Regarding Marvin Taylor's quote:
"It's not that the artist is a special sort of person; rather, every person
is a special sort of artist." Hakim Bey.
Ananda Coomaraswamy quotes Sankara as having said that. My memory is not
perfect, so either he quotes Meister Eckhart as having said the same thing,
or I made the connection myself. That is the view from the mystic's
position. It is just, that it should cross boundaries of language and
culture as mysticism does.
Unfortunately our society neither acts as though it believes it, nor acts
on it. And the number of roles which are confused with that of the
"Romantic" and agonized artist [see the old book of Mario Praz] get larger
and larger in number, while atthe same time the artist IS thought to be a
special sort of person.
Gabriel Laderman