09-23-2011, 10:55 PM
Some of that may be true, Leanne, but I am not sure your analogy with a painter is a good one. Yes, Old Masters, used to be not unlike joiners, and leave the routine stuff to the pupils and apprentices. Yet, if I paint some red in the centre of a canvas, and then listen to various passers-by, and other fellows with berets, and before long I have wiped off the red, and it has been replaced--yes, by me -- with a picture of a Spitfire and Golden Retriever both flying over Brisbane, is it not just a testament to my weakness of mind, that I have been so easily influenced? Is it not true that, the more ideas, perspectives etc, which a person adopts, and the more their own effort changes, the less it is their own? If I write 40 lines, and you and others suggest a new 39 lines, surely that is not mine, but yours --- even though it be the finest poem ever written? Is there a difference between workshoping and writing by committee? The kind of thing the Soviet Union of Writers might have approved? I don't do Facebook, but i don't think people's wish to publish in electronic or other form, what they have written, is reprehensible, and I would not want people to be put off by a perceived elitism.
Otherwise, I agree with every word you write!
Otherwise, I agree with every word you write!