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                                             February 26, 2007
                                        Rev: April     6, 2009

Should I avoid trying to think my way
through a subject without thoroughly
studying the works of the thinkers
who have come before me?

Isn't it likely that any
insight I might have into
say, the interplay of art
and culture, is likely to
be a mere reinvention of
someone else's work?

Yet the sheer quantity                            TO_SEE_OR_TO_DO
of prior work makes a
thorough study of more          Harder to justify,
than a tiny percentage          though, is choosing
of it an impossibility.         to write-up an            Is it good enough
                                idea, and make it         to want to add it
  The notion that you need      available for             to the pile?  How
  to read everything first      other's to read...        do I know?
  is a guarantee of
  paralysis.                IGNORANT                         I may just be
                                                             encouraging
                                   And my approach           someone else's
  Further, when I do come          toward sampling           paralysis.
  across some earlier              existing work
  source that appears to           is admittedly
  be saying something I've         erratic...
  said already, this               perhaps
                                   excessively       One can make
  (a) makes it easier for          random.           a case for
  me to follow what is                               studying the
  being said -- I don't                              authorities       E.g.
  need to make it my own,                            before breaking   I have
  it already is my own,                              with them.        read
  just not soley mine;                                                 little
                                                                       Said.
  (b) there's (ideally) a sense
  of vindication, or perhaps         There is (hopefully)
  just an excitement of finding      no sense of dissapointment:
  some authority I can site          "damn, someone got to *my*
                                     idea already!"
  (c) let's me compare someone
  else's take on the idea to                You should be used
  my own, without first having              to that by now.
  been contaminated by their
  presentation.                             How long have you
                                            been at this game?

              Or at least not                    You don't really get
              directly: I was                    to "own" ideas, and
              fascinated with                    coming up with ideas
              randomness in art                  isn't the hard part.
              long before
              encountering                             DONE_BEFORE
              Cage, but it
              doesn't mean I
              didn't *get* it
              from Cage, passed
              along through       A bucket
              other hands.        brigade
                                  of water
                                  music.


      Still, if I always learned things
      from primary sources first, it might
      be harder to see them from any other
      angle-- I might get stuck taking the
      authoritative approach as the               All of which helps justify
      definitive one.                             why I write these pieces,
                                                  though it doesn't help
                                                  explain why anyone else
                                                  might want to read them.

                                                         NEED_APPLY








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