From The Millions: Year-End Reflections on The Great and The Good.
A graduate school professor said to our class on Day One of our writing workshop: “The Great is the enemy of The Good.” I’m not sure if he was coining his own expression, or perhaps paraphrasingVoltaire’s, “Le mieux est l’ennemi du bien” (Dictionnaire Philosophique
, 1764) – literally translated, “The best is the enemy of the good.” In either case, I couldn’t help, in my youth, but be a little offended; it was Day One, after all, and you’d think he might at least get to know us a little before discouraging too-high writerly aspirations.
Over the years, however, that expression has stuck with me, and its meaning has morphed into something quite different – the conflict in my mind now not one between artistic brilliance and mediocrity, but between created and creator.
