Integrity

Two pieces on a great topic, the second made me think of the first.

Great monologue on fame and integrity from Basquiat:

Writer and ex-CIA Barry Eisler from a piece on maintaining integrity as a journalist:

The first compromise will likely be the hardest (and maybe this one was for Hayes), because you've never made one before, or at least not one of this magnitude, and the contrast with your relative purity will be strong. But they'll get easier over time, just as impurities are harder to notice when added to water that's already turbid.  The danger of this increasing ease is part of the reason I blurb so few books.  I won't claim absolute purity when it comes to the abysmally corrupt practice of blurbing; I've found myself (rarely, for what that's worth) in situations where I felt the cost of a no was too high, and I tried to square the circle by saying good things about a book that, while not exactly untrue, weren't exactly from the heart, either.  But I've also said no many times where the no was uncomfortable and a yes would have done me a lot of good.  From the beginning, I've sensed that once you start saying positive things about books you didn't really enjoy (or that you haven't even read), it gets easier and easier, and that the increased commercial success you might enjoy as a result of all those increasingly easy blurbs will be purchased with your own integrity.  The best way out of that trap is not to get into it in the first place.

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