Ought to I attain out to her?
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Expensive James,
I’ve a literary crush. Since first encountering this girl’s work a number of years in the past, I’ve learn her sentences aloud to extra mates, acquaintances, and pets than I can rely. On the finish of every piece, I can’t assist considering: I need to meet this individual. I need to pour a few drinks, pull a thread of concepts, and observe wherever the dialog wanders.
Why can’t I simply take pleasure in her work and go away her alone? I do know the gulf between artwork and artist can yawn huge. I additionally know I’ll merely be craving glory by affiliation. Largely, although, I feel my life could be qualitatively richer for realizing the individual behind these pleasant and insightful phrases. Additionally, dare I say, her life is likely to be enriched by realizing me.
Have you ever ever tracked down one among your dwelling heroes? If that’s the case, how did it go? If not, what did you do with the unrelenting impulse to know them personally?
In all seriousness,
Not a Stalker
Expensive Reader,
Very fascinating. Are you aware many writers? As a result of should you do, you’ll already remember that the individual on the web page, so trendy and alluring, could be very totally different from the individual on the earth—who’s petulant and broody and self-absorbed, and may’t discover their socks, and shakes their fist within the evening at invisible editors, and takes three days to alter a lightbulb, and weeps gently once they discover they’ve run out of whiskey. I gained’t say {that a} author’s writing is the very best a part of themselves, however it’s the most coherent; the author’s precise persona is extra of an afterthought. It lies round in glowing lumps, just like the by-product or drossy sublimate of some violent industrial course of. All of which is to say: Sure, you’ll be disillusioned.
However that’s not the true query right here. The actual query is what to do with this crush, this “unrelenting impulse” of yours. To cite my buddy John: Sweat it out. Digest, metabolize, transmogrify, do push-ups, take trains till it ceases to fill your creativeness. You’re not a stalker (but). However I get the sensation you’re within the grip of a fantasy. I’ve been there. So don’t pursue and even just about prowl round this author. That approach lies confusion. Don’t a lot as ship a chastely admiring be aware—you’ll get wound up ready for a response. Disentangle your self from her stunning sentences. Learn another books, by another voice-y, glittery writers. Depart her in her realm, and get again to yours.
In solidarity,
James
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