The Creative Act

Rick Rubin is a record producer, but he is not known for a signature sound. His reputation rests on something else: he gives artists from very different genres and traditions room to find out who they are and what they actually have to offer. His method is to help people let go of the expectations they place on themselves, so they can return to a kind of innocence where the surprising result feels inevitable. The Creative Act grew out of that practice and took many years to write. Rubin began with the plan of explaining what to do in order to make a great work of art. By his own account, the book turned into something else, a book about how to be. After years of thinking about where creativity comes from and where it does not, he concluded that being an artist has little to do with what you produce. It has to do with how you relate to the world around you. From that view follows the book's central claim: creativity belongs in everyone's life, and anyone can give it more space. Rubin treats this as close to a responsibility, one of the more important ones a person has. The book is arranged as a course of study, drawing on the wisdom of a lifetime's work and presenting the artist's path as a road open to everyone, not only to professionals. It is meant for writers, musicians and other makers who feel stuck, and equally for readers who simply want a more attentive, creative way of living. The aim is to bring moments of exhilaration and transcendence, and perhaps whole lifetimes of them, within closer reach.