Writing and storytelling are like blood and oxygen to my soul. Since childhood, there has been no better feeling for me than when words spill out of my heart and onto the page through my fingertips. While I always felt that my writing had value, it was James Baldwin’s essay “The Creative Process” that gave me newfound purpose and altered my aspirations and identity forever.
In his essay, Baldwin preached that the life’s work of all artists shouldn’t be limited to personal expression but should more importantly reflect the necessity of us going a mile in one another’s shoes – understanding each other – without the long walk. He wrote that while “society must accept some things as real, [the artist] must always know that visible reality hides a deeper one[…]. A society must assume that it is stable, but the artist must know, and he must let us know, that there is nothing stable under heaven” (Baldwin 318).
His words resonated with me, fueling the fires of my imagination, and instilling in me a potent desire to change the world through poetry and prose. He taught me that I “cannot and must not take anything for granted, but must drive to the heart of every answer and expose the question the answer hides,” (319). My role as a literary artist “is to illuminate that darkness […] so that we will not, in all our doing, lose sight of our purpose, which is, after all, to make the world a more human dwelling place” (315).
After reading his essay, I vowed to give a voice to the voiceless, to invest the richness of the world into stories that bridge the gaps between us, and to use my creative process to bolster the oneness of humanity in us all.
~ J. Mishaelle
Works Cited
Baldwin, James. Baldwin, James. 1985. “The Creative Process”. The Price of The Ticket: Collected Nonfiction, 1948-1985, London, St. Martin’s Press, 1985, pp. 315-324.
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