Please note that this episode contains depictions of violence that some people may find disturbing.
Hello, Radio Readers. I’m Jane Holwerda in Dodge City, Kansas, about the fourth and last book in our Fall 2024 series, “Through the Eyes of a Child.” Published in 2017, Long Way Down is the work of North American author Jason Reynolds, recipient of Newbury and Caldecott literary awards for his children’s and young adult books.
A prose poem of a few hundred pages, with poetic lines of one to a few words, Long Way Down is set primarily in an elevator. The narrator, teenaged Will, shares his mission, which is to follow his community’s rules. The rules are few and concise – don’t cry, don’t snitch, and get revenge. With each stop of the descending elevator, Will is joined by others who in getting their revenge were in turned killed for being known for killing someone else. These dead include his uncle, father, and brother. It may seem, during the long ride down, that Will might have a chance to choose differently, to not follow the rules, to not join his dead, but, at the elevator’s final stop, his dead elders encourage him to exit with them.
That we are well accustomed to this scenario of death by violence should be a source of sorrow. But for well over a hundred years, murder has been a top source of entertainment and top sales for books, films and videos, and, more recently, for the podcasts we consume. In our “real” lives, daily, we are made aware of deaths due to gun violence – in schools, theatres; massacres and assassinations. This kind of habituation blunts emotional responses. But Reynolds’ writing gut punches through all that. Teenaged Will’s voice and situation are wrenching. There he is, in this dark elevator box, contained and crowded with his dead kin, inexorably descending. Analogous to his life situation where he is also boxed in. Unable to think outside of that box, he’s compelled, by the mores of his community, to enact revenge. It’s like he has no options, no choice but to continue to follow the rules and role models he’s given.
Another critically acclaimed poet, Najwan Darwish, a contemporary Palestinian living in Jerusalem, offers a balm for our consciences about the rules and guidance we give children. Darwish writes:
“Tomorrow our children will wake
Without any guidance
They are the future’s survivors:
By some miracle of the Creator
They survived all our attempts to guide them.”
As miracles seem not to be coming quickly enough, we can meanwhile attend to wisdom and words of poets like Darwish and Reynolds, and, in doing so, find courage to question and challenge those who claim authority over our lives, neighborhoods, and governments, find strength enough to break the cycle of blood feuds, a cycle as American as the Hatfields and McCoys, as universal as recent military conflicts in the world.
Yes, I know: I’m a dreamer. And I know I’m not the only one. We can teach each other better ways to live.
For HPPR Radio Readers, I’m Jane Holwerda in Dodge City, Kansas, where gun fights and shoot-outs are proudly staged for celebration and fun.
