What Writers Ought To Do
...according to the late Susan Sontag in an essay, The Truth of Fiction Evokes Our Common Humanity:
"Love words. Agonize over sentences. And pay attention to the world...Be serious. By which I [mean]: Never be cynical. And which doesn't preclude being funny. And if you'll allow me one more: Take care to be born at a time when it was likely you could still be exalted and influenced by Dostoevsky and Tolstoy and Chekhov...The writers who matter most to us are those who enlarge our consciences and our sympathies and our knowledge."
