TRTR(I.3) The Unbearable Accumulation of Writing (p. 113)

[Jed Kelestron]

Why TR got bad reviews:

"That's why most writing now, if you read it they go on one two three
four and tell you what happened like newspaper accounts, no
adjectives, no long sentences, no tricks they pretend, and they
finally believe that they really believe that the way they saw it is
the way it is...it never takes your breath away, telling you things
you already know, laying everything out flat, as though the terms and
the time, and the nature and the movement of everything were secrets
of the same magnitude. They write for people who read with the surface
of their minds, people with reading habits that make the smallest
demands on them, people brought up reading for facts, who know what's
going to come next and want to know what's coming next, and get angry
at surprises. Clarity's essential, and detail, no fake mysticism, the
facts are bad enough. But we're embarrassed for people who tell too
much, and tell it without surprise. How does he know what happened?
unless it's one unshaven man alone in a boat, in all this .... all
this .... Listen, there are so many delicate fixtures, moving toward
you, you'll see. Like a man going into a dark room, holding his hands
down guarding his parts for fear of a table corner, and ... Why, all
this around us is for people who can keep their balance only in the
light, where they move as though nothing were fragile, nothing
tempered by possibility, and all of a sudden bang! something breaks.
then you have to stop and put the pieces together again. But you never
can put the pieces back together again. but you never can put them
back together quite the same way. You stop when you can and expose
things, and leave them within reach until you can bring them back and
show them, put together slightly different, maybe a little more
enduring, until you've broken it and picked up the pieces enough
times, and you have the whole thing in all it's dimensions. But the
discipline, the detail, it's just....sometimes the accumulation is too
much to bear."