The Beauty of Democracy in Art

Lately Miss Dimity has been hearing reports to the effect that certain creators of entertainment – what is in the present age whimsically known as ‘content’ – have been subject to suppositions unbecoming  their pursuit of Art, to wit: they, their works and their modes of creative thought are unoriginal and these certain people had best pay heed because The Readers are losing patience.

Dear Me. That does sound dreadfully harsh, does it not? Especially when one considers that most purveyors of Art labor long and hard to first of all learn their craft – something which usually takes years, not months – and subsequently labor long and hard (ibid.) creating the very best Thing they can make, especially for the contemplation and consumption of one`s long suffering audience. That many of them don`t actually manage to make pin money, let alone a living, seems to be lost on these posturing pedagogues, whose raison d‘etre involves pointing out what appears to be wrong with everyone else.

Miss Dimity would never be so crass as to suggest that one`s intended audience does not matter (good heavens!) but at the same time she would caution all creators to remember that old French adage: between two stools, one sits on the ground. It is, as dear old Honest Abe pointed out, possible to fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but one cannot fool all of the people all of the time. Miss Dimity would suggest that the same goes for pleasing said people: that it is most probably done by bearing in mind that, as the Preacher Ecclesiastes opined, there is nothing new under the sun and what one creates is likely influenced by some previous work, whether one knows this or not.

The great thinker and statesman Benjamin Franklin said that originality is the art of concealing your sources and to a certain extent this is true; it might also be said that originality is the art of forgetting one`s sources or being somewhat ignorant of them in the first place. And Miss Dimity is not speaking about copyright, a modern notion which rightfully exists as protection for the rights of creators. Miss Dimity is here making reference to what literary theorists such as Wolfgang Iser (whose seminal work on reader response ought to be required reading for all would-be critics of literature) named ”repertoire” - viz., the necessary convergence of creator, culture and reader in the act of reading. Professor Iser contends that:

If the literary communication is to be successful, it must bring with it
all the components necessary for the construction of the situation, since this has no existence outside the literary work.

What Professor Iser is saying is that, in order for a putative Reader to even make sense of a literary work, she must bring to the act of reading the sum total of her cultural and societal experiences whether she realizes she is bringing such information to bear upon a text or not; such experiences allow her to penetrate (ahem) that text. It can be inferred that the role of the Creator also draws upon the same cultural and societal framework, if the text is to have any meaning for the Reader whatsoever.

Really, Miss Dimity is tired of hearing statements such as “…obviously draws upon…”; “…is clearly modeled upon…”; “…the resemblance to so-and-so was irritating” and so forth, and not merely because such inane statements effectively render any critical analysis useless but also because demanding – and expecting – Absolute Originality in any work of art is utter twaddle. In fact, Miss Dimity isn`t convinced that such oughtn`t be punishable by the ducking stool or something equally horrid.

To assume that one is creating something utterly original is ridiculous. Shakespeare`s sources included Geoffrey of Monmouth, Burton`s famous Anatomy of Melancholy, and Danish history, to name but a few.

Demanding absolute originality in a work of art is a futile and scurrilous reproach, and nearly as bad as the sin of publicly divulging matters imparted in confidence. Miss Dimity is hard pressed to decide which is the lesser sin, and which the greater.