Point to ponder
Nov. 13th, 2007 10:28 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
It is a truth universally acknowledged that no-one will ever be in need of a writer.
Discuss, taking care to distinguish between "need" as we might externally perceive it from our civilised standpoint, and need as it would appear to people whose primary concern is survival.
Discuss, taking care to distinguish between "need" as we might externally perceive it from our civilised standpoint, and need as it would appear to people whose primary concern is survival.
no subject
Date: 2007-11-13 05:14 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-11-13 06:41 pm (UTC)But it is hard to justify creative writing (which is of course what I'm talking about) in terms of need. Even in Maslow's hierarchy, creativity is only mentioned at the very top of the pyramid, and only in terms of self-actualisation and maximising potential and problem-solving and so on. All very sober and worthy, and not much to do with Right Ho Jeeves or Xena Warrior Princess or anything I might turn out. Comes right down to it, we seem to be more of a want, not a need at all.
no subject
Date: 2007-11-13 08:32 pm (UTC)Is there a need for professional creators (I'm using the term to include all forms of communicative art, not just the limited writing)? I think there isn't, there are so many amateurs who can do it. There is a demand, yes, but then there is a demand for all sorts of things which aren't actually necessary, because they are wanted or (as you said elsewhere) so common now that people expect them as a 'right', and in particular they are wanted "right now" rather than "when they fit it in with their regular work". I can think of several people I know who create music and visual art as well as writing without pay whose works I enjoy as much and more than most of the professionals in the field. I'm writing in the journal of one of them *g*...
no subject
Date: 2007-11-13 11:45 pm (UTC)Giving fiction to children only teaches them to believe in untruths if you teach them to believe anything they read.