eternal dream

I actually read the New Yorker this week (well, last week's, anyway), and was fascinated yet again by the idea of Japanese cell phone novels. In the article, one of these young cell-phone novelists explains why she writes under a pen name and never lets her photograph be seen: "I don't want to bring unwanted attention on my family. And it's not just me--there's my husband's family to think of, given the things I'm writing. I don't want to inconvenience anyone. Revealing anything, whether it's fiction or truth, is embarrassing, don't you think?" Okay, I get that the content of these cell-phone novels is sort of racy (they sound intriguing and completely unreadable, from the article's descriptions), and that culturally things are very different there. Still, part of me wants to scream, "Writers and artists should inconvenience people! It's their job!" But I think I mean that in an abstract, thought-provoking way. Who knows how I would feel were my writing more autobiographical. And at the same time, she has a point -- revealing anything as a writer can be embarrassing, whether you realize what you're revealing or not.

Meanwhile, on the same page was nestled the only New Yorker cartoon that's ever made me chuckle out loud. Oh man. Good stuff.




Sigh.