Whether through empathy or some other form of understanding, humans will frequently attempt to form a connection with others in order to perceive alternate life experiences and to consider how those experiences might differ from their own. When documentary filmmaker James Robinson writes his memoir about seeing and being seen, he seeks to build not only understanding but compassion and a more accurate representation of the disability experience in the media.
Whale Eyes relates Robinson’s experience from childhood through young adulthood as he contends with a condition often referred to as strabismus. With his misaligned eyes, which can make such tasks as reading and playing baseball exceedingly unjoyful, Robinson wonders how it’s possible to be so scrutinized and still be unseen. As a child with alternating exotropia, he endures the stares of others and their desire to fix, which overpowered any desire to help.
With creative definitions, illustrations by Brian Rea, and atypical formatting that provokes thought, Robinson forces his readers to consider such topics as how memory is a lot like afterimage or how many of us take for granted what we consider basic abilities, like face recognition, stereoscopic vision, or speech free of a stutter.
Initially seeing indifference as a form of protection, for a time, Robinson tried to convince himself that he didn’t care about his eyes: “If I didn’t care about my eyes, then I wouldn’t feel the burden of trying to get other people to care about them too. . . . [After all,] you can’t hurt someone by attacking something they do not care about” (122). However, he soon learned the dangerous truth about not caring: “It breeds anger. And frustration. And it can take you to places that you don’t even realize you’re going” (124).
In the process of telling his enlightening story, Robinson defines love and its depths. He celebrates the sacrifices his mother made and “her ability to turn the sparks of interest into the flames of passion” (161). He also relates the power of books and documentary film to capture the imagination, even including a link to his film called Whale Eyes. With his clever approach, he forms a bridge between the public eye and his own eye difference. He also asserts how “understanding is transformed, not merely by statistics and analysis but by memories and stories” (185) and how everyone’s job involves caring. “Caring is the precursor to action. The precursor to policy. It can drive movements and marches. It can transform relationships” (221).
Despite all of these positives, perhaps one of the best aspects of the book is how Robinson encourages readers to reconsider the term disability and how he invites us to invent a term when the one we’re looking for doesn’t exist, as he does with out-trigue (229). Ultimately, he offers tools and truths that transform perception.
- Donna