October 21, 2010

2 comments:

  1. Interesting post. It is commendable that these guys were solely dedicated to their work, yet they must have been lonely fellows.

    I have a couple of friends who went farther into their musical careers than I did and sometimes that sounds appealing yet when I was single (and more so even now with a family) it never occured to me that a person can't do both, be dedicated to artistic ventures while having a family and a job and whatnot. It seems like there is a balance to be had and it makes for a richer life, in my opinion. Of course, this kind of thing is subjective so I am not making any statement about "how life should be lived".

    I think that if you investigated a little more you'd find that there are many great writers (artists in general) that were dedicated to both art and to family. They did and do exist.

    -Justin

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  2. Well, to be fair, out of the 4 authors I have read in this book, only Flaubert dedicated himself solely to writing. And yes, he was fairly lonely.

    Thoreau had a lot of visitors throughout his writing life. Dickens and Clemens both did a lot of other things during their writing careers.

    I had the same experience with my musical career. I had a couple friends that were really talented and didn't have to practice nearly as much as I would to be as good as them. And then when I started to focus on working and making a living, I quit doing any music because I didn't realize that I could actually balance both, if I wanted to.

    I will admit that a lot of writers seem to take things to the extreme, hence a lot of the drug and alcohol addictions, but I think you are right, with more investigation, I could probably find just as many that have a good art/life balance.

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