Are You an Author, Editor, or Collector?

No doubt, these categories blur, but let’s put it this way:

• Authors generate

• Editors revise

• Collectors curate

Each mode is a kind of creation. The God of Genesis 1-3 is an author. But the God of the Flood story is an editor, as it were—creating through subtraction.

Collecting is distinct from both authoring and editing in that you are neither bringing forth anything new, nor changing anything old. Yet the arrangement itself is a form of creation, like a bouquet or anthology, a museum or party.

In Hebrew, the same word—m’chaber—can mean author, editor, or collector. It literally means one who joins or, poetically, one who brings together in friendship.

Here’s another triad that loosely maps on: content creator (e.g., Lady Gaga), gatekeeper/publisher (Virgin Records), and platform (Spotify, Youtube).

If you think of this triad as taking place on both a micro level within the individual creative process and on a macro-cultural level, ask yourself—who does the heavy lifting, who gets rewarded, and who do you most aspire to and why?

How would you view Homer or Shakespeare or the Bible differently if you thought of these not as works of authorship, but works of editorship or platformship?

And where is the muse?