Seeing Past Z: Nurturing the Imagination in a Fast-Forward World

by Beth Kephart

Overview

Impassioned and eloquent—reasons and inspirations for nurturing your child's creativity.

Kids today seem to be under more competitive pressure than ever, while studies show that reading, writing, and the arts in schools are suffering. Is there any place for imagination in kids' lives anymore? In a dog-eat-dog world, why dream things that aren't there?

In gorgeous prose and through personal stories, Beth Kephart resoundingly affirms the imagination as the heart of our ability to empathize with others, to appreciate the world, and to envision possibilities for the future. The star of her story is once again her son, Jeremy (as in her National Book Award-nominated A Slant of Sun), now fourteen years old—a child who at first resists storytelling, preferring more objective and orderly pursuits, but later leads a neighborhood book club/writing group and aspires to follow Steven Spielberg into moviemaking.

Embedded in the text and appendices are examples of how to inspire children to read, write, and dream.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780393342543
Publisher:	Norton, W. W. & Company, Inc.
Publication date:	06/17/2004
Pages:	254
Product dimensions:	5.00(w) x 8.00(h) x (d)

About the Author

Beth Kephart is the award-winning author of a memoir trilogy. She has written about writing and the imagination for the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Chicago Tribune, and Parenting. She lives in Devon, Pennsylvania.

Table of Contents

	Acknowledgments	XI
	Imagining Tomorrow	3
	I'll Trade You My Story for Your Story	7
	Tiny Golden Spark	11
	Legacies	17
	Guess Who	23
	Dimming the Lights	27
	The Things We'd Never Think Of	33
	Stars on the Ceiling	41
	The Velvet Beyond	49
	The Stuff of Memory	55
	Perseverance	63
	Reading Alone	67
	Writing It Down	75
	What Does It Matter?	79
	The First Summer Workshop	85
	Wherever They Are Going	95
	Interference	101
	Paying Attention to Process	111
	Surprise Endings	119
	A Few Like-Minded Souls	123
	The Little Critic	131
	A Community of Writers	141
	Prolific	149
	On Becoming a Compassionate Writer	157
	On His Own	167
	No More than That, No Less	171
	The Unbridled Imagination	177
	In the Director's Seat	183
	Postscript	191
	Appendix 1	193
	Appendix 2	225

Editorial Reviews

Beth Kephart's approach to fostering a child's innate imagination is similar to the wisdom of a subsistence hunter: finding, with quiet gratitude and with respect for the rhythms and the unexpected in life, the sustenance in everything-flesh, bone, heart, memory, even magic. Seeing Past Z is a moving, beautifully evoked reminder of what it means to be truly present as a parent, so that our children can someday leave us, whole and wholly themselves.”

Kate Moses

This is not just a how-to for parents who want to get their kids away from the TV and Game Boy. In her inimitable velvet prose, Beth Kephart reminds us how to nurture children's imaginations; in so doing, she nurtures the imagination of anyone who would pick up this book. If you love kids, or you love books, you will adore Seeing Past Z.”

Lauren F. Winner

As good parents we tend to think exhaustively about our children, even when we know that thinking is not enough. Beth Kephart illuminates how the stories we tell one another enable us to feel with-and for-our kids. We've been entrusted with the bright fires of imagination; words are our fuel. Thanks to Beth and her son Jeremy for making the soul sparks fly in my household once again.

Alyson Hagy

In our current culture of competitive parenting and hyper-competent superkids, Seeing Past Z is a subversive, brilliant, and deeply affecting account of one family's decision to step out of the mad race to achievement and onto a different path....Kephart offers her son the greatest gift a parent can bestow—her own abiding faith in him, just as he is. What a different world it would be if all parents read this bold, brave book and took its message to heart.”

Katrina Kenison

Give kids the freedom to be kids, says Kephart, in this delightful book that, like her A Slant of Sun, centers on, in vibrant, loving detail, her 14-year-old son, Jeremy. Let children discover their own passions and interests; guide, but don't force; prod, but don't push; and, most important, let their imaginations flourish. Kephart and her husband have resisted the pressure from today's society to get kids involved in heavy competition and early preparation for college, sports or music. Freed from self-consciousness and with his parents' gentle encouragement, Jeremy has dared to dream that he could be a mystery writer, a poet, a comedian, a filmmaker. Understandably, Kephart's approach has made her an outsider among many parents who believe she's hurting Jeremy and his future prospects. "In the scheme of some things, these parents are right," she concedes. "It's Darwin's world, after all...." But, she says, "I do believe that the push to win is threatening-even already eroding-this generation's happiness." To resist this "erosion," she began a reading and writing group for her son and his friends. These kids' bursting creativity astounded and vindicated her. In serene and sage prose, she concludes that unleashing youths' imagination can create well-rounded, stable, happier people, both in their generation and the one guiding them. (June) Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Publishers Weekly

Kephart argues for imagination over the pressures today's kids feel to excel in reading, writing, and arithmetic, citing as an example her son (first featured in her highly praised A Slant of Light). Copyright 2004 Reed Business Information.

Library Journal