Courtesy of Rutherford Classics.com
People sometimes ask if I’ve thought about publishing a selection of my blogs in book form. Naturally, I’m flattered, just as I am when they suggest my novels would make great movies. Such notions don’t swell my head. Steven Spielberg, I know, won’t be calling soon. As for the blogs, they will never be bound in book form. What I do here is unoriginal.
Michael Kingsley might describe my daily jottings as akin to my being a curator. (“Hello, Sweetheart, Get Me Data!”, by Michael Kingsley, Vanity Fair, Sept. 2016, pg. 177.) That’s true, in part. I assemble the work of others. Though I’m not entirely a curator. I do add commentary, so the practice isn’t exactly plagiarism — though that term might be applied to many writers as we tend to feed upon each other.
When Eric Hoffer’s publisher complained one of his books was too short, the author bristled. The work provided 6 original ideas, he said. That should be enough to satisfy any reader.
Six original ideas? Can that be said of the whole of Shakespeare?
I am no Eric Hoffer, so I do borrow. Yet, I hope, I give these used thoughts a provocative perspective that makes them fresh. Six provocative ideas should be enough for any reader. Nonetheless, for lack of true originality, my handful of admirers should never hope to see my work in a collection with my name emblazoned in gold across the cover. Like J. Alfred Prufrocks, I am no Prince Hamlet nor was meant to be. I am an attendant lord, meant to swell a progress, start a scene or two. (“The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” by T. S. Eliot, The Collected Poems of T. S. Eliot, Faber & Faber Limited, Mcmxxxvi, pg. 15)
The point of these blogs is to allow others to know me better. The point of these blogs is to sell my books. Now there’s an original idea.
(Originally published 8/30/16)
