This morning I was struck by this topic so I told myself, I have to write about it. Now.
I've been told that I'm generally a "deep" person and they wish they could think like me - but I could never think like them either, yknow?
Some more than others, some less- whatever, we're all good and bad in our own way.
(One thing I'm not afraid of sharing is that I cry alot because I get stressed easily. Two things that are also good about it is that it's natural stress relief and I don't get puffy eyes. Okay, back to the point.)
So I'd like to propose that all respected content producers/ writers/ poets/ artists only have their own human emotions and personal experiences to work from and are simply sharing them with you.
They don't mean to do it in a self-indulgent "I am very expressive bitch, I need to express them if not I'll die, bitch" sort of way - and I believe people who think this way are the critics we don't need, the people who do not know how to appreciate art or literary form and the people who are jealous because writers are making money and gaining fame from it.
Let me just say the fame they receive is appropriate and rightly theirs because of their hard work.
Even Lady Gaga. (Though having gone bankrupt 4 times in her life due to the millions she spends on clothes is her problem.)
We take very little pride in the fact that we are able to analyse things beyond their face value but we don't purposely go round trying to preach or making up analogies like:
OH LOOK HERE'S A PIECE OF BREAD. LOOK AT HOW POROUS THE SURFACE IS, LET'S GO DEEPER. HEY IT LOOKS JUST LIKE OUR LIVES, WITH MANY HOLES AND FLAWS AND SOMETIMES WE GET SMOTHERED BY JAMS. TRAFFIC JAMS. TRAFFIC JAMS CAN SOMETIMES CAUSE THE WORST HUMAN BEHAVIOUR AND MAKE US KILL EACH OTHER. SO STOP EATING BREAD.
Geez.
We're all materialistic because we all can't deny that we cherish a good download speed. True?
But please understand that a content producer's utmost priority is to reach out to his/her audience and to be relatable.
It's not even about being rich.
I'm not a huge fan of Potter but I really respect Rowling. To read more, clickito this linko:
A true writer only wants to be relatable. Not rich, not elitist. You buy their works for what it's worth. Yet it's worth so much more.
To be relatable is to admit that they themselves are human beings of equal standing: think of every human heart as a canvas. None look quite the same, with different experiences in the form of paint strokes, textures, colours- yet they're all the same thing, whether complete or not. They are ultimately canvases, from beginning till end.
I've always found the goal of the writer's the hardest to achieve.
Because he spends so much time creating the right metaphors and choosing the right diction to bring out emotions in its most accurate form.
The more accurate he is, the more credible he is, isn't he? Who wouldn't want that? Because that way, you gain respect.
As John Green writes in Paper Towns:
"We don't suffer from a shortage of metaphors, is what I mean. But you have to be careful which metaphor your choose, because it matters...the metaphors have implications."
The thing I fear the most as a growing writer are phrases like "It's the type of feeling that you can't describe in words".
I want to let you know that we actually recognise the possibility of not being able to achieve a 'representation' of something that is important and personal to you.
And with that said, we just keep challenging the "impossible" anyway. Call us stubborn, but we're not stopping till we finally understand ourselves and every facet of our weird selves.
Because being human is all we've ever known.
Ourselves first, yes, but with the general audience in mind as well. Balance.
And it's evident every writer and artist struggles with battling their own ego, Sarah Kay can second that. You don't even need to be an artist to struggle with that- we struggle with humility and pride everyday of our lives!
See, my point exactly: we are human in every way.
I don't know about you but the strangest thing to me as a human being is having emotions. Not physical pain but things that the spirit feels and laments and goes into self-withdrawal about or bursts with so much joy and love that it may be seen in every step a person takes and every detailed action a person does.
Obviously some works have accurately translated your feelings into words and visuals and trust me, all the great, late writers and living ones of this age celebrate in both their crypts and cribs. (see what i did thar)
Imagine every time you are able to relate, that paragraph/page glows because it made a spark in your life. You are never the same again. Because as a reader and member of an audience, you understand yourself a little better. You are able to propel your fight for life again once more. It makes you want to touch another's life the way that writer's words touched yours. It's like sharing canvases, showing someone else your heart - and sometimes that 'someone' becomes 'some people' and 'anyone' and all of them appreciate what you feel. It even makes you feel less alone as a writer. You're both reaching out and being reached out to. A mind blowing two-way process that has played a huge part in completing your joy and playing a role in contributing to theirs as well.
Being a writer is not about showing off your vocabulary - some people take advantage of beautiful language and throw them into sentences that don't even make sense.
But for those that actually offer meaning, readers naturally know that the writer understands that there is no language as vast as the English language, whose vocabulary has been refined through and through to only achieve one thing every dictionary on this earth longs to be: To be accurate.
And that's why them using 'big words' is legit.
So my point is: If you think literary works are 'deep' and 'hipster', then you're just lazy to make the effort to understand them in their entirety. Then you're not curious enough. Same goes for religion. You need to taste it, sink your whole soul in it to believe. I don't think many people would be able to live without books.
I know I can't.
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