happiness & writing

I recently stumbled across this interview, a conversation really, that occurred on Wendell Berry’s front porch. The discussion rambles through many of Berry’s favorite themes, the importance of place, sustainability, and — above all — community. Given my propensity to life as a professional student, I was particularly interested in Berry’s thoughts on the life of a writer. Jeff Fearnsideby described how for some, being a writer means getting up early in the morning — sometimes when it’s dark — writing as much as possible, and then going out and working a full-time job. Berry responded, “that’s good, but you need to realize something else: that you can lead a perfectly good and satisfactory life even if you’re not a writer. When I figured out that I could be perfectly happy and not be a writer, I became a better writer…I don’t think you ought to let your happiness depend on writing. There are a lot of worthwhile things you can do. The unhappiest people in the world may be the ones who think their happiness depends on artistic success of some kind.”


“Digging In” The Sun interview by Jeff Fearnsideby July 2008 http://www.thesunmagazine.org/issues/391/digging_in?page=3