No iPhones without Aqueducts

There are many sentiments in writing that get under my skin. The idea of the writer as a paragon, as god, as untouchable deity of words. Writers are just people. You can be a writer to - you just have to write.

Another is that you can never write anything original. Also known as "Everything has been done before". I think this is an excuse for those who cannot seem to break out of commonality. They strive for originality, but land in another pool of isn't-it-so-tragic-his-wife/child/father-died stories. The issue with this sentiment is that nearly every story is original. Predictability doesn't make this story the same story. This rebel looks/smells/thinks a little differently than the next bad boy and the girl who likes him.

I think this sentiment is similar to those questions, "Why didn't I think of that?" or "Why didn't they think of this?" We look back into the Paleolithic era and ask, "Why didn't they just wash their hands and stop dying so much?" We look at the Romans and say, "Sure they are masters of Engineering - but where are the air conditioners?" These questions apply to creative work as well as technology.

Why didn't you think of having a great evil in a small New England town? Why didn't the writers of the 19th century think of it? The truth is, someone had to pave the way, and there was just as much declaration of no-more-newness back in Stephen Kings day.

These stories don't seem original anymore, but I could tell the same story in my voice and it can become new. I don't write like King, I write like me and that is what makes it original. You can simplify a story as much as you want, but just because red was a color before Picasso was a painter, it doesn't mean Cubism wasn't a great innovation that paved the way for pop art and other, more modern movements.

I couldn't write a description of a Roman temple if the Romans didn't build temples and we would have no iPhones without their aqueducts.