Click here…
If writing plays a significant part in your life, this cliche is familiar:
No one wants to write. Everyone wants to have written.
Repeated by numerous notable authors, George R.R. Martin among them, and most often attributed to Dorothy Parker, though in fact originating earlier still, it’s a cute, clever explanation for the scourge of writer’s block that affects nearly everyone who’s ever tried to put a sentence on a piece of paper or Gorilla Glass.
The reverse (or is it inverse…?) sentiment is expressed less often, but is older and surely truer — how many of us have confidently chimed in on a movie scene that we’ve never seen — I remember doing that in high school, or wax rhapsodically in proper social primate fashion on classics which we’ve never come close to starting, let alone finishing? (Don’t punish me for skipping Crime & Punishment, at least I’ve read War & Peace, French paragraphs included)
Our ever-shortening attention spans are partially at fault, but there’s something else at work here as well, exacerbated by sites such as Medium or Substack: we get on them to be read, not to read, and while some of us break out and get larger followings, most of us can’t escape the feeling of the circle-jerk, especially when one sees the quite common, breathless “let’s follow each other and spread the word” Substack messages.
No, we don’t want to read any of these other missives. We click if the bait is sufficiently tasty, and then rush through to the summary. No amount of site gamification (e.g., paying for thirty seconds) can make us slow down enough to dwell on any purported wisdom therein. We didn’t come here for that.
We came here to have someone read us, not to read them.
But we want to have read.
Leave a Reply