Meaningless Meanderings

A Small Spark

We wear our black caps and gowns, walking in our solemn line to receive our reward for years of labor: a piece of paper to symbolize the effort that we placed in the true goal of education. That goal is the death of creativity. Maybe the situation isn't this drastic, but there is some truth to the idea.

Consider for just a moment what you have done in school. You learned how to analyze a poem, how it rhymes and carries a certain beat through stressing certain words. You have also learned that two plus two is always four and not five, and that combined colors can make new shades. Perhaps you even learned that an object in motion stays in motion, and in a perfect environment an object can travel forever with a single push.

Yes, we learn these “essentials” to education. We learn what is tried and true, what is confirmed fact and a theory that cannot be proven true or false. Sentence structure, definitions and proper language are also taught. But what of that creative spark that we find in youth, or even in the amazing minds?

We douse that spark before it becomes a wildfire. With each day, we suppress these creative desires by enforcing personal “knowledge” on the creative individual. A young writer is told to read Robert Frost, William Shakespeare, Jules Verne or Arthur C. Clarke, and told that these men are the best writers and should be emulated; any deviation from their methods is a deviation from the art. A child who sketches in class is sent to an art school and is shown images of DaVinci and Rembrandt, and is then told that these greats should be emulated. These students will have their talent wasted as their creative sparks and love of the topic are snuffed out under the oppression of what makes a “real” artist.

Yet those of us who are educated look around us at other creative minds. Well-known figured such as Alan Turing, Albert Einstein, William Faulkner, Henry James, and Salvador Dali are known within their respective fields and geniuses. Turing is credited for the idea of artificial intelligence, and Einstein his theory of relativity. If they did not step outside of their paradigm, away from the suppression that would have destroyed their theories, would we know of them today? Faulkner and James are known for their long works with drawn-out sentences and long-winded paragraphs, yet they are considered by some to be some of the best writers within American and British Literature. Salvador Dali painted surreal images, such as the “melted clocks”, instead of the traditional works that “artists” are expected to draw, thus guaranteeing his fame. If these men performed these great works by stepping outside of a given boundary, then why do we enforce them so avidly?

These boundaries can ruin that spark of creativity. I am unable to write a “nice” work of poetry unless I enforce a rhyme scheme as I was taught as a child; without it, I cannot make sense of my writing, and give up. I have met an artist that can draw amazing landscapes, real or otherwise, who has been forced to give up on these designs due to the lack of “realism”. Many students of science have almost given up the idea of discovering anything, as they are not taught how to break the rules, but to live within them.

While education may increase the overall level of intelligence, what do we have to show for it? A collection of broken hearts, shattered ideas and hollow people forced to act within the confines of theses “rules” that we know so well. . .