»
Discussion
»
Philosophy 101
»
Writing your own Oblivion
| Philosophy 101 |
|
Writing your own Oblivion |
|
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
This stems from Ron's comments concerning credit. The more I think about it, the more I think a writer's goal insomuch as he or she is a writer is the complete destruction of any association with what he or she has written. Once something, a phrase or neoligism, has entered the language in such a way that most people no longer know or care where it comes from, you have truly changed the language, you have turned your own language into the language itself. By doing so you have ever so subtly changed the way people think, the way people act, and you've done this without any of them ever knowing that they are influenced by you (albeit a few crusty old academics might know but that's merely academic, right?). If they know they were influenced, an immediate distance would be created and, through that, a certain separation between your words and their mind. If they don't know, they won't feel that separation. Anything less would be the quest for mere fame or money, writing would be a means to an end, not an end in itself. Of course, I also think have writers have tremendous egos so how do I square that? I think it's obvious, really, in the distinction between the need to change things and the need to be seen making those changes. The former is a sign of confidence and the latter is one of insecurity. Unfortunately, I think writers are generally subject to extremes of both. So, if you're a writer then it just goes with the territory that you want both fame and money and, at the same time, the comfort of anonymity. But I could be wrong.  |
||
| © Copyright 2002 Brad - All Rights Reserved | |||
|
Toad Member
since 2002-06-16
Posts 161 |
quote: Brad I’d be considered by anyone who knows me as stupid if I didn’t agree with this.  I’m not convinced however that anonymity while changing is the driving force that makes writers write nor is the quest to be recognised as the changer the reason. It’s tempting to draw a line down the middle and choose a little bit of both but even that doesn’t seem quite right, I’m going to plump for a vague reason – writers write because they want or need to, fame and change are just side effects. Some writers become famous and have a real impact, most never get past mediocrity and anonymity (hello Toad) very few of either group stop writing by choice whatever happens, mainly because they want or need to write. Thanks for the chance to read and reply |
||
|
Ron
Administrator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-05-19
Posts 8669Michigan, US |
Sorry, Brad, but I think you're trying to draw generalities rather than conclusions. What you say is certainly true for some writers. And some politicians. And some scientists. And a whole bunch of advertising people. Ad infinitum. I doubt any two writers write for the same reasons and I'm absolutely sure that no single writer writes for just a single reason. (Please don't ask me to say that three times fast!) I'm more interested, I think, in exploring some of your tangential points. There seems to be a hidden assumption that changing the language is necessarily a good thing. Underlying that is the assumption there's a "need to change things" inherent in this thing we do. I see a basis for those assumptions, but think maybe they're worth exploring more deeply. Do all writers, or most writers - or even a lot of writers - really want to change the world? I also think it would be interesting to explore what seems to be a negative view of "mere" fame and money. Is that quest necessarily a bad thing? |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
And...tsk...ducking again, but I think "buzz words" are too easily written--I would like to read some "buzz" that had reverberation---and? I find that RARE. |
||
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Well, I think it was Harlan Ellison who said writers write from a deep sense of dissatisfaction with the world as it is. I thought the whole part about changing the world was more of a tautology than anything else (otherwise, we'd all be striving to be xerox machines). But if I'm guilty of throwing around generalities, it's still better, I think, than throwing out statements that stop conversations like people write for different reasons. Where does that get us? It's quite similar, in fact, to statements like, "Who's to say what good poetry is?" Instead of stating these points again and again, why not take the risk and start answering them: what is writing and why do people write? I don't mean to start a sound bite thread where everyone jumps in and give their one sentence answers as if the questions were some kind of multiple choice quiz, but I do think you can start from a few basic premises and wind up with some strange developments. My premises here were that people often talk about writing as an end in itself, they write to write. Well, okay, buy a notebook and a pen and draw cute little squiggly lines all day long. But that's not quite what people mean, is it? So, what do they mean? |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
NO....I am one of those---and I do not write just to write---I buy those marble notebooks and burn them.... (just ask the neighbors...) I write these things, to get them out of me...I WRITE, in hopes, that writing is SURGERY.... tsk...truly Brad, I have no more grandiose intention. |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
and should you type "GOOD THING" I am coming after you!!! |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
*Brad hates me* |
||
|
Toad Member
since 2002-06-16
Posts 161 |
Brad quote: Ok I hold my hand up, perhaps vagueness isn’t the way to go, and perhaps it might be worthwhile digging a little deeper. I, like Ron it seems, still believe you’ll end up with a myriad of reasons as to why people write or, as you said yourself a series of sound-bites as diverse as the people that post them. I know it's not what you want but here's mine anyway. Having thought about it for a while the best single reason I can come up with that satisfies, to any degree, the possibilities is competition. By competition I don’t mean simply writer versus writer, although that does have a part to play, I mean competition against language and against the expectations of your own capabilities. The closest analogy would be a golfer playing a round of golf with language as the course and success measured against your last score (previous written work), par for the course (others peoples work) and your expected score. Some golfers are really good at the game and people pay a lot to see them play these players are the ones that make the changes in how the game is played. Others aren’t so good but they’re still out there every weekend chipping away to reach their own personal goals. Sometimes there are crowds cheering and clapping you on and that can be reward in itself but even without the crowd the Sunday golfer will still walk the course alone in search of that elusive birdie or that hole in one, when the only competition is his own expectations. I believe therefore that writing is a competition where the opponent can be yourself, other writers or even language itself. The rewards can be financial, simple self-satisfaction or general recognition by your peers, anonymity and fame are potential side effects but competition is the driving force. The downside is that I need a handicap of 52 to get anywhere near par. |
||
