Friday, March 16, 2007

Art or Science? Me or You?

With more than 100 blogs under my belt what has this medium turned into? How much of it is art? How much should be intuitive and off the sleeve? And how much thematic, scripted, planned, scientific? I have to confess that the exercise of writing this blog has evolved through a number of phases reflective of my intentions. It started out with a hard focus on my travel diaries, and then moved into some attempts at posting up past and current creative writing. I even invited some serious, journalistic writing houses in the US to comment. Surprise surprise, they replied.

Then some kids responded to the blogs and I found myself writing not for myself but for an unseen but imagined audience. I went searching for tools that would broaden my readership and perhaps even earn the site a few dollars. (So far $5.10!!). I don;t think that should be the focus and I have resisted Google's Adwords. Where I have used the blog to help shape the novel I have been grinding away on for the last few years that imagined audience has been very helpful, freeing up thoughts and forcing some discipline into the writing.

Now it has settled down into what I really think it should be. Something that has proven cathartic and therapeutic. Something for myself. Writing about my recently killed friend, JD has confirmed that. Perhaps writing for myself will infuse a more honest air to the posts. And if readers respond to that, well and good.

Mind you that has not stopped me prodding for feedback. Dave, had a look and kindly posted some feedback. Not everyone reacts well to his advice but if you are going to hang your shingle out you need to expect the occasional egg to be thrown at it. He does what I should really do and create a separate blog for different themes. He has a few out there including dreamydestinations.blogspot.com. I think I will be sticking with this blog alone, writing for myself, and keeping fingers crossed that the posts have a resonance with those that stumble over them. Comments always welcome of course!!

1 comment:

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