#499: The Alphabet Is An Abolitionist

The power of reading and the various feelings of a first kiss

Hey Loyal Readers. Tomorrow, summer school ends, and I’ll finally have a few weeks off to rest, reflect, and celebrate Article Club’s 500th issue, coming next week.

Before launching into today’s issue, I have three quick things for you:

1️⃣ 🎉🥳 Come celebrate Article Club’s 500th issue! We’re meeting up in Oakland at Room 389 next Thurs, June 26, beginning at 5:30 pm. Get your free ticket here.

2️⃣ 🙋🏽👋🏻 If you’re newish here: Say hi at our Article Club Roll Call. Who are you, why did you sign up for Article Club, what do you like so far, what hopes do you have?

3️⃣ 🗞️📖 Next week, I might highlight a few of the best articles of the last 10 years. Do you have a favorite? Recommend yours here.

Thank you for sharing. Also, if you have ideas about how to improve the experience of online reading, I’m all ears. (It’s a recent big interest of mine.)

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All right, let’s get to this week’s issue. Some weeks (like last week), the articles flow easily. I do my regular reading, plenty of great articles come my way, and the issue practically publishes itself. Then there are weeks like this week, where no matter how much I look, no great articles emerge. (I blame the multiple crises and other shenanigans of the world, which are crowding out creativity and beautiful prose.)

When the articles are slim pickings, I go on Turbo Mode. Going on Turbo Mode means excavating every conceivable literary journal and article collection on the Internet and patiently looking for gems. Who here knows about Agni? or Barrelhouse? or Black Warrior Review? Extra points if you do!

I’m happy to say, after some toil, Turbo Mode yielded two brilliant pieces I would have otherwise not found. The lead article, “How I Learned to Read,” by Alexis M. Wright, is a magnificent lyrical essay on the beauty, power, and danger of the act of reading. If reading about reading isn’t your thing, I’ve also included “Never Thirteen,” by Lee Martin, a coming-of-age piece about a boy and his first love. I’m confident they’re both worth your time and spirit.

Hope you enjoy this week’s issue and hope you have a great weekend ahead. I’ll see you next Thursday for Issue #500.

1️⃣ How I Learned To Read: An Abecedarian Primer

Part of why I still love doing Article Club after all these years is that I become acquainted with writers who make words do magical things. Last week, it was Saint Trey W. This week, it’s Alexis M. Wright. There are plenty of how-I-learned-to-read memoirs out there, no doubt. But I haven’t read a better one for a long time. Here’s an excerpt from her “abecedarian” primer, a lyric memoir:

My ancestral lineage is rooted in resistance and ways outta no ways, and my people’s love language is language itself, which is why, maybe, my mom was such a committed reader, why she had so many books. But Mom’s reading troubled some folks. It troubled Grammy because it meant we had to pack up all the books every time we moved, which was often. But it troubled everyone else because it was threatening; she always had her

nose in a book. The alphabet is an abolitionist.

To be honest, I really, really learned to read when I realized that some people read to know and not for what’s possible — to understand the world as it is, not as it could be. They see words as strict, neat, forgetting that language holds a history and a spirit, that it burns through silence. They don’t sing words the way I do, they don’t love language for what it is: vibrant, evolving, survival.

By Alexis M. Wright • Shenandoah • 5 min • Gift Link

Loyal reader Ale got married! Do you have something to celebrate? If you have a celebratory photo to share, send it my way at mark@articleclub.org.

2️⃣ Never Thirteen

It’s 1969 in a town in Illinois called Oak Forest. This is the story of two 13-year-old teenagers, Lee and Beth, boyfriend and girlfriend, about to graduate from the eighth grade. It’s about their walks in Yankee Woods, the ways they hold hands, and the moment of their first kiss. Lee Martin reflects:

I suppose I should be embarrassed now — how sentimental I am, going on and on about a first kiss — but I can’t manage it. When I look at that boy and girl, kissing in the dark shade, walking out into bright sunlight, I feel a great tenderness for them and the affection that they share. They will never again be this age, never again be this innocent. They’re still children, really, but just barely, and because I know now everything they have to lose, I want them to linger in the cool woods forever, to always be just that age. All the boy wants is to be in this place with this girl, and if they end up kissing, that’s fine, and if they don’t, that’s fine, too. The girl feels completely safe to be alone with him, hidden in these woods where sometimes horrible things happen to women.

To be sure, this piece is sappy at times. If you’re not in the mood, you might squirm and say, “That was a long time ago. No way that’d happen now.” Maybe you’d be right. But maybe there’s something about being 13 that’s universal and timeless. Either way, it’s remarkable to me that a middle-aged writer can still evoke those innocent and cringey and awkward feelings, forty years later.

By Lee Martin • Serving House • 21 min • Gift Link

Thank you for reading this week’s issue. Hope you liked it. 😀

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