Why do we write?

Why do we write? And for whom? What do our readers expect from us? And what is it that we’re actually offering them? Are we honest with them? Are we honest with ourselves? Answering these questions should be an easy task for all journalist—the quality of our job, after all, depends on how we respond them—, but most of us might not have the time to think what is this all about. It’s normal: we don’t have much time. Especially since the digital revolution and the new routines for consuming and producing information force us to stay tuned and always follow the news. It’s normal, but it’s not an excuse. Now, more than ever, it’s necessary for us to doubt, to question our own work—with no mercy—, and to keep asking ourselves why do we write and whose interests are we serving.

Doing it in our day to day is complicated. This is why Faber and spaces of this kind are so essential; they allow us to be in control of time, to squeeze the most out of our day or to put it on hold, to spend hours searching for the perfect sentence and delete an entire page whenever it’s necessary. Spaces where we can ask ourselves why we do things the way we do them.

This is the second year that I’m a resident at Faber as a member of SomAtents. This time, our goal is more ambitious: we want to rethink and relaunch our project in order to reach more people, and to do it better (and we want to do it, of course, according to those principles that provide meaning to our job). These objective require hour-long discussions, but also—and perhaps most importantly—a good relationship with our colleagues. We needed to improve our group communication, to learn how to disagree, and reach a consensus, and to to start thinking as “We” rather than “I”.

Our time in Faber made all these things possible. They laid the foundation of our project for the coming years. And what matters even more: we did so in part thanks to the other residents, who offered us their poignant criticism and wise suggestions.