Quite possibly the most ridiculous words to be callously tossed out of my eleven year old sister's mouth. They were said today, as me my mother and her walked out of the Monmouth County Public Library Howell Branch. We had gone there before my guitar lesson to get a book for a book report I have to do. I loaded up on books for the impending four-day-weekend, I checked out Hemingway's Old Man And The Sea, Asimov's Foundation, and Adams' Hitchhikers guide to the galaxy, and Restaurant at the end of the universe. My sister neglected to pick out any books and just sat in the library with a sour look on her face the whole time. My mom yelled at her on the way out about how she was stupid to close her mind off to new ideas like she did, to not even seek when knowledge was all around her waiting to be found. She said "But Mom I don't need to read, Im a writer." At that point I had to make a visible effort to keep from bursting into peals of incredulous laughter. She says she hates reading, but I don't think that's true.
Every writer I know was an avid reader. Reading and writing go hand in hand. I enjoy reading, and it increases my vocabulary making me a better noder, win-win situation! My mom says my sister needs to open her mind. My sister says her mind is open when she writes. I have to side with my mom on this one, reading opens your mind. Ideas don't just come out of the abyss. We are all, as Isaac Newton said, "Standing on the shoulders of giants." I believe all our ideas come from previous experiences, upon which we draw insight and knowledge from. If you're a writer, you need to read.