Why We Write in Dark Times

image: Herman Preet for Unsplash

I have been incredibly lucky, thus far, in living in a country that protected and promoted free speech. I’ve never had to wonder if what I’m writing—the ideas my work generates in readers—will be disallowed.

That time is, of course, over now.  

I’ll confess that as the first rapid changes in the American government were shot out over the landscape of our lives, effectively changing what’s always been seen as an administration into a regime—I’ll confess to some sleepless nights when my fears whispered sweet nothings in my ear. There’s no point in starting a book, you may not be here to finish it. Why write something that no one will be able to read? Your time is better spent in practical ways.

Fortunately, the three o’clock gremlins aren’t the only voices I listen to; I hear voices echoing from a history we’re no longer allowed to know about, voices that are thoughtful, generous, and courageous.

Literature, they say, bears witness to historical complexity. Books, at their best, serve as conduits to build understanding, empathy, and connection. Stories allow us to be lifted up, to feel, to be.

image: Josep Pines for Unsplash

There is a cultural tapestry to which all artists contribute that continues to inform thoughts, decisions, faith, dreams, no matter how attacked and wounded they might be. And someone has to weave that tapestry. Be that person.

Because so many are counting on it. To understand their lives. To put repression into a context. To experience beauty.

Victor Serge, who wrote under—and about—the most difficult of conditions, understood that people have needs that go beyond survival.

“Repression can really only live off fear. But is fear enough to remove need, thirst for justice, intelligence, reason, idealism…? Relying on intimidation, the reactionaries forget that they will cause more indignation, more hatred, more thirst for martyrdom, than real fear. They only intimidate the weak; they exasperate the best forces and temper the resolution of the strongest.” 

Art is never neutral—it holds power, shapes culture, and carries history. Keep making it. Keep making light.

image: Hudson Graves for Unsplash