Tonight I’m putting together a proposal to be presented by a board member to his group as a possible inclusion in a Fine Arts organization. They have dance, art, and stage covered; this is to add writing to the collection.
What can a writer, a group of writers, bring to a community?
For one thing, the opportunity and support to write. Every whim and wish that remained within can be given the chance to assert itself and develop. Among other writers, one does not feel quite as alone in what is truly a lonely endeavor.
Traditional writing, particularly in fiction and poetry, has evolved to meet the opportunities of the computer and the web, and to meet the new demands of the reader. Interactive fiction, mixed media presentations that involved audio and video alongside text–and here we find that writers round out a group comprised of dancers, singers, photographers, musicians–are all growing and improving with the talent and nature of the new generation of artists and writers. This is something that school children can be exposed to at an early age in the arts as well as other areas of technology, and something that the elderly not be left out of because they don’t know where to go to learn.
The additional element of writers to the art community can only benefit the others by being strong in a specific area; painters paint, dancers dance, and writers write the program.
The contemporary community is computer savy, but many are not aware of the presence of weblogs, literary forums, critique groups, e-zines, writing resources that are available to today’s writers. The publishing market is hard, always has been; now there are ways to self-publish for purposes of sharing via online capabilities.
If warranted, a magazine of member contributions can become part of the town’s legacy, perhaps tied in with a specific event that is special or traditional to the community so that the writers can be recognized within it. This needn’t particularly be an expensive proposition and is something that I’m sure writers would appreciate in seeing their work in published form.
There are many more things to offer a community to bring out its literary connections and this is something that I’m hoping to be able to do.
NEXT: Gathering the flock.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology
I think that supporting the arts in all their forms makes any community a more vibrant one. Communities with lively arts scenes are just better places to live, in ways that are impossible to quantify. Writing is probably the poor stepchild in that family, not being much given to the ‘show’ (although there is playwriting…), but it definitely has a place. Writers, generally, are people who think about things, and it’s always good to have people around who think about things even if you don’t agree with them.
I’ve often thought that one of the things I’d do if I won a really large lottery would be to start a literary festival in one of the artsy little towns near where I live.
Yes, in the field of the arts, I suppose we still fall into the ‘tell’ rather than ‘show’ category. I’ve been involved in writing groups, workshops, seminars, festivals, and magazines and it’s really hard to establish exactly how one can share the experience of writing other than to drag a group together, drag in an audience, and see what happens.