On Looking: A Walker's Guide to the Art of Observation

by Alexandra Horowitz

For the first five years of life, it is said, children learn approximately one word every two hours they are awake. This fact is intended to impress, and it does. From an adult’s vantage, the prodigiousness of the infant mind is enviable (even though we have all had that mind). Most of us struggle to remember that new, curious word we read just this morning in the newspaper. In theory, I would like my brain to sponge up words like an infant’s does, but in reality, I also find the child’s progress terrifying. Every hour, children are losing more and more ability to think without language—and without the cultural knowledge that language passes along. Every hour, children are less able to not notice words. And to me, the lack of language is what is enviable.