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Serenity, But you make the connection between surgery and writing. Is being a surgeon not in itself a grandiose intention? Is it not trying to change the world? You know, I've gotten in trouble for this before so I should have known better, but I'm always a bit confused when people take 'to change the world' to mean that you want to be a politician, a revolutionary, or whatever. Perhaps if I said, "change some part, some aspect of the world," it might be clearer? Ah, but I was also trying to be gently facetious here, I was trying to poke fun at those who say, "I write to write" and trying to simply draw out the implications of what that means. Of the three comments so far, one says writing is a form of addiction, "I have to write", one says, "it's impossible to determine because people write for different and for multiple reasons", and one says, "I write to get it out". The first and third comments implicity recognize that writing has power (as a drug and as a surgeon), the second, Ron's, avoids the question altogether (but given that Ron has probably had so many similar conversations that he's just bored with the whole thing). But the first and third comments neither attempt to describe the reasons behind that power nor seem concerned with why writing as opposed to something else has that power for you or for toad. We have a pretty good idea of why drugs have power, why surgeons have power, but we avoid the question when it comes to writing; I'm tempted to say that there's almost a fear of asking that question. But if it is a fear, where does it come from? If you believe, as I do, that as much as we speak a language, language speaks us, a kind of answer presents itself: writing (more on what I specifically mean by this later) presents both the power to control language and the fear that we are being controlled by language. Yet, this fear has been turned upside down (or perhaps it's something I've touched on in a recent poem --that we, in fact, want to be controlled -- but that's just another way of saying the same thing, isn't it? A fear of responsibility.). This fear of language or of a responsibility to language is now exalted as a release in your case (I have to get this stuff outside my self) or as compulsory (It's like breathing, I have to write). It's not my fault, it's just something I have to do. A kind of rejection of self, is it not? I'm not criticizing you, Serenity, nor am I criticizing toad. I did criticize Ron slightly but I think I understand why he said what he said. I want to see, however, if we can take this further, if we can find a way of looking at this thing that makes it clearer for those already interested in it and, as a result, allow them to formulate clearer goals for what they want to achieve. I'll stop here for the moment but there's a lot more to say. I will say that for those who simply shrug their shoulders and say, "Ah, hell, I just write," I don't blame you, but I want to explore why you feel the need to say that. How would you feel about a doctor who said, "Ah, hell, I just operate." |
||
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Toad, I like the analogy, but suspect that, "Ah, hell, I just golf" is not a phrase commonly used. I suspect the conversation simply doesn't come up. Why? Well, I can think of two reasons: 1. The rules of golf are well-established. If you play golf, you play by those rules; if you don't, you're not playing golf. This gives an 'objective' position from which to judge others and yourself. Writing doesn't have this same set of rules (tendencies, yes, but not rules). Writing creates the initial illusion of 'I can do anything I want' and I think the wildly different reactions to 'Geez, you're a bad golfer' and 'Geez, this is a bad poem' are symptoms of that distinction. Interestingly enough, while I think most people would consider writing a more noble pursuit than golf, their complaints almost always allude to the fact that writing isn't enough like golf. 2. There are very few people who would deny the importance of technique in golf (This can be shown by the surprise people have when someone with poor technique still gets the job done). But technique in writing is almost always deemphasized to the meaning. It's not how I say it, it's what I say that matters. In the competition model you bring up, consistently getting the ball in the hole and techinique are practically synonymous, are they not? The goal, again, is clear in golf, it is not always clear in writing. I think people hide behind that ambiguity. Okay, I'm not a golfer but I have hit the ball right a couple of times, and I can certainly see the quest to get it right again. But (the very few times) I have gotten it right, it wasn't my conscious thought that did it, it just 'sort of happened' and isn't that what many people want when it comes to writing? In this sense, I see this 'sort of happening' as roughly the same thing in both writing and golf -- is it the quest to control the uncontrollable or to be controlled? This is something Maurice Blanchot talks about. That in the act of writing, he says, he himself is not there. Okay, I realize I've gone off on a number of different tangents (and still haven't touched on some of the other tangents that Ron brought up). I have no idea if I can bring everything together but it's going to be fun trying. Brad |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
By surgery? I did not mean that my writing had some sort of noble healing effect on OTHERS...I am a very self indulgent sort of person (shocking revelation, that, eh?) No...perhaps surgery was the wrong analogy. I just thought it nicer than, say, um--PUKING...sigh... I'm gonna go to bed AT NIGHT for once...check with ya tomorrow--glad ya don't hate me! |
||
|
Ron
Administrator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-05-19
Posts 8669Michigan, US |
So many bases to touch, so little time. Toad, I suspect, is talking about the human desire to excel, which I think transcends the desire to write. We enjoy doing things we feel we do well, whether that be golf or writing, and that leads us to want to do it even better. Makes sense, in a human sort of way. If doing something well makes us feel good, doing it better will make us feel MORE good. More is always desirable. I have no doubt this is a valid reason for writing, and I'm sure Toad gave it some serious thought. But even if it explains why he writes, it doesn't explain why he chose writing instead of golf. The desire to compete and excel, I think, applies to most human enterprises (maybe all?). Karen's declared reason for writing is closer to my own reasons, though I would probably tend to be less romantic and more pragmatic. Or maybe I just disagree with the metaphor? Surgeons typically cut out and discard unwanted parts, and I don't necessarily feel that's the role of the writer. More on that, I guess, in a minute. I suspect writing is little different than painting, photography, programming, math, woodworking, or even gardening (my latest obsession). Each is a way to create something that didn't previously exist. That, too, I think is a basic human desire. It may well be what God meant when he told us man was created in His image. I'm sure I didn't get my belly button and receding hairline so I could look like God, so it has to be something a bit more fundamental. And, like the story of Genesis, I think most human beings feel an overwhelming and life-long need to be creative. Why writing? Sadly, for many, I think they turn to writing because of early exposure and because it seems easy. A bad painter recognizes they're bad pretty quickly. A bad writer, however, often doesn't realize how bad they are until they've become much better. At which point they keep going - because they don't know they're still pretty bad and probably won't until they again get better. While that's also true of other arts (I've seen some pretty miserable painters), writing seems to be far more subjective. Brad touched on this, I think, when he talked about the strict rules of golf versus the much more nebulous rules of writing. No one can ever be a better writer than they are a reader, and if they don't see "it" in