2008 Woodie Awards
The Best Education Money Can Buy
Putting a Price on Artistic Ability
Karl de Vries
Issue date: 10/21/04 Section: Opinion
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Imagine if you were to set up the spectrum of American literary talent as lots on the Monopoly board; the top tier vying for Park Place and Boardwalk, the exceptional housed on St. James Street, the clever and influential accounted for, but placed in their proper perspective.
The more expensive properties reflect the genius of their tenants, as the catalog of American scribes works its way down to Mediterranean Avenue. In this context, you could rank writers against each other; is Arthur Miller superior to David Mamet? Is the satire of Mark Twain better than that of Philip Roth? Who's better: Hemingway or Fitzgerald? For perhaps the first time, you really could place a price on talent.
If valuing an artist's talent in the form of dollars and cents sounds ridiculous, ask yourself the following: does $35,000 a year in tuition costs really make you a better writer? Does one's ivy league degree out duel that of a state college?
There is no price tag hanging off the brain of the great writer, and yet, in this day and age, we are willing to justify the costs of cultivating talent and artistic genius in the form of ultra-expensive colleges and universities. Art and talent exist in the abstract, but in this country, there are places to go and bills to pay.
But imagine the college graduate, interviewing to get published in The New Yorker magazine, who submits mediocre work but waves his high-priced degree around; he doesn't stand a chance. It is the work of the writer that does the talking.
In the profession of the arts, it's a results business; either you produce consistently or go home. To the graduate, confident that $150,000 in tuition has secured him a spot on the proverbial Monopoly board, his family has made a poor investment.
I'm of the belief that the college system, for all its flaws and shortcomings, still works and has much to offer students. There are experiences and lessons learned outside academics that can have a great deal of impact on young lives, and a well-rounded education, even in studies outside of one's focused field may prove to be beneficial later in life.
The more expensive properties reflect the genius of their tenants, as the catalog of American scribes works its way down to Mediterranean Avenue. In this context, you could rank writers against each other; is Arthur Miller superior to David Mamet? Is the satire of Mark Twain better than that of Philip Roth? Who's better: Hemingway or Fitzgerald? For perhaps the first time, you really could place a price on talent.
If valuing an artist's talent in the form of dollars and cents sounds ridiculous, ask yourself the following: does $35,000 a year in tuition costs really make you a better writer? Does one's ivy league degree out duel that of a state college?
There is no price tag hanging off the brain of the great writer, and yet, in this day and age, we are willing to justify the costs of cultivating talent and artistic genius in the form of ultra-expensive colleges and universities. Art and talent exist in the abstract, but in this country, there are places to go and bills to pay.
But imagine the college graduate, interviewing to get published in The New Yorker magazine, who submits mediocre work but waves his high-priced degree around; he doesn't stand a chance. It is the work of the writer that does the talking.
In the profession of the arts, it's a results business; either you produce consistently or go home. To the graduate, confident that $150,000 in tuition has secured him a spot on the proverbial Monopoly board, his family has made a poor investment.
I'm of the belief that the college system, for all its flaws and shortcomings, still works and has much to offer students. There are experiences and lessons learned outside academics that can have a great deal of impact on young lives, and a well-rounded education, even in studies outside of one's focused field may prove to be beneficial later in life.