ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Joshua Prager - Journalist
Joshua Prager’s journalism unravels historical secrets -- and his own.

Why you should listen

Joshua Prager writes for publications including Vanity Fair, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, where he was a senior writer for eight years. George Will has described his work as "exemplary journalistic sleuthing."

His new book, 100 Years, is a list of literary quotations on every age from birth to one hundred. Designed by Milton Glaser, the legendary graphic designer who created the I ♥ NY logo, the book moves year by year through the words of our most beloved authors, revealing the great sequence of life.

His first book, The Echoing Green, was a Washington Post Best Book of the Year. The New York Times Book Review called it “a revelation and a page turner, a group character study unequaled in baseball writing since Roger Kahn’s Boys of Summer some three decades ago.”

His second book, Half-Life, describes his recovery from a bus crash that broke his neck. Dr. Jerome Groopman, staff writer at the New Yorker magazine, called it “an extraordinary memoir, told with nuance and brimming with wisdom.

Joshua was a Nieman fellow at Harvard in 2011 and a Fulbright Distinguished Chair at Hebrew University in 2012. He was born in Eagle Butte, South Dakota, grew up in New Jersey, and lives in New York. He is writing a book about Roe v. Wade.

 

More profile about the speaker
Joshua Prager | Speaker | TED.com
TEDActive 2015

Joshua Prager: Wisdom from great writers on every year of life

Joshua Prager: Sabedoria de grandes escritores para cada ano de vida

Filmed:
1,797,150 views

Tão diferentes quanto nós humanos somos uns dos outros, todos nós envelhecemos ao longo da mesma grande sequência e os padrões comuns da nossa vida passam para as páginas dos livros que amamos. Nesta comovente palestra, o jornalista Josh Prager explora as fases da vida através de citações de Norman Mailer, Joyce Carol Oates, William Trevor e outros grandes escritores, através de visualizações do desenhista gráfico Milton Glaser. "Os livros nos dizem quem temos sido, quem somos, e também quem seremos", diz Prager.
- Journalist
Joshua Prager’s journalism unravels historical secrets -- and his own. Full bio

Double-click the English transcript below to play the video.

