the pretentious nonconformist

"The unexamined life is not worth living" - Socrates
The fallacy of an individualistic writer Some writers straight up have the gift. The right hemispheres of their brains ooze linguistic sex onto their outdated or pirated copies of Microsoft Word and captivate audiences on a scale that transcends the blogosphere that I now shamelessly pander to. The rest of us…simply don’t. Even before Vonnegut, spell-check, and Linear A, writers (and epic poets) sought the quality of distinction. It is the human condition to endeavor for one’s own literary mark on the written history. As one of these self-absorbed scribes, particularly one with a journalistic background, I have aspired to draw attention to topics of the day, but more so to myself for those oh-so-valuable webpage hits. There have been many, but in the end, what do those mean and does that qualify my work as decent writing? I had always felt that I could stand alone as a rogue writer, unfazed by and unconcerned with the great writers who came before. I always skimmed through historically significant books such as the Grapes of Wrath or the Odyssey in high school. This apathy toward culturally iconic pieces of written word persevered until recently. As my SAT classes during that time instilled a broad lexicon of pedantic vocabulary (see what I mean), my writing turned into a Frankenstein-esque monstrosity that tragically pitted natural linguistic flow against obscure, ostentatious bullshit. There was no style, and certainly no substance. My writing’s antithesis would be the basic, yet compelling prose of one Ernest Hemingway. He said (in essence) that if you couldn’t get a point across with the metaphorical tip of an iceberg in writing, you were already fucked. I have needed at least two obscure and needlessly academic words to get a point across. I clearly have some work to do on that. As I have started to indulge in the works of some revered authors, I find that it is important to absorb, but not necessarily emulate their style. Many have set important precedents for the modern writer. Even Shakespeare, as much as I hate his works, put soliloquys on the literary map and paved the way for the stream-of-consciousness writing and speech that pervades the blogging mentality. Perhaps if I’m thinking so much about my writing and waxing romantic on my blog, maybe I should focus on actually writing about things that matter rather than self-analyzing. That’s usually more productive. So until next week…two…or three, I bid you adieu.

The fallacy of an individualistic writer

Some writers straight up have the gift. The right hemispheres of their brains ooze linguistic sex onto their outdated or pirated copies of Microsoft Word and captivate audiences on a scale that transcends the blogosphere that I now shamelessly pander to. The rest of us…simply don’t. Even before Vonnegut, spell-check, and Linear A, writers (and epic poets) sought the quality of distinction. It is the human condition to endeavor for one’s own literary mark on the written history.

As one of these self-absorbed scribes, particularly one with a journalistic background, I have aspired to draw attention to topics of the day, but more so to myself for those oh-so-valuable webpage hits. There have been many, but in the end, what do those mean and does that qualify my work as decent writing? I had always felt that I could stand alone as a rogue writer, unfazed by and unconcerned with the great writers who came before.

I always skimmed through historically significant books such as the Grapes of Wrath or the Odyssey in high school. This apathy toward culturally iconic pieces of written word persevered until recently. As my SAT classes during that time instilled a broad lexicon of pedantic vocabulary (see what I mean), my writing turned into a Frankenstein-esque monstrosity that tragically pitted natural linguistic flow against obscure, ostentatious bullshit. There was no style, and certainly no substance.

My writing’s antithesis would be the basic, yet compelling prose of one Ernest Hemingway. He said (in essence) that if you couldn’t get a point across with the metaphorical tip of an iceberg in writing, you were already fucked. I have needed at least two obscure and needlessly academic words to get a point across. I clearly have some work to do on that. As I have started to indulge in the works of some revered authors, I find that it is important to absorb, but not necessarily emulate their style. Many have set important precedents for the modern writer. Even Shakespeare, as much as I hate his works, put soliloquys on the literary map and paved the way for the stream-of-consciousness writing and speech that pervades the blogging mentality.

Perhaps if I’m thinking so much about my writing and waxing romantic on my blog, maybe I should focus on actually writing about things that matter rather than self-analyzing. That’s usually more productive. So until next week…two…or three, I bid you adieu.

  1. ramennoodles21 posted this