The lurking writer round every corner

They say there is a rat within 15 metres of every human being; I wonder if the same applies to writers.

One of my favourite activities is picking up snippets of other people’s conversations, I believe the common term is eavesdropping. But I don’t like that term, it suggests that such an activity performs a loss of some desirable attribute when in fact eavesdropping is always a gain. The eavesdropping writer quietly collects material, in the same way as the visual artist may do on the street.
 

To the creative mind a receipt dropped is a whole world of new ideas, a personal note even better. Found objects are a wealth of new material to the artist, but does the use of someone else’s private life mean a dropping of all moral virtues by the artistic type?

I don’t know if this is an issue raised that frequently with regards to purely fictional literature. Documentary – anything – yes, but fiction not so much. Because words in a novel or a play disguise themselves in the trappings of fiction so much so that we do not think about them having come from reality. But to think that someone may be stealing your words, your personality, your tragedy, and your comedy may leave one in slight discomfort.

But the fact is that all art is founded, in some way, in the reality surrounding the artist. We shouldn’t think of the writer lurking on the streets in a bad way because, unlike rats, they do not bring with them plague and death. They actually deal in quite the opposite.

Recognising that there is something absolutely real at the foundation of every artwork, even if it is the farthest flung fantasy, is what keeps us wanting more. The moment of recognition within any work of art – be it of an emotion shared or a familiar character, is magical and brilliant.

In a sense the eavesdropping writer or the nosy photographer is keeping us all alive through their work. If you don’t like the idea of snippets of your life being appropriated in this way, think of it like this: we can now all, perhaps rather tenuously, claim ourselves as collaborators in great works of fiction.