Again with the Podcast

Julio Alvarez sits down with us again as we talk about people who have inspired us.  We soon leave that topic behind and start talking about what art means, specifically Juan tries to debunk my notion that within the artist realm writers are at the bottom of the totem pole.

Listen here

I'll take this time to address that statement.  First and foremost, I am not saying writing is easy, not by any means.  What i am saying is that in a world of painters, sculptors, musicians, actors, and so on.  The writer belongs among them, just not over any of them.  The beautiful thing about being a writer is that you can be one in the most simple possible way, just by writing how you speak.  Your voice, style, allows you to be unique and separates you from other writers.  As long as you can spell, and even that isn't a necessity (thank god for editors).  It's how you say it, not what you say most of the time.  5 people can tell the same story in 5 different ways and it'll change each time it gets told, making that story infinite.  You don't have to learn to write, you just have to want to do it, you have to keep doing it even if in the end nothing ever comes of.  Of course you can go to school and learn techniques, but in the end if you don't have a voice or something to say then you won't want continue.  Writers start that totem pole because in the end everyone above us can do what we do, but we can't always do what they do.  A painter needs to expand his craft, he needs to learn constantly to improve, he needs to have a talent for it to begin with.  An actor really puts himself out there and if he's successful he will continue acting and make millions per movie, if he isn't good, he can improve.  Musicians just the same, as well as someone who draws or sculpts.  Writers, man, it's in you or it's not.  And i don't mean the talent is in you to write, no, is it just in you to want to write.  No poem will ever cost 4 mil or some ridiculous amount like a painting and we'll never have thousands of people in front of a stage hanging on to every word we sing.  No, the life of writer is a lonely one that will lead to nothing maybe.  So we hold up the totem pole and get to hang with the rest of them, some of us stand out, some of us don't.  Maybe i'm selling myself short but, to answer Juan's question, if i was in a deserted island, would i still write?  Yes, probably every day that i was there because it's all i want to do.