the work of others, they won't see the lack of it in their own. So, at least for a time, writing often seems an easy way to fulfill our creative drive. Perhaps that's a blessing, though. I spent much more time drawing and painting as a child than I ever spent writing. I went to college and studied commercial art for two years. But, when I discovered and truly understood the genius that was Picasso, I changed my major to business. I knew I could NEVER shine that brightly, and while I didn't give up my art, neither did I ever again pursue it with the same fervor. I suspect if I really understood writing, in the same way I did Picasso, I'd probably spend a lot more time in the garden. My ignorance is both my salvation and perhaps the only path to less ignorance. (That's why I believe we shouldn't beat other writers over the head with their own ineptitude. We should, when asked, show them just enough to move them along their path, but never so much as to make the path look ugly and impassable. It is ugly. It is impassable. Most of us don't need to know that yet. At the risk of mixing metaphors, writers juggle a thousand balls simultaneously, and it's inevitable that some will fall. Standing to the side, it's easy to see the balls at the writer's feet. But the writer can't afford to look down. Not yet, not until keeping those other balls in the air become second nature.) Now, having identified what I think are a few basic human needs that relate to writing, I have to admit that "changing the world" probably isn't one of them. I don't even think it's possible. Of course, the term is a vague one, and maybe we're not even talking about the same thing. So let me clarify a little. I think we can, and at times should, "rearrange" the world. We determine those things we think are "good" and do what we can to multiply them. Similarly, we minimize the things we see as "bad." In that sense, we make the world different, but then again, that's almost a definition of living. We make the world different by our very existence. Changing the world in the greater sense, in the sense Brad uses the phrase, implies more, I think, than simple difference. And that's where I run into problems. I don't think we can ever bring out anything, either in the world or in people, that doesn't already exist. At best, we can "rearrange" things. Even then, I don't think we can rearrange the world directly through words. Indirectly, perhaps, but not directly. We maximize the good and minimize the bad by action and example. By doing it, not by talking about it. If we're lucky, if we work hard at it, if we really believe it's important, our words can become a reflection of our example and impact more people than otherwise possible. But that's it. The words only reflect the light, they never cast it. Brad, I think conversation-stoppers often have less to do with the answers than with the questions. Your original premise questioned the goals of a writer, and that led me to the only answer I know. We have many different goals, many different reasons for writing (and our goals and reasons don't always coincide). To really pursue the conversation further than that, I think we need to move from the general to the specific. We need to focus not on writers, but on one particular facet of writing. Should writers attempt to influence the language and, if so, should they distance themselves in order to further enhance that influence? I think it's inevitable that writers WILL influence the language, but I suspect (with no supporting evidence) that it's a mistake to try doing it intentionally. Society, and by extension the language that connects individuals into a society, is too complex (chaotic) to ever fully understand. Injecting our influence may seem like a good idea, but I seriously question whether anyone has the wisdom or insight to understand the ultimate repercussions. If language tempers thought, as you and I both believe it does, then the thoughts of a single writer are but small pieces of a much larger puzzle. And so should they remain. What you are suggesting, I think, has a parallel in the "Politically Correct" movement discussed in other threads. Nigger is a nasty word. But the minute we outlaw if from our language, in a very valid attempt to outlaw it from human thought, we open the door for outlawing far more. I agree one hundred percent with the principles behind the PC movement, but have seen very little wisdom in its implementation. Controlling the language, whether through activists or writers, is a very dangerous thing. Fortunately, neither activists nor writers have that power. You may never again hear nigger spoken in the boardroom, but it remains rampant on the streets. Society accepts the changes IT wants, and only very slowly. Individuals may influence, but rarely control, and I personally believe attempts to do so carry grave risk, a risk to the individual's integrity when they fail, coupled with a risk to society should they ever succeed. And yet, in spite of that, writers unintentionally influence our language and thoughts all the time. Socrates almost single-handedly shaped Western civilization, Shakespeare's words have become common English phrases, and the Big Brother world of Huxley has become a backdrop for modern society that we all recognize, understand, and fear. Such influence is inevitable. That kind of influence would be far more dangerous, though, were we unable to return to the original sources for a deeper understanding of what the writer really meant. Anonymity is another word for lost knowledge. If the writer is seeking power, disassociation makes a warped kind of sense because it severs any link to questioning the original words. Personally, I don't think that is the goal of writing. That's the goal of propaganda. This also, I think, ties to my earlier point in another thread about the impossibility of separating credit and responsibility. And, yes, credit for a writer's work is occasionally going to include some of that much maligned fame and riches. But that's okay, too. Fame and riches for the writer is much the same as tenure for the professor. Both provide a very necessary freedom to take risks, to sometimes march to a different beat than is expected. The writer needs that. The professor needs that. And society, I think, very much needs that. Of course, not all writers take advantage of that freedom. Too many write the same story over and over, constantly trying to relive their first success. One of the things that most impresses me about Stephen King is not his writing (mediocre), not his story-telling (much, much better), but rather his willingness to step outside his past successes and try something wildly different. He can do that, and still carry a phenomenal audience, only because of his fame. Those who write so they can be rich and famous are doomed to failure. Those who want to be rich and famous so they can write have a chance. And, personally, I think that's the way it should be. Maybe Ellison was right, but I think the sense of dissatisfaction he described can surface in different ways. For me, writing has always been less about changing the world than about explaining it. Sometimes, I try to explain it to others, but usually I'm trying to explain it to myself. I think maybe this is the similarly Karen and I share, though I can't really liken the process to surgery (expect perhaps the exploratory kind). Life has this nasty tendency of happening too fast for easy analysis. Every Big Event in our lives should be followed by an intermission, but that's rarely what happens. Instead, the curtain is always up, and it seems like we're never given the chance to learn our lines for the last act, let alone for the next. And for some of us, at least for the greater portion of our life, every act is a cliff-hanger that propels us at break-neck speed into the next act. Words come more