>>presenter: TMI
>>Walker: TMI.
[presenter laughs]
[laughter]
Well, TMJ would be "too much junk." But yeah,
I think, I think that there is so much information
that people don't know which records are worth
keeping, or where to keep them or how to keep
them. And that's a real problem. I don't think,
I don't, I think the mind was not meant to
have so much stuff stuffed into it so that
you just, it's like you're always ingesting,
but nothing is ever leaving and that's not
exactly healthy and it's not really saving
anything because you don't, often you don't
even know what you're saving. And, in, on
a personal level, I'm concerned about how
I will continue to save my own records because
until a couple of years ago, maybe three or
four years ago, I saved everything on paper
and then I gave all of that to Emory University
in Atlanta and so now it's in an archive.
And it's there and I like that. I like to
go there and I actually see these old notebooks
that I wrote in for decades; they're there.
But when I look at my computer, I have saved
emails, saved files and I'm not sure how you
save those things ultimately. I mean, the
computer itself seems to be about to crash--
[laughter]
and when it crashes, what happens to all of
that? What do I do with that? Do I send it
somewhere? Do I try to copy it? And I'm also
wondering whether, this is something I've
noticed from television watchers, which may
creep in to laptop users and I'm, of course,
one of those. But actually seeing something
or experiencing something on a screen is really
not the same thing as actually getting it.
It's more like just looking at something and
the information it just clicks in there. But
what changes us is the more visceral, the
more visceral connection to reality. And that
is what keeps us human, is the actual ability
to feel. In the film that I mentioned earlier,
that I was watching last night, The Most Dangerous
Man in America about Daniel Ellsberg. Part
of what's so chilling is that Nixon and Kissinger
and all these people showed no feeling. They
had no feeling. Nixon was saying to Kissinger
about Vietnam, "Well, I think we should just
nuke it." And Kissinger says, "Well, no, you
don't wanna do that because then the world
would think of you as a butcher." But not
about the people that you're nuking. So, the,
it seems to me the real struggle right now
is to retain the humanity that develops out
of real passion, out of real solidarity, out
of real love. I've been to places where I've
seen the people up against such a lot and
they're still clinging to being human beings.
They're still clinging to being people who
share, people who care, people who can dance,
people who will give you a recipe for something.
This is this is the crux because otherwise,
you run the risk of just having more and more
people who have no feeling whatsoever. And
the, there's a study by Martha Stout, who
went to Harvard. I don't think she's there,
but she's a psychologist and she has written
this wonderful book called The Sociopath Next
Door. And it talks about how 4 % of people
are actually sociopathic; they're born without
a conscious. Now, this is really something
to think about because we tend to think that
everybody has Buddha nature, however your
Buddha nature is, like Christ consciousness,
a love in your heart somewhere, but that's
not necessarily true. And then if that's not
necessarily true then what do you do with
that 4%? And then, do you start to augment
it by all the other people who are just resisting
any kind of feeling? So, it's really crucial
that the record-keeping that happens has passion,
it has integrity, it has roots, it has real
meaning. Its record keeping that you can also
start another world with because we're losing
this one. We need to have, we will have to
start a new one and so for that you really
do need all those things; courage, passion,
a lot of love.
>>presenter: I think you had a question.
>>Male member #2: Hi. Thank you for coming
here. I was wondering if you could pick a
poem in your book and maybe walk us through
it and talk to us about the inspiration behind
it.
>>Walker: Oh, dear.
[laughter]
>>presenter: You knew that was--
>>member #2: I could bring the book up if
you want.
>>Walker: Well, why don't you pick a poem
and tell me what page it's on and I'll see
what I can do.
>>member #2: Ok.
>>Walker: It's interesting, I find, I've been
writing now for decades and people who have
just read something, not not this book, cause
I did just finish this, but people who've
just read something will say, "Oh, well what
about Josie who went off and did something
with Samuel and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,"
and I'll think, "Who?"
