I think you're overstating the class issue. She may be blind to her privilege, but most American rock musicians are working class and took the same kinds of risks.

I was just reading Richard Hell's memoir the other day and the way he dealt with a living space is the way most musicians did: he shacked up with a rich lady, he didn't pay the rent when he didn't have the money because it took two months to evict somebody, he moved around a lot, he shared a super cheap space with another musician (Tom Verlaine) for five years where they didn't have anything except mattresses on the floor and scammed what food they could.

The musicians in Neutral Milk Hotel moved around constantly, where places would pop up where they could stay. They formed a kind of collective to support each others efforts. They didn't day job - they went outside the mainstream economy and worked in a gift economy. That's doable. That's what bohemians do.

If you can live with those kinds of risks and uncertainties you are creating opportunity for yourself.

When Malcolm Gladwell wrote about his 10,000 hours theory, he used the example of a writer whose wife supported him for five years while he learned how to be a writer.

If you want to get that 10,000 hours to achieve some level of mastery with your work, you aren't going to get there with Plan B.

David, temping IS a Plan B.

I don't think that's true. Temping was Plan A - doing a shit job that I didn't care about to support my writing. It wasn't a different path. I didn't take a "career" job. It paid no benefits and its chief virtue was it gave me freedom to do my other work. Waiting tables or working at a bookstore or a copy shop is not Plan B. It's what frees up your time to focus on your work.

She's not arguing that everybody needs to be a trust fund baby. She's saying that you have to live with risk and uncertainty to create. That you balance the need for security against your work.

People don't get rich by collecting salaries; they get rich by taking chances and risking loss. It's the same with artistic careers.

She has a point.

If you want to get that 10,000 hours to achieve some level of mastery with your work, you aren't going to get there with Plan B.

Bullshit. If I could get Chatty to register here, I would. Then he could tell you about his Plan B and yet he's still achieved his dream of inking for Marvel.

This seems to assume some really wishy washy people. People who can't make the big decision unless the alternative is starving to death. Which it isn't, but is sure amps up the creativity drama narrative if you indicate you don't have a skill to fall back on, and if this didn't work out you couldn't make furniture/be a doctor/program computers like those boring mundane not-rich normal people.

Hey, is it still a Plan B if it's other arts? I mean, if you're going to fall back on being a supermodel if you don't make it as an actor, or you're a successful actor with a rock band, say, do you still get starving artist points? Or do we have to absolutely and uniformly punish people for the very existence of alternatives that keep them out of the poorhouse?

When Malcolm Gladwell wrote about his 10,000 hours theory, he used the example of a writer whose wife supported him for five years while he learned how to be a writer.

So what happens if the wife also wants to be a writer? Who makes the hard choice about supporting the art of the other person?

Bullshit. If I could get Chatty to register here, I would. Then he could tell you about his Plan B and yet he's still achieved his dream of inking for Marvel.

To be blunt: My Plan B hasn't kept me from writing a book and being a role model to thousands of goths. Would I like to be able to support myself full-time with writing? Yes. But I have learned that living in uncertainty and poverty is more detrimental to my creativity than having a career that has a good salary and health benefits.

Didn't we once have a conversation in the music thread about rock musicians with (unexpected) PhDs? The guy I know personally was a pretty successful rock musician and frankly the music was his plan B - he wrote his dissertation in Roman History at Harvard while touring Europe with a rock band, but left the music world in favor of a tenure-track academic job. Does his success in (and preference for) a "straight" job negate his success as a rocker? (It could also be argued that in the modern employment environment, getting a PhD in the humanities is riskier than becoming a rock musician...)

Bullshit. If I could get Chatty to register here, I would. Then he could tell you about his Plan B and yet he's still achieved his dream of inking for Marvel.

Different things work for different people, but I think the principle holds. I'm sure it took him longer to achieve his goal, and I think generally the longer it takes and the older you get, the harder it is to achieve that goal.

So what happens if the wife also wants to be a writer? Who makes the hard choice about supporting the art of the other person?

That's between the people in the marriage. There are many instances of husbands supporting their wives writing careers, that was case was notable for the gender swap. Joyce Carol Oates' husband paid the bills for a long time.

Didn't we once have a conversation in the music thread about rock musicians with (unexpected) PhDs?

That is notable chiefly for its novelty. Though 3/4s of Queen had advanced science degrees, and the lead singer of The Blasters got a mathematics degree those are extremely rare exceptions.

I'm not saying you can't work full time and have a creative career. You can. But it's enough of an obstacle that it's going to less often lead to success.

Risk taking when you're young, when you're unburdened with other responsibilities, when you're willing live with insecurity - that is by far the most common way people build creative carers.

the most common way people build creative carers.

I'm assuming that creative careers don't include all creative people, just the crazy fame junkie ideal. Because there are people who write songs/movies/books as their primary job, and who went to school for all that, and got a nine to five. All songs aren't scribbled on a coked up supermodel's panties between acid trips.

There's an elevation of one tiny slice of "creative" here that's got some creaky values. The creative career I'd have wanted? You can tell I didn't got to school for it and then get day jobs doing it, because those people are so much better than me. If I'd decided to draw or die, they'd still be better than me. And they're not in some epic dramatic edgy lifestyle, just a nine to five they worked their way up the same way I worked my way up mine.

I'm assuming you don't mean creative like that, right? You mean the cool kind of creative.

You mean the cool kind of creative.

Damn if I'm not going to emoticon.

:D