November 19, 2009
The gritty
This is not my favorite setting to talk in. I think it would be much more rewarding for all of us if we could sit around and have a little taste and, in a very informal way, get down to the “nitty.” Then maybe later on, we could get down to the “gritty.” That’s the only way to talk about things, about life, about people. I don’t know who devised in the institutions of learning that we should have straight-back chairs, or have architecture that is very rigid and very formal. Whoever devised this system (and I suspect it’s mostly western Europeans) had no great compassion for the art of learning. You can’t learn anything under these conditions. They’re not conducive to learning. The greatest institutions I’ve attended have been somebody’s house, or sometimes in a kitchen, when a few people get around the table and start yakking. Sometimes it’s being out at the corner on some street. Sometimes it’s been in a bar. These are the kinds of atmospheres that people normally sit around and exchange ideas in.
—Charles White, lecture at Columbia University, February 10, 1975
(From the book I’m editing.)
I immediately thought of this.
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