A new film tells the life story of the man who created the Wonder Woman comic book character. Angela Robinson directed Professor Marston and the Wonder Women. The public got its first look at the movie a few weeks ago at the Toronto International Film Festival. William Moulton Marston was a professor at Harvard University in the early part of the 20th century. He was also in love with two women at the same time -- his wife Elizabeth and a student, Olive Byrne. She became his assistant and his lover. The three lived together as a family. Welsh actor Luke Evans plays Marston. He says he was surprised to find that the script was based on a true story. “This man was a Harvard professor of psychology in the ‘20s, went on to invent the lie detector test, or the early forms of the polygraph, what became the polygraph, then fell in love with not just his wife but another woman who then shared their lives for the rest of his life. Had a wonderful family and then created ‘Wonder Woman.’ The same person did all of those things and it’s an extraordinary, extraordinary story -- one that most people have no knowledge or idea about. So it’s about time it was made.” Australian actress Bella Heathcoate plays Olive Byrne. “I mean, it’s great to tell the origin story about this character who’s a feminist icon, created by a feminist, based on these two women who he loved. And the message is all about empowerment and equality.” Robinson, who has directed several television shows, including True Blood, The L Word and How to Get Away With Murder, says the movie is a love story. “There’s this really amazing love story at the center of what ‘Wonder Woman’ eventually came to be. So it was really exciting to kind of bring that to the screen and see where ‘Wonder Woman’ kind of truly began.” William Marston died of skin cancer in 1947, but Elizabeth and Olive stayed together and raised the children they had with Marston. I’m Caty Weaver. David Byrd reported this story for VOA. Christopher Jones-Cruise adapted the report for Learning English. Caty Weaver was the editor We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments Section, or visit our Facebook page. ______________________________________________________________ Words in This Story character - n. a person who appears in a story, book, play, movie, or television show polygraph - n. a test that is done with a lie detector machine to see if someone is telling the truth feminist - n. a person who believes that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities icon - n. a widely known symbol amazing - adj. causing great surprise or wonder: causing amazement
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Friday, October 13, 2017
What It Takes: James Michener
00:00:02 OPRAH WINFREY: "Hattie Mae, this child is gifted," and I heard that enough that I started to believe it. 00:00:08 ROGER BANNISTER: If you have the opportunity, not a perfect opportunity, and you don't take it, you may never have another chance. 00:00:14 LAURYN HILL: It all was so clear. It was just, like, the picture started to form itself. 00:00:19 DESMOND TUTU: There was no way in which a lie could prevail over the truth, darkness over light, death over life. 00:00:27 CAROL BURNETT (quoting CARRIE HAMILTON): “Every day I wake up and decide, today I'm going to love my life. Decide.” 00:00:35 JOHNNY CASH: My advice is, if they're going to break your leg once when you go in that place, stay out of there. 00:00:40 JAMES MICHENER: And then along come these differential experiences that you don't look for, you don't plan for, but boy, you’d better not miss them. 00:00:52 ALICE WINKLER: This is What It Takes, a podcast about passion, vision, and perseverance from the Academy of Achievement. For this week’s episode, I’ve dug into the Academy’s vault and pulled out a 1991 interview with author James Michener. Michener wrote over 50 books of fiction and nonfiction, including historical epics like Hawaii, The Source, and Texas, along with Tales of the South Pacific, which won a Pulitzer. I loved listening to this conversation with Michener. He was 85 at the time. The story of his childhood could have come straight out of Dickens, and the story of his success is full of surprising twists. But listen first to this frank assessment he gave of his own talents as a writer. 00:01:44 JAMES MICHENER: Let me say what I cannot do. I am not extremely good in plotting. I really don't care how the story works out. Let it find its own way. I am not good in psychology, and I don't deal with characters who are driven by forces which I, myself, don't understand, and my understandings are rather simplistic. I am not especially good at humor. 00:02:10 I wish I were. And I am certainly not a stylist in the English language using arcane words and very fanciful constructions and so on. There's a great deal I can't do, but boy, I can tell a story. I can get a person with moderate interest in what I'm writing about, and if she or he will stay with me for the first hundred pages, which are very difficult — and I make them difficult — he'll be hooked. He'll want to know what's happening in the next story and the next story and the next story. 00:02:49 And that I have. I prize it, and I'm wretched when I fail, and I feel a sense of terrible defeat. But I believe throughout history, way back to the most early days of the human race, when people gathered around the fireplace at night, they wanted to remember what had happened and reflect upon the big events of that day. Well, I'm one of the guys who sat around the fireplace and did the talking. 00:03:24 ALICE WINKLER: Michener was one of the all-time great storytellers. It’s why his books were so popular, why they were published in nearly every country and every language in the world, and why they sold so well, something like 75 million copies. A lot of Michener's novels go way back in history, and they tell expansive stories about particular places, like Texas, or the Chesapeake Bay, or Israel. 00:03:51 Journalist Irv Drasnin, who interviewed Michener for the Academy of Achievement, started their conversation by asking, “How far back do you have to go to understand James Michener?” 00:04:03 JAMES MICHENER: Well, that's a very complex question because I don't know who my parents were. I know nothing about my inheritance. I could be Jewish. I could be part Irish. I could be Russian. I am a — spiritually a mix, anyway, but I did have a solid childhood, fortunately, because of some wonderful women who brought me up. 00:04:34 Never had a father or a man in the house. That was a loss, but you live with that loss, and so you don't have to go back very far. You pick me up around 1912 when I was five years old. 00:04:53 IRV DRASNIN: I mean, your early life reads like a novel. 