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Emma Watson is taking a break from acting to focus on her own personal growth and activist work. The Harry Potteractress opened up to Paper magazine about her plans for the future.
“I'm taking a year away from acting to focus on twothings, really,” she revealed. “My own personal development is one.” Emma added, “My own personal task is to read a book a week, and also toread a book a month as part of my book club. I'm doing a huge amount of readingand studying just on my own.”
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“My own personal task is to read a book a week," she said Photo: Getty Images
The Beauty and the Beast star admitted that she consideredtaking gender studies classes for a year, but ultimately decided against it.She explained, “I realized that I was learning so much by being on the groundand just speaking with people and doing my reading. That I was learning so muchon my own. I actually wanted to keep on the path that I'm on. I'm reading a lotthis year, and I want to do a lot of listening.”
While her acting career will be on hold for a year, Emma will be keeping busywith her work as a UN Women's Goodwill Ambassador. The actress launched the "HeForShe" campaign back in 2014, calling for gender equality.
Emma, who recently founded a feminist book club — "Our Shared Shelf" — has identified as a feminist since she was a kid. She said, “WhenI was 9, I think, during my first-ever Harry Potter conference, I said Iwas a 'bit of a feminist!' Ha! I think I was scared to go the fullhog. I was scared I didn't understand what it meant. I obviously did, I wasjust so bemused by all the chatter around the idea.”
"WhenI was 9, I think, during my first-ever Harry Potter conference, I said Iwas a 'bit of a feminist!'" she recalled Photo: Getty Images
Now at 25, the brunettebeauty revealed that she is on a “journey” with her activist work. She said, “Whatis really liberating and empowering me through being involved in feminism isthat for me the biggest liberation has been that so much of the self-critiquingis gone. “
“I've certainly come a long wayfrom where I was in my early 20s. Engaging with feminism, there is this kind ofbubble now that goes off in my head where these really negative thoughts aboutmyself hit where I'm able to combat them in a very rational and quick way," Emma continued.
"Ican see it now in a way that's different. I guess if I could give womenanything through feminism – or you're asking about power – it would just be,to be able to move away, to move through all of that.”
