Game Masters are entertainers

For those playing the home game since our last post (yes, that is the royal we), I am now no longer sort of drunk. I am now full blown drunk.

Anyway.

I often hear game masters called failed novelists, or wannabe novelists, or aspiring novelists, as though this is some sort of insult.

As TS Eliot once said, "they damn editors by saying they're failed writers- most writers are failed writers too".

I am sure that's not the exact quote, as sure as I am that it captures the essence of the real quote.

To be clear- none of those things are slurred. Wanting to write a novel, thinking you might in the future, or trying and failing- none of these things are bad.

Novels are awesome. Sharing one with the world, even if you don't succeed, is a noble endeavor.

Game masters are entertainers. Some of them do indeed want to be novelists, but I think this is just a deeper expression of wanting to entertain.

However, even game masters who never want to write a novel love to entertain- just like people who cook, or people who homebrew beer to share with their friends, or people who like to write games and bask in the pleasant glow of other game masters saying "hey, you made my task of entertaining my friends easier".

This is the same impulse that caused Homer to sing around campfires of the glory of Achilles.

It's noble. Maybe the noblest thing in the history of the human race.

If you think that deserves a snicker, then fuck you. I don't want to know you.