00:04:56 JAMES MICHENER: I lived in extreme poverty. My mother, who took in stray children — and had eight or nine of them around sometimes — we moved often, in the dead of night and on a few minutes' notice, so I grew up in a small town. I think we lived in nine different houses, and I remember each one most vividly. 00:05:23 So I was different to begin with, and that made me very tough. Now if you look at my nose carefully, it goes around a corner. I didn't discipline myself, but older fellows and tougher fellows did. That's one of the great things about growing up as a boy. There's always somebody who's tougher than you are. And I was suspended from every school I was ever in. I was a difficult child, but I was also — by our standards of how they were measured, I was really quite bright. 00:05:59 I always had straight A's and did extremely well in tests, but I think it was in the accumulation and amassing and organizing of data, rather than using it creatively. I was a Germanic type of mind. I had a bear trap, and education was very easy for me. 00:06:22 ALICE WINKLER: Michener’s bear trap of a mind will not come as a surprise to anyone who’s ever read one of his books. They are filled with extraordinary detail based on years of meticulous research, but Michener’s path in life and his success, he says, was more the result of a decision he made very early on as a child not to let money be an important factor in his life. 00:06:47 JAMES MICHENER: Now how did that come about? I think through Christmas. At Christmas, we rarely had anything. I never had a pair of skates. Never had a bicycle. Never had a little wagon. Never had a baseball glove. Never had a pair of sneakers. I didn't have anything, and you know, at about seven or eight — I really think, seven or eight — I just decided, well, that's the way it is. 00:07:20 That's not part of my life. I'm not going to worry about it, and I never have. So the first influence was an entirely different view toward economics. Economics, for me, was a way of survival. I never saved much money. I think when I married, I had maybe 60 bucks in the bank. When I left for the Navy, I didn’t have anything in the bank. 00:07:52 When I got out of the Navy, I had a little pay in the last pay envelope, as they had. That was it. So, for me later to have stumbled upon a profession, which, in my case, paid very well, was a radical shift. 00:08:10 ALICE WINKLER: A shift that happened pretty quickly once Michener’s first book was published, but that didn’t happen until he was 40. What a debut, though. The book was Tales of the South Pacific, based on his time in the Navy. It won him a Pulitzer Prize and is still considered one of the greatest novels of World War II. Here’s the opening passage, read by actor Andy Ferlo. 00:08:35 ANDY FERLO: “I wish I could tell you about the South Pacific, the way it actually was. The endless ocean, the infinite specks of coral we called islands, coconut palms nodding gracefully toward the ocean, reefs upon which waves broke into spray, and inner lagoons, lovely beyond description. I wish I could tell you about the sweating jungle, the full moon rising behind the volcanoes, and the waiting, the waiting, the timeless, repetitive waiting.” 00:09:12 ALICE WINKLER: If you’ve never read Tales of the South Pacific, you’ve probably seen the stage adaptation by Rodgers and Hammerstein and Josh Logan. They shortened the title to just South Pacific, one of the biggest Broadway musicals of all time. Or maybe you’ve watched the movie version on Netflix or Hulu or whatever. And even if you’ve never seen that, then then you definitely still know some of the music. If you don’t, I give up. 00:09:40 MUSIC: A COCKEYED OPTIMIST 00:09:40 When the sky is a bright canary yellow I forget every cloud I've ever seen So they called me a cockeyed optimist Immature and incurably green 00:10:00 MUSIC: SOME ENCHANTED EVENING 00:10:00 Some enchanted evening You may see a stranger 00:10:09 MUSIC: YOUNGER THAN SPRINGTIME 00:10:09 Younger than springtime are you Softer than starlight are you Warmer than winds of June Are the gentle lips you gave me 00:10:26 MUSIC: I'M GONNA WASH THAT MAN RIGHT OUTTA MY HAIR 00:10:26 I went and washed that man right outta my hair I went and washed that man right outta my hair I went and washed that man right outta my hair And sent him on his way She went and washed that man right outta her hair She went and washed that man right outta her hair 00:10:47 ALICE WINKLER: Michener’s overnight success with Tales of the South Pacific really was just that. He hadn’t been intending to be a novelist, hadn’t been rejected from a hundred publishers before one finally accepted him. And although he laid out just a moment ago how dirt poor he was as a child, he describes the rest of his life as a cockeyed optimist might. 00:11:10 JAMES MICHENER: Starting about age fourteen, my life became rather easy. The hard years were from zero to fourteen. The easy ones came thereafter. Now, they were only relatively easy. They were — I still had no money, and I still had no car, and I had no great prospects, but I did get scholarships. I was one of the leaders of the team, and I was good in everything I did in athletics as well as scholarships. 00:11:45 And so, starting about age fourteen, and continuing unbroken until today, I had a clear field. I never in my life applied for a job, or asked for a raise, or asked for a promotion, or sought any kind of reward whatsoever. I just have never done it. I don’t discuss with my publisher about royalties. 00:12:14 I don't argue five minutes with my agent about what to do. That's a world over there that I've never been a part of. 00:12:22 IRV DRASNIN: Your life could have taken a different turn than the one it took. 00:12:27 JAMES MICHENER: Oh, yes. I think the bottom line, sir, is that if you get through a childhood like mine, it's not at all bad. Obvious, you come out a pretty tough turkey, and you have had all the inoculations you need to keep you on a level keel for the rest of your life. The sad part is most of us don't come out, and most of the boys and girls like me that I knew never had a life like mine. They had tough life all the way down. 00:13:05 IRV DRASNIN: What got you through it? What made it different for you? 00:13:10 JAMES MICHENER: Well, I — my mother read to me when I was a boy. I had all the Dickens and Thackeray and Charles Reade and Sienkiewicz before I was the age of seven or eight, so that I knew about books, and there was a good library in our town, and I read almost everything in there. 