41 pages • 1 hour read
Austin KleonSteal Like an Artist: 10 Things Nobody Told You About Being Creative
Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 2012A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapter 3Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 3 Summary: “Write the Book You Want To Read.”
Kleon relates an anecdote where, after seeing Jurassic Park for the first time, he immediately began to write a sequel. Though he didn’t know the term “fan fiction” then, he now thinks that “All fiction, in fact, is fan fiction” (47): Writers identify what they wished happened in stories that came before them and create their own stories about what was missed or what could have been better. Kleon thinks the best writing advice isn’t to write what you know, but what you like or would want to read yourself.
Chapter 3 Analysis
This chapter both reorients typical ideas people might have about making art and provides practical advice for idea creation. In this chapter Kleon leans on a key example to present his ideas, that of fan fiction. Fan fiction is stories written by fans (now online) that derive from an existing story, usually a book, film, or TV series. Kleon relates how, as a child, he wrote a sequel to Jurassic Park, filling it with all the things he wanted to happen next in the story. He says, “I didn’t know it at the time, but I was writing what we now call fan fiction” (45). In telling this personal anecdote, Kleon seeks the reader’s empathy and creates intimacy. Fan fiction also plays into Kleon’s supporting concepts of community and lack of ownership, as fan fiction spaces online often provide marginalized people and those with niche interests a community to share their ideas. It therefore supports Kleon’s argument that art is for everybody. Fan fiction is also in its nature derivative, both in relation to the original inspirational work, and to the communal, iterative nature of the body of work that results. Fan fiction authors don’t make money (and usually they can’t because of IP restrictions) but they deliver large outputs of creative work for other people who are passionate about the same media, thus engaging in Art as a Genealogy of Ideas. The creative impulse here is driven directly by influence. Fan fiction is derivative but also original and challenging in that it helps people make art that is outside the mainstream perspective, making it a useful tool for Kleon to demonstrate how originality can grow out of derivation.
To this effect, his practical advice is not to “write what you know,” but to “write what you like” (46). Writing what one knows limits authors to the boundaries of their own experience. Thinking about what one wishes existed in the world and then creating that thing is Kleon’s proposal for how to become an artist that finds fulfillment and productivity not in monetary reward but in creation itself.
