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Ambition in Writing

ON WRITING & DIRECTING - by G.L. Horton

FG wrote: "Very few writers--if any--sit down and say--consciously or otherwise--today, I think I'll explore deeper into humanity."

I'm not up to a debate at the moment, but I'd just like to point out that all of the writers instanced so far have indeed had "pompous and pretentious" aspirations to greatness. Shakespeare seriously claimed that his work would outlive marble and gilded monuments. Reading their letters, interviews, and biographies reveals that the Great Moderns did really believe that they were in an epic struggle to discover and communicate Significance, that they wrote their plays in conscious reference to and competition with great works of the past, and that they hoped that their efforts would be rewarded with a place in a Classic Canon that they regarded with something very like religious awe. Not only did they work towards this end, they assumed that if they achieved it the continuing life of their plays would enlighten and engage their fellow citizens and improve the world.

This isn't sufficient, of course. A lot of people have had the same ambitious delusions and written garbage. But although some brief bursts of Truth and Beauty may be accomplished modestly and, as it were, by happy accident, a great play is an ambitious construct. No ambition, no cigar. (1/24/05)

 

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