00:13:32 ALICE WINKLER: He read about the bigger world in books, and then he went out to see it. 00:13:38 JAMES MICHENER: When I was fourteen, I had already hitchhiked, with no money whatsoever, from Central Pennsylvania down to Florida. Didn’t get into Florida — the police stopped me — and from there up to Canada. Hitchhiked down to Detroit, I remember, to visit an aunt, and from there I went out to Iowa, and then I fanned out, again and again, when I was fourteen and fifteen. 00:14:08 I would leave home with 25 or 35 — 35 sticks in my mind. I think I had a quarter and a dime on two of my trips. Never fazed me a bit. Go straight across the continent. In those days, it was easy to do. Everybody had a new car. They wanted to show it off. They liked you. They would pick you up, oftentimes feed you; oftentimes take you to their home. 00:14:36 I had a vivid experience in those years. I went everywhere, and I did it on nothing. 00:14:45 ALICE WINKLER: He was part of that generation, the one that would volunteer for World War II. They defined the word “grit.” It was a different time, with a different ethos, but Michener says the lessons in his story are universal. 00:15:00 JAMES MICHENER: I do believe that everyone growing up faces differential opportunities. With me, it was books and travel and some good teachers. With somebody else, it may be a Boy Scout master; somebody else, it could be a clergyman; somebody else, an uncle who was wiser than the father. But I think young people ought to seek that differential experience that is going to knock them off dead center. 00:15:37 I was a typical American schoolboy. I happened to get straight A's and be pretty good in sports, but I had no great vision of what I could be, and I never had any yearning. My job was to live through Friday afternoon, get over the — get through the week and eat something. And then along come these differential experiences that you don't look for, you don't plan for, but boy, you’d better not miss them — the things that make you bigger than you are, the things that give you a vision. 00:16:24 ALICE WINKLER: Michener’s vision was more about how he would live his life than about his career. His vision, for instance, did not involve becoming a writer, even though he loved storytelling and started writing when he was quite young. In fact, he remembers reading a children’s book about the Trojan War and deciding the Greeks were a bunch of frauds with their tricky horses and their wife-stealing. 00:16:48 JAMES MICHENER: So at that very early age, I rewrote the ending of The Iliad so that the Trojans won, and boy, Achilles and Ajax got what they wanted, believe me. 00:17:00 ALICE WINKLER: Michener says he wrote a good many bold stories when he was young, even if they weren’t very good, and he wrote for his school paper. Then, of course, he wrote lots of academic work during college and grad school, but as he told journalist Irv Drasnin in this interview, it still didn’t occur to him to be professional writer. 00:17:19 JAMES MICHENER: Again, the phrase “set out” or “wanted to be,” either one them, just doesn’t apply to me at all. I lucked into everything I did. My senior year in college, when I did not have a clue in the world as to what I would do the next year, a very wonderful, private school in Pennsylvania came to me and said, "How would you like to work for us?" 00:17:44 "I would like it very much, sir," and I became a teacher by almost accident. I loved it. I was a good teacher and had students whom I still correspond with, and for whom I still have great affection. 00:18:02 IRV DRASNIN: I mean, I don’t want to suggest that you couldn't hold a job, but you had a lot of different kinds of jobs in your life before World War II. Can you tell me about some of the jobs you had before you went into the Navy? 00:18:16 JAMES MICHENER: In those days, the dreadful disease had not hit the chestnut trees, and all through our part of Pennsylvania there were these wonderful chestnut trees that grew very high, and on their lower branches they produced chestnuts, and inside the most delicious meat there ever was. And we kids could go out with clubs and knock down those chestnuts after the first frost, and we could sell them anywhere. 00:18:50 And I think that I peddled chestnuts in my hometown at the age of ten, and everybody wanted them. I — as many as I had, that many I could sell. At the age of twelve or thirteen, I worked for the Burpee Seed Company ten hours a day in summer, 75 cents a day, $4-and-a-half a week, all the money going back to my mother. 00:19:17 Then next, I was a private detective in an amusement park. After that, I was a night watchman in a hotel and so on. I have worked all my life, never very seriously and never with any long-term purpose. Even when I was a teacher in the schools, I never wanted to be headmaster or head of the English department. 00:19:45 I was just a pretty good teacher, and it was the same in the Navy. 00:19:45 ALICE WINKLER: Michener didn’t join the Navy until he was 36 years old. It was another one of those differential experiences he talked about earlier. He was a Quaker and was exempt. He was also beyond the age of the draft, so he could have escaped service. 00:20:06 JAMES MICHENER: But I didn’t. I had taught about Hitler, and I had taught about the Japanese war machine, and I knew that this was a battle to the death. It was a vivid experience. I think I saw the devastation of war. I saw the loneliness of that terrible Pacific duty. I had two complete tours out there. I saw a lot of the war and a lot of the aftermath of it, and wonder what might have happened had I stayed home and not gone. I might never have become what I did become. 00:20:47 ALICE WINKLER: So what about Michener’s service in the South Pacific did lead him toward a writing career? He said it had a lot to do with the men he was surrounded by. 00:20:58 JAMES MICHENER: The system had, in those days, decided that the fine men in the society would go and conduct this war. So I had men who had had positions of great importance in Wanamaker's department store and Macy’s, and a wonderful guy in Tennessee who had been troubleshooter for the Chattanooga Times, a New York Times subsidiary. 