I begin this blog because as a writer an outlet to express my ideas is, naturally, helpful. My issue is I have many ideas, and for a 'mainstream' blog I don't quite have something worked out. What better place to start then at a completely silly meta-blog about my pursuit of something to blog about.
I started reading a book titled 'The Post-Modern Aura' today. It is making me contemplate the nature of ideas and culture, their value, etc.
The author points out that with the advent of Modernism and Post-Modernism we feel 'freed from our limitations', that art does not need to be a social reflection but can foremost be a thing unto itself without restraint. History plainly demonstrates that greatness has already been created in our previous 'limits', and furthermore we may be overestimating ourselves if we thing that no limitations means better art. Without parameters, where do we start? If everything is legitimate, then nothing is illegitimate. If there is no reference point of what is 'not', how is there even such a thing as legitimacy? I suppose we are left solely with qualifiers of good and bad.
In the modern age, ideas are abundant. In fact they're in excess and we are still short on solutions. Nowadays any position you can take seems shaky: someone has probably written an excellent researched and well thought-out rebuttal of any stance you may take...and likewise there is a rebuttal to that rebuttal. I can't believe something based solely on faith that it is right. So what am I left with? I suppose I accept an idea temporarily, until proven wrong. As I ponder how to deepen my own life philosophy (a kind of pseudo existentialism) I realize the alternatives are infinite.
Anyway, with a blog the possibilities are also endless. I can write about my life which is seemingly trite. Certainly I have ideas of the world, but to express them in a manner interesting to anybody? I don't even know if their is something inherently interesting in them by themselves. I suppose something trite can seemingly be made into something captivating. It has certainly been done.
I have been reckoning lately that the 'next great American novel' would be something timely. To my knowledge no one has written anything with ground-breaking style and selection about this economic downturn, the fervently expanding age of information we are in, political confusion, hipsters (and their simultaneous cheapening and reverence of culture), Facebook, Twitter, Google, or any other corporation that has managed to penetrate or day-to-day lives. I think people of this generation, maybe roughly now 22-35, are in a prime position to be this author. I chiefly suggest this because of the advent of the internet and social media.
The internet has changed the world. Everyone is part of one network now. The aforementioned age range grew up in a world without the internet, a world with comically crappy internet, a world with beepers, a world with no-texting phones, a world with no smart phones, no MySpace, no auto-tune...and now we have today. A kid who had the internet in his household since age 5 likely didn't quite get the chance to experience the feeling of internetless fully (I'm sure there is a yet undiscovered neologism for this). Those older than my 23 years of age grew up without these things, but at their introduction were young enough to comfortably integrate them into their lives.
Once we start getting older than mid-30s there is a generation gap. Those are people who are part of a different time. If they were to evaluate our society through fiction or otherwise it would by necessity be partially removed. While entirely fascinating, it is not quite the looking glass people need to see through (it could be).
I think the foggy memory of the 'old times' experienced in childhood is more potent. That is, after all, when we were pure, and God knows that this technology has been corrupting. People learn about sex for the first time from the internet nowadays, not from their parents, or experience. They learn about it rather graphically I might add. A kid can go on Xbox Live and be called non-nonsensical amalgamations of bigotry simply because fellow players heard the high frequency of his voice. I am sure as kids become more savvy, parental controls will become less effective. For example all one has to do is go to the options of their browser to turn it off (I think). My 3 year old niece knows how to use an iPad. Granted they're more intuitive than the traditional computer, but that is the way things are going. Even my 1 1/2 year old niece is starting to figure it out.
I once saw something startling. I was on the LIRR, and as we drove parallel to a train going the opposite direction I made it a point to observe the number of tablets, smart phones and books I saw. It was astonishing. A good 65% of people were on some sort of device, and a rather small percentage had books.
My thoughts are jumping this way and that, and frankly, I am unconsciously stylistically limiting myself because this is a blog that may one day be visible by others. Hopefully with enough writing this may be fixed.
No comments:
Post a Comment