Writers have been despairing about writing in America for the last couple decades, maybe longer.[0] They are right to note that serious writing has been eclipse

Writers have been despairing about writing in America for the last couple decades, maybe longer.[0] They are right to note that serious writing has been eclipsed by other media, like television, gaming, movies and the Internet. It's hard to make a living as a writer. Lots of people want to write, but nobody owes them a living, and they end up caught between their own inclinations and an indifferent market. Most of them end up teaching to pay the rent, like Chee. (That of course is pyramid scheme, like others in academia, where teachers teach would-be teachers even though there are not enough teaching roles to go around.) Chee has written some pretty good things.[1] He has also written some self-indulgent things, which, in my opinion, includes the essay through the link above. Self-indulgence is one hallmark of contemporary creative non-fiction in America. It's frequently soft autobiography and banal scenes ginned up with internal melodramas. Whether or not one enjoys that is a matter of taste that we won't settle here. Those who are put off by the self-indulgence will be less likely to read Chee in the future, which makes his expressions of despair the trigger of a vicious circle. But Chee is not writing for a general readership here. He says he is writing for other writers, and the general readers among us just stumbled on his letter to them. Maybe it's just what they needed. [0] Jonathan Franzen "Perchance to Dream: In the Age of Images, a reason to write novels" (Paywall) https://archive.harpers.org/1996/04/pdf/HarpersMagazine-1996-04-0007955.pdf?AWSAccessKeyId=AKIAJUM7PFZHQ4PMJ4LA&Expires=1524535179&Signature=ahDC5czIWIzLbqcu9jouGMvwZqE%3D https://archive.harpers.org/1996/04/pdf/HarpersMagazine-1996... [1] Annie Dillard and the Writing Life https://themorningnews.org/article/annie-dillard-and-the-writing-life https://themorningnews.org/article/annie-dillard-and-the-wri...