2016-03-20 Alberto Manguel’s unquenchable Curiosity, Interview

Interview, Alberto Manguel by Michael Enright on the Sunday Edition, March 20, 2016

http://www.cbc.ca/radio/popup/audio/listen.html?autoPlay=true&clipIds=&mediaIds=2685567527&contentarea=radio&subsection1=radio1&subsection2=currentaffairs&subsection3=the_sunday_edition&contenttype=audio&title=2016/03/20/1.3497648-alberto-manguels-unquenchable-curiosity-&contentid=1.3497648

At  9:30

Q:  Have you ever met anyone who says or who seems to be not curious about anything?

A:   Of course.   Again our society blunts curiosity,  our education systems  try to smother the curiosity that is natural in children because society needs those children to become obedient citizens and also consumer.   The definition of consumer might be someone who is not curious but who accepts the temptation of the banal.   And of course, we all know people like that.

At 15:20

…  So let’s say through our actions we construct the consequences of our actions.

So there are no cruel punishments unless we are cruel to ourselves.    And all our actions derive from love, from excess of love, for instance excess of love of money  from not enough love, not enough love for our neighbours who we envy    And this vision of a loving and loved universe is, I think unique to Dante and extraordinarily powerful.

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http://www.cbc.ca/radio/thesundayedition/the-past-is-not-the-present-do-food-animals-have-rights-alberto-manguel-s-curious-mind-the-great-hunger-1.3497315/alberto-manguel-s-unquenchable-curiosity-1.3497648

One of the first questions a child asks is “why?” According to the writer Alberto Manguel, it is the most important question they will ever ask. It opens numberless possibilities to children, as it does to all of us. And the act of asking questions, he says, is far more important than getting answers.

The curious mind is one which is always asking “Why this and why that?” and revels in where this takes it. Manguel’s curious mind was cultivated early. He began reading from a very young age and his friends were found in the pages of books  in part because his family led a somewhat peripatetic life. 

Alberto Manguel is renowned as a prolific writer and reader; indeed, he’s a dedicated champion of serious reading. His own library contains more than 35,000 books, and he’s just been appointed chief librarian of the National Library of Argentina.

His latest passion is an examination of the perils and promise of curiosity. In fact, his latest book is called Curiosity. Each chapter poses an essential human question. “Why Do Things Happen?” “What Are We Doing Here?”  “Why Are We Different?”