A telling story

Editor,

I like your column entitled "To write well, one first must read well" (October 24).

First, let me thank the writer for expressing in such a clear and direct way so many profound truths about improving one's writing skills. The acquisition of language, and the use of it in communication, is such a multi-faceted process that I think we often lose track of where we really learn language (and how to use it) in the first place.

I am a published author, but my wife is a more accomplished writer than I. So I sent her the link to your article, and after she read it she noted something else that I had not thought of. She drew a parallel between the novels you were given to read as a student with the new-found studies that have shown that pre-school children are much more attracted to narrative (as well as learn and make sense of their world through creating narratives for themselves) than was previously thought.

Narrative is clearly a key for organizing and expressing one's thoughts whether one is a novelist, a reporter or a businessman. Therefore it is no wonder that reading novels (such as your Ian Fleming and Joseph Conrad books), which can be such strong story-telling documents, will help create the required narrative and authoring skills. (May I recommend the book "The Tipping Point" (Chapter 3) by Malcolm Gladwell for some additional reading in the area of narrative skills in young children that I believe will interest you?)

I plan to give the link to your article to my university's administrators with the strong recommendation that they have all our students and faculty read it.

Grover Proctor, the United States

Smoking ban

Editor,

Your Opinion page of November 1 offers some remarkably candid "reasons" in favour of cigarette smoking. There are the quotations from the Dahe Daily explaining that "many local governments rely heavily on the taxes collected from tobacco products..." and since "much production is still under State monopoly..." money also flows into the pockets of "the many tobacco retailers" under State administration.

And we wouldn't want to hurt this cosy situation by increasing taxes on cigarettes, the Dahe Daily goes on, since this would only make the poor addicts buy cheaper brands of cigarettes, thus "causing even more damage to their health."

A similar solicitous tack is taken in your cartoon that day, showing the "smoker" crushed under a triple burden of "tobacco tax," "cigarette company profit" and "cost of tobacco." If only these could be lessened, all would be well.

What a pity that millions are falling ill and dying from cigarette smoking every year, and that China has the world's highest number of victims. Health experts everywhere are urgently pleading for the immediate cessation of the manufacture and sale of cigarettes as the only real solution.

What can you do? Business is business, after all.

Sidney Shapiro, Beijing

(China Daily 11/13/2006 page4)