The Reader and the Writer

Just read this here:

The reader is the musician of the book

https://austinkleon.com/2018/04/23/shelf-life-2/

“Books are frozen voices, in the same way that musical scores are frozen music. The score is a way of transmitting the music to someone who can play it, releasing it into the air where it can once more be heard. And the black alphabet marks on the page represent words that were once spoken, if only in the writer’s head. They lie there inert until a reader comes along and transforms the letters into living sounds. The reader is the musician of the book: each reader may read the same text, just as each violinist plays the same piece, but each interpretation is different.”

—Margaret Atwood

This of course rhymes and echoes with the concept of the Canon of Creativity – conserves > warm up > spontaneity > creativity.

I’m writing this post as it goes well with a thought we developed recently about The Writer.

The writer is the servant of the vision.

The writer can give the voice to the vision.  The writer is not you, or the whole of you. The writer has a job to to.  The vision needs no bounds. The writer will prune and edit in a way the visionary can’t.

The discipline of the writer will paradoxically enhance the vision.