How necessary is it that an author should live in a major city?
I've lived in one for four years now and I am absolutely depressed and longing to return, if only for a few years, to my much smaller hometown.
Yet every time I read about a so-called great writer, I discover that they spent most of their lives in a major city. I was just reading about Oswald Spengler for example, and his biography stated that: "Spengler flourished in these cities of big industry and metropolitan life—despite his writings criticising money power and the soul-stealing metropolis, Spengler remained a cosmopolitan urbanite throughout his life". It makes me feel retarded for not wanting to live in such a place. The city I live in however is majority non-white, and is more expensive to live in than ever before, so I simply couldn't afford to live here for long unless I rented all my life.
Its only useful for gaining contacts If you're not meeting people there you might as well move
Christian Walker
Also, which authors didn't live in major cities?
Jeremiah Russell
This only makes me feel stupider, as I have made no contacts here. That said, it's not as if it's as easy to "make contacts" in London today as it was for Robert Frost in 1911. And being a white, conservative male from a working class background, I don't think anyone I could potentially meet in publishing etc would give a fuck about me.
Ayden Thompson
Your victim mentality is more likely to be a hindrance than your background.
Anyway, my advice would be to get your writing up to a good enough standard to get published, then worry about making contacts. Until then move to whichever location helps you write better.
Grayson Campbell
Being close to accumulations of wealth is necessary for an author whose purpose is personal profit motive. Otherwise he may run laughingly drunk thru endless forests.
Charles Howard
Henry David Thoreau for one. Read Walden and get the hell of out the concrete abyss, friend.
Depends what you want to write about. If its human experience then you will get more of that being around people. You can still have a social life in a rural area.
Brody Russell
dude farming is hard yet rewarding
Jayden Cook
Why would you have to live in the city to publish? Pretty sure you don't need to meet anyone in person for the most part.
Henry Taylor
> it's not as if it's as easy to "make contacts" in London today as it was for Robert Frost in 1911 "no"
>And being a white, conservative male from a working class background poor you, how do you ever manage
Write a Joseph Conrad novel about how living amongst Blacks corrupts and ruins your soul. Conrad had to go on a long boat trip for tens of thousands of miles, but thanks to an unfortunate war result we moderns can go live in any major Western European or American city and experience the same inspiration. Drink deeply from the nigger's Pierian Spring and write your masterpiece!
