# Get value of variable set in script from one cell in a different cell without using \`mutable\`
**URL:** https://talk.observablehq.com/t/get-value-of-variable-set-in-script-from-one-cell-in-a-different-cell-without-using-mutable/5897
**Category:** Help
**Created:** [December 3, 2021, 5:39am UTC](https://talk.observablehq.com/t/get-value-of-variable-set-in-script-from-one-cell-in-a-different-cell-without-using-mutable/5897 "2021-12-03T05:39:25Z")
**Posts on this page:** 6
**Page:** 1
Hello! I’ll preface this by saying that I’m new to Observable (and Observable Talk), and so apologies if this topic has already been addressed elsewhere and I’m missing it.
I’m building a notebook that explores a data set via an interactive visualization (built with D3). The interactive visualization is the output from one of the Observable cells. The data set includes a very long text string (a speech transcript) for each entry; in this visualization, users can click on an element in the interactive visualization, and I’m trying to get the speech transcript to display in a scrollable text box as an output from the subsequent cell. The click event sets a variable `mutable DisplayText` to be the transcript string from the selected data element. I can get the selected text to display in the text box output from the subsequent cell this way; however, the issue is that I have to declare the `mutable DisplayText` variable in a cell (Cell 1, below) prior to using it in my visualization code (Cell 2, below), and it also updates and displays the long transcript text in that initial cell (Cell 1, below) when you click on the visualization. It seems like I can’t hide the output of the initial cell, but having the transcript text show up here is irritating. Is there any way to get the `DisplayText` value in my text box cell (Cell 3, below) without using `mutable`?
This is how I have it implemented so far:
Cell 1:
```auto
mutable DisplayText = "" // the output of this cell also shows the transcript text - I don't want this.
```
Cell 2:
[Relevant part of code for visualization]
```auto
{
svg.selectAll('circle')
.data(data)
.join('circle')
.on('click', function(event, d) {
mutable DisplayText = d.Transcript // d.Transcript is the transcript text string I want to display
});
}
```
Cell 3:
```auto
html`
${DisplayText} // This is the only place I want the transcript text to display
To avoid `mutable` altogether, you might name your `html` cell, `d3.select` it in your response to the click, and then change it directly there. Thus, your `html` cell might be:
```
info = html``
```
Then, your response to the click might look like:
```
.on("click", function (event, d) {
d3.select(info).text(d.Transcript);
});
```
Here’s a similar example where I base the info text on a title element, rather than a transcript.
https://observablehq.com/embed/826c7c7a751a8578?cells=plot%2Cinfo
---