Friday, August 29, 2014

What is Art?

Perhaps art is seeing the obvious in such a new light that the old becomes new.
--Madeleine l'Engle. WALKING ON WATER, p175.
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Behold, I make all things new. 
--Jesus, in the aptly-named book of Revelation.
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I've learned a ton about art this past decade or so. We've been to museums and galleries in San Diego, Tucson, Phoenix, Oklahoma City, Chicago, Boston, and both the Portland and Colby Museums here in Maine. I've been fascinated recently in reading about the intersections of art and world history...and literature, architecture and culture.

Applying the term "art" to all the creative enterprises, l'Engle offers a valid way of getting under one roof all of our open-ended, imagination-fueled pursuits, from painting to poetry, from sculpting to scripting. She also recognizes that there are creative, non-rule-bound creative leaps in the sciences, be they nuclear physics or sub-cellular mechanisms, brilliant computer programming, or the solution to Fermat's "unsolvable" Last Theorem.

Okay, perhaps that's a bit windy--let's try again: Madeleine sees creativity everywhere, in all jobs and tasks. Some jobs are more up-front in the use and need for creativity--other jobs require the worker to be creative in order to not die of boredom!
I also like Madeleine's observations on our reactions to disorder:
  --some see chaos and bring cosmos out of chaos. 
  --others, seeing chaos, only reproduce chaos in their art.

I'd add to l'Engle's thoughts:
  --there are probably many more who, trapped inside chaos, cannot escape it and thus are chaos.

For those of you who like word games...turn "OLD" into "NEW" via one-letter substitutions in the fewest steps possible.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
mebbe not the shortest, but after a coupla missteps:

OLD
odd
ode
ole
owe
............not gonna go.....

OLD
odd
add
and
end
any
ana
............phooey, again....

OLD
odd
old  ode
ole        |
ale        |
are        |
ore   <--
ort
oat
cat
caw
saw
sew
NEW

Friday, August 22, 2014

Cart? Horse? Cart-horse? Horse-cart?

Okay, weird title, but, Elizabeth tells me I've got a weird sense of humor...


The following is a quote from Dan Blank, writing for Writer Unboxed:
I worry that the cart & horse analogy is exactly the type of social contract that has long since broken, if it ever existed at all. That you do well in grade school and high school to get into a good college to get a good internship to get a good job which leads to a good promotion which leads to a good salary which leads to a nice house which leads to retirement savings which leads to…this concept that there is a basic, safe, linear order to things that leads to “success.” 

Instead, what I have found from my friends and colleagues: life is complex; trusting relationships are the core of everything; great work is highly respected, but not always rewarded; persistence is key; luck is necessary, but unpredictable; ‘best practices’ are often illusions sold to you so that others can feel like gurus. 

Scott Berkun puts this nicely when we consider actions based on the odds of them working:
“They say most businesses fail in the two years. That most books don’t sell many copies. Why is this surprising? The interesting things in life are hard. Do you want an interesting life? Then you have to accept different odds.”
[end quote.]
+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+

 My only point of disagreement would be to cut the title to..."On Finding Success." The "as a Writer" is unnecessary, eh?

So, what do I need to do differently in order to write more and sell more? Hmmmmm, I am going to pump up my relationships, get a tad more pushy in selling, and write more, every day. I've done a great job this yr of sticking with my "Poem a Day" writing, but the fiction-writing needs more time. So....

buh-bye, gotta hitch my wagon to my horse...or, my horse to my wagon...oh, whatever......gotta go write.

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https://www.facebook.com/AnimalsOfChristmas

Monday, August 18, 2014

Dead Poets?

Is poetry dead...or, are we merely dead to poetry?
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We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. Medicine, law, business, engineering these are all noble pursuits, and necessary to sustain life. But poetry beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman,
   O me, O life of the questions of these recurring,
of the endless trains of the faithless,
of cities filled with the foolish...
What good amid these O me, O life?
   Answer: that you are here.,
That life exists, and identity.
That the powerful play goes on,
and you may contribute a verse.
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as recited by Robin Williams' character
Dead Poets' Society (1989)
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I think we spend a lot of life focused on those "noble pursuits" mentioned above, but we spend the remainder of our time on ignoble pursuits that simply salve the savage beast within. IMHO, the savage beast, like a child or a clock, needs to be wound up and set to RUN!
The creative pursuits, when passively flickering in front of our eyeballs, don't do much for us due to that very passivity--sitting on the recliner or bed, watching the images somebody else has dreamed up for us to watch. Okay, I know, we're not all masterly poets, dramatists, sculptors, painters, or novelists...but, look at this for an example of happy people, out creating art and loving it!
 -
 -=-
 -=-=-=-
 I paint with words
   I follow a meter
I brush my keys
   words flying fleeter,
pictures emerge
   oft rather hazy...
and even for me
words can sound crazy.
I'll try again
   it's cheaper'n paint
and no one to tell me,
   "isn't," not "ain't"!
I paint with words
   hold still, little birds!


(Sorry to be slow--I started this as a minor tribute to Robin Williams, then company showed up and blogging took a seat way in the back of the bus. Appropriately so, but still a bit frustrating.)