(no subject)
I do not subscribe to the Romantic ideal of the suffering isolated artist. Struggle makes for a good story, a mythology, not for creative output. Overcoming challenges is obviously a positive thing, but suffering leaves a residue which can build up and cripple. It's what happens in spite of this that builds a mythology, and it's not a case of suffering facilitates great things. It makes you see things differently, yes, and very often forces you to become extremely self-aware, and so people will create things they otherwise couldn't have. But any suffering is first and foremost a burden, and is always damaging.
I'll think through this a bit more when my eyes aren't desperately trying to close. It's something I've been thinking about quite a bit lately. I guess for someone to have been through difficulties and dealt with them is probably always going to enhance their work long term, but it's whether that's an attainable stage at all. Part of what annoys me about the whole ideal is that it makes some people think suffering is something to aim for, something desirable in a really perverse sort of way. The glorification of suffering is never acceptable, and is always an insult to the person and to the validity of the suffering; only overcoming it may be glorified in any way.
I'll think through this a bit more when my eyes aren't desperately trying to close. It's something I've been thinking about quite a bit lately. I guess for someone to have been through difficulties and dealt with them is probably always going to enhance their work long term, but it's whether that's an attainable stage at all. Part of what annoys me about the whole ideal is that it makes some people think suffering is something to aim for, something desirable in a really perverse sort of way. The glorification of suffering is never acceptable, and is always an insult to the person and to the validity of the suffering; only overcoming it may be glorified in any way.