First off I love creativity. I love art. I love entertainment. I don’t feel like art and entertainment need to be thought of as separate things. The entertainment I love; specifically music, film and literature, I see as art. The music of Jimi Hendrix is art. I really think that. Mozart and Hendrix, neither one is inherently more artistic or beautiful then the other. Both are different ways of expressing oneself through music. It comes down to the individual preferences of the listener. What is and what isn’t art is not important. Well that’s not entirely true. It’s just not what I want to write about right now. What I want to write about now is how I want to be a part of that world, the creative artistic world. I can’t and don’t have the patience to play music. I can’t sing, I can’t paint, I can’t act and I’m pretty sure I couldn’t direct a film. I do, however think I can write.
This, though, is where I start to realize what I don’t like about myself and my writing. I feel as if I have the constant need to seek approval or be praised by my peers. This need to be perceived as smart, witty and insightful leaks into my writing. Of course if I want to be a writer, or in other words contribute to that world of art and thought, I should write in a way that engages people; the problem is that a lot of times I feel like I’m just trying to show off. I’m writing for the praise and not for the art. This motive for praise and self aggrandizement seems impossible to escape completely. George Orwell said as much in his essay “Why I Write.” In it he lists four main reasons why someone chooses to write, the first of which he says is “sheer egotism,” which he describes as, a “desire to seem clever, to be talked about, to be remembered after death…” He goes on to say, “it is humbug (bullshit in modern terms) to pretend this is not a motive, and a strong one” (312). While much of the essay also focuses on Orwell’s more idealistic reasons for writing; the “desire to push the world in a certain direction, to alter peoples’ ideas of the kind of society they should strive after” (312 – 313); he is careful to bring it back to what he ultimately believes to be one of the more powerful motives to write. “All writers are vain, selfish and lazy” (316). This quote sounds like a terrible characterization, but it brings a knowing little smirk to my face because there is truth in it. First of all, it does seem lazy to want to be an artist or writer. I don’t want to do manual labor and it’s not because I think I’m above it. I just hate it and I suck at it. In saying this I am not discounting what I believe to be the importance of art and writing. Art is another way to express what we believe to be a truth. It can sometimes communicate to us in a way that other things do not. Sometimes a love song or a sonnet speaks to us because it explains a feeling that we have in our own heart. It’s unfair for me to classify all artists as lazy. There are many artists who are industrious and multi talented, I just don’t count myself among them. This particular writer is lazy.
Again, I am getting off track here. The part of Orwell’s quote that I think really sums up how I feel about my own attempts to be a writer are the parts about selfishness and vanity. I’m both of these because I want to write my thoughts and I want to be praised for verbalizing them, but as I said earlier I’m afraid that I’m not always being true to my voice because I want to be admired as an insightful person who sheds light on the mysteries of the human condition. See, even that last sentence makes me sound like a show off and a pretentious fuck. Writing “fuck,” I guess is supposed to make me seem grounded and edgy. I’m no word snob and I have no moral objection to swearing. Ass, bitch, cunt, cock, mother fucker, shit. It’s just that I don’t want to swear just to swear or show off. I want to be insightful, edgy and funny; but I don’t want to pretend to be insightful, edgy and funny. I want my writing to come from a real place inside of me and not from what I perceive to be what people think of as great writing; otherwise my writing will be hollow or as Kurt Vonnegut would call it, “cheap, silly, false” (12).
Recently I reread The Catcher In the Rye, and out of all of Holden Caulfield’s rants there was one in particular that stood out and I think it relates to the anxiety I’m speaking of, about wanting to be a successful writer but also making sure that I’m doing it from a pure and authentic place. In the passage I’m thinking of, Holden is asked by his little sister, Phoebe, what he wants to do with his life. He has a hard time answering the question and at one point begins talking about lawyers.
“Lawyers are alright, I guess – but it doesn’t appeal to me… I mean they’re alright if they go around saving innocent guys’ lives all the time, and like that, but you don’t do that kind of stuff if you’re a lawyer. All you do is make a lot of dough and play golf and play bridge and buy cars and drink Martinis and look like a hot-shot. And besides, even if you did go around saving guys’ lives and all, how would you know if you did it because you really wanted to save guys’ lives, or because you did it because what you really wanted to do was be a terrific lawyer, with everybody slapping you on the back and congratulating you in court when the goddam trial was over, the reporters and everybody, the way it is in the dirty movies? How would you know you weren’t being a phony? The trouble is you wouldn’t” (Salinger 172).