[laughter]
But, ok, where are you?
>>member #2: Ok, I just opened it randomly.
Page 56, there's a poem called Love is That
Giant Bag.
>>Walker: Oh, yeah. Ok. All right. Well, this
one actually.
[reads]
"Love is that giant bag of everything
Into which we might disappear
Without a trace and still be found again.
Even the parent you thought was lost
Father, gone to Spirit, before you reach my
age.
I am your dream of me and more
And I will carry us, plucked
From love's abyss."
Ok. The thing about love is that it really
is indestructible, but you can think that
it's gone and so I'm saying, "Love is that
giant bag of everything into which we might
disappear without a trace and be found again.
Even the parent you thought was lost." And
where this connects with my life, is that
my father and I battled constantly when I
was growing up. Because, even though he understood
racism and fought against it his whole life,
he didn't have a clue about sexism, which
was so annoying.
[laughter]
I cannot tell you. So, we battled constantly
and deeply and it really harmed our relationship.
And yet, now I think of him with such tenderness,
such love and such emotion and so, in a sense,
it went into this big bag, lost for a long
time, but found again.
"And so I will carry us, plucked from love's
abyss."
Yes? Now, how about this one, though.
[presenter laughs]
[Walker laughs]
>>presenter: Keep going!
>>Walker: Now, this is about hatred. This
is about hatred and, hatred is something you
really have to work with because it is so
poisonous to you. It's not the other person.
One of the things you learn as you get older
and you have more experiences with hatred
and stuff, is that while you are suffering
with it and really, any kind of hatred is
suffering, you may notice that the person
you're hating is just having the best time.
[laughter]
They are just having a wonderful time. They
are happy. So, so, that's to teach you something
really important, which is that hatred is
totally not necessary. You must learn to get
rid of it because it basically hurts you.
So, this is called "Watching You Hold Your
Hatred."
[reads]
"Watching you hold your hatred for such a
long time
I wonder, isn't it slippery?
Might you not someday drop it on yourself?
I wonder, where does it sleep, if ever?
And where do you deposit it
While you feed your children
Or sit in the lap of the one who cherishes
you?
There is no graceful way
To carry hatred.
While hidden, it is everywhere."
[pause]
>>female member #3: Hi.
>>Walker: Hi.
>>member #3: Thank you very much for coming.
>>Walker: Mm-hmm.
>>member #3: You mentioned before that instead
of spending that year publishing your book,
you can just publish it right online and have
people read it right away. And it made me
think about how many times we tweet or we
post something on Facebook, and we have this
direct response. And I was just wondering
how you think that that changes us as creators
of art and also just as humans who are becoming
digital narcissists who constantly need this
feedback?
>>Walker: I don't accept feedback.
>>member #3: Ok.
[laughter]
>>presenter: Very good.
>>Walker: I, I don't see that it's, it's necessary,
really.
>>member #3: That works.
[laughter]
And I tell you, it's part of it, I write on
the Internet the same way I wrote when I was
not writing on the Internet. When you write
a book of poetry, you don't get feedback.
You just write the book and send it to your
agent and your agent sends it to the publisher.
You don't get any feedback for a year. And
I think that works for me.
[laughter]
But you know something, excuse me. I am curious
about how people deal with that because I
don't think it's good for you.
>>member #3: That's sort of my idea [inaudible
>>Walker: It's not.
>>member #3: [inaudible]
>>Walker: No, no, no, no.
>>member #3: [inaudible]
>>Walker: Exactly. So, let me, let me affirm
what you're feeling.