00:21:24 I had a great oil field geologist. I was small potatoes in my group, and I lived with these men, and I noticed that almost all the ones that I liked had decided they did not want to go back and do what they had done before. They wanted to be something else. Quite a few of them went into religion. 00:21:51 They had been deeply moved by this. They had a spiritual awakening. Quite a few of them went into politics. They said, "I'm as bright as that clown." Quite a few of them at that advanced age went back to college on the GI bill, and I was one of that group, who said, "Now, wait, if you're ever going to change direction, let's do it now." 00:22:16 ALICE WINKLER: That was one of Michener’s wartime revelations, but another came on a single night, after landing by plane on a mountainous island 900 miles east of Australia. The approach was a treacherous one. 00:22:32 JAMES MICHENER: We had to make three passes at the airfield. The weather was really quite bad. The third time, I said, "Wait a minute. This isn't going to work. This is tough. We may have had it." Wonderful pilot, did it, came back, came into a perfect landing. That night, I could not sleep, and I went out on that airstrip at Tontouta — I'll never forget it — and I walked along the airstrip. 00:23:08 And that's when the war hit me, and that's when the phenomenon I spoke of before hit me. I said, "When this is over, I'm not going to be the same guy. I am going to live as if I were a great man." I never said I was going to be a great man, because I had no idea what my capacities were. I had no great confidence. 00:23:37 Nothing in my background gave me a reason to think so, but I was not forestalled from acting as if I were. “Let us deal with big subjects, associate with people who are brighter than you are, grapple with the problems of your time,” and it was as clear to me as if a voice were telling me to do this, that “this is the choosing-up point, kiddo." 00:24:13 From here on — I had no idea then that life was as short as it is. That concept comes very late in any human life, I think. I thought life was immeasurable and extensive to the horizon and beyond. But I did know that my capacities were not unlimited. I had only so much to spend, and let’s do it in a big way. 00:24:41 ALICE WINKLER: Which brings us back again to Tales of the South Pacific, the first book of fiction James Michener wrote. It was based on his observations and his research when he was a lieutenant commander in what’s now called Vanuatu. The war and the tropical paradise are backdrops, but the fictional stories he weaves deal with people of different cultures crossing and often colliding. A young Marine falls for a Tonkinese girl and gets her pregnant. A Navy nurse tries to broaden her horizons and accept the illegitimate Polynesian children of the wealthy Frenchman she’s in love with. It was potent stuff in the late 1940s. 00:25:26 NELLIE: Joe, you're trying to get over to Bali Hai. That little girl you told me about? 00:25:32 JOSEPH: Liat? You know, the way you look at me now is just the way my mother would look. Damn it to hell, why? What difference does it make if her hair is blonde and curly or black and straight? If I want her to be my wife, why can't I have her? 00:25:47 NELLIE: Well, you can! It's just... people! I mean, they say it never works, don't they? 00:26:00 JOSEPH: They do. And then everybody does their damnedest to prove it. A hell of a chance Liat and I would have in one of those little gray stone and timber houses on the main line. Mr. and Mrs. Joseph Cable, entertained by Susie with a housewarming! 00:26:13 NELLIE: Stop it, please. Joe! 00:26:15 JOSEPH: Nobody came! 00:26:15 NELLIE: Stop it! 00:26:18 JAMES MICHENER: It came along when it was needed. People were thinking about these things. It was very daring for its day. We were advised to drop all the racial comments, that they would never be acceptable on Broadway and it would destroy the play. I think that is a particularly American problem. I was not smart enough to perceive that it was an American problem until much later when race problems became dominant in this country. 00:26:58 But I had certainly staked out my position on it when I was a very young man, and I've never wavered from that. 00:27:07 ALICE WINKLER: Michener would explore the people of different climates and religions, skin colors, and cultures again and again in his novels. To write them with authenticity, he would not only conduct exhaustive research, he’d often move to whatever location he’d chosen as the setting for his next book. Michener loved travel and said he had some kind of a geographer's divining rod, pointing him toward places that would soon become center stage. 00:27:35 JAMES MICHENER: If Hobart Lewis were here, the former editor and publisher of Readers Digest, he could verify the fact that about 20 years ago I wanted to stop everything I was doing and write a great book about the Muslim world, because I was probably the only American who had ever lived in all of the Muslim countries in the world, except Arabia. 00:28:04 I'd lived in Indonesia. I'd lived in Pakistan. I'd lived in Malaysia. People don't think of that much — lived all across North Africa, lived in Spain, and I understood the Muslim world at that time as well as an outsider could. I had a great affinity for it, and Hobart was going to set up an arrangement whereby I could do that. And somehow or other, it — I was diverted to other things. 00:28:31 It was one of the great mistakes of my life, because had I written that book, I would, this very day, when things are in turmoil in that part of the world, have been an invaluable citizen. 00:28:45 ALICE WINKLER: Michener was a world traveler, at home on virtually every continent, and he would not begin to write until he had absorbed every nuance of the culture, the history, the geography, and the people of the country he’d chosen for his next work. But when he got down to writing, how did he walk that precarious line between fact and fiction while blending them together? 00:29:09 Other writers, and filmmakers too, have been taken to task when attempting such feats. Oliver Stone comes to mind. So how did James Michener make it work so artfully? 00:29:21 JAMES MICHENER: I pioneered this form, in certain respects. I have tried to — in this wonderfully exciting form, always to pin the story upon fictional characters or fictional boats or fictional regiments. I would never write about the Mayflower because everybody's done that, and everybody knows too much about that. I'll write about the third ship that came in. Nobody knows what it was. I'm going to say it's the Thetus. 