slowly. They give me the chance to relive pieces of my life in slow motion, with more thought and reflection than was possible in the living moment, and when I get it just right, those words can bring new understanding. I can see not only what happened, which is usually all that life gives us time to see, but also WHY it happened. And when the light is shining its brightest, I feel I can extrapolate that understanding into the might-have-been's and the yet-to-be's. Understanding people and their motivations brings me satisfaction. Tracing a line between cause and effect brings me pleasure. Like Toad, I continually try to improve my efforts, in the hope such improvement will lead to greater satisfaction and pleasure. Like Karen, my focus remains on my own life, though often hidden well within the province of fiction, and the impact of my words is an internal force. Much of what I write is never shared, and I would probably be largely happy with that notebook, pen, and lots of cute little squiggly lines. (We should note, I think, that our reasons for writing and our reasons for sharing can be very different creatures.) Like Brad, I believe language represents a power and responsibility, and like Brad, I dislike ambiguity. Maybe changing the world is a good reason to write for some. But not for me. It would take a heart far stronger than mine to withstand the inevitable failures, and shoulders far wider than mine to bear any possible success. I find the struggle to change just myself, undertaken largely through written explorations, more than sufficient to occupy the remainder of my life. |
||
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Not even sure where to begin now. When in doubt, I'll use someone else's words: "elements of what we call 'language' or 'mind' penetrate so deeply into what we call 'reality' that the very project of representing ourselves as 'mappers' of something 'language-independent' is fatally compromised from the start. Like Relatavism, Realism is an impossible attempt to view the world from Nowhere." Hilary Putnam, "Reality with a Human Face", p. 28. Why is this important? Well, you just have to wait for that one. |
||
|
Toad Member
since 2002-06-16
Posts 161 |
Brad I haven’t read much of Mr Putnam’s work, I keep my brain in a vat most of the time, but isn’t he overlooking or perhaps ignoring a rather large point? The reality described by language is our reference to the surrounding world, regardless of whether the perceived description or explanation bears any relationship to our actual surroundings it remains the only reality we have. Language does not create reality language describes our perception of reality, whether that reality is flawed has no relevance. Let’s say for instance that the colour green is in fact two colours green and blimth, being unable to recognise or distinguish green from blimth isn’t a failure of language or a failure to describe our reality – blimth doesn’t, nor ever will, exist as far as we are concerned. The absence of blimth therefore does not lesson our reality, the absence of blimth from our language describes our reality perfectly. Far from viewing the world from nowhere language allows us to describe the world from somewhere, namely the human perspective. Or have I once again failed to grasp the correct end of the stick? |
||
|
Ron
Administrator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-05-19
Posts 8669Michigan, US |
Looking forward to seeing where you intend to go with that, Brad. There's little danger anyone will ever accuse you of being obvious. |
||
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Toad, I think you and Putnam are in agreement. I quoted him here because I think Ron was distinguishing between writing and real life (in 'to explain' or 'to reflect'), and I want to muddy up the waters a bit. When people do this, they almost always subordinate writing to real life and I think that's the wrong way to go (as someone who recommended a novel by Michael Chrichton to me once because, you know, it was 'true'. )If we see language and the real world as indissoubly linked for precisely the reasons you gave, we can also see writing in that same light. Now, by this I certainly don't mean to privilege writing over something else (as in 'Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world' -- as Shelly put it), but at the same time I don't think we should privilege something else over writing. This also gives me a chance to explain my phrase "writers insomuch as they are writers" -- I wasn't very clear there but what I was trying to get at was the act itself, not the reason for the act. A writer is someone who writes but I was trying to distinguish between someone who writes a weekly grocery list and someone who gains pleasure from the manipulation of a language. Perhaps I was being too snobby here but that was my starting point -- a lot of people write but not all are writers. Note that this particular motivation does not invite an assement of quality. Motivation is completely irrelevant to the quality of the work in my view. Well almost. But that still leaves the question of why I also assumed that writers would necessarily be concerned with others, why the distinction between writing and sharing as Ron put it is one that I can, to some extent, combine. I don't know if I've gotten it right here but I think that distinction is muddied when we remember that we aren't talking about random symbols but the manipulation of a semantic system. [This message has been edited by Brad (06-23-2002 01:54 AM).] |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
"Perhaps I was being too snobby here but that was my starting point -- a lot of people write but not all are writers." And babies? Generally crawl before they walk. ah...so here it is... my 10,000th post, for YOU, BRAD!!! /pip/Forum70/HTML/000756.html Not sure if it proves your point or mine, but it better explains my intent--than, sigh..writing about writing? [This message has been edited by serenity (06-23-2002 03:39 AM).] |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
k--that done? Now... smiling--didn't mean that as self-promo--more as explanation. I disagree that writers of "serious import" re-invent language--I do not believe, for example, that Shakespeare, re-invented anything--I think he simply wrote commonalities in uncommonly great language. He expressed the universal in language so strong, as to be adapted by those who felt the resonance of truth within his writings. (Much as YOU---smile) "When in doubt, I'll use someone else's words" Again, with all the humor of a struggling being, I say, I will use "the beads" of others, as it is all I have, but they MUST be re-strung, to suit ME. If others find it pleasing, well, that's great and gratifying, and makes me feel less lonely--but if they don't? *shrug* It's not going to make me thread my needle any other way. [This message has been edited by serenity (06-23-2002 04:18 AM).] |
||
|
Toad Member
since 2002-06-16
Posts 161 |
