It's a tragic truth that the kinds of imaginative people who can envision new societies — the intellectuals — are typically not the same people who know how to communicate those visions to the great mass of people. In fact, the intellectuals are often crummy at it. To get people off their butts and out into the streets, you need professional storytellers — writers, artists, songwriters, poets, filmmakers, actors, ritualists — who are gifted at grabbing people by the guts and not letting them go.

Artists are the ones who transform the intellectuals' ideas and visions into heart-level imperatives brimming with deep historical and personal meaning. They're the ones who can inspire vast numbers of people to make the necessary sacrifices, to feel intense bonds of solidarity, and to understand that the work of revolution is the most important work of their lives. You can't do that with a treatise. It takes a manifesto, a movie, a theatrical ritual, a marching song.

six people you need to start a revolution by sara robinson