When Franz Kafka said, “Writing is a form of prayer,” his words extended beyond just aligning writing with spirituality that might surround the writer. His assertion reaches deeper, connecting with the most intimate aspects of existence, and life in its purest expressions. He endows writing with a sanctity that permits it to explore the subtle complexities of the human mind and the profound mysteries of the universe. It is indeed a form of prayer, a state where everything else is forsaken. It’s a reverence that gracefully permeates the self, shedding away forms of slavery and oppressive bonds, liberating the individual to explore boundless realms of dreams, imagination, pain, hope, yearning, and love.
Even with all the interpretations and contextual relationships that Kafka’s phrase may suggest, and setting aside his personal life brimming with potential meanings and analyses, his statement – that is, “Writing is a form of prayer” – undeniably exalts writing to a lofty and esteemed stature. This view diverges from the view that perceives writing as a foundational element in societal construction or a purely ideological instrument. It stands in contrast to the Marxist and realistic perspectives that tend to reduce the act of writing to a social tool for achieving a specific goal.
Furthermore, Kafka’s perspective stands apart from postmodern viewpoints that expand the chasm between the symbol and its meaning, deepen the disconnection between the text and its creator, and delay meaning while leaving interpretation adrift. These viewpoints steer clear from that enigmatic, near-yet-far personal dimension that understanding Kafka, and those existential thinkers preceding and succeeding him, allows us to access.
From this perspective, writing is seen as an exquisite, humbling act, reminiscent of Sufi spiritual practices, profound in its significance and influence. However, this isn’t something everyone can master. Hence, I’ve chosen not to discuss a unique personal experience that might not hold much significance in the grand scheme of literary life, or importance in the extensive timeline of our predecessors and contemporaries. Instead, I will delve into the issues surrounding writing, its impact on writers and readers alike, the fervor it stirs within poets and novelists, and the graceful humility someone like Kafka experienced, which we aspire to emulate someday. Essentially, it’s about understanding what it truly means to be a writer.
In the realm of classical writers and poets, writing is seen as a lofty ideal that one strives to attain and mirror. For Romantics and those who adhere to the theory of expression, it’s primarily a means of expressing oneself. Those who subscribe to realist theories view it as a social activity. As for deconstructionists, writing is an act of self-dissolution, a constant flow of infinite interpretations.
It represents a variety of elements. Things that don’t neatly fit together, and how can a single thing embody such multiplicity? This is possible because its essence doesn’t lie in a singular truth, but rather in a multitude of varying and sometimes conflicting and clashing truths. All these theories hold some degree of truth, given a certain context, a particular viewpoint, and a distinct moment in history.
Considering this, responses to the profound inquiry, “Why do I write?” will be diverse and expansive. Some perceive it as an act with societal impact, while others see it as a conduit for expressing internal anxieties and concealed emotions. Some consider it an endeavor to embody the pinnacle of excellence and the loftiest ideals, while others regard it as a tool for forging a better world.
And there are those who see it –as Kafka phrased it– as a spiritual state, a form of reverence and presence, a style of delightful suffering, cherished endurance, and the hope of an imminent breakthrough on the horizon.
This immense existential state is what prompted poets like Ibn Al-Farid, Al-Hallaj, and others to adopt a language different from others. A language that draws its radiance from collision, absence, reverence, and unique passion. In their lexicon, words transform, taking on new and different meanings than those found in the ordinary dictionary. Their words become private symbols in a unique dictionary – this is a kind of detachment, a type of solitude, a form of experiencing loneliness with your beloved. It is indescribable and unreachable except through a language of profound gravity, devoid of any singular interpretation.
The journey begins here, aiming to read the universe, a primitive but tremendous attempt to interpret existence, towards savoring the cosmic beauty in all its dimensions, manifestations, and expressions. It’s about looking at differences and similarities, parallels and analogies, intersections and discrepancies. It is about observing the minuscule that can’t be seen, and the large that also remains unseen. It’s about identifying with existence, examining the evidence that points to itself, the entity that tries to explain its existence, and towards the universe and being in its multiple forms and various dimensions.
Here, the experience of writing becomes an elusive journey, venturing into wide spaces facilitated by the merging of the self with the other, the self with existence, and the self with itself.
In this experience, everything becomes a worthy subject of writing, everything can be written about, with different perspectives, multiple facets, and changing views, styles, and possibilities.
The question here is: Why do I write? Because I write, or because I live? Do I live to write or write to live? The difference is only semantics.
If this passionate sentiment belongs to ancient poets, other experiences lead to different meanings, not straying far from this context. In his famous text titled “Why do I write?” Nizar states:
I write…
To ignite things, for writing is an explosion,
I write…
So that light triumphs over darkness,
And poetry is a victory…
I write…
So that wheat ears read me,
And trees read me,
So that the rose, the star, the sparrow,
The cat, the fish, the shells and the seashell understand me.
After Nizar is drawn by these lines into the tangible world, he returns to his first existential passion, to say: “Nothing protects us from death, except for women… and writing.” With this, writing becomes life for the human author, an everlasting existence for him after his physical presence fades. It becomes his homeland, as Edward Said describes, or to use a famous phrase: Writing becomes a substitute for life!
Moving on to the other important question: How do I write?
This is a question authors and poets spend their lives and their most precious times trying to answer, as it allows the writing act to reach its highest potential. This very tiring question requires years of effort, work, and fatigue for the writer to answer, I mean, for the writer to recognize the tools that enable him to author his text, and identify with it, and merge with it. Isabel Allende says: “Writing is like magic, it’s not enough to just pull a rabbit out of a hat, it has to be done professionally and with pleasure.”
The writer needs a vast base of extensive reading, numerous observations, and genuine experiences to draw upon. Then, with childlike joy, he attempts to outdo this foundation, to leap over it. But his joy is fleeting. He soon realizes that, after a brief moment of triumph, he needs to outdo his own previous work. He must write something fresh, unique, and different. Essentially, he must continually strive to exceed his own limits.
He returns to replenishing his memory through reading, experiencing, living voraciously, and existential contemplation once again, and then tries to surpass himself. He’s thus caught in a never-ending cycle, constantly seeking the means to reach his elusive, unknown, new text. This is where the pleasure of the chase in writing lies, or as expressed by Jabra Ibrahim Jabra, and before him Kazantzakis: The joy of living the tiger’s experience! And trying to tame it and triumph over it.
In this cycle, writing becomes a form of illness. An illness that the writer cherishes and does not wish to be cured of. Whenever he feels ill, he remedies it with writing. As the Irish proverb says: when a person has the itch to write, the only cure is to scratch it with a pen. But it’s both a disease and a cure at the same time! It’s nearness and distance, pleasure and suffering, or as Darwish sees it, a combination of closeness and alienation, or as Adonis expresses it, the possible and the impossible.
But, isn’t writing sometimes an illusion? In the sense that, doesn’t writing delude us into thinking we have knowledge! That we possess the truth, it makes us believe that we have found the path, and have interpreted what needs interpretation. If writing leads its author to this path, it loses its most valuable qualities and dearest gains. That’s why Socrates, early in human history, warned against writing! Because it would kill memory and make people trust in their possession of knowledge!
Indeed, engaging with this metaphorical ‘tiger’ can be exhilarating, but it also warrants worry and repeated reflection. We’re unsure in our endeavor to author. Maybe in our attempt to control this ‘tiger’, we fall victim to it, then we get saved by the broader context of our situation, and our attempt fades without getting noticed by history.
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