The Mystery Of The Inner Moonlight

Stumbling upon remarks on an obscure internet bulletin board (thank you and credit where credit is due, “Ocelot”!, sadly we can no longer link to you), we came across this:

“In 1989, Michael Schumacher wrote a book containing advice for young writers called, “On Being a Writer”, where he asked advice from 31 famous authors. One of.. (those) interviewed for the book was Allen Ginsberg. The quote “Follow your inner moonlight; don’t hide the madness.” was part of his (Allen’s) advice for aspiring writers, so the context is Ginsberg’s advice on self-expression.”

We got in touch with Michael (Allen’s biographer) and got further clarification (the book is not actually Michael’s but, rather, an anthology, of interviews that first appeared in Writers Digest, edited by Bill Strickland. On page 47, from the reprint of Michael’s interview with Allen, we read, as follows:

“It’s more important to concentrate on what you want to say to yourself and your friends. Follow your inner moonlight; don’t hide the madness. Take (William Carlos) Williams: until he was 50 or 60, he was a local nut from Paterson, New Jersey, as far as the literary world was concerned. He went half a century without real recognition except among his friends and peers.

“You say what you want to say when you don’t care who’s listening. If you’re grasping to get your own voice, you’re making a strained attempt to talk, so it’s a matter of just listening to yourself as you sound when you’re talking about something that’s intensely important to you.”

Follow your inner moonlight and here’s a host more useful slogans