Friday 1/5/24
New op-ed just written. Very good. I probably won't be able to move it. This is from it:
As a boy, I harbored a belief that come the evening, I morphed into a bad sort of fellow, though this was a necessary transmogrification all the same.
You’re a kid, you have a bedtime, out go the lights, which for me meant on went the flashlight under the covers, so that I could read and begin a process of bargaining with myself.
I’d read a bunch of chapters of a life-altering book, and then think, “One more, I mean it this time,” and read another, and another, and so on, until it was three in the morning and I despaired how I’d ever be able to get up for school.
I don’t think we have many reading experiences like this anymore in our adult lives, in large part because of what’s on offer. Writers of all stripes now seem to want us to be hyper-conscious that they’re writing, and we should note just what that looks like and give the act attention.
That’s not how the best writing—and reading—works and won't ever be. The best writers understand that a reader should never feel like they’re reading—instead, they’re having a life experience. That’s the point. Not clicks and platforming and perfunctory praise within the circle-of-yank.
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