Comparing oneself with one's fellow writers is a bad idea. I would not review a fellow writer unless I had something terribly positive to say.
Interpretation
Comparing oneself to others can be detrimental, especially in creative fields. Itβs better to uplift others rather than criticize or compete.
In this quote, W. G. Sebald emphasizes the importance of maintaining a healthy perspective on one's own achievements by cautioning against the harmful practice of comparing oneself to peers, particularly in the writing profession. He advocates for a mindset that focuses on positivity and support, suggesting that if one cannot provide constructive feedback, it is advisable to refrain from commenting altogether. This approach fosters a more encouraging and collaborative environment among writers, allowing for personal growth without the burden of competition.
In practice
A motivational speech about fostering creativity in writers during an authors' conference.
How happily, said Austerlitz, have I sat over a book in the deepening twilight until I could no longer make out the words and my mind began to wander, and how secure have I felt seated at the desk in my house in the dark night, just watching the tip of my pencil in the lamplight following its shadow, as if of its own accord and with perfect fidelity, while that shadow moved regularly from left to right, line by line, over the ruled paper.
When I was a boy, I'd hide under the kitchen table and wind string around the chairs. I have a sense now that I am pulling on those threads. The more I pull, the more it comes unraveled.
If you're based in two places, on a bad day you see only the disadvantages everywhere. On a bad day, returning to Germany brings back all kinds of spectres from the past.
The seasons and the years came and went...and always...one was, as the crow flies, about 2,000 km away - but from where? - and day by day hour by hour, with every beat of the pulse, one lost more and more of one's qualities, became less comprehensible to oneself, increasingly abstract.
You could grow up in Germany in the postwar years without ever meeting a Jewish person. There were small communities in Frankfurt or Berlin, but in a provincial town in south Germany, Jewish people didn't exist.
No matter whether one is flying over Newfoundland or the sea of lights that stretches from Boston to Philadelphia after nightfall, over the Arabian deserts which gleam like mother-of-pearl, over the Ruhr or the city of Frankfurt, it is as though there were no people, only the things they have made and in which they are hiding.
We live in the midst of alarms; anxiety beclouds the future; we expect some new disaster with each newspaper we read.
A correct answer is like an affectionate kiss.
Instead of fretting about getting everything done, why not simply accept that being alive means having things to do? Then drop into full engagement with whatever you're doing, and let the worry go.
I thought, I need to be more cautious about my choices - it reflects on who I am.
Perhaps some day I'll crawl back home, beaten, defeated. But not as long as I can make stories out of my heartbreak, beauty out of sorrow.
Appearance is something absolute, but reality is not that way - everything is interdependent, not absolute. So that view is very helpful to maintain a peace of mind because the main destroyer of a peaceful mind is anger.
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