What Can ‘What Can Art Do’ Essays Do?
Sally Olds
Reflecting on the history of pandemic literature, Sally Olds asks ‘what can writing do?’ in this meta-essay on the economics of writing during a crisis.
What can writing do? In and of itself, maybe not much. But if the struggling writer is given money to write, the writer might buy a new laptop, a pair of shoes, a warmer coat, a dental check-up—all the things you go without when you’re barely breaking even or in debt. If enough writers are paid to write, the payment will stimulate consumption, which stimulates demand, which drives supply, which creates the jobs needed to produce the goods to fulfil the demand. The writing produced is not an end in itself—not art for art’s sake—but a means to the end of economic stability, if economic stability is indeed what you want.
—Sally Olds, 2020
Essay coming soon.
Sally Olds is a writer from Queensland living in Narrm/Melbourne. She has written for AQNB, recess, and un Magazine, among other publications, and has collaborated extensively with Precog, an experimental club night held in Narrm. She is a sessional tutor at the University of Melbourne, where she recently completed an MA.