[laughter]
And, and really to tell all of you who are
writing, whatever you're writing, and you
have that little thing. They have that little
thing where you can get comments, just shut
that off--
[laughter]
because, because you, you are on a journey
and you're trying to grow and six months later,
you can turn the thing on and see what they
thought, but you don't need to know the minute
you have finished something because you're
not finished with it. You're actually still,
you notice how many times you go back sometimes
to change something, or correct something
and editing something? So, trust more that
you will get it right just the way it needs
to be without the outside commentary. And
wait. Learn to really wait, like six months
is not that long, or even three months, but
don't right away feel that you have to know
what some stranger in God knows where is going
to say. I mean, what do they know about what
you're doing in your essence? Yes.
>>female member #4: Thank you so much for
coming. I recently joined a women's writing
circle and I was wondering if you could give
some advice on. I'm not a great writer, I'm
not a good writer at all, actually, but I
just would love to get some advice. What type
of writing exercises would you recommend or
ways to go about writing? I mean, I think
you're what you just said about feedback is
really, really important, but anything more
to that would be great.
>>Walker: Well, feedback from me is different.
[laughter]
Because I want you to just grow perfectly
as yourself. Period. End of story. I think
you should just do your, do your reading.
Writing, actually, is more about reading.
It's not about exercises. It's about reading,
reading, reading, reading everything and everybody
starting in, I dunno, the whichever century
catches your fancy. And just fall completely
in love with how words sound and how sentences
make you feel and how paragraphs ring, you
know? I mean, get one of those two page long
sentences of Faulkner, for instance.
[laughter]
And just go all over the country with it.
And, and just fall in love with what it is
you're doing. I think that's the best way.
>>member #4: Thank you.
>>Walker: Mm-hmm.
>>Male member #5: Hi. So, I had a question
about the MFA programs and the number of [inaudible]
we have today. So, what do you see the increasing
number of MFA programs, the number of writers
who go and study, would that result in us
having more appreciation for character driven
literary fiction in the age where there's
a lot more fiction that's produced?
>>Walker: I didn't really understand what
you said.
>>member #5: So there is most of these MFA
programs kind of encourage character driven
literary fiction and writers who pass out
of MFA programs write literary fiction.
>>Walker: Yes.
>>member #5: So, would you think that a lot
of writers doing that would create more of
an appreciation for character driven literary
fiction?
>>Walker: I don't know. I, what comes to mind
is though, is this wonderful little tale from
Flannery O'Connor, who said, someone said
to her, "Well, do you think more writers should,
let's see, do you think universities, academic
life kills writers?" And she said, "Unfortunately,
not enough of them."
[laughter]
So, I don't know how that fits in, but, but
I've always loved it. Which is to say that
if you really want to write passionate living
words, its better, I think, just to pay attention
to what you're trying to express rather than
any group thing. That's what I mean. I love,
I was always someone who loved school and
I loved being in college, but at the moment
when I could've gotten a grant to go on to
graduate school and study literature in this
way, in writing courses and writing courses
that have long names and everything. My poetry
teacher, who I went to to get a recommendation
to get this grant, just refused. She said,
"Oh, no. I'm not going to sign you away to
graduate school because it will hurt you."
And I have to say, I was so annoyed and angry
with her, but she was right. So, this may
or may not be anywhere near the answer that
you need, but it's basically to say stay close
to the story itself that you want to write.
Don't let it bleed away into a course or some
organized fiction thing. Don't do that. And,
for some reason, I keep thinking of Arundhati
Roy's The God of Small Things, which is such
a brilliant book. And I just met her last,
a few, some months ago, I was in India and
hanging out with her and seeing that this
spirit, this spirit that wrote this book stayed
deliberately close to, in this case, Kerala,
in India and the sights and the sounds and
the languages of the people and the stories
and the other encouragement that she needed
to write this would've come from her own solitary
study of literature, not from any kind of
conglomerate.
>>member #5: Thank you.
[pause]
>>presenter: So, while Dolores is queuing
up I had a, I did have a question. So we've
talked about the Internet and how people are
using it to get information and probably,
Google is responsible for giving us so much
information, but the other thing that's happening
is that people are really using it to advance
causes.