Brad I’m not sure I agree with Putnam, I’m not even sure Putnam agrees with Putnam if his early beliefs in functionalism are anything to go by. I think my point of disagreement is one of application, Putnam professes that man, using language as a tool, has set himself up to be a mapper of something language independent. This assumption splits the real from the imagined and claims that language can only describe the latter, which produces a necessary and expected failure. I believe Putnam is one split short of the truth, if you accept that our perceived reality, sans blinth, is to all intents and purposes the only reality that we can or will ever know then actual reality can be disregarded. Once free from the restrictions of a realty we can never know you can reapply Putnams theory to perceived reality and split it neatly into the real (however false) and the imagined. Language describes both the real and the imagined perfectly in this model, oddly the ability to describe the imagined is where Putnam came in. How does that help us investigate writing? If reality (our perceived version) can be split into two segments, real and imagined it is also possible to split our use of language along similar lines (your attempt to muddy the waters Brad had an opposite effect at this point). People who write as a means to communicate and describe the real are not Writers in the artistic sense. True Writers, regardless of the quality of what they write are communicators of thought or the imagined, the ‘Internal Realism’ label used by Putnam would fit here just as well. The natural urge is to call these two forms of writing fiction and non-fiction but my gut feeling is that that may be a mistake, sometimes even non-fiction contains enough embellishments to blur such a distinction, poetry proves this point. Given the tool, language, and the objects real or imagined it only requires the spark of reason to explain why people write. Perhaps it is simply an attempt to communicate, on one level descriptions of the real (however false) and on another descriptions of the imagined. Serenity quote: I think that’s why Brad discounted quality, the classification of Writers as communicators of thought segregates the list makers from the poets regardless of their level of expertise. Babies that crawl and those that walk still fall into the category of babies in the same way as bad poets and good poets are still poets. (Well almost) I have an overriding urge to delete that last passage having suddenly been struck with the thought that you may mean that one type of writing proceeds another creating a necessary evolution between the two. Maybe later [This message has been edited by Toad (06-23-2002 06:11 AM).] |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
I know, Toad, I was not trying to be unfair by quoting Brad out of context--tone is hard to type! I simply meant to point out, that I, personally find charm in many expressions of writing... and never meant to assume anyone's taste in that matter. my thinking? is a bit like I am learning the alphabet in language---I tend to make obscure points--to my own disadvantage, I admit...um, it WOULD be a disadvantage, if this were a contest that is... (IZZIT?  ) |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
*chuckle to Toad* I'll see yer edit, and raise ya TWO!!! |
||
|
Toad Member
since 2002-06-16
Posts 161 |
Perhaps writing is a contest but there’s only ever one competitor – the writer. I missed an s from contain(s) and my fear of losing took over. |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
(serenity enters, places a simple daisy on stage, and exits....backwards--SHE WAS BORN THAT WAY) stay tuned...until tomorrow |
||
|
Toad Member
since 2002-06-16
Posts 161 |
Craig enters picks a daisy from the stage and tries to write the best poem ever written about daisies and stages, after the first attempt he tries again and then again and again. Every attempt is slightly better than the last but still a complete failure – HE WAS BORN THAT WAY. |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
 (fade to black) |
||
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
[ENTER JANITOR] Janitor: Damn kids. I always have to clean up their 'art'. What does this clump of dirt have to do with anything, anyway? [Notices a crumpled piece of paper, a page from the play] Janitor: I WAS BORN THAT WAY? Who cares how you were born. Get a job. -------------------------- Serenity said: "I think he simply wrote commonalities in uncommonly great language. He expressed the universal in language so strong, as to be adapted by those who felt the resonance of truth within his writings." I agree that Shakespeare resonates but I see no reason for the preposition 'of truth' or of arguing that he expressed the universal. Just reduce something far enough and you can always get there and that means "Taming the Shrew" has something in common with "Chushingura". In fact, it means Shakespeare has something in common with everything. But what if it's the other way around? What if Shakespeare isn't the universalist but readers who are indocrinated with universalism reading universal truths in great literature because that is one definition of great literature? I think we can just drop that whole part and argue that Shakespeare's greatness lies in that uncommon language you were talking about. Resonance doesn't lie in the universal, it lies in the uncommon. More later. |
||
|
Ron
Administrator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-05-19
Posts 8669Michigan, US |
My best friend in college was a brilliant young man with a seemingly unquenchable thirst for knowledge. Steve was pursuing two degrees and still found time to read self-help books unrelated to any of his classes. I remember a conversation we had, on a long drive to somewhere long since forgotten, almost as if it happened yesterday. Steve admitted he didn't see much sense in reading fiction. Escapism, he called it. I told him I considered good fiction an extension of living. Learning about the law is great (Steve is now a lawyer in San Diego), and figuring out how to calculate ROI can be rewarding, but nothing will ever replace the importance of understanding people. Without great books and greater writers, life is simply far too short to experience all there is to experience. Fiction allows us to meet people we would never meet, in situations we would never see, living dramas contrived specifically to reveal oft hidden truths. Steve wasn't much into the subtleties of language, or even beauty for the sake of beauty, but he was very much into Truth and Understanding. People, he knew, were important. I don't think he ever did learn to really enjoy great fiction, but he did learn to read it. Avidly. Shakespeare, I think, did far more than turn an uncommon phrase or two. Like every great writer before and after, Shakespeare used words to communicate and enlighten the human condition. He created complex characters and helped us to understand them. And in understanding them, we learn to better understand ourselves and our world. Absolute Truths? Probably not. But until man or society changes a lot more than they have in five centuries, they were certainly Universal Truths. Personally, I think there are many writers with a greater command of the language than the Bard. None that I have ever read, however, have a greater or wider or more profound understanding of human nature. While it's impossible to ever divorce content and language, I think the former must always be elevated above the latter. Too much emphasis on language results in long, rambling pages of beautiful sunset descriptions that go no where and mean nothing. On the other hand, any of Shakespeare's stories could be told in prosaic, even boringly trite English and still have an impact far beyond the words. I think we have a problem in this thread differentiating between language and writing. They are not the same thing. Only when language is wed to meaning does it become writing. I believe words exist only as a tool. The universe would still exist even if mankind was still grunting with the apes, and it will continue to exist long after the last human is biodegradable sludge. We are not the center of creation, except within our own egocentric minds, nor is the language we developed the fulcrum from which reality is leveraged. It exists only as a tool, an often imperfect tool, that grants us the ability to communicate our understanding to others. Language doesn't define the individual mind so much as it defines the collective mind. It may well be what we are, but it is not who we are. |
||