00:29:58 And boy, are there going to be some interesting people on the Thetus, and they're going to get to a Plymouth colony. They're going to tear that damn place apart, because nobody knows really who they were. That's a device I use. And the adjunct to that is, basing my story upon those imaginary characters, I then am not averse to bringing in historic characters to give it authenticity and color, but only insofar as the historic character might really have impinged on these lives. 00:30:33 And I think the best example of that is in my novel The Source, in which I'm dealing with the digging of this well in a place like — it's over in Northern Israel. And anybody who was doing that would ultimately come into contact with King David, and so my boy comes into contact with King David, and I try to show David as a troubled king, a king who sent his prime general into the front lines so that the general would be killed so that David could inherit the general's widow. 00:31:18 That's my David, and I'm entitled to do that because I know David. I know everything about him that a man like me could know, and so I will use David to elucidate this whole period, but I will not fake him. I will not give him resounding statements of what we're going to do about the people living out in the desert when there's no evidence he ever even bothered with that. 00:31:47 ALICE WINKLER: When James Michener sat in his home for this interview with the Academy of Achievement, The Source was among the dozens of his novels that sat nearby on a shelf, books with fat, fat spines and bold one-word titles, like Alaska, Centennial, Chesapeake, many of them New York Times bestsellers, many of them adapted as films or TV mini-series, all of them based on his meticulous brand of research. 00:32:15 JAMES MICHENER: The best books, by and large, are written by people who don't do a great deal of research, who don’t follow my pattern, who just sit down in a little room like this with a typewriter and maybe a word processor and some maps, and write a great book out of your own experience. That's what Jane Austin did. That's what the Brontë Sisters did. That's what Emily Dickinson did. That's what Tennessee Williams did. 00:32:45 That's what Truman Capote did. But then there are the writers like Gore Vidal and Herman Wouk and me. And the great classics who are greater than any of us: Balzac, the son of a gun could write; Tolstoy — writers like that who did need data, did need research. 00:33:13 Now if you look at the best books of the research writers, they're as good as anything anybody else did. But the bulk of the best books, I think, come from people who just sit at a desk and write. And if I were starting over again, knowing that I had the ability that I did have, I might well go that route. 00:33:42 ALICE WINKLER: But then we’d have some James Michener from a parallel universe, not the James Michener who spent three, four, five, even seven years becoming an expert in a new topic for each book he wrote; not the James Michener who made his indelible literary mark with deep dives into the past. In Centennial, his novel about a town on the plains of Northeast Colorado, Michener’s story includes events that happened three-and-a-half billion years ago, with the formation of the earth’s crust. Why did he often think it necessary to take the long view to such extremes? 00:34:20 JAMES MICHENER: I would hate for any young person to think that she or he was the center of the universe. I lived in a little town in a medium-sized state in a medium-sized country. I mean, Canada and Brazil and China and Russia are all much bigger than we are. And I live on a medium-sized planet, and our galaxy, our stars — you know, one of the smallest stars, and doomed after four-and-a-half billion years — and our galaxy's not the big one in the sky. 00:35:06 And it's only one in about a billion or more. So I cannot believe that I am the hottest thing in the universe, and I think that sobers you up. 00:35:19 ALICE WINKLER: James Michener seemed to revel in the things that sobered him and kept him humble. Maybe it was his way of reconciling the wealthy, celebrity, bestselling author he became with the scrappy, impoverished foster kid he had inside him. James Michener died in 1997 at the age of 90. During his lifetime, he published over 50 books of both fiction and nonfiction. He spent many happy years working in government. 00:35:49 He gave away over a hundred million dollars to museums, libraries, and universities, and he won the Medal of Freedom, the country’s highest civilian award. Thanks for gathering around the fire to listen to him. I'm Alice Winkler. 00:36:09 And a special shout-out, as always, to the Catherine B. Reynolds Foundation for its generous funding of What It Takes. END OF FILE
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Thursday, October 12, 2017
The Many Reasons for the Word 'The'
The 1995 film Dead Man has a strange opening scene. Actor Johnny Depp is sitting on a train. A man sits down across from Depp’s character, and speaks to him: "Look out the window. And doesn't this remind you of when you were in the boat, and then later that night, you were lying, looking up at the ceiling, and the water in your head was not dissimilar from the landscape…" Today we will explore the word 'the.' Yes, the word 'the.' You heard it many times in the audio from the movie. English speakers use this word for several reasons – some of which we will discuss in this program. Today, we will show you how Americans use 'the' in everyday speech, writing, and even in the arts, such as literature or movies. But first, we need to give you a few definitions. What are articles? Articles are words that go before nouns. They tell if the noun is general or specific. When an article is specific, it is called a definite article. The word 'the' is a definite article. English speakers use 'the' when both the speaker and the listener know what is being referred to. They can have this shared understanding for any number of reasons. Sometimes the noun is already known, for example. Sometimes the speakers are referring to nouns that are unique. At other times, the situation makes it clear what the noun refers to. #1 Thing being referred to is known from the context One of the main reasons Americans use the word 'the' when they are speaking is because the noun being referred to is clearly understood. The noun could be something seen or heard in an area around the speakers, or it could be a part of their daily lives. Let's listen to an example. You can hear the speakers use 'the' in an everyday situation – at the dinner table. 