>>Walker: Mm-hmm.
>>presenter: So, there isn't anyone in this
room who probably hasn't supported a cause
on Facebook or supported a cause and followed
something on Twitter. And as an activist,
do you really see this as a great medium to
really advance different causes, or is it
a distraction? Is it really helping, or is
it not helping?
>>Walker: Oh, I think it's helping a lot.
I like it. I use AVAAZ the, I don't know what
you call it, but it's an organization that
can send a million signatures to representatives
of wherever they're doing something awful--
[presenter laughs]
which is like, everywhere, but they can do
this in a concerted way, quickly. We can also,
through them, send money to Haiti, to Pakistan,
to wherever people need help. I love this
function of the Internet and I actually love,
very much, being able to Google anything.
I mean, that's, that's fabulous.
>>presenter: Great. We're glad to hear that.
>>Walker: Oh, no. I'm not saying that it's
a bad thing, I'm just saying that like everything,
you have to learn how to use it because if
you just use it in a way that is just the
information without the heart, you can disfigure
yourself. You can become people who just know
facts and figures, but you basically, emotionally
you don't grow. You just know a lot of facts
and figures. And we see where that leads.
>>Female member #6: Hi. I loved your story
of when you were in Gaza and you, you just
danced with the women there and I imagine
that took a lot of courage, but there was
a naturalness to it and in the preface, you
talk about how you learned how to dance through
the slings and arrows of life and became an
optimist. And I guess I'm curious about what
advice you have for the rest of us who are
also going through the slings and arrows and
addressing human nature to have that same
attitude. And I, actually, I'm curious about
the actual dancing part, too.
[laughter]
>>Walker: Yeah, well, we launched this book
Hard Times Require Furious Dancing a couple
weekends ago at Busboys & Poets in D.C. and
the man who owns it, Andy Shallal, emptied
the restaurant/bookstore of all the furniture
and tables and everything and people did,
and just had a DJ, actually, who played a
lot of Al Green and James Brown and Bob Marley
and people just danced until they felt a lot
better about themselves and everything is
happening. I've, I think that I was in South
Africa last month and part of the medicine
of that trip was to talk about how they now
have a president who's just very disturbing
for them and a very big step backward in terms
of leadership and vision. And the people are
feeling a lot of despair, especially the women.
And I was saying that part of what we can
do is start to circle in each other's homes
and let, call up seven or eight of your friends
and just have a circle without an agenda,
but something that expresses your deepest
concerns about the state of your country,
the state of your world and the world, and
that this might be a way for the concentric
circles to finally join and it would be a
very organic way of transforming the planet.
This is not like trying to do it by doing
it with Internet. It's similar, but where
the Internet is like this wonderful, I'm an
Aquarian, so the Internet is perfect for me.
I mean, this circling is, too, but the idea
of thoughts just going through the air and
transforming things, that's just fabulous.
It's what I've been waiting for, but also
grounding so that you don't become just, as
Aquarians can often be, in the air. You need
to be in the ground, you need to be really
solid. And this way of circling with other
people can help that a lot and also helps
us to feel more at home with our ideas and
with our fears if we can do that with other
people.
>>presenter: Belinda, do you want to ask another
question from the Dory page?
>>Belinda: Question, "For Colored Girls Who
Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf"
has been adapted for screen by Tyler Perry.
Do you see a tension between the benefits
of bringing works to a larger, mainstream
audience in the loss of artistic control and/or
message?" And I think we can make parallels
to The Color Purple, too, I imagine, with
this question.
>>Walker: There's always a danger in creativity
and sharing it with people because the level
of understanding differs. People often just
have no idea what you're trying to do. But
I think it's worth the risk if you are intent
on transforming society. And I think that
in Ntozake Shange's play, which she wrote
I think 30-something years ago, was very much
about transforming society and having people
really look at what was happening to these
seven women of color. So, I hope that the
movie is well done and I've seen some of Tyler
Perry's movies and some I like a lot; some,
not so much. But some, I think, are really
very wonderful and warm and thoughtful. And
I'm hoping that he can bring all of that to
this classic work by Shange.
