How Father James Martin Writes

Today I got around to reading this post by Austin Kleon about a James Martin interview where Martin was asked about how he writes. Kleon points out,

Out of all the interesting subjects they discussed, I think I was most taken by Father Martin’s explanation of how his vow of poverty affects his writing. Martin is “editor at large” at America Magazine, and as he explained it, he basically has the freedom to write about whatever he wants. The same goes for his books: All of his royalties go to the magazine, so he’s mostly unconcerned about sales. He also said his purpose in writing, always, is not to achieve literary greatness, but to “help souls.” So his mission and his vow of poverty takes away most of the common pressures of publishing. Writing, for him, is never a struggle.

That’s cool.

Thought I’m surprised to find out that writing to help souls is never a struggle! (That sounds hard to me.)

Be that as it may, I think the idea of freeing one’s self from writing out of a need to make a living is interesting.

It makes me think of teaching. I say this because I think I teach better when I’m not over concerned about how it will go over with administration. When I’m worried about an teaching observation I do what is probate worst teaching...