From Essays After Montaigne
But this exceedeth all hearts-basenesse in persons of that stampe, to have gone about to draw some principall glorie from prating and speaking, even to imploy their private Epistles written to their friends; in such sort, as some missing the opportunitie to be sent, they notwithstanding cause them to be published, with this worthy excuse, that they would not lose their travell and lucubrations. Is it not a seemly thing in two Romane Consuls, chiefs magistrates of the common-wealth, Empresse of the world, to spend their time in wittily devising and closely hudling up of a quaint missive or wittie epistle, thereby to attaine the reputation that they perfectly understand their mother tongue? What could a seely Schoolmaster, who gets his living by such trash, do worse?
Well I wot that when I heare some give themselves to dwell on the phrase of my Essayes, I would rather have them hold their peace: They doe not so much raise the words as depresse the sense; so much the more sharply by how much more obliquely. Yet am I deceived if some others take not more hold on the matter; and how well or ill soever, if any writer hath scattered the same, either more materiall, or at least thicker on his paper: That I may collect the more, I doe but huddle it; the arguments or chiefe heads. Let me but adde what followes them, I shall daily increase this volume. And how many stories have I glanced at therein, that speake not a word, which whosoever shall unfold may from them draw infinite Essayes? Nor they, nor my allegations doe ever serve simply for examples, authoritie, or ornament. I doe not only respect them for the use I draw from them. They often (beyond my purpose) produce the seed of a richer subject and bolder matter, and often, collaterally, a more harmonious tune, both for me, that will expresse no more in this place, and for them that shall hit upon my tune.
I've described the "anxiety of influence" that I've suffered reading some other Weblogs (the list of which grows and grows). I bring this up again not to be told that my writing is valuable or of interest to others (other people's reactions don't much affect my sense of my writing), but to try to understand the nature of this anxiety. It arises through a purely internal process by which I hear my own voice alongside voices that I find intimidating to me as a writer, though they're generally thrilling to me as a reader. Some might say that writing isn't competitive, that my anxiety is groundless, but the more I've written (and the more widely I've read), the more I've become convinced that writers of any seriousness must, as Harold Bloom has put it, "clear imaginative space" for themselves within which to create. I've lost count of the number of times my wife has read a book and exclaimed that the author has written the book that she hoped to write, often not as well as she would have written it herself. I can try to offer some comfort ("Your book will be yours--it will say things that this one doesn't, and that no other will."), but the sad fact is that the imaginative space available for her creative efforts has been diminished.
Perhaps my experiences of reading and writing reflect or express the complexities of my relationship to the world: When reading, I can feel myself being absorbed into the timeless world of ideas, but when writing, I feel the need to be wholly myself and shape that world of ideas to my needs. My own writing isn't particularly creative. I don't invent characters, plots, or even ideas. At its best, my writing is synthetic--not in the sense that it's artificial, but in the sense that it connects the ideas of others in productive ways. That may be how I seek to balance those contradictory impulses: I give myself over to the world of ideas while trying to build myself out of it. But I don't quite manage surrender or triumph, so I end up frustrated.
This leaves me wondering why I write this Weblog (just as so many before me have wondered why they write Weblogs--as I said, a creative imagination isn't my greatest asset). I once thought that I wrote here as a way of learning to be and express myself, to learn to interact with others intellectually. Though my compulsion to write may be used for those purposes, its motivation lies much deeper than that. I'm trying to join a conversation by reading the thoughts of those long dead and writing my thoughts for those not yet born. That's the context in which I feel the inadequacy of my writing. I'm being immodest, I'm neglecting the present in which I actually exist in favor of abstractions that I'll never really experience, I'm turning my attention from the people around me to those dead or not yet born, and it should come as no surprise that I'm anxious as a result. It doesn't seem to be in my character to write a simple Weblog.
7:52:14 AM 
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