Teacher. What if we leave this "measurement problem" for a while? I am eager to hear what do you think about one of Beta's assumptions.
Gamma. Which one?
Teacher. That the only things changing in ever-same creativity are the subject and the real meaning of the outcome.
Alpha. That is more than one question.
Teacher. True.
Alpha. Which one do you want to discuss then?
Teacher. I am curious about examples of outcome.
Beta. What do you mean?
Teacher. How it works in different areas of human activity.
Gamma. Like we discussed already investigation, invention, photography?
Teacher. Yes, like those.
Delta. Do you have something specific in mind?
Teacher. I am not sure yet. Cannot we collect some examples together?
Beta. What are we looking for? I am not sure either.
Teacher. All right, what about journalism?
Gamma. What about it?
Beta. Actually, the first thing that comes to mind is that a journalist does not create facts, does he?
Kappa. So?
Alpha. It is like photography.
Delta. Quick shot, eh?
Kappa. Oh, God! Won't you ever stop it?
Alpha. That's all right, I don't care and I don't mind.
Beta. You don't mind what?
Alpha. The quick shot is still there.
Delta. But seriously, Alpha, I fail to see it there. A journalist gets the task to go somewhere and bring back a story. Say a car accident happened... The paper editor sends some guy to cover the story...
Beta. ...Well, the question stands as usual... One journalist makes up the story that nobody wants to read, and another one does, so that people rip the paper out of each others' hands to read it!
Delta. I am not talking about "made up stories!"
Beta. Actually, I am not either... But whatever the facts are, you have to arrange them in a story! Different journalists would do this differently, right? It can be terribly boring and it can be incredibly exciting, right? And facts on the ground still would be the same, right?
Delta. ...Yea...
Kappa. What about the "quick shot?"
Beta. What about it?
Kappa. I agree with Alpha that journalism does resemble photography: you have to reflect real things, but you can do it in different ways.
Gamma. Could it be only in those cases, when a journalist does not have a specific task and encounters something extraordinary?
Beta. But this changes nothing!
Alpha. What do you mean "nothing?"
Beta. I don't see how this specific case changes anything about what we understood of creativity itself. If it is always the arranging of known things in a new form, then all of circumstances mean nothing.
Kappa. But we are exploring how it works in different circumstances now. This, in fact, was the question.
Beta. ...Agreed. So, what about the journalist and his story?
Alpha. And his news.
Gamma. I see no difference between that and fiction writing...
Alpha. Fiction is the same as news?
Gamma. Wait, let me finish. I just want to compare the two.
Kappa. It is interesting.
Teacher. It is. I am dying to hear.
Gamma. All right. Obviously, the creativity itself is the same here. Both, the writer and the journalist have to arrange things in some attractive form...
Alpha. Except the writer makes facts up.
Delta. Not necessarily.
Gamma. Yes... you are right... both of you... Let me finish. They both have to create stories to engage their readers, to make them feel involved...
Kappa. This is right! This is perfectly right!
Gamma. ...Yea, I know. OK, they make up stories, they try to engage readers... there is no differences so far. But the real value of their stories, the real job is different.
Alpha. I didn't get that. It is all the same, it is all the same, it is all the same... it is different!
Gamma. Look, when the journalist engages his readers, he leads them to the facts. The writer engages people to some general feelings, or trends, or ideas...
Teacher. I believe both things can be involved in both genres. The writer can use real events and names, while the journalist can talk about some general ideas also.
Beta. But they use those differently!
Alpha. How?
Beta. The writer uses real facts to put forth his general ideas and the journalist uses general ideas to put forth facts!
Gamma. Maybe... It is necessary for the journalist to engage public into the events happening right away, and he can use whatever he wants to do it.
Beta. Hm-m. Actually the same thing can happen to the writer too. He can write about the past or the future, but imply present problems...
Kappa. Can we say that the journalist is bound to the present in terms of content and writer is not? People just know that journalist is to draw them into immediate events, this is like a rule of the game. I think Gamma and Beta said the same.
Gamma. Yes, the writer and the journalist just have different goals.
Teacher. So, despite the fact that they both do essentially equal work, it is judged and valued by the public on different bases?
Beta. This is what the public would think.
Teacher. What do you mean?
Beta. It is simple. If they both do the same in terms of art, namely engage their readers in the events they portray, then the public gets involved in the same manner. The public fools itself about the real value of a fictitious story and the real value of one in a newspaper.
Kappa. They all are fools, ha-ha-ha. But, listen Beta, you contradict yourself. You said a few minutes back that two stories have different relations to reality, didn't you?
Alpha. The writer can write about his dreams, what the world could be like. The journalist is writing about reality.
Beta. Yea, Kappa you are right, it is clear that the goals are different, but the real jobs are so similar, that I go back and forth... and am going in circles.
Gamma. We are all going in circles, but I got a kind of funny idea about journalism. It is impossible to write about the present. It is always about the past, a near past, but still the past.
Beta. Physically. But people do perceive it like it is happening now... Like it can all be fixed right away.
Alpha. Come on! Fixed!.. Somebody got killed - go fix that!
Gamma. It is always a kind of illusion. However, like Kappa said, it is a rule of the game, the journalism game. A reader should get the feeling that action should be taken, that something can be fixed, that justice must be restored...
Teacher. All right, so let there be another circle. Is it not the same about fiction?
Alpha. Like in Stargate, ha-ha-ha.
Gamma. Like in Stargate. The difference is that those fictitious events substitute real ones and thus, they stand for general ideas, while in a newspaper it is directly about what it says... Ah... All of this was already said today!
Kappa. Yes, but it is amazing, how differently things look in the beginning of a discussion and after a while. My first impression was that fiction and newspaper articles have nothing in common. Then you start to analyze them. The journalist writes about current events, but the writer can very well write about these too. The journalist wants an action to be taken and the writer can desire this too. The writer organizes his reality so as to engage the public, the journalist does the same. The writer can turn to the past or future, the journalist can do the same to make his point. The only real difference we saw is how the public perceives their writings. If it is fiction, the public gets involved in fictitious events and feels easy about them. If it is news, the public gets involved in thinking about the immediate physical reality... Well, I am asking myself, if this is really so, and I am in doubt again...
Teacher. All right. I think this is enough for today. Thank you all.
- Войдите, чтобы оставлять комментарии