Any writer, in general, is more of an artist than a scientist.

 

Any writer, in general, is more of an artist than a scientist.

As an artist, a writer, knows and senses what Thomas Merton has put it appropriately, “Art enables us to find ourselves and lose ourselves at the same time”.

“People lose their way when they lose their why”. - Michael Hyatt

Writers do not, more so novelists, make dim witted dry prosaic factual details which even news reporters don’t do nowadays.

Every writer at heart nurtures romance with reason or vice versa, on some occasions may trade off reason but not romance.

While great writers have visualized grand future and possibilities for life as a whole through extraordinary philosophical enquiries and far-fetched fictions they never factored in what posterity may pander to. So, it is not their fault that they are unsuspecting victims of petrified perceptions.

Maya Angelou perceived and stated, “There's a world of difference between truth and facts. Facts can obscure the truth”.

 

Let me dress up the article with some spicy and colourful quotations.

“I’m not interested in a Freudian reading of Shakespeare but a Shakespearean reading of Freud”, Harold Bloom

“Literature is the most agreeable way of ignoring life”, Fernando Pessoa

 “Literature is a process of producing beautiful lies that tell more truth than any facts”, Barnes

In their romantic journeys they feel even the very tool they use i.e. language is limiting as M. Atwood remarked, “All writers feel struck by the limitations of language”.

“Writing is a suspension of life in order to re-create life”, John McPhee

“The trouble with fiction is that it makes too much sense. Reality never makes sense”, A. Huxley

“I write because I want more than one life; I insist on a wider selection. It is greed, plain and simple”, TYLER

“When you write, you want to get rid of the world, don’t you? Of course you do. When you’re writing, you’re creating your own worlds”, Stephen King

“My ideal for writing fiction is to put Dostoyevsky and Chandler together in one book”, Haruki Murakami.

 

If one wants to know only the naked facts of history one must have access to such information through historically verifiable, archeologically authenticable and to be further confirmed through various tools of verification like carbon dating, genetic studies etc.

Otherwise, often, the much pleasant and easy way is to corroborate with references tucked in literature, sociology, traditions, cultures, etymology etc.   

 

When hyper emotionally charged and prefixed ideological perspectives and interpretations are used as frames of reference and scales of observation along with a deadly mix of doctrinaire affinities to extrapolate everything and worse still, to evaluate things/ topics/issues/happenings/personalities, then, any rationality contextual relevance and intrinsic attribute/aspect of the things, topics, issue and so on [more appropriate and vital elements of evaluation] take a hit.

However, when reason is required, good writers are not averse to stretching themselves beyond the restrictive realms of these ideological circus arenas.

Responsible writers also know that when reality is restricted by identity and rationality is relegated, then, sobriety is causality and moderation is a mute spectator. 

 

They know the need to explore possibilities of synthesis and synergy in all relationship that one has with oneself, with others, with nature, with machines, with different cultures, different times, different places, traditions etc.

 

 

Moderate, nuanced, nice, balanced, diplomatic wording are then used [with moderation] to generate possibilities of synthesis and synergy.

 

Though it may be a tough art or sport like flying kite while rope walking between peaks of two mountains with a thousand feet deep valley beneath. However, the sheer thrill and adventure captivate the heart and more than compensate the risks such a venture may require.

 

 

Human life, after all, is a very short journey in the ocean of totality of LIFE. 

 

Identities of all hues while they enable creating social groups at the same time enfeeble options for universal acceptance.

The ideology freaks resort to arriving at conclusions based on contrived and convoluted concepts justifying them with farfetched data, irrelevant surveys and attention grabbing statements. 

 

 

Writers, when they slide on the side of reason are 360 degree stroke makers. For, they are able to seek and to see numerous possibilities that exist between, beneath and beyond ‘Yes’ and ‘No’ which ordinary mortals may not that easily  grasp. In addition, writers are not averse to churn by throwing those possibilities in the cauldron which may contain, from several sources, all sorts of thoughts, information and /or knowledge of /in various domains, intellect, conscious awareness, perception, tools of perception, logic, reason, evaluations, purpose of evaluations, tools of evaluations, understanding and application of understanding, social values, social interactions, individual and/or collective emotions/feelings, psychology, cultural contexts, ideological identities which influence that very thought process, imaginations, dreams, fantasies, scientifically established facts, intelligent questioning, attitudes, willingness and ability to understand and solve problems, bio-chemical components of human beings and /or some other species as well, application of  highest physical laws etc.

 

But one thing good writers know to do and that is never to misplace reason and romance.

 

 

Messick, S. (1994) writes in The Interplay of Evidence and Consequences in the Validation of Performance Assessments. Educational Researcher, 23(2), 13–23, “Validity, reliability, comparability, and fairness are not just measurement issues, but social values that have meaning and force outside of measurement wherever evaluative judgments and decisions are made”.