1: The pasta turned out great! 2: Thank you! 1: Would you mind passing me the butter? 2: Sure thing! 1: Oh, I just remembered I forgot to let the dog outside! I'll be right back. In the example, you heard the speakers use the word 'the' three times: 'the pasta;' 'the butter;' and 'the dog.' The reason the speakers used 'the' is because the nouns they were referring to were clear in the context – in this case, the dinner table. The speakers all understood that they were eating pasta, and that there was butter nearby. The meaning of 'the dog' is clear to them because the animal is a part of their daily lives. Even if it is not in the room at the time, both speakers know what 'the dog' is referring to. #2 Modifiers of the noun specify the thing being referred to One of the common reasons you will see the word 'the' in writing is because modifiers of the noun specify what is being referred to. The modifiers of the noun change it from a general noun to a specific noun. Although more common in writing, you can hear examples in films. Let's listen to this example from the 1955 film Seven Year Itch. "The island of Manhattan derives its name from its earliest inhabitants - the Manhattan Indians." In the film, the speaker said 'the island of Manhattan' because the modifier, the words “of Manhattan”, gives information about the noun 'island.' The word 'island' could be a general or specific noun, but when it is modified it becomes a specific noun – the island of Manhattan. In the example you heard, the modifier came after the noun. However, sometimes the modifier can come before the noun. For example, you might see a story about buildings in the United States. The story might say, "Chicago has the tallest building in America." Here, 'tallest' modifies the noun 'building.' This is a specific noun because only one building can be the tallest. #3 Presenting something as familiar The last reason speakers and writers use the word 'the' is for stylistic purposes. This is most common in fiction writing and movies. By using the article 'the', the writer or speaker is able to make the reader or listener more interested in the story. People are likely to show an interest because the writer or speaker is presenting information as if it is understood - even if it is not! Let's listen again to the opening lines from Dead Man. "Look out the window. And doesn't this remind you of when you were in the boat, and then later that night, you were lying, looking up at the ceiling, and the water in your head was not dissimilar from the landscape…" In the film, the strange man uses specific language – the boat, the ceiling, and so on. This language is not understood by those of us watching. Viewers start asking themselves questions like ‘Which boat is the man talking about?’ And, ‘Which ceiling?’ In other words, the viewer or listener is more curious about the story because they do not know what the man is talking about. This is a common technique you will see often in films and books, such as thrillers and mystery stories. What can you do? The next time you are watching films or talking with an English speaker, try to listen for examples of the word 'the'. Ask yourself why the speaker is using 'the' instead of a different article – such as ‘a’ or ‘an’. The process of recognizing and understanding articles can be a difficult one. However, with time and effort, you will use them with no trouble. And we will be here to help! I'm Alice Bryant. And I'm John Russell. John Russell wrote this story for Learning English. George Grow was the editor. _____________________________________________________________ Words in the Story scene – n. a part of a play, movie, story, etc., in which a particular action or activity occurs refer – v. to have a direct connection or relationship to (something) often + to modifier – n. grammar : a word (such as an adjective or adverb) or phrase that describes another word or group of words derive – v. to take or get (something) from (something else) stylistic – adj. of or relating to an artistic way of doing things fiction – n. something invented by the intention; written stories that are not real thriller – n. a very exciting book or movie
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Boy Scouts of America to Welcome Girls
This is What’s Trending Today…. The Boy Scouts of America (BSA) has made a lot of change in recent years. The youth organization, which formed in 1910, agreed in 2015 to accept openly gay members, as well as gay adult volunteers. It also now lets transgender boys join. And this week, it announced that girls will soon be permitted to join the traditionally male organization. The BSA says it will admit girls into the Cub Scouts starting in 2018. That group is for younger children. It also announced plans to create a new program for older girls based on the Boy Scout curriculum. The Girl Scouts of the USA is another of the country’s major scouting organizations. It had tried to dissuade the Boy Scouts from making the changes. “Girl Scouts is, and will remain, the scouting program that truly benefits U.S. girls by providing a safe space for them to learn and lead,” the Girl Scouts said in a statement. Girl Scouts officials have also suggested the move was driven partly by the BSA’s need to raise more money. They say some of the group’s financial problems come from past settlements it had to pay in sex-abuse cases. Membership numbers for both groups have been falling in recent years. Under the new plan, smaller Cub Scout groups will be either all-boys or all-girls. Larger Cub Scout groups will have the choice to remain single gender or welcome both boys and girls. The new program for older girls is expected to start in 2019. It will let girls earn the same Eagle Scout rank that has been reached by young men who have gone on to be astronauts, senators and admirals. It is the highest level of scouting in the Boy Scouts. The announcement made the Boy Scouts a trending topic on Twitter, Facebook and Google. Zach Wahls is an Eagle Scout. He played an active role in pressuring the BSA to end its ban on gay members. Wahls wrote on Twitter about the BSA’s most recent move. “So proud of this organization for doing the right thing. Yet another step forward for [this] American icon.” But, many on social media did not support the