Write Diamonds

In the interests of brevity, I’ll do my best to be short. Blogging encourages that as a format. Which I don’t mind.

A brief exchange I had with another writer, where he was quite critical of those who write for self-expression, closed the gap on my own considerations of writing. There is a quote I love attributed to Ernest Hemingway, “There’s nothing to writing. All you do is sit down at a typewriter and open a vein.”

On one hand, I believe that writing for the purposes of self-expression is incredibly selfish. It is the equivalent of saying, I have problems, here they are, and I expect you to dedicate your precious time to consuming them. Also, be nice to me. I believe that.

Conversely, Hemingway is right where by right. And an author can lay themselves down as a sacrifice to their community on a topic. Which is incredibly selfless.

How to thread the needle on that, and where is the final decision on that? Readers get to decide ultimately, once a work is released it how it is consumed by the world is not up to the author. It isn’t fully your work anymore.

This is where being conscious of that thin line between selfish self-expression and deliberately serving up a piece of one’s self for public consumption matters. I’ll use the idea of crafting diamonds, not for their rarity (See Debeers intentional supply control), or their beauty, because that doesn’t matter. But because of the way a diamond is cut, and how it reflects and refracts light. How it is different depending upon the angle it is viewed at.

Read any work, and the resulting criticism. How each era will inject itself into a piece and gain new relevance. Was John Milton a feminist? is one of my favorites. When a writer presents something personal and relevant, that can be respected for its substance enjoyed from its artisanship, those works become diamonds. Relevance to the greater public, either as a piece of historical social commentary, or something that always carries new weight. Diamonds are timeliness to as an addition to the metaphor. 1984 by George Orwell as a great example of a book that always feels relevant.

Many works carry far greater weight than the author intended, The Outsiders strikes me as a book greater than the author intended. Milton’s Paradise Lost, well, he was pretty arrogant, talented but arrogant. This is all to say that the intention of the author, the care which they manage their craft, and deep consideration for their reader all matter. And with a bit of luck, a culture or institution will align itself with a work and give it greater reach.

As a final note, I’m not arrogant enough to believe I craft diamonds. Most of what I do is blindly stumbling through writing.

Photo by Pereanu Sebastian on Unsplash

Featured image Photo by Andrik Langfield on Unsplash