Imitation is death, imagination is life.
Imitation is servitude, imagination is royalty. He who claims the name of
artist must rise to that vision of a loftier reality--a more true because
a more beautiful world--which only imagination can reveal. A truer world,
--for the world of facts is not and cannot be true. It is barren,
incoherent, misleading. But behind every fact there is a truth: and these
truths are enlightening, unifying, creative. Fasten your hold upon them,
and facts will become your servants instead of your tyrants. No charm of
detail will be lost, no homely picturesque circumstance, no touch of human
pathos or humor; but all hardness, rigidity, and finality will disappear,
and your story will be not yours alone, but that of every one who feels
and thinks. Spirit gives universality and meaning; but alas! for this new
gospel of the auctioneer's catalogue, and the crackling of thorns under a
pot. He who deals with facts only, deprives his work of gradation and
distinction. One fact, considered in itself, has no less importance than
any other; a lump of charcoal is as valuable as a diamond. But that is the
philosophy of brute beasts and Digger Indians.
Pages:
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38
39
40
41