The body of writing

Some people do not write because they feel writing will cheapen their beloved insights and strip them of their vitality. They are their own worst and most critical readers who come back to what they have written, after gaining some distance from it, and are appalled at the banality and pretentiousness of their words. Gaining this distance gives enough time for that madness and adrenaline to subside , which induced them to writing in the first place. They rather prefer to read somebody else's writing, and take envious pleasure in the fact that the author has expressed something which is close to what they would have expressed, if they were not so disgusted with their own ink. Isn't this quite strange? They forgive others of their shamelessness to express themselves easily, but are inexplicably hard on themselves and are ashamed at their own immodesty.

What a writer requires is that distance from himself, such that he does not feel ashamed and disgusted at his own insights and words. He should earn the right to be immodest. This distance should be gained before he begins to write, not after he has written something. Gaining this distance means to lend body and power to one's writing, to let one's pen control one's thoughts, and give content and form to the latter such that they are transformed in turn. Put crudely, a writer should not really be clear about what he is writing. But to gain this distance, one should also have thoughts which are strong and lively enough so that they can traverse this distance uninhibited, without losing their brilliance, their suddenness and their surprise factor. But this is another matter.