Do any on Orwell's list below apply to you?
Orwell lists "four great motives for writing" which he feels exist in every writer. He explains that all are present, but in different proportions, and also that these proportions vary from time to time. They are as follows:
1.Sheer egoism- Orwell argues that a writer writes from a "desire to seem clever, to be talked about, to be remembered after death, to get your own back on grown-ups in childhood, etc." He says that this is a motive the writer shares with scientists, artists, lawyers - "the whole top crust of humanity" - and that the great mass of humanity, not acutely selfish, after the age of about thirty abandons individual ambition. A minority remains however, determined 'to live their own lives to the end, and writers belong in this class.' Serious writers are vainer than journalists, though "less interested in money".
2.Aesthetic enthusiasm- Orwell explains that the present in writing is the desire to make one's writing look and sound good, having "pleasure in the impact of one sound on another, in the firmness of good prose or the rhythm of a good story." He says that this motive is "very feeble in a lot of writers" but still present in all works of writing.
3.Historical impulse- He sums this up stating this motive is the "desire to see things as they are, to find out true facts and store them up for the use of posterity."
4.Political purpose- Orwell writes that "no book is genuinely free from political bias", and further explains that this motive is used very commonly in all forms of writing in the broadest sense, citing a "desire to push the world in a certain direction" in every person. He concludes by saying that "the opinion that art should have nothing to do with politics is itself a political attitude."
I confess that 1&4 apply to me.
A challenging question. So challenging that I put off opening it up until now... and saw that Orwell had already done all my work for me!
I'm going to be lazy here and not search my soul for reasons that Orwell hadn't mentioned. Are there more that he didn't think of? Don't ask me, I'm being lazy.
All 4 of Orwell's reasons apply to me... and without being shy about letting me know it.
@ Christina ("I love the feeling of being so engrossed in a book that you forget about time, chores, work, assignments, and any other thing that's on your mind.") There was a small library at our church when I was a preteen. Many a time the rest of the family was halfway home in the car (of course it was a large family) and someone would say: "We've left Jimmy behind again." (I considered ending that with a !, but really, they weren't surprised at all, so a . is more truthful.) And of course nobody was in any doubt about where they'd find me.
I write mostly for children... and my writing for them is definitely politically motivated. I'm SICK of children's books that treat them as if they're feeble-minded. I want to encourage children to THINK and to question absolutely EVERYTHING. Don't take your parents word for it, don't take your teachers' word for it, don't take MY word for it. MAKE UP YOUR OWN MIND!!! There are enough sheeple in this world. The Nazis' power came from that fact... and the way things are going, we're headed there again.
If children don't grow up believing themselves strong, trusting their own opinions and feelings, questioning authority ESPECIALLY that stupid authority that trots out: "because I SAID so!"... then there really isn't a lot of hope for the future, is there?
I created a web-site called "Jimm's Fairy Tales" http://jimmsfairytales.com/ which I pay a yearly subscription to keep up WITHOUT pop-up ads to finance it. I don't make a cent (nor a penny) from it. I want children (and adults:it's not all stories for children [and despite the title - a play on words - there's not a single fairy in there]) to read my stories (and articles on, for example, The Spanish Revolution, as well as politically motivated poetry). So I can hum in resonance with Orwell's observation: 'Serious writers are vainer than journalists, though "less interested in money".'
And now I've started up my own publishing concern because I've come to realise that publishers are also politically motivated.
[Orwell knew that: His own publishers, Gollancz, weren't pleased at the way that he - based on his own EXPERIENCE in the Spanish Civil War - started criticising the Communists in Homage To Catalonia. He moved to Secker & Warburg, who allowed him to further criticise Stalinism in Animal Farm and 1984. As far as I'm concerned, these 3 books were his best. Well, Down And Out In Paris And London is the real goods, too.]
Most radical, independent, tiny publishers from the idealistic 60s and 70s have either gone bust or been swallowed up by bigger fish who got swallowed by bigger fish, so that now, most [English-language] publishing is in the claws of US-based multinationalswith a definite agenda of teaching people NOT to think for themselves. They may allow the odd revolutionary, thought-provoking novel to have its day, but their overall message is "enjoy yourselves, don't think TOO hard, and don't rock the boat." Witness Harry Potter: black and white, Good versus Evil SCHLOCK! (Huge success commercially, of course.)
... And that's me being lazy.
Honestly, I don't think any of them really apply to me. There are times where I would want to write a piece which is politically motivated but for the most part, I just write because I enjoy writing. I love being drawn into a whole different world. I love the feeling of being so engrossed in a book that you forget about time, chores, work, assignments, and any other thing that's on your mind. I suppose I would want anyone who reads my stories to feel like that as well.
as an after thought I think Orwell was a bit of a wag anyway, talking animals... that concept will never take off!!!