You may not yet be familiar with the work of Levi Ouwendijk and his
so I will brief you.Each contemplation on his newly launched Substack is a single dense wall of text- sentences but no paragraphs. I suspect this may be daunting and off-putting in the age of easily digestible ‘content’ and I suspect that this is Levi’s point with the bold practice. It reminds me a little of Jose Saramago and his multipage sentences. And hey, he won the Nobel Prize so maybe there is something to this.
But it is what is within the wall of text here that matters. This is a powerful call to arms that I am sure will not only resonate with all of the writers in our midst but with anyone who has a calling or a creative dream. This is a bracing and much needed rallying cry, which I hope you will all enjoy.
~TJB
Writing is not mere tomfoolery. Not putting up tricks that you think people may want to see, or holding up some frivolous facade of things that may seem interesting but are not any more than leading people on. False advertising. Yet it comes in degrees. At some point the foolery is so proficient that only we ourselves could know. Many a trickster will live off the people he manages to con. In some ways that is the most unfortunate fate a writer could suffer. No, to write is to have something to say, something to tell. Not for your benefit, but for someone else’s. No more boundaries. Pure intimacy. I am merely the benefactor, the messenger, the caretaker and form-giver. I do not think highly of myself because I can’t—I cannot afford to do so. My job as a messenger would be impoverished. I would not get paid—at least not an honest living, and not a fair wage. Writing is work, but it is rewarding work. It is magnificent work. To play around with it carelessly is as to dull the strings of a finely crafted instrument. What a waste. Do not bombard people with questions endlessly, not if you never plan on having any answer, or in the very least suggest a direction. What is that but a dumping ground, a hoarding of attention? “Look at me. This I thought!” Funny? No. And nobody would stop you, myself included. Go, do this. But know it takes up space for good works. This is not mean. I don’t consider it an insult. It is a truth. I say it in love. Love for the art, for work, for me, for you, for the dignity of man. Experiment all you like, but—if you can at all restrain the urge—minimize the extent to which you use other people as your guinea pigs. Don’t make puzzles for yourself, and don’t make puzzles for your reader. Tell him something! He is not there to be amused by the way in which you drivel in an erected universe of self-entertainment. He wants something of you! Something you can give him, mind you, if you were willing to. He wants to know what the reason is for communing with you, what is common to you both but uniquely put together by you. Be the voice of your spirit, of the mute world you inhabit. He will even pay you for it, because we must live life, and make the most of it. In living is no going back, no retreat, no reverse—only forward. To our fate we are both witness and maker. Do it! Serve! To live. To spend it in dance, with no heed for its passing except as reason to dance all the more. The best I can tell you is that. There’s nothing to bust around for, but do the work. To write is to speak. Say it. Say it well. Do not play around with things you think may sound as something that would be written, or something which someone could write. Weak imitations. No vision, even less character. All style, no substance. It is as far from the centre as one, in writing, could possibly get. Far from oneself, further from anything to say, and furthest from something worth saying. Speak honestly. Speak beautifully. Speak how you speak. The alternative is certain death. No rules—they will embed themselves in the narrative you pave. Take the words and weave them into your garment. Knit for you, knit for us! Let yourself be possessed by the course and current, not the wheel. Live, set sail!
On the Art of Writing
Fantastic!
"Look at me. This I thought!" 😆