Garrison Keillor to me: Get over it, already

[pegkerr]

I have sort of a hard time not taking this personally. Garrison Keillor says that writers who gripe that Writing is Hard (and you all know that I've bitched plenty about being blocked in this journal before) should just get a grip and knock it off. Writing is hard. Get over it.

Writers, Quit Whining. Spare us the self-involved moaning over the agonies of your art. Writing is no harder than anything else, and the complainers should can it.

Ouch.

Thoughts?

Comments

[d-aulnoy.livejournal.com]

Well, for one thing - if writing in general isn't that "hard" for Mr. Keillor, perhaps he ought to consider that his results aren't very "good".

This is one of the most pointless, blathering pieces of drek that I've ever come across. keillor begins with a fundamental untruth; the assumption that most writers are members of the idle rich, who do not, in fact, teach school, build houses, bus tables ... and then and only then, come home to try to write.

Writing is unlike most other professions in a number of ways. For one thing, everybody writes (I'm not addressing the problem of illiteracy in a comment with a maximum length, but I hope you'll allow me the generalization). People who teach, engage in construction, etc.? Still have occasion to write letters, editorials, reports for their jobs. Writing is one of the key skills which everyone needs, and I'm not just saying that because I teach English. :)

Second, writing is one of the few professions that is very rarely an area of specialization from the get-go. Except for the rare wunderkind who starts early, most people *do* have to deal with other concerns simultaneously with pursuing their creative dreams - a fact which complicates matters considerably, and a fact which he ignores. Writing is not only hard, it's an additional hardship that most people choose out of ... what? Love.

Can people be boring when they speak about their private passions, their hobby-horses? Certainly, to people who don't share those passions, or who are very insensitive in general. But writers are no more guilty of this sin than any other group ....

What I detect most in Keillor's little diatribe is the same kind of entitlement that you can, in fact, see in many other areas: writing isn't hard *for him*. Great! Lots of people think it's not that hard to find a job, either. Or to raise kids. We can generally acknowledge that those people are full of it, especially when we see examples from their own lives, either of their entitlement, or of their own issues when faced with a moment of difficulty.

And this brings me back to the issue of difficulty vs. the issue of quality ... I'd say that, generally, anything that's worth doing is worth doing well, and "doing well" generally involves making an effort. Somteimes it flows; sometimes it's hard. At the end of the day, I'd rather read a well-written piece that resulted from a great deal of work than a piece of tripe that flowed trippingly of someone's tongue. I can *also* say, subjective as my opinion might be, that your writing is very, very good.

Just my two cents ....

By the Brust/Rosenberg Pact of 1998 . . .

[joelrosenberg.livejournal.com]

. . . anything that Steve and I agree on is, by definition, true. We agree that how hard you've worked at a given piece of writing doesn't have anything to do with how good it is.

Re: By the Brust/Rosenberg Pact of 1998 . . .

[papersky.livejournal.com]

And I agree with that one too!

[whapnoggin.livejournal.com]

It's the fact that the message cannot possibly apply to all writers that makes me suspect Keillor has a few specific targets in mind.