256 pages
If you don’t read Ryan Holiday, you should. He consistently puts out great articles, and fantastic books. This book is no exception. In Perennial Seller, Holiday explores the difference between art that comes and goes, and art that endures. This should touch a nerve with every creative out there. Because, who wants to create something that is irrelevant in a week or two anyway? I try to do the same in my own little way with my brief blog posts, always asking myself: Will this still be relevant in 50 years? Time will tell.
Two of my favorite quotes:
“The actress, writer, and comedian Sarah Silverman is often approached by aspiring writers asking for career advice. “I want to be a writer,” they tell her. Her response isn’t to encourage them or tell them how great they are or to ask to see their work. Silverman doesn’t say “You can do it!” or “How can I help?” Instead, she’s blunt. “Well, write!” she says. “Writers write. You don’t wait to get hired on something to write.””
“Young aspiring writers like to point to Jack Kerouac, who supposedly wrote On the Road in a three-week drug-fueled blitz. What they leave out is the six years he spent editing and refining it until it was finally ready. As one Kerouac scholar told NPR on the book’s fiftieth anniversary, “Kerouac cultivated this myth that he was this spontaneous prose man, and that everything that he ever put down was never changed, and that’s not true. He was really a supreme craftsman, and devoted to writing and the writing process.””