>>presenter: Yeah, sure.
>>Female member #7: Hello. Thank you for coming.
I, as you talk about the different places
where you've travelled to as an activist,
I was wondering, how do you balance the desire
to change the world and transform the world
and bring healing to different places, but
also being culturally sensitive to what's
going on in that particular place and not
imposing something that may not necessarily
be welcomed where you travel?
>>Walker: Mm-hmm. Well, I'm very small, so--
[laughter]
I doubt that I could impose very much. My
intent, also, is just to be there as a witness
and as a witness to report what it is that
I witnessed. The transformation of the world,
I understand, is a group effort. I don't see
myself doing it by myself. I think that as
a writer, and as someone whose parents and
grandparents suffered a great deal so that
I could be educated, is part of my duty, really,
to use that education to see that other people
are more happy. I mean that rather is more
like for me, I would like people to be free
and I want them to really enjoy life. There
will always be people in cultures who don't
believe that and who don't want to hear it
and who would rather say that you were there
to destroy them. And I don't know what you
can do about those people. They do exist.
Now, for instance, with the work that I did
with female genital mutilation, which took,
I worked on that issue for about a decade
and often, African men and a lot of it was
in Africa, but this is not something that
just happens in Africa, but the men would
say things like, "Oh, no. This doesn't happen
at all. You're delusional." And a lot of the
women couldn't say anything because it was
a taboo in their culture and they could be
killed. So, what do you do? If you have a
feeling of love and concern for 130 million
women who've been mutilated, what do you do?
You're having people who can't even talk about
it in their own culture. What is our responsibility?
And then I think about my own life and the
lives of my ancestors in Georgia, Mississippi,
Alabama, Louisiana, when they were enslaved
and they had no rights. They could not speak
about their own enslavement. They, so they
really, their lives depended on people coming
from other parts of the country to help them.
And, in fact, we would not have been un-enslaved
if we had not had a lot of help from people
from the North. So, I factor that in that
often, when people cannot speak for themselves,
they depend on us to speak for them and then
that leads us to the higher understanding
that we're not separate. If I speak for you,
it's because I'm speaking for me. I, it's
what Gandhi said. Someone said to Gandhi,
"Well why do you do all this stuff you do
for other people?" And he drew himself up,
he was a short man, but he drew himself up
and he said, "Madam, I don't do it for anyone
else. I do it for myself." And that's what
you do it for. The idea that people are separate
is really our greatest delusion. We're not.
I mean, it's just, when you, when you begin
to see that you're not separate the idea that
people think they're separate is so amusing.
It's like, for instance, if you tell, if I
tell you a story, I won't do it because it
would be very gruesome and I don't wanna do
that to the people here, but I could tell
you a story that would be really gruesome
and you would feel it in your body. That's
how much we are the same. You're one, but
we just, we get to running around, separately,
we think. But we're really one expression.
>>member #7: Thank you.
>>Walker: You're welcome.
[laughter]
>>presenter: So, we maybe have time for one
more question, either from the audience or
from the Dory page before we have to wrap
up. Go ahead.
>>Belinda: I have my personal--
>>presenter: Sure, you can ask own Belinda.
