Searching for the Art Beyond the Struggle

By Rae Pagliarulo

“I’m having a writer/identity crisis,” I say to my therapist, whose smile is glowing from my laptop screen.

“I know!” she blurts back. “The very best kind. This is huge.”

I have never been one to buy into that narrative that to make art, a person has to suffer. The Struggling Artist trope is tired and typical, I think, and it only exists because capitalism doesn’t reward creativity – not because suffering begets it. But here I am, trying to navigate my own relation...