Taking the ego out of 'serious' cultural work

I’ve written off entertainment since I started writing in 2008. I never got into the field merely to entertain, I had an agenda: galvanize the masses, make a statement, lead the way. Around the beginning of this year, I gave up that agenda but was a bit lost as to what to do with writing sans an agenda. I’ve dabbled in sharing my experiences a la blog, writing informative pieces that sometimes included facts, and considered abandoning the craft altogether. Not once did I consider entertainment, until this week.

It was a 2007 blog post by Scottish playwright Anthony Neilson that got me to thinking differently. In the post, Neilson criticizes ‘serious drama’ for lamenting its dwindling audience while failing to provide entertainment. There is a similar case to be made for ‘serious fiction’ sometimes called ‘literary fiction’ wherein reading becomes more of an intellectual exercise than anything resembling entertainment. Writers and readers of such work often scoff at the lesser ‘genre fiction’ for its lack of intellectual depth. I did too.

Why? Mainly because of my aforementioned social agenda that I sought to achieve by lacing fiction with my intellectual and spiritual arguments - I saw entertainment, or ‘genre fiction’ as the enemy; how could giving people a laugh be a worthwhile pursuit? Of course I had considered the more traditional ways in which people try to change others on intellectual and spiritual bases: academia and religion. But neither are all that popular among the masses, so I thought cultural work would be the more appropriate venue for my ego to do its work. After all, I thought I knew better than most people if they would only listen!

But then comes along Mr. Neilson saying very clearly that in fact entertainment is the purpose of a play and any hope theatre has of reviving audiences lies in its ability to be less boring. The same could be said for fiction. What cruel motive do I have thinking people coming home from a hard day at work ought to be deprived of relaxation and a good TV drama - my egomaniacal thinking says that until we address the climate crisis, social justice and the myriad other problems facing humanity no one has a right to be entertained, let alone laugh. Yet, I’m a hypocrite! I watch films and series on Netflix all the time. I love the laughter and relaxation I get from reading one of Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels.

I have a tendency to be so damn serious, because after all we are facing serious challenges as a society, but what does my seriousness accomplish? What does it motivate me to do? Deprive people of laughter and criticize them for their complicity in social issues? Attempt to control them, thinking I know better, all in the interest of serving my own ego - not my readers nor society. If all writers followed this broken thinking, it would just expedite the nosedive of ‘serious’ creative work’s audience numbers.

And the flash of light for me was the connection that if entertainment is what people want when they turn to cultural work, then by producing entertainment I am being of service to my fellows. While I had learned about the importance of serving others rather than trying to change them earlier this year, it is only now that I see how I might be able to do that with creative writing. Thank goodness! My brief forays into religion, academia, journalism and politics this year were far from fruitful. Returning to writing as a means of service through entertainment is something I never would have imagined a few months ago, but now it makes all the sense in the world.

And let’s not assume that by entertaining one can’t also provoke serious thought and raise important questions - I think some of the best cultural work out there manages to do all of this.

So now I’ve turned a corner as the year comes to a close, I’ve found a new purpose as a writer; a way to serve others and continue doing what I love. Time to get to work!