There are a lot of struggling author stories out there I've enjoyed reading about over the decades, but my favorite of all is the story of J. K. Rowling. The rags-to-riches aspect is of no interest to me, aside from the part of how after becoming the world's first billionaire author she then chose to give up that status by donating huge amounts of her amassed fortune to charities. What interests me most about her story is the part about her writing motivations, how she set about channeling her deepest personal feelings to create something and carried on with that creative endeavor for the mere joy of it all.
I've never idolized anyone for any reason, considering that a foolish hobby to take up wasting precious time and energy on. And I doubt anyone successful in creating interesting stuff would want anyone expending inordinate personal resources idolizing them. What I suspect is that people like this author prefer their audiences draw inspiration from their creative works to delve into their own personal feelings and engage in activities of enthusiastic, self-directed exploration, discovery and creativity.
At the risk of practicing the opposite of what I preach about never idolizing anyone, I've decided to call this "The Rowling Effect".
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