Prudence in Hell 049
How Do I Love Thee, Part VI: Writing, 4 / Performance, 2
"Still, one needs to know how to use it. For just as one can use rhymes to compose good or bad verses, so one can use this method to produce good or bad works." —Raymond Roussel, “How I Wrote Certain of My Books"
A reminder: writing, done well, is a dangerous profession —soul-baring, underrewarded, prone to every form of self-obliteration.
Nobody chooses to be a writer; not a real one, in any case. It’s a hand one is dealt, and one lives with it; despite it, sometimes.
I’m fortunately Anglo enough to be quite permissive with my eccentricities, but writing needs conflict, and trouble, and drama. A writer is also an actor.
I grew up in a universe of actors: diplomats, politicians, writers. This in part explains why my epistemology revolves around the theatre and its contagion. The world is run by actors; some of whom know what they are, some of whom pretend that they don’t. Many are trapped in character and cannot break it, as they do not know that there is character to break at all.
Me? I’m an honest actress. Whether that makes me a good or bad actor remains to be seen.
Brion Gysin. Untitled. 1960. Calligraphy, ink on paper.