Kwame Anthony Appiah: belief

Transcript context

…But fame and fortune could be a reason, right? Samuel Johnson at least claimed that’s why he wrote. Yes, and sometimes it reads like it. I think literary fiction is not written by people who are looking for fame and fortune. The author of Milkman — she’s living in a small apartment, didn’t have very much money. When asked what she would do with the prize money, she said, “Pay off my debts.” Anna Burns has a vocation to write these novels. She writes them in a very particular way. She says they come to her. She waits for them, and then she writes stuff down. Sometimes she knows it’s working, and sometimes it isn’t, and so on. She has a very particular picture of what she’s up to. I don’t think people like that are motivated by anything like this, but it doesn’t mean there isn’t anybody who’s motivated in that way. I think that recognition is part of the important structure of the literary world, and prizes big and small are an important part of that. I don’t think they’re unimportant. I think it’s good to do them. I’m also the chair of the prize committee for the Berggruen Prize, which is a philosophy prize, which is a million dollars a year. Which tends to go to people who’ve had a long career. Like Charles Taylor, right?…

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