“WRITE to LIGHT”
A Literary Manifesto
One Writer’s Plea for a Visionary School of Literature
The age of anomie
We live in an era of anomie. That is to say, we live apart, in isolation from each other, in a world often apparently bereft of meaning, point or purpose.
Western literature since the mid-twentieth century increasingly reflects this spiritual dislocation: our widespread inability to accept that human lives have meaning, or that building a life of purpose and fulfillment rewards the effort.
Hence the global epidemic of depression, much of it fueled by war, rapid social change, lifestyles that undermine our health, dependency on social media, natural and man-made disasters, and the hugest waves of human migration in the history of the planet.
Above all else, depression and darkness are rooted in isolation. How to cure loneliness? Meaning doesn’t exist in ether. We craft and mold it to reflect our own life trajectory. We tell stories about ourselves.
Stories can draw us close
The stories that we tell can draw others closer, drive them away or drive us apart.
I reject, with all my heart and intellect, works of “literature” and nonfiction that truck in the perpetual shadow that showcases only lives of gray and grit without nuance or complexity, meaning or success.
Why writers exist
I issue a call for more works of literature and nonfiction that heed the call to serve humanity and bring us closer to each other.
Writers do not exist for ourselves. We exist for others. We evolved as storytellers. Stories historically were social: a way in which ancient groups transmitted knowledge, culture, tools and ways of being. Stories made our lives easier and more pleasant. Hence the vital role of entertainment. So-called genre fiction holds authentic value for its primary purpose, which is to give pleasure. Entertainment doesn’t exist to teach or preach (the work of propaganda): rather, it serves to stimulate, excite and transport us. Readers readers flock to fiction and nonfiction for the fun.
But entertainment alone, when cast in writing, is not “literature.” Nor is casual nonfiction. Literature bears a truth burden. It carries a social responsibility to reflect our lives in all their depth and breadth and holds up a mirror that reveals ourselves to our own eye.
Literature is art. The task of art is not to teach but to share insight and reflect the world in particular ways that sharpen and shape our vision.
Ideally, writing will come to us cloaked in entertainment too, in the same way that we cook nourishing healthy food and make it palatable using skills and condiments from the art of fine cuisine.
Where the literature of anomie falls down
The literature of anomie is one-sided. It highlights dismal aspects of our lives without offering a roadmap out of darkness. I submit that most such literature is failing us by refusing, as a body of work or professional culture in many parts of the world, to acknowledge that writing is a moral act with costs and consequences for both writers and our readers.
(To be clear, I find this problem far less common in nonfiction than in fiction.)
To “write to light” is not to succumb to trivialities, clichés, prevailing socio-political constructs or religious dogma. To write to light is to bear a candle in the dark that leads us back to ourselves and allows us to see life as it truly is: that is, not only in shades of gray and the cinder and ashes of our self-destructive tendencies but through delineations of pathways to a life of purpose and meaning rich with human connection.
To the extent that writers abandon our collective social responsibility and wallow in darkness, I submit that we do not write real literature at all. For true literature reflects life as it is, and life is never only darkness.
If we truck in shadow alone, we fail our evolutionary purpose of passing on value and learning that serves societies at large and crafts a lens through which readers see a world in vibrant color. Instead, I propose that literary writers, to the extent we can and choose to, craft works that share purpose of being and inspire hope.
I also suggest that in our work we aspire to kindle the desire to perceive, understand and accept other ways of being that light a path to richer lives and to foster tolerance, generosity and compassion.
Literature, from this perspective, would not paint a world of only “us vs. them.” For in reality there is no other, only us.
Why do we write?
Why should we write?
If writers fail in this mission to reflect light as well as darkness, we fail ourselves. We fail our readers and our tribes. Whether we garner success or wallow in obscurity, if we write about only miserable, pointless lives, we fail as writers because we carry a sacred responsibility to act in the world of words with care and balance.
To borrow a phrase from therapists, which I espouse here though it is perhaps the most controversial concept in this text, and one that many writers will likely dispute with passion, writers have in my view a moral responsibility to reflect in our work unconditional positive regard for all.
I contend that we do not exist as writers to stimulate ourselves. We exist to care.
to GIVE.
to NURTURE.
to SUPPORT.
That obligation is laid on all humans who share society. If our work as writers fails in this regard, it fails us all.
Imagine a visionary school of literature
I speak, to be clear, not in judgment of my fellow writers but from a passionate desire to inspire change. I have dedicated my work specifically to this mission: to model a visionary school of writing. By “visionary school” I mean an approach to writing literature where the goal is to craft a vision for each work that is founded and grounded in the bedrock of meaning, with the purpose of highlighting human connection and not anomie.
Without vision, our work is pointless.
Decades ago as a young woman, I envisioned this project of a visionary school of literature. My own work of publishing fiction has been delayed for decades despite writing fiction 12 to 20 hours a week for decades and spending other hours writing nonfiction for my work. That delay in publishing fiction stems specifically from my long history of serial sexual trauma, suicidal depression and despair, dissociative identity disorder, eating disorders, extreme PTSD, bipolar disorder, ADHD, mothering my children and much more.
Yet I see clearly how fiction reveals us. No matter the topic, or how distant the plot and characters appear from our own lives, fiction uncloaks us.
If I can write to light, so can any writer born, whether they began young or came later to the call.
Those of us who embrace a literary vocation know too well how it encompasses a congenital affection for the spoken and written word, and a nearly frantic desire to tame words into ways of being. I issue my call to literary writers in particular, but to other writers too, and ask them to consider and reflect on what it means to write: why we write, what we choose to write, and whom we write for.
Writing is a moral act
I also call for writers to see our writing for what it is: an act that shapes the perception and understanding of our readers in complex and specific ways and carries a non-trivial responsibility for the outcome—that is, the coarse and subtle impacts of our work on others’ lives.
I humbly yet forcefully ask literary writers in particular to consider the value of making conscious decisions about what we seek to accomplish and how much of what we write is merely for ourselves (whether to garner fame and fortune, attention or affirmation and so forth), how much for others and how much for society at large.
Shape a vision
Until we craft a vision for each work, we will never achieve the purpose of forging vibrant writing that uplift us all. With a specific vision, we can lucidly compare our goals with our achievements.
By shaping a vision for each work, we lay bare who we are to ourselves and others.
Why do we write? Whom do we write for? What do we seek to accomplish with our writing?
If we do not ask ourselves these questions and give meaningful answers, the next questions to ask writers may rightfully center on why we write at all.
Respectfully,