The worst stuff you’re ever going to make

July 30, 2018 10:53 AM

Sorkin, the award winning stage and film writer, recently taught a master class on the art of the screenplay.

One of his students asked if it was worth the time and money to invest to art school. To which the instructor said:

The only advantage of going to college is, you give yourself a chance to write the worst stuff you’re ever going to write.

It’s an interesting insight on higher education; a product that many say does not work, has an antiquated business model and comes with ridiculous costs that send students into debt for the rest of their lives.

And so, it depends on our definition of the word education, which comes from the word educe, which means to bring out of.

What if that’s all education was? Not the mindless implantation of things into people’s minds, but the bringing out of those people what’s natural, native, good, special and useful to the world?

I have spent the better part of my life making art. And although I never enrolled in art school, what I did do between the ages of ten and twenty was spend thousands and thousands of hours making the worst stuff I was ever going to make. Which didn’t insulate me against making bad art in the future, but it was a process, an educational journey, that laid a creative foundation and flushed a lot of the crap out of my system and built a body of experience that brought out of me what was natural, native, good, special and useful to the world.

My art school was practicing.

LET ME ASK YA THIS...