William Deresiewicz: The Death of the Artist

He refers to it as the “one name” that is bleeding authors and the creativity from their pens dry.  Since 1995, that name has become the lone book seller and, consequently, the lone book buyer.  Not only authors are suffering, though.  Before, where musicians earned 10.00, they now earn 00.01 (cents, that is).  s’That so?  How about getting a comfy professorship at a university, then?  No place there, either, only contract work and the insecurity that goes with it.  Western middle classes have been especially ravaged by the longterm (mis)calculations of Chicago-style economic liberalism.  When politicians sold “trickle-down,” they meant to be taken both seriously and literally.  Political willpower, itself, seems to have been included in that sale; the decision-maker class clearly is unable to address, let alone improve the situation.  Artists, like prophets, are usually considered to be “ahead of their time.”  What happens when that time catches up with everyone else?