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Hmmm, if I understand you correctly, Ron, you seem to be saying that the study of language as language or of writing as writing can be done without any semantic content at all. Perhaps this stems from Chomsky's universal grammar theory (syntax sans semantics), but I think he was wrong about that. When we say language, when we say writing, I think we already include meaning; otherwise we're just talking about noise or scribbles. As you say, you can never divorce content with structure and I fail to see why we should privilege one over the other. I don't think they should be compared at all -- unless by comparison you want to see how these two abstractions interact with each other. A poem is first and foremost a poem and should be read like that. It's only after it's been read that we start thinking about which was more important, the ideas or the way those ideas are presented. I've only touched on this, but it's from this premise that I think writing is irreducibly social in nature. That is, when you write something you are intending it to be read (even if only by yourself at some later date). If you read it and destroy it, well, the probably means that you don't want it to be read by someone else. You've changed your mind. ---------------------------- I also fail to see why we compare fiction or non-fiction; they're trying to do two different things and should be seen in that light. I do not believe that a novel or a poem's quality is dependent on it's verifiable truth value, an historical narrative, on the other hand, is. When an historical narrative is found to be faulty or to have been surpassed by later research, it moves into the literature genre (Gibon's Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire for example). I think this is fine. Steve seems to be a particularly extreme example of what many people believe, and ultimately I think that view is limiting in that it has to be real before it is worthwhile. I think it's more important to concentrate on what a work does to you than on what it gives you in terms of personal knowledge. I agree that language is a tool but it's not a representational tool, it's a tool for coping. More later -- sorry this wasn't better organized. |
||
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
I've been mentally going through the major characters in Will's stuff and trying to find a universal truth that we can actually talk about. I don't see it. What do people mean by universal truth and how does that relate to a specific play? Here's kind of what I've been doing: 1. Romantic Love is a good thing (Romeo and Juliet?) 2. Friendship is important (Henry the IV, pt. 2? 3. Justice cannot be denied (The Merchant of Venice?) 4. Trust your instincts (Hamlet?) 5. Truth is always the best way (Corialanus?) 6. You should follow your destiny (Macbeth?) Aren't the plays interesting precisely because the characters aren't universal, they are as Ron said, complex and believable even when doing things that are impossible? I don't know, I've been fighting universals for such a long time that maybe I've forgotten what people are actually talking about. |
||
|
Ron
Administrator
Member Rara Avis
since 1999-05-19
Posts 8669Michigan, US |
I really don't think we disagree on much, Brad. Except (dare I say it?), a few semantical issues. "Meaning" is a word that, obviously, has meaning. But it doesn't really mean a lot. At least not alone. In that sense, I agree that language and writing imply meaning. Yet, in spite of that, I suspect you'd agree that a lot of stories and poems are - what was the phrase you used? - noise or scribbles. My point about Shakespeare was that eloquence without depth is, well, just eloquence. It's a jingle that's pleasing to the ear, that bounces around inside your head for a time, but is soon forgotten. Had the jingle never been written, there would be no loss. Had Shakespeare not existed, the loss would have been incalculable. I still think, when you describe writing as a social exercise, that you are unduly assigning motivation to the writer. Interestingly, in an earlier post, you differentiated between "someone who writes a weekly grocery list and someone who gains pleasure from the manipulation of a language." I'm not at all sure that distinction can be so easily assumed, especially if you then include the prerequisite that the latter writes with the intention to be read. I make lists all the time, and often the very act of writing the list commits it to memory and makes the list unnecessary. I never refer to it again. I don't think it unreasonable to assume that stories and poems could be written for the same reason. If lists help us better organize our lives, maybe stories and poems help us to better organize our understanding of life? While I agree that "most" writers intend to be read, and indeed fervently hope to be read, I'm not so sure it's safe to extend that to ALL writers. I'm guessing I have at least a million written words which I will probably never read again and will most certainly never make public. Those words have served their purpose without having ever been read, but just by having been written. Fiction and non-fiction are, perhaps, less different than you suggest. I free-lanced for fifteen years, with about fifty articles published, and I approached every one of those pieces in the same way I approach fiction. I told a story in order to make something I wanted to say more palatable. Much in the same way I did in my last post with Steve. Similarly, when I write fiction, I research the facts in the story just as if I was writing an article. Not because the facts are what I want to reveal in the story, but because getting those facts wrong will obscure what I want to say. In other words, many of my articles contain partially fabricated anecdotes and all of my stories and poems contain non-fictional props. At some point, the line gets a little blurry. As for fiction's quality being dependent on a verifiable truth, we are in complete agreement - IF you mean historical truth. More on that in a moment. I think Steve was an extreme example only in the sense that he vocalized why he didn't read fiction. Most don't. I have met far more people, both in business and in school, who either never read or read only what they MUST read, than people who actually enjoy reading. And of those who enjoy reading, most would rather curl up with Harold Robbins than Charles Dickens. And while I agree it's more important to concentrate on what a work does to you than what it gives you in personal knowledge, I think those two are even more inseparable than language and content. I'm not talking about reading Moby Dick so you can consume the 100 plus pages on the history of whaling. But what the story does to you, unless you're completely comatose, should enrich you in some way and increase your personal knowledge ABOUT YOURSELF. Can a poem or story evoke emotion without also telling you something about yourself? That brings us back to Shakespeare and universal truth. Fiction need not depend on verifiable truth in the historical sense, but I think it very much depends on truth in the larger sense. For me, the universal truth of fiction revolves around human motivations. Bad writing is when the characters do things so the author can move them closer to the ending he envisions. Good writing is when the characters do exactly what you would expect them to do, given everything you know about them. They follow their own nature, not the whims of the plot. Television and movies lean towards the former, novels lean towards the latter, but almost everything written has some of both. A few really great writers, like Shakespeare, seem to almost let the characters write the ending. Boy, in reading what I just wrote, I have over-simplified to the point of banality. The universal truths of great fiction are much more complex than just showing that finding out your father was killed by your uncle and mother leads to vengeance and violence. It's in the interweaving of complexity, often in the midst of conflicting motivations, that the truth is found. Simplicity is anathema. If Romeo and Juliet just told us "Romantic love is good," the story could have been written by Daniel Steele. Shakespeare, instead, shows us that romantic love can make a shambles of familial love, while at the same time, the love of a friend (Mercutio) can foolishly bring about the destruction of the romance. The Bard pits love against love against love, and I think the tragedy that ensues teaches us something important about the very nature of human love. Not everyone in Romeo's situation would react as he did. But anyone who FELT as he felt, whether five hundred years ago or today, could really do very little else differently. Therein lies both the universality and the truth. Of course, if I could REALLY explain it, I'd be writing plays instead of computer programs. |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