00:12
I'm turning 44 next month,
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Farei 44 anos no mês que vem,
e tenho a sensação de que 44 anos
vai ser uma idade muito boa,
00:15
and I have the sense that 44
is going to be a very good year,
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um ano de satisfação, realização.
00:19
a year of fulfillment, realization.
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00:23
I have that sense,
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Tenho essa sensação,
00:24
not because of anything
particular in store for me,
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não por causa de algo especial
reservado para mim,
00:27
but because I read it would be a good year
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mas porque li que seria uma boa idade
00:30
in a 1968 book by Norman Mailer.
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no livro de 1968 de Norman Mailer.
00:34
"He felt his own age, forty-four ..."
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"Ele sentiu sua idade,
quarenta e quatro ..."
escreveu Mailer
em "The Armies of the Night",
00:37
wrote Mailer in "The Armies of the Night,"
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"... sentiu como se ele fosse
uma personificação sólida
00:40
"... felt as if he were a solid embodiment
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00:42
of bone, muscle, heart, mind,
and sentiment to be a man,
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de ossos, músculos, coração, mente,
e o sentimento de ser um homem,
como se ele tivesse chegado".
00:46
as if he had arrived."
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00:49
Yes, I know Mailer
wasn't writing about me.
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Sim, eu sei que Mailer
não escrevia sobre mim.
Mas também sei
que ele escrevia sobre mim;
00:52
But I also know that he was;
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00:54
for all of us -- you, me,
the subject of his book,
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para cada um de nós - você, eu,
a personagem do livro.
Envelhecemos mais ou menos em etapas,
00:58
age more or less in step,
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que procedem desde o nascimento
ao longo da mesma grande sequência:
01:00
proceed from birth
along the same great sequence:
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01:05
through the wonders
and confinements of childhood;
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através das maravilhas
e isolamentos da infância;
01:08
the emancipations
and frustrations of adolescence;
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as emancipações e frustrações
da adolescência;
01:12
the empowerments
and millstones of adulthood;
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os empoderamentos
e obstáculos da vida adulta;
01:16
the recognitions
and resignations of old age.
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os reconhecimentos e renúncias da velhice.
01:20
There are patterns to life,
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Há padrões de vida,
e eles são compartilhados.
01:22
and they are shared.
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01:24
As Thomas Mann wrote:
"It will happen to me as to them."
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Como Thomas Mann escreveu:
"Isso acontecerá para mim como para eles".
01:29
We don't simply live these patterns.
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Nós não simplesmente
vivemos esses padrões.
Nós também os gravamos.
01:32
We record them, too.
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Nós os anotamos em livros,
onde eles se tornam narrativas
01:33
We write them down in books,
where they become narratives
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que podemos, então, ler e reconhecer.
01:36
that we can then read and recognize.
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01:39
Books tell us who we've been,
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Livros nos dizem quem temos sido,
quem somos e também quem seremos.
01:41
who we are, who we will be, too.
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01:45
So they have for millennia.
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Assim tem sido por milênios.
01:48
As James Salter wrote,
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Como James Salter escreveu:
"A vida passa em páginas
se passar em todo o resto".
01:49
"Life passes into pages
if it passes into anything."
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01:54
And so six years ago,
a thought leapt to mind:
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E assim, há seis anos,
um pensamento me veio à mente:
se a vida passou para as páginas,
havia, em algum lugar,
01:58
if life passed into pages,
there were, somewhere,
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passagens escritas sobre todas as idades.
02:02
passages written about every age.
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Se eu pudesse encontrá-las,
poderia reuni-las numa narrativa.
02:04
If I could find them, I could
assemble them into a narrative.
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Poderia reuni-las numa vida,
02:08
I could assemble them into a life,
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uma longa vida, uma vida de cem anos,
02:10
a long life, a hundred-year life,
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a totalidade dessa mesma grande sequência
02:13
the entirety of that same great sequence
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através da qual passa o mais
afortunado de nós.
02:15
through which the luckiest among us pass.
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02:19
I was then 37 years old,
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Eu estava com 37 anos de idade,
02:22
"an age of discretion,"
wrote William Trevor.
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"uma idade de discrição",
escreveu William Trevor.
02:27
I was prone to meditating on time and age.
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Eu estava propenso a meditar
sobre o tempo e a idade.
Uma doença na família
e mais tarde uma lesão em mim
02:30
An illness in the family
and later an injury to me
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há muito tempo deixaram claro
que não se presumia envelhecer.
02:33
had long made clear that growing old
could not be assumed.
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02:37
And besides, growing old
only postponed the inevitable,
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E, além disso, envelhecer
apenas adia o inevitável,
tempo de ver através
do que a circunstância não deixou.
02:40
time seeing through
what circumstance did not.
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02:43
It was all a bit disheartening.
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Foi tudo um pouco desanimador.
02:46
A list, though, would last.
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Uma lista, entretanto, iria durar.
02:49
To chronicle a life
year by vulnerable year
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Narrar um ano de vida como ano vulnerável
seria agarrar e fundamentar
o que era passageiro,
02:52
would be to clasp and to ground
what was fleeting,
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seria fornecer a mim e aos outros
um vislumbre do futuro,
02:55
would be to provide myself and others
a glimpse into the future,
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se chegamos lá ou não.
02:59
whether we made it there or not.
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03:01
And when I then began to compile my list,
I was quickly obsessed,
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E quando, em seguida, comecei a compilar
minha lista, fiquei rapidamente obcecado,
pesquisando páginas e páginas
por idades e idades.
03:05
searching pages and pages
for ages and ages.
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03:09
Here we were at every annual step
through our first hundred years.
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Aqui estávamos em cada etapa anual
através de nossos primeiros cem anos.
03:14
"Twenty-seven ... a time
of sudden revelations,"
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"Vinte e sete ... um momento
de revelações repentinas",
03:19
"sixty-two, ... of subtle diminishments."
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"Sessenta e dois, ...
de diminuições sutis."
03:23
I was mindful, of course,
that such insights were relative.
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Eu estava consciente, é claro,
que essas percepções eram relativas.
03:28
For starters, we now live longer,
and so age more slowly.
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Para começar, agora vivemos mais tempo,
e assim envelhecemos mais lentamente.
03:33
Christopher Isherwood used
the phrase "the yellow leaf"
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Christopher Isherwood usou
a frase "a folha amarela"
para descrever um homem aos 53.
03:36
to describe a man at 53,
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apenas um século depois de Lord Byron
usá-la para descrever a si mesmo aos 36.
03:38
only one century after Lord Byron
used it to describe himself at 36.
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(Risos)
03:42
(Laughter)
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Estava ciente, também, que a vida pode
balançar descontrolada e imprevisivelmente
03:45
I was mindful, too, that life
can swing wildly and unpredictably
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de um ano para o outro,
03:48
from one year to the next,
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e que as pessoas podem experimentar
a mesma idade de formas diferentes.
03:50
and that people may experience
the same age differently.
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03:54
But even so, as the list coalesced,
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Mas, mesmo assim,
como a lista se cristalizou,
assim, também, na página,
clara como o reflexo no espelho,
03:57
so, too, on the page, clear
as the reflection in the mirror,
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se fez a vida que eu tinha vivido:
04:01
did the life that I had been living:
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04:03
finding at 20 that "... one is less
and less sure of who one is;"
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encontrando aos 20 que "... é cada vez
menos certo de quem é";
04:08
emerging at 30 from the "... wasteland
of preparation into active life;"
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emergindo aos 30 do "... deserto
de preparação para a vida ativa";
04:13
learning at 40 "... to close softly
the doors to rooms
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aprendendo aos 40 "... a fechar suavemente
as portas para os quartos
[que eu poderia] não estar voltando".
04:17
[I would] not be coming back to."
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04:20
There I was.
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Lá estava eu.
04:23
Of course, there we all are.
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Claro, lá estávamos todos.
04:26
Milton Glaser, the great graphic designer
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Milton Glaser, o grande desenhista gráfico
cujas belas visualizações vocês veem aqui,
04:29
whose beautiful
visualizations you see here,
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04:32
and who today is 85 --
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e que hoje está com 85 -
todos esses anos "... um amadurecimento
e uma apoteose", escreveu Nabokov -
04:34
all those years "... a ripening
and an apotheosis," wrote Nabokov --
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04:39
noted to me that, like art and like color,
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marcou para mim que, como a arte e a cor,
04:43
literature helps us to remember
what we've experienced.
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a literatura nos ajuda a lembrar
o que temos experimentado.
04:47
And indeed, when I shared
the list with my grandfather,
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E, de fato, quando compartilhei
a lista com o meu avô,
ele assentiu em reconhecimento.
04:50
he nodded in recognition.
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04:53
He was then 95 and soon to die,
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Ele estava com 95 e prestes a morrer,
04:57
which, wrote Roberto Bolaño,
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o que, escreveu Roberto Bolaño,
"... é o mesmo que nunca morrer".
04:59
"... is the same as never dying."
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05:03
And looking back, he said to me that, yes,
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E olhando para trás,
ele me disse que, sim.
05:07
Proust was right that at 22,
we are sure we will not die,
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Proust estava certo que aos 22,
temos a certeza que não vamos morrer,
assim como um tanatologista
chamado Edwin Shneidman estava certo
05:13
just as a thanatologist
named Edwin Shneidman was right
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que aos 90, temos a certeza que vamos.
05:16
that at 90, we are sure we will.
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05:21
It had happened to him,
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Isso aconteceu tanto a ele,
05:23
as to them.
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quanto a outros.
05:27
Now the list is done:
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Agora a lista está pronta:
05:30
a hundred years.
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cem anos.
05:33
And looking back over it,
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E olhando agora para ela,
05:36
I know that I am not done.
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sei que não terminei.
05:38
I still have my life to live,
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Ainda tenho a minha vida para viver,
ainda tenho muito mais
páginas para passar.
05:40
still have many more pages to pass into.
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05:44
And mindful of Mailer,
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E consciente de Mailer,
espero os 44.
05:46
I await 44.
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05:48
Thank you.
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Obrigado.
(Aplausos)
05:49
(Applause)
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Translated by Custodio Marcelino
Reviewed by Gustavo Rocha

