You’re sick. You are all sick, those of you that are writers, you are, and you know it.
Let’s talk openly about it for a moment without fear of confirming anyone else's assumptions about what being a (w/ air quotes) “writer” (hand does circle motions by the ear) means. It's neither wholly crazy or lazy (although both are constant threats).
Honestly, it’s quite chivalric the way writers donate their minds and bodies for the sake of the craft and not for want of fame and money- No Siree!
Nope, most writers give their work away for free and willingly even, like charity without philanthropy. Because ultimately a writer has to get it out and if its good-someday, someone may notice, that’s why. That’s what motivates writers to spill ink on the page-I know, that isn’t the way it’s done anymore, 'spreading ink', but spreading pixels across the screen doesn’t sound dimensional or nearly dramatic enough. “Get Ink and weep/ Write of it. Sob your heart out sing)”, that’s what Boris Pasternak says in one of his famous poems. Now that has texture.
Words you can taste, that’s all any of us has time for. It's because we are bombarded and pulled in so many directions all vying for (shortened) attention (and if not we all act like that’s the case), filling up every spare moment with our “Social Lives”-which sure doesn’t mean the same thing as it used to.
Painting by Édouard Manet [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons, 'In the conservatory' (1879).
Writing isn’t roofing per se, but it certainly feels just as dangerous. Probably just as difficult to get liability coverage as well. With both professions though the risk does go down based on your skill and knowledge level (I assume). But there are no guarantees in gravity or going for it, which is essentially what writers do every day.
Writers go for it, they choose what to say and they pay the consequence. Writing may not even be as dangerous as being a rock star stereotypically health wise, but it seems both of these professional non-professions are nearly equal in the death toll by overdose category. And it may surprise you, but I have suspected for some time that writers far surpass our little one hit wonders, aka media machinations, mega stars, supernovas, planetary egos, aka superstars by quite a bit-and what do you know, they do. It's a dangerous risky job you'd be crazy to try, seriously. Equally, it is the most wonderful thing to witness done well.
Sure, nobody cares about (famished) writers or (hungry) artists dying broke and unknown. That is exactly what is supposed to happen so don’t go writing about it, right? I know, it's a rule or something.
I read a lot, I mean a lot. I’ve noticed so many mini-bios of the authors I adore who have some medical or psychological diagnosis/issue/malady that one could easily mistake it for a defective body-short end of the stick-secret club, perhaps the Dead Poets Society is actually sub-chapter of the Illuminati…nevermind, that's crazy.
Image by By Anonymous [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.
It’s actually depressing. Or would be if most writers weren’t solitary often borderline bipolar creatures as it were. Perhaps it’s not the profession that does it to these innocent people compelled the play around with words their whole life. This could be one of those first mover questions, or the chicken and the egg game. But we can just avoid beating around the bush and jump right to the conclusion that discomfort, pain and even constant torture has its own source of inspiration for many a scribbler.
And dare I cliche and say-the plot thickens even further...
The resources that validate this sneaking suspicion, which began as an annoyance, is quickly confirmed online. Dr. John D. Ross wrote an article for the Huffington Post which notes just “10 Writers’ Mental and Physical Maladies” where he notes;
“Coleridge was a dope fiend, Joyce and Faulkner were high-functioning drunks, Sylvia Plath a hot bipolar mess. The pic social ineptitude of Swift, Milton and Emily Bronte is suspicious for what we would know call Asperger’s Syndrome. Herman Melville was mired for decades in black depression.”
Dr. Ross points these out in the first paragraph before detailing further about Shakespeare and company ultimately for the promotion of his book Shakespeare’s Tremor and Orwell’s Cough. I have not read this book (will likely) but do not need to right this moment for this lament. That paragraph must (of course) be a much-abbreviated list since both you and I could think of many more alcoholic and depressed, even suicidal writers. Let’s not even consider yet the writers that may be mildly merely hypochondriacs, which is perhaps all.
Like I said, you’re sick, you’re all sick. I’m no doctor but it seems like there’s plenty of writers out there that feel just ‘fine’ or ‘normal’. Meh. And that’s what it’s worth. So go ahead and give it away. You’re not hurting anybody. Actually, honestly, people like me would be lost without you.
What is the point of enduring all this painful writing, or writing about pain you ask? I wonder if it is a curse in general of this talent, or affliction, gift or malady, in sickness and in health, writers write-but are they all doomed? Of course not-that would be a sweeping generalization and we don’t do that.
Besides, with examples like Harper Lee and Umberto Eco recently passing and living well into their old age, in Umberto’s case writing (like a marvelous madman) in both cases celebrating some late past-due recognition. By the way, everyone should read Umberto. Perhaps Umberto would say that this ‘fictional fate’ has more to do with time period…maybe. It could also be that many writers were never able to overcome a certain amount of social anxiety, preferring the company of their own thoughts more than the chatter of others. Self-absorbed? Not at all, literally the opposite which is exuding, emitting, ejecting, spewing or vomiting, I believe. That sounds more like a writer. A sick writer even.
Maybe it is the pain medication that makes writers write if not the pain itself, or the relief and joy of being pain-free even for a fleeting time. Methinks there’s some soul searching for sanity in most prose and it is worth drinking the kool aid of most passionate and poetic, prophetic writers.
Having only partial histories of the lives of the most famous writers affords us only singular perspective snapshots, documented facts (even in their own words) but there is little doubt that any one of these individuals saw glimmers of joy or else how would they know what they were missing or deprived thereof? The sense of loss perhaps compels one to reach out, but I think most writers would not have lived as long (that goes for present tense as well) if they wouldn’t have been writing, that would have been the death sentence.
I think of Osip Mandelstam (1891-1938) who poignantly spoke the following words;
“By denying me the seas,
The right to run and fly
By holding my foot firm
On this constraining earth
What have you achieved?
A splendid calculation.
But you could not seize
My muttering lips thereby. “
My lips are sealed. I will not mutter, or is it utter, a word of the writers illness, a grim prognosis, an addiction to a never ending curiosity, zest and fearless exploration, a daily test of strength and regular confrontation with the self (egads!) and all for pennies, but that is art, and that is worth all the insanity, those fleeting moments of magic are the closest thing to heaven on earth.
Feature image of painting by Evert Collier (circa 1640–1708) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.
3rd image of William Faulkner by Carl Van Vechten [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.
4th image of 'Writing Scientist' by Friedrich von Amerling [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.
Final image By NASA/JPL-Caltech/Space Science Institute (http://photojournal.jpl.nasa.gov/catalog/PIA17171) [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.
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