>>Belinda: Ms. Walker, we talked before this
session. I shared with you that I grew up
in Mississippi, especially during the height
of the Civil Rights Movement as a child and
I witnessed all the things that, that, that
are chronicled in history books now. And one
thing that I wanted to bring up is that we
talk about the heavyweights, Martin Luther
King, Medgar Evers, just a list of names,
but one of my heroes is Fannie, Fannie Lou
Hamer and she was a woman that just came from
a sharecropper background and she had no formal
education, but she was really powerful when
she really stood up to the Democratic National
Committee in 1964. And so, and I think about
her and I think about my grandmother and different
women who really had no voice to a certain
degree; that lack of formal education and
confidence. But yet, it's like they're the
unsung heroes. Like, when Rosa Parks was out
there, when Martin Luther King led the Birmingham
Boycott, it was the maids who, did not go
to work and sacrifice and then I think about
the times we live in now and where are those
unsung heroes? I know I see the Tea Party
Movement and I see like moveon.org, even though
that's an online space, but sometimes it worries
me that where are those unsung heroes who
really make a difference? Do they, do they
still exist today? Do you see that in your
travels? Am I just jaded and cynical? Thank
you.
>>Walker: Well, I was gonna say, who do you
think is getting all these other people out
of bed? Those are the unsung heroes; the mothers,
fathers, whoever is doing the work of getting
the rest of the world moving, but you don't
see them and you don't acknowledge them. Those
are the unsung heroes. Me, for instance, cause
I was saying to you my mother was such a heroic
woman, but I'm the only person who wrote about
her. But that doesn't mean that she didn't
exist and she's not existing now. They're
all the people in the world who make it their
business to see that the rest of us are sitting
in this room. We're all sitting here and somewhere,
behind each of us, there are these unsung
people who made it possible for us to be here.
That's who gets it done.
>>Belinda: Right. And I also think that it's
reflective in many of your works. I talked
to you about the book you wrote, Meridian,
and that main character and a lot of the things
that I saw with her, reminded me of people
that I observed when I was a child or grew
up with. So, I appreciate you and other artists
who think about just regular, everyday people,
just getting up doing what they have to do
and no one ever acknowledges or thanks them.
>>Walker: Yes. Well, lemme just say a few
things. One is that the reason I wrote Meridian
was because I understood that revolutionaries
are often flawed; they're badly flawed. But
that is not the reason you should not follow
them. I mean, you should follow them precisely
because they are flawed. And so, this book
is actually looking at the ways in which all
of these revolutionaries in the 60s in Mississippi
had had something really awry and they kept
going. And this is the reality of people.
We make the changes in society, whether we
call ourselves revolutionaries or radicals
or just irritants, but we make the changes
that transform society. And a few of us will
then be sung. And that's, we accept that.
We have to. I was gonna try an adopt an African
child and then I realized that I probably
would not be the best parent at this point,
so I adopted an orphanage--
[laughter]
and there are 87 children in this orphanage
and the woman who runs it and I were looking
at pictures of the children, and she just
said matter of factly, she said, "You know,
only one in two of these children will actually
develop into what we are imagining." Only
one in two of them, and the rest? Who knows
what will become of them? But that's it. I
mean, the rest of them will go on into their
lives; they will do whatever it is. One or
two will become Mandela or Obama or [inaudible]
or somebody that we envision, or Wangari Maathai,
or [inaudible]. They will become what, that's
not what happens to most of us and yet, I
think part of what we do have to do in our
literature and our life is to affirm the person
who causes the growth of the other person.
There's a Cherokee poet, Marilou Awiakta,
who says something like, "Every flower has
two parts of it. One is the flower that you
see and then there's the root where the mother
is often the root that you don't see." That's
the root; the father that you don't see and
you just see the flower.
>>Belinda: Thank you very much.
>>Walker: Mm-hmm.
>>presenter: Thank you. I think I speak for
everyone when I say that that last comment
was very powerful and will give us all something
to think about as we think about our roles,
whether we're sung or whether we're unsung,
and which one matters to us. I've heard you
say once or twice, that you don't have expectations
and you prefer to live in the moment.
>>Walker: Mm-hmm.
>>presenter: I can say that I hope you enjoyed
this moment and I hope that you all enjoyed
this moment with Ms. Walker, so thank you
for coming.
>>Walker: Mm-hmm. Thank you. Thank you. Thank
you.
[applause]