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ABOUT THE SPEAKER
Joshua Prager - Journalist
Joshua Prager’s journalism unravels historical secrets -- and his own.

Why you should listen

Joshua Prager writes for publications including Vanity Fair, The New York Times and The Wall Street Journal, where he was a senior writer for eight years. George Will has described his work as "exemplary journalistic sleuthing."

His new book, 100 Years, is a list of literary quotations on every age from birth to one hundred. Designed by Milton Glaser, the legendary graphic designer who created the I ♥ NY logo, the book moves year by year through the words of our most beloved authors, revealing the great sequence of life.

His first book, The Echoing Green, was a Washington Post Best Book of the Year. The New York Times Book Review called it “a revelation and a page turner, a group character study unequaled in baseball writing since Roger Kahn’s Boys of Summer some three decades ago.”

His second book, Half-Life, describes his recovery from a bus crash that broke his neck. Dr. Jerome Groopman, staff writer at the New Yorker magazine, called it “an extraordinary memoir, told with nuance and brimming with wisdom.

Joshua was a Nieman fellow at Harvard in 2011 and a Fulbright Distinguished Chair at Hebrew University in 2012. He was born in Eagle Butte, South Dakota, grew up in New Jersey, and lives in New York. He is writing a book about Roe v. Wade.

 

More profile about the speaker
Joshua Prager | Speaker | TED.com