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"   Naturally, not all of what I said to Amy O&amp;#039;Dell regarding Tavi&amp;#039;s writing abilities was quoted in her piece on nymag.com. Interview comments are never quoted at length. But in our conversation, I did comment on the impressive qualities of Tavi&amp;#039;s writing, especially the level of confidence and sophistication in her narrative voice and its adult tone, hence the comment &amp;quot;tween savant.&amp;quot; I also addressed what has been industry chatter since the day Tavi appeared on the scene: i.e., her great style, whether there&amp;#039;s anything amiss with being at the center of the fashion industry at 13, and the question of whether or not her writing is her own.  I think the discomfort some people feel regarding the age issue has more to do with the inherent contradictions of an image-based business that doesn&amp;#039;t always play nice and from time to time eats its own than with Tavi&amp;#039;s obvious love of fashion. It&amp;#039;s natural to want to protect a 13-year-old from this while at the same time celebrate her style and enthusiasm. But as there&amp;#039;s a fine line between embracing a sensation and exploiting one, I think there is a genuine concern for her well-being.   As for her writing, I personally have no information as to whether it is or isn&amp;#039;t her own or whether she edits it herself. I&amp;#039;m not the first person to discuss this, and there is nothing wrong, mean, or hateful in addressing the question. And I&amp;#039;m sure Tavi would agree. I don&amp;#039;t recall ever saying she had a &amp;quot;Tavi team,&amp;quot; but I have heard others say it. Regardless, it&amp;#039;s the gist of what people are talking about, and that&amp;#039;s what Amy and I were discussing.  That the way in which Tavi speaks about fashion on a video clip doesn&amp;#039;t embody the same level of sophistication that is in her writing, neither in tone nor content, could suggest a disconnect. Or maybe not. Many writers are not overly verbose. But I also discussed with Amy that it seemed to me the video was shot in so purposefully a laid-back fashion that it brought to my mind a play on the Pink Floyd song where everyone in the video was &amp;quot;Comfortably Numb,&amp;quot; and it made me feel &amp;quot;uncomfortably dumb.&amp;quot; A joke that got jumbled, but my point was essentially a random example of a potential inconsistency, not a hard-and-fast argument that she doesn&amp;#039;t write her own stuff, followed by a pun. But honestly, who cares? It&amp;#039;s all mere conjecture about conjecture. No one is picking on Tavi by discussing her provenance, writing skills, or style. They are just fascinated by her and asking obvious questions. Is it gimmicky to hire a 13-year-old au courant &amp;quot;sensation&amp;quot; to write about fashion when the mean age of your reader is over forty? Maybe. I&amp;#039;ve heard comments from &amp;quot;it&amp;#039;s fantastic&amp;quot; to &amp;quot;ridiculous.&amp;quot; Is that in any way an attack on Tavi the person? Not really. So if what&amp;#039;s good for the gander is good for the goose, then let everyone be on their merry way. If she&amp;#039;s this good of a writer at 13, I look forward to reading her in the future. If she isn&amp;#039;t, the truth will out. And if she is, part of me hopes she&amp;#039;ll aim high. I&amp;#039;m sure her style and thoughts would work wonders at CERN. In another ten years or so.  \u2014Anne Slowey Photo: Getty Images "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.elle.com/fashion/news/a3304/i-dont-hate-tavi-tempest-in-a-tutu-1426/>