11. The art of writing is the art of applying the seat of the pants to the seat of the chair. -Mary Heaton Vorse
I just had a rather nasty argument with Manda. The argument had to do with this quote, one of our prompts, the lines we are supposed to use as inspiration and motivation. The problem came when I apparently had no idea what this quote meant. I saw it as a line referring to the reader... The art of writing is the art of making a piece of work interesting enough for someone to sit down and read. Apparently I was very wrong, the quote is actually about discipline and consistency. My problem was that the quote in no way says that. I could not comprehend how sitting on your ass is supposed to be synonymous with the ability to sit down and get to work. I would think it was a slight against writers before a mark on their determination.
This argument between me and my closest friend became rather heated, words came about that neither of us are proud of. And this brings me to my point of interpretations, and how defiantly we can defend them. Our views on the world are just that, ours. Someone else could have vastly different views on what is and isn't. When these two people, two people who's views are so contrast meet, their opposing opinions in fact challenge each others reality. You cling to what you know to be true so deeply that you can sometimes become violent and lash out against someone who is just doing the same.
If you will allow me to show my inner nerd, I can recount another experience, this time with me being on the 'right' side of what a particular piece was saying. I was discussing an episode of Star Trek with a friend, one that is quite explicitly about Homosexuality and the social fear of it. It was an awesome episode, and one of my favorites. But my friend for some reason saw it as about conformity. I wondered how the lines could be so clearly drawn yet such a different conclusion could come to be. I saw it, sure, it was in essence about everyone being the same, but I still knew the actual message was acceptance of people with an alternate sexuality.
I can see how the quote here says that writing is about sitting down and doing the work. I just simply do not see how one who looks at this quote for the first time, with no background as to the context of it, can assume that meaning without being told outright. Looking at a line with nothing but the line, I took from it my own meaning. I took from it a message about what a writer does for his readers, as oppose to what a writer first does for himself. I think it simply tells something about who I am, as a writer, it's less about the writing as much as it is about capturing someone, entertaining them.
Though it is hard to write standing up.
3 comments:
Did you consider that maybe the "message" of the episode was "homosexuality vs. conformity?" In other words, perhaps you are both correct.
"I saw it, sure, it was in essence about everyone being the same"
As you can see I very much agreed that the message of that episode can be seen as conformity. The episode in question was TNG: The Outcast, which is pretty explicit in being about people born with a sexual preference that was seen as incorrect. My friend stated that they did NOT see it as being about Homosexuality, or alternate sexuality at all. Just conformity.
My point in this all was to state that two people can see the same work of art/media that is meant to represent one message, and yet come to two separate conclusions that can both be justified as correct.
If the two separate conclusions can both be justified as correct then most likely they are both correct and neither has the grounds to say the other is wrong. Only the original author can say that.
Yes, two people can see the same work of art/media and come to two separate conclusions. How do you know that it was meant to only represent one of them?
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