To B Or Not To B?

As I write this, I’m watching Tom Ford’s Oscar nominated A Single Man: as artsy fartsy a film as you can get without watching The Artist. And I wonder, who on earth has the right to decide whether this deserved an award or not? I would have given best picture to this, not Hurt Locker – but they didn’t; I would have given best picture to Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, not The Artist – but they didn’t. And then this nightmare came into clarity in my mind’s eye: even at that far off level of professionalism, beautiful things (the term ‘art’ is far too pretentious, it entails the silly, impossible question of ‘what is art?’, the labelling itself a form of grading) will always be reduced to a grade: winner, loser, not even nominated = A, B, whatever. I’ve already begun making a nightmare out of my dreams because of the dreaded marks for my first term writing portfolio.


I consider myself lucky (or perhaps, in a parent’s eyes, copping out) to be studying something I love with creative writing (although I’m placing all arts subjects involving a creative project under an umbrella generalisation here). Did you spot the blackened word in the otherwise positively phrased sentence above? No, not parents. ‘Studying.’ Of course there’s a wealth to learn from studying other’s work but can you honestly study ‘how to’ something? Whether it be writing, composing, or performance etc. – let alone mark it.

Obviously, to a technical extent you can: the comma goes here, act it in the style of this practitioner. I won’t say must for undoubtedly there are those who didn’t study their craft yet are hailed as the best in their field. But beyond a general check for competent knowledge about conventions, how can you mark the arts without creating a weirdly communist breed of ‘correct’ (I can’t help but use the word now, sorry) artists? It’s a form of censorship in a sense which is purely paradoxical. In a recent interview for IdeasTap, playwright David Eldridge said ‘there’s no right way to write a play...do this workshop, learn this structure...it doesn’t work like that: writers need treating in as...individual a way as possible.’ And I forgot about feeling guilty for doing things my way.

Although my contention is obvious, I’m not bitter about my first marks of university, elements of the feedback seem fair enough. But following the results, I heard this phrase resonate amongst my peers ‘they just didn’t seem to get it’. Do they ever? My eyes aren’t your eyes. So we come to the obvious point: art is subjective, possibly too subjective to be called good or bad. It took years for Joyce’s Ulysses to be published, but now it’s heralded as one of the greatest books ever written. Looking at the marketing criteria, I can’ help but see a vicious circle in which you can’t get an A for originality, without getting a substantially lower mark in structure or language, and vice versa.

In an age where achieving originality anymore seems impossible, I would argue that nurturing creativity should come before restraining it to a marking criterion. I have increasingly found myself using this phrase, ‘you have to sell your soul for an A’. Reading this back, it sounds a little on the Faustian side of overdramatic, but it earnestly feels that way. If (I feel I should slap my wrist every time I use this word) ‘art’ often holds a mirror up to its creator, then doesn’t marking it suddenly seem not just difficult, but perverse? Take art – as in paintings etc. – for example; before appreciating whether the composition of a painting is perfect, I ask myself whether I identify with it.

Of course whether you identify with a piece of writing, the interpretation of a character, the phrasing of a musical line, doesn’t, or at least, shouldn’t influence the mark. But does it influence whether one ‘gets’ it or not? This is what worries me.

I’m not presuming I can change the whole educational system with one article – I always accepted a degree as the easiest way into the industry. But in writing this, I can exercise my voice without getting panic attacks over whether it’ll receive above a B; and isn’t expression of ideas what it’s all about?