move, including another Eagle Scout, Charlie Kirk. He tweeted, “I am an Eagle Scout. Only boys should be in Boy Scouts. Only girls should be in Girl Scouts. Don’t change things that work.” Many scouting organizations in other countries already permit both girls and boys. They use gender-free names, such as Scouts Canada. But for now, the Boy Scout name will remain unchanged, BSA officials say. Public opinion studies carried out by the Boy Scouts showed strong support for the changes among parents not currently connected to the Scouts, including Hispanic and Asian families that the group has been trying to attract. Unlike the Boy Scouts, the Girl Scouts have kept its girls-only status for all its programs. The empowerment of girls remains at the center of its mission. Andrea Bastiani Archibald is a psychologist who helps with the development of the Girl Scouts’ programming. She said, “We know that girls learn [best] in an all-girl, girl-led environment.” And that’s What’s Trending Today…. I'm Caty Weaver. The Associated Press reported this story. Ashley Thompson adapted it for Learning English, with additional content. Hai Do was the editor. Do you have similar organizations in your country? What do you think about the Boy Scouts' decision to welcome girls into their groups? We want to hear from you. Write to us in the comments section. _______________________________________________________________ Words in This Story transgender - adj. of or relating to people who feel that their true nature does not match their sex at birth curriculum - n. the courses that are taught by a school, college, etc. gender - n. the state of being male or female status - n. the position or rank of someone or something when compared to others in a society, organization, group, etc.
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Puerto Ricans Leave for US Mainland After Storm
Lourdes Rodriguez left Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria filled her home in the town of Vega Baja with mud. The mud damaged mattresses and other things in the house. She thought she would stay with her daughter in Florida for a short time. But three weeks later, there is still no electricity or water back home. The 59-year-old retiree said in an interview at her daughter’s home in Tampa that she does not plan to return soon. “It’s been crazy, totally unexpected, like nothing I’ve experienced before,” she said. In Puerto Rico’s capital, San Juan, Efrain Diaz Figueroa listened to a battery-powered radio while he sat in his destroyed home. Its walls have collapsed and his clothes and mattresses are wet from the rain. His sister was coming to take the 70-year-old to Boston with her family. “I’ll live better there,” Figueroa said. Tens of thousands of Puerto Ricans left for the U.S. mainland to escape the aftermath of the storm. Things are still bad on the island — about 85 percent of residents still do not have electricity and 40 percent do not have running water. It will take months to restore them, so many Puerto Ricans are trying to rebuild their lives away from the island. People are living with relatives in states with large Puerto Rican populations, such as New York, Illinois, Florida and Connecticut. They are searching for jobs, schools for their children and housing. “I am in limbo right now,” said Betzaida Ferrer. She is a 74-year-old retiree who moved from Miami to Puerto Rico in July. Now she is back in Miami and living with friends. She is trying to find a job that will pay for her $1,300 monthly rent. That is double what she paid in Puerto Rico. “To be in a situation like this where you need help is horrible,” Ferrer said. Now, she is taking a three-hour a day job training program. Over the years many Puerto Ricans have moved to the mainland U.S. Since 2007, the island’s population decreased by about 10 percent because of a shrinking economy that continues to make life difficult. Then, Hurricane Maria struck on September 20 killing at least 45 people, according to the Puerto Rican government. That has caused even more people to leave. Jorge Duany, a professor of anthropology at Florida International University, has studied migration from the island. He said many people may not come back. Many of those who left are elderly or sick people. They fled, or were forced to leave, because of the danger of being without electricity or air conditioning in a hot climate. The trip has been tiring for people like Madeline Maldonado. She stayed in a hotel in New York with her two granddaughters, ages 9 and 13, before going to a friend’s house in Washington. “I need to get back to my homeland,” she said, although it is not clear when that may be possible. Puerto Ricans are used to bad weather and other difficulties. But the storm’s damage has been too much for some residents. Carmelo Rivera is a 78-year-old from the central town of Caguas. She is staying with relatives in Long Island, New York. Rivera compared the storm to Hurricane Hugo in 1989 and Hurricane George in 1998. “Nothing has been as hard as Maria,” he said. No one knows how many Puerto Ricans have moved to the mainland U.S., but officials in Florida say 20,000 have arrived in their state since October 3. Florida already had nearly one million Puerto Rican residents before the storm. New York had over one million. Government agencies are trying to help the Puerto Ricans deal with the situation. Law schools, including Florida A&M and the University of Connecticut, have agreed to accept students from Puerto Rico. Miami-Dade County Public Schools have offered to partly use the curriculum and change bus routes to help newly arrived children. Florida Governor Rick Scott has said teachers from Puerto Rico will not have to pay for certificates to work in the state. He also eased financial requirements for some professional jobs, such as real estate agents and barbers. Lourdes Rodriguez said her family may need to sell their house in Puerto Rico to get enough money to create a new life in the United States. They do not want to, but now she, her husband, a daughter and two grandchildren are living in a small two-bedroom rented apartment. Rodriguez said her family had considered moving to the mainland U.S. before. But they never imagined it would be because of such a difficult situation. I’m Susan Shand. Susan Shand adapted this story for Learning English based on an Associated Press story. Mario Ritter was the editor. Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page. _______________________________________________________________ Words in This Story Mainland - n. area of land that forms a country or a continent and that does not include islands Mud - n. soft, wet dirt Mattress - n. a cloth case that is filled with material that is slept upon. Aftermath - n. the period of time after a bad and usually destructive event Limbo - n. in an uncertain or undecided state or condition Anthropology - n. the study of human races, origins, societies, and cultures Migration - n. to move from one country or place to live or work in another Curriculum - n. the courses that are taught by a school
