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The
attack is the thread weaving together observations of how people at all levels
reacted before and after.
By Greg Esposito
BLACKSBURG -- Virginia Tech English professor
Lucinda Roy said the title of her book released Tuesday -- "No Right to
Remain Silent" has multiple meanings.
It refers to the killer, Seung-Hui
Cho, who harbored hateful thoughts only occasionally hinted at in his writings
before he killed 32 people and himself on April 16, 2007. Roy said it also would refer to herself if
she chose not to write about her experience tutoring Cho and question the
university's actions before and after the shootings.
"I didn't want to shine a
light on Virginia Tech again in a way that would be harmful or wounding to the
institution. ... I just pretty much came to the conclusion Virginia Tech wasn't
an anomaly, that this was going to happen again. If something else happened,
and I had said nothing about my own experience, then I would be acting in a way
that I think is unethical."
Some passages in the 300-page
memoir imply that the title applies to university leadership. One suggests a
"selective mutism" that Cho suffered from was passed on to some at
the university after the shootings. Roy
criticizes the university for a lack of meaningful discussion about Cho since
the shootings and a bunker mentality with the media.
"I don't understand what that
means," Tech spokesman Larry Hincker said Tuesday. "There was
discussion every which way from Sunday."
Hincker referred to multiple
investigations, reports and the release of thousands of pages of information as
proof that the university was forthright in addressing questions.
But Roy gives a detailed account of being
isolated from the administration after she spoke to the media the week of the
shootings. Her interviews revealed that Cho was the focus of discussion among
English faculty and university leaders more than a year before the killings.
Roy recounts multiple incidents and
conversations with people at the university that indicated anyone reporting to
Tech President Charles Steger was forbidden from speaking with her. Roy said Monday that the
administration's attitude toward her hasn't changed, and she thinks the book's
publication means it is unlikely she will remain at Tech. An alumni
distinguished professor, Roy has been at the university for 23 years.
Hincker said he thought Roy's interviews with the
media were moving and articulate, and he sees no reason why the publication of
the book would lead to her leaving. He said Roy's decision to hire an attorney led to the
lack of direct communication.
"When you get an attorney,
that's what you're buying into," he said, indicating that communications
went between Tech's legal counsel and Roy's
attorney.
The book covers broad topics such
as freedom of speech and the importance of parenting, and it gives detailed
accounts of her experiences over three decades in education. She also recounts
her work with Cho, who she tutored one-on-one after he caused problems in a
poetry class in 2005.
"The memories themselves were
actually quite disturbing," she said. "At the time it was a very
uncomfortable thing for me to have to do. Going through it again was very
difficult."
Roy said she did not intend for the
release of the book to come two weeks before the anniversary of the shootings.
It took her longer to write than she had planned, pushing the release date back
to March 31. Proceeds from the book will go to aid families in Sierra Leone. Roy once taught in the
war-torn nation.
Roy said she is careful not to glorify
Cho in the book. Writing the book is her attempt at moving beyond the attack.
She said the goal of the book is to
get across "the idea that it is possible to learn from what's happened and
that we don't have to keep making the same mistakes."
http://www.roanoke.com/news/roanoke/wb/199576
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