Chris Webber asks me:

>In particular, I found Steve's suggestion that literature is somehow a
>technically less demanding discipline than music caused me at least one
>raised eyebrow.  In what important sense can this possibly be true?

In no really important sense is it true.  The work of someone writing
a novel is just as hard as that of someone writing a symphony.  It's
different work.  However, there is a plethora of technical information
to be absorbed by the beginning composer that has no counterpart in the
literary field.  The information isn't all that hard to master, but there
*is* a lot of it and it's not particularly well-organized, in the sense
that it can all be found in one convenient place.  I would also add that
the addition of counterpoint - simultaneous voices - has no widespread
counterpart in printed literature.  A writer deals with one voice at a time
in sequence.  A composer deals with several voices at a time and also has
to deal with the problem of sequence.  Perhaps I'm just projecting my own
experience on the matter.  I've written novels and I've written music.
For me, music is a lot harder.

>It may indeed be cheaper to tinker with words, and the fact that most
>people can read certainly encourages many more - too many more - to try
>their hand at literature, but good writers do not spring fully armed from
>their own thighs any more than composers.

I'd disagree.  There have been a number of authors who were completely
self-taught once they learned to speak.  Consider all the folk poetry out
there, for one.  Furthermore, once authors learn to read and write, they
have - in the past at least - been mostly self-taught.  Dickens didn't
learn to write novels in class or from a living mentor.  I'd say his
experience was far more common among writers before the advent of MFAs in
writing, at any rate.  But almost every composer has undergone some sort
of apprenticeship to acquire basic knowledge and skill.

Steve Schwartz