Monday, December 29, 2008

Art of writing

Art does not consist in underlining what already is, but to transform it, to infuse an idea into a working matter. For example, writing has three elements: what is in our mind, the art of writing, and words - the working matter with which one cooperates, but which in any case keeps its secret, until the very end; one can only try to extract to some degree the secret of a word.

With music, it's the same thing: there is what is in our mind, the art of writing, and finally the notes and sounds. It is the same for any art! So someone who does not write well, is often someone who isn't doing well or who has nothing to say. The most beautiful pages I have come to read were written by people without an epistolary experience, but who have a sensibility, an intelligence and a profound internal life. So even their “mistakes” are pearls.Then you have people who know how to write but who have nothing to say... And there are quite a few!


Further, one must distinguish those who know how to write but who seem to be disliked and resisted by words, who don't have much of a style... from those who, despite their real lack of inspiration, nevertheless manage to stroke words in the sense of the comma... without ever saying anything interesting (ie profound, interior, animated).

Finally, you have those who have a real interiority, combined with an experience of writing: they have a style, words flirt indefinitely with them. These are few and far between in my opinion. It is very difficult to tame words, for they never lie, they are what we make of them, and at the same time you cannot do what you want with them... that is the whole difficulty! A word can say what you think, but you must think, and sometimes it can better express than you what you think, but to think it or to hope it makes the right word elude you instantly...

I assure you, writing words is something nuts, one must be rather audacious! This matter is not so simple ultimately. One can, for example, seek to convey an emotion, but which emotion is that? For that is the question!! If it is an emotion of intelligence, you do not go about it in quite the same fashion as an emotion of the senses, even interior and poetic... you must actually proscribe flattering external and internal senses if you seek an emotion of intelligence, else you risk submerging what you were seeking to communicate...

I see that for a text to be finished, a real text, the author must feel objectively that it is no longer his text, and must even be able to be measured by what he has written, else it is not a good text, independently of the content. I do believe it is the same for any artistic endeavor.

8 comments:

  1. I really agree with your last statement--that for a text to be finished, the author must feel that it is no longer his.

    I think that is actually true for most art forms--that when we are ready to give our work away, it is no longer ours--but is imprinted by us. Beautiful post.

    Melinda

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  2. This is the second time I have tried to comment! I loved what you wrote about the author feeling, objectively, that a text is no longer his for it to be finished. I think that is true with most art forms--when we are finished with our imprint, we give the art to the world--it is no longer ours. I know I felt this way as an actor and musician--and I also have felt this way as a writer.

    Melinda

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  3. Hi Melinda, I agree with my buddy too, who was an accomplished artist. I merely did a bit of translating. :))) Greatly appreciate the comment!

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  4. The author puts in his creation something personal. Other see their personal feelings in it, not necessarily the authors. A true work of art has its own independent life.

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  5. Wizard,
    I like that! ;-)

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  6. I enjoyed this insightful post. The act of Creation is of the present. A creation is part and parcel to all that is present including the reflections of yesterday and tomorrow.

    When we are present within our life all experience, (including art and creation) are released like seeds on the wind as we continue flowing.

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  7. Another good post, and I agree, I think it's the same for any type of art. It is a stuggle to get what we see in our imagination translated onto the page perfectly, be it by paintbrush or pen or the tap of keys. :-)

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  8. The old quote is apt:" We drink from wells we did not dig." Creative activity is basically, except for learned, forced or experimental technique, mostly unconscious buckets drawn from those wells others have dug. Sheer control of technique is the way of no struggle. Delight yourself first by drinking deeply from as many wells as you find along your way. Delight yourself first with your work, and others will find you.

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