How do you and I know we aren’t being phonies? How do we know we are being authentic and acting completely selflessly without any thought of compensation, whether that compensation be in the form of financial gain or in words of praise? Is it even possible to be completely selfless? Is a perceived noble act any less noble because we find out the actor is a self involved status seeking prick? It certainly feels wrong to praise someone who seemingly does something good for selfish reasons, but again; is it possible to be completely selfless when doing something righteous? Personally, I don’t think it is. Even if we serve out of a desire to serve, we are still fulfilling a personal desire. We are seeking to fulfill something in our self which is in a way selfish.
Holden is critical of people he perceives as phony throughout the novel. He sees, most especially in the world of grown – ups, a lack of authenticity. The question I have is similar to the question I had about selflessness. Is it possible to be completely authentic and true to one’s self in every word and in every action? For someone like me or Holden who seem to idealize authenticity, the answer is a hopeful yes. The fact that I say “a hopeful yes,” however implies that I am skeptical of my own reply. In reality I think the best we can do is try. Complete authenticity requires complete knowledge of one’s self; but this a life long journey. The self is not some permanent stagnate thing. It is and should be something that is constantly changing and evolving through life experience. In our quest to be authentic all we can do is be true to where we are in the moment we act but with the knowledge that we are always changing.
With Holden and with myself there is a fear of failure, the ultimate failure is possibly being exposed as that thing we hate the most, a phony. Part of this seems to stem from having an overly idealized and impossibly high standard of selflessness and authenticity. In Holden’s case and in my own this fear has paralyzed us from accomplishing much with our lives. As you read the “Catcher in the Rye,” once you get past his obvious pettiness and immaturity, you also realize that Holden can be insightful and intelligent. He speaks of his talent in writing and he is clearly capable of more than flunking out of the schools he has attended. I relate to this flaw in Holden Caulfield. I hesitate to write and I have nearly flunked out of school twice. I’m enrolled to go back this year, but under continued academic probation, just as at the end of the novel Holden is scheduled to go back to another school. He is hesitant however to commit that he is going to do better, which again seems to stem from the same fear of being exposed as a phony.
“A lot of people, especially this one psychoanalyst guy they have here, keeps asking me if I’m going to apply myself when I go back to school next September. It’s such a stupid question, in my opinion. I mean how do you know what you’re going to do till you do it? The answer is you don’t. I think I am, but how do I know? I swear it’s a stupid question” (Salinger 213).
If Holden answers yes and he fails then he thinks he will be seen as a phony. It is a difficult question to answer, especially when you’re history suggests that you will fail, not because you want to but because we humans are creatures of habit. We have noble hopes to change our behaviors but until we actually change our behaviors we repeat our mistakes. As with selflessness and authenticity the best I can answer about my own future success in both school and in attempting to be a successful and authentic writer is that I will try. Whenever someone says I will try, we automatically think of it as a weak and uncommitted response. Many of us of a certain age hear Yoda saying, “do or do not, there is no try.” Damn it, I don’t care what Yoda says. We do by trying to do. I am going to try but this time I’m not going to let my fear of being seen as selfish or phony stop me from doing what it is I want to do. I will strive to do things as selflessly and as authentically as is possible for me to do. In the end I believe it’s better to act with imperfect motives then to not act all. At least by acting we can change our motives over time; they can come from a more selfless and authentic place just by acting and striving to have them come from those places.
So here I am, attempting to enter the world of writers and thinkers hoping that what I am writing is something worthwhile and helpful to those who struggle and are apprehensive about their futures. I can say that in at least this, I have spoken from the heart.
By the way, if you are interested in reading George Orwell's vastly superior, short and entertaining essay, "Why I Write," here is the link: http://orwell.ru/library/essays/wiw/english/e_wiw
Bibliography
Orwell, George. A Collection of Essays. Orlando: Harcourt, 1981.
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Vonnegut, Kurt. Welcome to the Monkey House. New York: Dial Press, 2006.
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Salinger, J.D. The Catcher in the Rye. New York: Little Brown and Co., 1991
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