While Shakespeare doesn’t appear in the following rant, King James certainly does. Both continued to produce at the highest level late in their careers. So what’s their secret?
Because the topic at hand is creative longevity, I originally used the following thumbnail (the quote is LeBron’s):
In the end, though the quote is crucial, my face is less important than King James’s and King William’s.
For those of us aiming to produce stellar, relevant artistic work well into our later years, LeBron’s insight only needs a small tweak to resonate with writers.
I bare my soul in all these videos, but perhaps especially this one:
Thanks for sticking around, good people.
John
Ride the dinosaur you're given
If you want to keep on livin'
This was in yesterday's Sunday New York Times, Robert Pinsky reviewing THE POEMS OF SEAMUS HEANEY
Seamus Heaney in the persona of Joyce admonishes himself and encourages himself. The shade of Joyce advocates the life’s work of being multiple and unique, Irish and oneself, a mortal and a poet. Joyce speaks in:
a voice like a prosecutor’s or a singer’s,
*
cunning, narcotic, mimic, definite
as a steel nib’s downstroke, quick and clean,
and suddenly he hit a litter basket
*
with his stick, saying, “Your obligation
is not discharged by any common rite.
What you must do must be done on your own
*
so get back in harness. The main thing is to write
for the joy of it. Cultivate a work-lust
that imagines its haven like your hands at night
*
dreaming the sun in the sunspot of a breast.
You are fasted now, light-headed, dangerous.
Take off from here. And don’t be so earnest,
let others wear the sackcloth and the ashes.
Let go, let fly, forget.
You’ve listened long enough. Now strike your note.”