a wild bore

while reading prettier than napoleon i came across this, quoting an old post by scalzi that discussed whether (good) writing can be learned or only admired from a distance by the untalented.

...getting trapped in an academic feedback loop of writing is pretty damn useless. All you do is hang out with other would-be writers, writing writerly little stories to impress them. You're not actually learning much about anything or anyone else. My own guess is that this has led to the really fabulously boring world of modern literary fiction, where all the writing is terribly clever but doesn't actually say anything of consequence to anyone who's not already a writer or wishing they were. In other words, modern literary fiction is just like sitting in a room full of people who are delighted to smell their own farts. Good for them, but I'd like to go outside, if it's all the same.

i recognize myself as one of the people in the room. and i feel pretty good about it. experience over imagination? i disagree with scalzi on this. after all, there is skill in being terribly clever but saying nothing of consequence. but there is even more skill in saying something altogether new using characters who are clever but say nothing of consequence. and sometimes saying nothing of consequence to non-writers is a heavy statement itself.