hmmm...point taken, Brad. Just because I relate to something personally does not make it "universal." Sharon keeps telling me I've led a bit of an "unusual" life...I thought EVERYBODY could relate to lust, suicide, murder, and all the various Shakespearian complexities. Now, do I STILL have to get a job? *shudders*  |
||
|
serenity blaze Member Empyrean
since 2000-02-02
Posts 27738 |
Okay. In the interest of fairness, I decided to perform a small experiment to further explore this issue of "universal truth." So being also true to my Louisiana heritage, I decided to have a barbecue this evening, and take an opinion poll among my guests. One couple was a retired fisherman and his wife. My sister also attended. And also on my guest list were three life forms from a distant galaxy. (If you do not believe that, I urge you to attend one of my parties soon--I have a restraining order on a scout for the Jerry Springer show, as he kept "raiding" my barbecues for guests!) As the sun was slowly setting, I brought up our little discussion here and read them the content of this thread. My sister, of course, agreed with ME--but then, she has shared much of my unusual life, so I discounted her as biased. The fisherman suggested that if we wanted to discuss universal truth, we should forget Shakespeare, and discuss Hemingway. (Of course.) His wife simply asked me for another beer. Life form #1 said the question was moot--since as individuals truth is a subjective reality--and protested that the question was illogical and unimportant in the grand scheme of the actual universe (which, "he" pointed out, that he knew far better than a mere human could possibly imagine, just by the simple circumstance of his creation in a petrie dish--he's so arrogant--grrr). The second life form was in agreement with the first. (Smiling, now there's a universal theme...a simple, "I'm with him" will transcend the galaxies, language barriers, and biology.) The third life form, however, is considered an elder (having had experience with the evacuation of no less than three planets due to warfare, and a fourth collided with a meteor) This one did not speak. I mean it literally never speaks. It just waves this antennae-like thing around and places "thought" replies in your mind. I waited, and sure enough, it waved that "thing" in front of me and I instantly felt my mind sort of 'invaded' and the thought, "Who is William Shakespeare?" pervaded my mind. So I dropped my barbecue brush, and ran inside to get my volume of William Shakespeare Classics. I started to read aloud to the elder life form, but got another 'reply.' "The emotion through which you read these words could bias my opinion. Please hand me the information." So I offered my unusual friend the book. The Elder grabbed it with that antennae-like thing (it's kind of gross until you get used to it) and promptly ATE my treasured leather bound copy of William Shakespeare. Now I WAS speechless! The elder then gazed upon me gravely with all five eyes. With a wave of "antennae" this popped into my mind: "Share this universal truth with your friends. Where there's a "WILL," there's a Way. And do you have another one of those weenies with the cheese in the middle?" See Brad? I don't need a job. I AM a job!*chortle*-*chuckle*-*grin*... and thanks to RON for inspiring me, with this: "Fiction need not depend on verifiable truth in the historical sense, but I think it very much depends on truth in the larger sense." (serenity exits, doing the soft shoe...) [This message has been edited by serenity (06-25-2002 06:36 AM).] |
||
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
"Meaning" is a word that, obviously, has meaning. But it doesn't really mean a lot." --I agree, but I'll take a good piece of intentional doggerel over one more 'important' poem, a poem that, while certainly sincere, doesn't say anything new. Perhaps a better word is comprehensible? Certainly, we have a school of thought where meaning can be subordinated and even eliminated to the pure sound of language itself (Basil Bunting says something like this.), but I suspect that the more eloquent it is (as opposed to the more shocking it is), the more people will find meaning there. It may not persuade you, it may not persuade me, but as long as people are willing to take the time to explain it, I'll try to listen and try to 'get it'. --I contrast this approach with the culture of silence that permeates so much 'elite' views of what poetry is supposed to do -- the 'knowing smile' approach. I suspect many of these listeners or readers are more interested in the clever jingle than they are the synthesis of meaning and sound (and why do we have to synthesize something that was already wedded together in the first place?). --The problem here is that they assume that if it sounds good, it must be important (In itself, this is fine.), or more importantly they act as if it were important with no attempt to define what that importance is; in fact, they often denigrate those who have the courage to admit that they don't understand or the courage to describe it. I think this is a mistake. Simplistic or not, your attempt to describe Romeo and Juliet was a nice, quick description that shows many of the things I see and that all this talk of universals obscures. "I still think, when you describe writing as a social exercise, that you are unduly assigning motivation to the writer." Interestingly, in an earlier post, you differentiated between "someone who writes a weekly grocery list and someone who gains pleasure from the manipulation of a language." --Perhaps your right, but when someone in the course of a conversation says, 'I write' or 'I'm a writer' I find it hard to believe that he or she doesn't want to share with someone. True, it may not be me and that's okay, but look at Serenity's point about the beads. She may not care if someone dislikes it (she may not care if I like or dislike it), but she makes it very clear that she cares if somebody likes it. I see no difference between that statement and the statement that 'I'm looking for a target audience' and that makes it social. --I once knew a young woman who told me she wrote, I asked to see her stuff, she said, "No," I asked why, she said, "Because I'm going to be discovered just like Emily Dickinson, I'm not going to be read until I'm gone." Okay, but that belies the question, doesn't it? She wants to be read, she just doesn't want to be read by me and she doesn't want to be read now. --She also follows the myth of Dickinson. Dickinson did indeed send her work to publishers for assessment. --As someone who, several years back, spent practically every morning practicing my Chinese characters, I completely understand the use of pen to paper as a mnemonic device, but I'm not going to call myself a writer and I'm not going to say I write as a result. If I said I practiced calligraphy, on the other hand, I think that would open me up to a specifically social intent. "the latter writes with the intention to be read." --I really never saw this as controversial (Go figure, huh?) as I thought I wasn't so much attempting to define writing as an 'objective' thing, but trying to narrow the field to describe that moment when someone says, "I write." I certainly have written more poems than I've ever shown people but that's not because I didn't at one time intend for them to be read as I simply changed my mind (and wish that on a number of poems I had shown that, well, I hadn't. ).