Im still thinking and feeling and processing Ursula Le Guins brave and ferocious (in the words of Jynne Dilling Martin) speech last night--I know what her words meant to the writers like me sitting in the audience, and wonder what they meant to the publishers there. I think hard times are coming, when we will be wanting the voices of writers who can see alternatives to how we live now, and can see through our fear-stricken society and its obsessive technologies, to other ways of being. And even imagine some real grounds for hope. We will need writers who can remember freedom: poets, visionaries—the realists of a larger reality. Right now, I think we need writers who know the difference between production of a market commodity and the practice of an art. The profit motive is often in conflict with the aims of art. We live in capitalism. Its power seems inescapable; so did the divine right of kings. … Power can be resisted and changed by human beings; resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art—the art of words. I’ve had a long career and a good one, in good company, and here, at the end of it, I really don’t want to watch American literature get sold down the river. … The name of our beautiful reward is not profit. Its name is freedom. My favorite part of the night was Neil Gaimans introduction of Le Guin, in which he spoke with inspiring and authentic heartfelt gratitude of the impact Le Guin has had on his work. I remember well reading The Left of Hand of Darkness in college and how it cracked my perspective into pieces and then reassembled it (beings who can shift gender! Gaiman put it perfectly, A world in which a woman could be king. I was also reading Gaimans Sandman comic book series at the time, and see now, clearly, how Sandman was influenced by Le Guin. Also inspiring--Louise Glück, who took home the poetry prize for her collection “Faithful and Virtuous Night,” and thanked her fellow-poets for inspiring “envy that in time became gratitude.” A wonderful night, congrats to everyone at the National Book Foundation, National Book Awards--the nominees, winners, organizers, volunteers, after-party team. And an extra special thanks to my agent Maria Massie of Lippincott Massie McQuilkin who was the best literary date.
Posted on: Thu, 20 Nov 2014 20:23:32 +0000
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