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US to Leave UNESCO over Anti-Israel Bias
The United States is pulling out of UNESCO, the United Nations organization that encourages worldwide cooperation in education, science, and culture. In a statement on Thursday, the U.S. State Department says a “need for fundamental reform” and “anti-Israel bias” are reasons for the withdrawal. The decision will take effect Dec. 31, 2018. The U.S. will seek a “permanent observer” status instead. The United States stopped funding UNESCO after it voted to include Palestine as a member in 2011. But it has kept an office at UNESCO and owes about $550 million in back payments. U.S. officials said Secretary of State Rex Tillerson made the decision. The officials, who remained unnamed, said the United States is angry over UNESCO resolutions denying Jewish connection to holy sites and Israel’s rights to Jerusalem. Hours later, Israel said that it would also be leaving the UN agency. The office of Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the U.S. withdrawal “a courageous and moral decision.” The announcement came as the cultural organization is choosing a new director. The outgoing UNESCO chief, Irina Bokova of Bulgaria, called the U.S. withdrawal a loss for “the United Nations family.” She also noted UNESCO efforts to support Holocaust education and train teachers to fight anti-Semitism. She added that the Statue of Liberty is among the many World Heritage sites protected by the organization. It is not the first time that the United States has withdrawn from UNESCO. In the 1980s, it left because it viewed the organization as poorly managed, corrupt and used to advance Soviet interests. The U.S. rejoined in 2003. Other UNESCO members did not immediately comment on the U.S. withdrawal. Hai Do adapted this story for Learning English based on AP news reports. Ashley Thompson was the editor. Write to us in the Comments Section or on our Facebook page. ______________________________________________________________ Words in This Story anti-Semitism - n. hatred of Jewish people
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Northern California Wildfires Become Larger
Wildfires continue to spread in northern California. American weather experts were predicting high winds and low humidity levels in the area on Thursday. Such conditions are making it difficult to stop the 22 major wildfires north of San Francisco. The fires are blamed for at least 23 deaths. About 300 other people are listed as missing. California officials say at least 3,500 homes and businesses have been destroyed. Earlier this week, President Donald Trump declared part of northern California a disaster area. His declaration makes the area eligible for assistance from the federal government. The fires The state's forestry department fire chief, Ken Pimlott, is helping to direct the 8,000 firefighters struggling to contain the wildfires. He called the fires "a serious, critical, catastrophic event." This week, police blocked many roads and prevented residents from going to neighborhoods destroyed by the fires. Dave Larson lives in the Sonoma County community of Glen Ellen. He returned to his neighborhood to look for his cats. As he looked at the damage, he noted that some of his neighbors' homes had survived. Larson said he regretted he had not stayed, like his neighbors, standing on the housetop and fighting the fire with his water hose. Larson told VOA that he lost many objects that were valuable to him, including his grandfather's gun. "One thing I really kick myself for not grabbing before the fire came was my grandfather's 100 year old Lebel rifle that he was shot with in World War II. And it was in perfect condition. And as you can see, this is what's left. The bayonet is still attached. It's amazing. It was still sitting right next to my flat screen TV, which is also completely melted." Gordon O'Brien is a fire captain from Alameda, California. He said when a fire is coming fast, there is little people can do except save themselves. On Wednesday, O'Brien and his crew were working on protecting buildings instead of fighting the fire. "We're not focusing a whole lot right now on the actual containment – at least my aspect of it… We're focusing on structure protection and dealing within the fire lines to stop anything else from burning down." History of fires in the region Northern California has experienced many large fires in the past - although the current wildfires are the deadliest in recent memory. In 2012, a wildfire known as "Rush" burned over 110,000 hectares. In 2013, the "Rim" fire burned over 100,000 hectares and destroyed more than 100 structures. Strong, dry winds blow across the countryside from the mountains. These winds put northern California at a high risk for wildfires in the late summer and early autumn. State officials said they do not know the exact cause of the current fires. They say anything from a backfiring car to a burning cigarette can start a fire. In the past, people, lightning, and even powerlines have caused wildfires in northern California. It will be weeks before the exact amount of the damage is known. But for now, residents are just trying to make it through this fire safely. I'm John Russell. Michelle Quinn and Deana Mitchell reported on this story for VOANews.com. John Russell adapted their report for Learning English. George Grow was the editor. We want to hear from you. Write to us in the Comments Section. _____________________________________________________________ Words in This Story humidity – n. the amount of moisture in the air eligible – adj. able to be chosen for something; able to do or receive something hose – n. a long, usually rubber tube that liquids or gases can flow through backfire – n. a loud sound a car makes when fuel is not burned properly resident – n. someone who has lived in a place for some length of time
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