Steps Into the Darkness
3dogmama (1991 pencils) | Tue, 2009-02-24 01:50"Creative people are committed to risk," from Benny Golson, jazz musician and composer. "The creative person always walks two steps into the darkness. Everybody can see what's in the light. They can imitate it, they can underscore it, they can modify it, they can reshape it. But the real heroes delve in darkness of the unknown.
It's where you discover 'other things.' I say other things because when the new things are discovered, they have no name and they sometimes defy description - like a newborn baby. He has no name, he defies description. He's wrinkled. He looks like his grandfather but he's only one day old. He looks like his mother, but he also looks like his father. But after a while he's beautiful and he's got a name. And many times that's the way our ideas are, the ones we create from darkness. Darkness is important — and the risk that goes along with it."
An excerpt from:
Goleman, D., Kaufman P., Ray M. "The Creative Spirit" 1992. pp. 20.
"Art -- the one achievement of Man which has made the long trip up from all fours seem well advised." - James Thurber
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A wonderful quotation, 3dog. This is actually a favorite subject of mine. I wrote a short story a few years ago with a passage expressing something similar. May I share? Oh thank you :-)
The sensory component of the human nervous system functions by looking for contrasts, edges. In the absence of contrast, there is no perception. When one looks at a blank wall, one ignores the wall and attends to a patched nail hole, or its juncture with the floor. Given a canvas of snow, the mind seeks a naked branch, or the eyes of a wolf.
Fun story, huh?
Mara
Without the dark there can be no light.
Excellent.
Is this short story of yours published, and if so where? I like your writing style.
Cheers.
3dog
"Art -- the one achievement of Man which has made the long trip up from all fours seem well advised." - James Thurber
Thanks for the compliment. It's fan fiction for an old TV cop show. The part I quoted eventually wound up as part of the internal dialog I gave to a serial killer. I'll send you the URL if you're interested. It has homoerotic elements, so be warned of that. (Hey. You give your readers what they want and you go home early, know what I mean?)
Mara
I would love to read it, Mara.
Thank you.
"Art -- the one achievement of Man which has made the long trip up from all fours seem well advised." - James Thurber
I absolutely agree with the idea that "creative people are committed to risk". Creative people have to be willing to stand behind their ideas and sometimes fail but never give into the easy, routine way. If it weren't for those willing to go into the darkness our world would be so mundane.
You're so right. What we're involved in, many of us anyway, is dipping into the most vulnerable parts of ourselves to deliver up something for the critical scrutiny of others who are equally exposed, though in different ways. Very risky stuff. And then there's that business of depending on being able to pull off this miracle of creative chutzpah often enough to put food on the table. I really wonder why more of us aren't simply insane. ;-)
Mara