Year: 1970 Source: Partisan Review, v.37, no.3, (1970), p.339-358 SIEC No: 19832111

1 of the most remarkable features of the arts in this century has been the sudden sharp rise in the casualty rate among artists; the better the artist the more vulnerable he seems to be. Reasons include: restless urge to experiment & explore-technical exploration implies a degree of psychic exploration; awareness of a ubiquitous, arbitrary death is central to the 20th century experience-the need to find an artistic language with which to grasp this forces the artist into the role of scapegoat.