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A review by sab754
The Death of the Artist: How Creators Are Struggling to Survive in the Age of Billionaires and Big Tech by William Deresiewicz
3.0
Yeah it was alright. My dad recced this to me--considering I'm "trying to be an Artist" now--and he cited this book as an influence for him to avoid Amazon etc. forever.
Alright, sure.
It was...bleak, to say the least. I'm curious about the author's choice for his interview subjects, and there seemed to be some issues with bias in a lot of the chapters. A lot of his analysis stank of white privilege.
I'm not a fan--personally that is--of an art critic--someone who contributes nothing but unwarranted opinion--deciding to throw his hat into the ring where no one's asked for it. Typical of a critic, I suppose.
A lot of this book talks about the growing divide between haves and have-nots, and talks about the death of the middle-class. In the wrap-up, his suggestion is to try and revive the middle-class.
For context, I'm hoping to be a published fantasy author. The one chapter that felt relevant naturally was on writing--and the focus seemed to be on essayists, poets, short story writers, and magazine authors. Not really what I'm trying to do. I've done my own research prior to reading this book and it didn't quite offer anything new for me here--other than "being an Author is Hard!"
So yeah, 3/5 stars. It was fine, but nothing that I'd say was life changing or revolutionary. I'm certainly glad I didn't buy this and borrowed it from my dad--which I've realised the author probably wouldn't be a fan of. Whoops! Sorry! Perhaps he should've tried to upload his stuff to Wattpad first.
Alright, sure.
It was...bleak, to say the least. I'm curious about the author's choice for his interview subjects, and there seemed to be some issues with bias in a lot of the chapters. A lot of his analysis stank of white privilege.
I'm not a fan--personally that is--of an art critic--someone who contributes nothing but unwarranted opinion--deciding to throw his hat into the ring where no one's asked for it. Typical of a critic, I suppose.
A lot of this book talks about the growing divide between haves and have-nots, and talks about the death of the middle-class. In the wrap-up, his suggestion is to try and revive the middle-class.
For context, I'm hoping to be a published fantasy author. The one chapter that felt relevant naturally was on writing--and the focus seemed to be on essayists, poets, short story writers, and magazine authors. Not really what I'm trying to do. I've done my own research prior to reading this book and it didn't quite offer anything new for me here--other than "being an Author is Hard!"
So yeah, 3/5 stars. It was fine, but nothing that I'd say was life changing or revolutionary. I'm certainly glad I didn't buy this and borrowed it from my dad--which I've realised the author probably wouldn't be a fan of. Whoops! Sorry! Perhaps he should've tried to upload his stuff to Wattpad first.