--So, I guess my question to you Ron is when you were writing those unread stories, those unread poems, was that the intent -- to leave them unread? When I write something, and again by writing I mean the manipulation of language to create something new (stories, poems, essays), I always feel like I'm writing to someone, I have a vague picture in my head of someone 'out there' who will read it. True, there are practicing exercises, there are mnemonic devices, there is writing produced in trance-like states, but, honestly, I don't think that's what people mean when they say, "I write". In fact, the first two points are ways of distancing yourself (Don't judge this as a piece of writing, judge it for it's specific purpose). The third is a more interesting case. While no doubt many will take 'credit' for that writing, won't they also distance themselves by saying, 'that wasn't me, it just happened,' or 'that was my unconscious speaking,' or even, in extreme cases, 'that was someone else writing through me.' --How can you take credit for something that you won't take responsiblity for? More later, Brad PS Serenity and Toad, not ignoring your comments but it's taken me a couple of days to integrate all that's been said so far and I thought the best point to begin was with some of Ron's points. Believe it or not, I see this a lot more clearly with all that's been said. Whether or not I'm getting my point across is of course your decision. [This message has been edited by Brad (06-28-2002 05:35 PM).] |
||
|
Brad Member Ascendant
since 1999-08-20
Posts 5705Jejudo, South Korea |
Continuing: "Those words have served their purpose without having ever been read, but just by having been written." --Fair enough, but I see two different points of view here. Again, my question is was that the original purpose of the writing? If so, you don't call it writing (see above), you say, "This was just an exercise," or something like that. If not, you changed your mind and that does nothing to alter my original contention that if you call yourself a writer, you are trying to change something through the manipulation of language. I've changed my wording here so feel free to go after me here but at the same time, I never said that changing the world would work in the way you want to change the world. All things have unintended consequences. --If you're not quite sure, I think this is one aspect of what those crazy French (and Austrian) writers are talking about when they say that we necessarily must forget things in order to continue to do other things. I see what they say as a description, not a prescription, not that we should forget our original intentions but that our multiple intentions can confuse us so much that we stop doing anything. --And at the same time, Serenity, this is why we can't poll people here to find the right answer (human or otherwise), I'm attempting to look at certain assumptions that I think are mistaken. But those assumptions are second nature to most people, they aren't questioned as they allow people to ask the questions that they usually ask (which necessarily means that they don't ask others). And still at the same time, there are plenty of things one can point to to 'prove' one's second nature. When I see this (based on my own assumptions of course), I try to look at it twice, I try to question the ability to make the question so to speak, to see where it comes from, to see if more useful things might come out of this examination. I can't prove it, I can only try to explain it in different ways and hope that some see what I'm getting at. --The original motivation for this post and the tangents that have followed was the irony of demanding credit for what a certain author has done (even if he himself would probably laugh ) and the general understanding that most people also relinquish a certain responsibilty for that work (This is quite different, of course, than taking responsibility for those who react to your work). Specifically, I was thinking about what it means to say, "I write to write" and what that means for a socially situated individual who knows that everything that he or she writes, as long as it's not copying, can only be a manipulation of what has come before, a complete reinvention would not be writing, a creation of a full blown language that no one else knew would also not be writing. We have the Tolkien example of course but his language is not as 'new' as a new language now is it?And "Jabberwocky" is not as meaningless as some would have you believe. From this inevitability of influence (allusion to Bloom's "anxiety" fully intended), doesn't it seem strange that so few people seem to completely deny it, to ignore it, to still demand credit for writing the same thing in the same way as someone else? The easy way out is to argue insecurity (and assertion and dismissal are just as easily symptoms of this as shyness and silence), but that neglects the fact that Ron is right again -- we're juggling a hell of a lot of balls here. It neglects the fact that we're all insecure. Part of this insecurity stems from issues we've already discussed -- the lack of clear and agreed upon rules and the mistaken belief that vague rules (or tendencies) mean that anything goes. But part of this insecurity also comes from the inherently social nature of writing itself because even when the rules are clear, even when no rules have been broken, we still see, sometimes, people getting angry at other people for losing a game of golf. Again, the easy way out is to argue a kind of Social-Darwinism, we're all in a permanent competition, even with ourselves. This is useful up to a point but I still think we can go a bit further (or go back a bit further -- I'll end this comment with a quote to make that clearer.). Back to writing, let's assume two types of writers: one who denies influence and one who recognizes influence. I assert that the first denies influence in order to assume an identity (from the heart), and I assert that the one who recognizes influence desperately tries to create an identity (from the head). If I have time, I'll try to make this clearer but for now, if you remember my first post, I hope you can see why I find this hilarious. Because in order for that creation to happen it has to be recognized as new, as different, as interesting. Remember, he or she already recognizes that they are being influenced, so how do they know when in fact they have a bonafide specific identity? When they see what they've done influences others. Anyway, the quote I was thinking about comes from a speech by Michel Foucault: "But to truly escape Hegel involves an exact appreciation of the price we have to pay to detach ourselves from him. It assumes that we are aware to the extent to which Hegel, insiduiously perhaps, is close to us; it implies a knowledge, in that which permits us to think against Hegel, of that which remains Hegelian. We have to determine the extent to which our anti-Hegeliansim is possibly one of his tricks directed against us, at the end of which he stands, motionless, waiting for us." --The irony, to me, of my original post is nothing more than seeing that heart and head poets are still, in a certain sense, doing the same thing. |
||
|
|
⇧ top of page ⇧ |
|
| All times are ET (US). All dates are in Year-Month-Day format. | ||
