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| QUOTATIONS 226-245 |
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| 226.Nostalgia is a longing for a place, real or imaginary, where one supposedly had been accepted in the past and surely would be welcomed again the way one is (as much, of course, as it is possible for the human beings to accept each other). It is the place where one, presumably, would not be rejected and despised, especially not for what he actually is but for what he is only in the eyes of the prejudiced and often hostile beholders. For an immigrant, nostalgia also serves as a weapon to fight off the indignities and humiliations inflicted upon him by the new and unfriendly environment. The moment an immigrant arrives into a new country he immediately, as if by magic, loses his individuality (not in a true sense, of course, but only as far as his "native" hosts are concerned) and is labelled by the generic name, viz. by the name of a country he came from. He becomes the "Russian", the "Greek", the "Italian", etc. Everything he does or says from now on is looked upon as an expression of the characteristic traits, allegedly peculiar to the people from the country of his origin. But since the inhabitants of the host country usually have very little knowledge of the immigrant's country of origin those "characteristic traits" are naturally no more than a hodgepodge-podge of stereotypes, old wives' tales and pure ignorance with a good measure of prejudices and outright hostility. At the same time these foreign lands the new immigrants come from are habitually graded as "good" (usually the mother land of the original settlers, by now the dominant majority), "bad" (more likely than not a point of departure of the most recent arrivals) and anything in between, using in this gradation the reasons which are no more valid than those employed to define the national character of their present or former inhabitants. Consequently, the immigrants are judged and treated according to the status arbitrarily given to their country of origin, and, if this country is labelled as "bad", they are going to be treated badly, no matter what they personally are. Such immigrants therefore have only one way to improve this situation: they have to improve the image of their mother country in the eyes of their hosts. To that purpose they embark on creating their own, new and positive myth about the "old country" to confront the negative one created by the others. This new myth, understandably, tends to idealize and to embellish the country of their origin and, subsequently, they begin to believe this myth themselves, regardless of the reaction of the others toward it. After the immigrants had created this image of the "lost paradise" they would naturally develop the longing and nostalgia for such a beautiful and bountiful land they were so foolish to abandon. The second and subsequent generations born in the new country believe in this myth even more, having no real experience of the "old country" at all. Suffice it to say it is next to impossible to persuade the hosts to accept the new and positive image of immigrants' country of origin. For whatever reasons, they feel more comfortable with the old and negative one. But if this new and positive image doesn't change the way they are viewed and treated by others, the immigrants (and especially their children) are getting rid, at least, of the inferiority complex, which in itself constitutes a very important psychological gain. Yet, even those who have originally come from the supposedly "good countries" are practising the useful art of nostalgia, though for the entirely different reasons. Having usually obtained vastly superior to that of the immigrants from the "bad countries" position in a new country, mostly due to the positive myth about their mother country, they thereafter have vested interests in maintaining and upgrading it in order to convince both others and themselves that their position of privilege and dominance is justified and therefore has to be perpetuated. 227. The reason we often experience disappointment and nagging emptiness after our dreams had been finally materialized is that they probably were not our dreams after all, but have been "borrowed" from somebody else - our parents, friends, or society in general. For there are always a lot of such ready-made for mass consumption dreams floating around, and it is not easy to resist the temptation to pick up the most popular and/or the most accessible ones without giving too much thoughts to it. In addition, it has to be acknowledged, it is equally hard to choose among them those that might suit us best. But the hardest thing, of course, is to create in a crucible of our imagination our own dreams. Yet, it is absolutely necessary (though not sufficient), if we are to avoid the disappointments of the even fulfilled dreams or, which is more important, the disillusionment of the unfulfilled life. 228. As the young children ( and one can extend , by analogy, what follows to the early civilizations as well) we live in a very small world of which we consider ourselves (with various degrees of awareness and certainty) to be a centre, and not simply a centre but the one which occupies disproportionately large part of this small world of ours. Then, as we grow, our knowledge about the world around us gradually increases, its boundaries expand and it becomes correspondingly bigger. And the older we get the more we know, and the more we know the larger the outside world seems to us. But the larger the world outside us becomes the smaller we feel, progressively occupying less and less space in the bigger and bigger world, which, in turn, compels us to continuously reassess and consequently scale down the importance of ourselves in the general scheme of things. Yet, as the years go by, it's getting harder and harder to carry the increasingly unbearable burden of one's own insignificance. Some, hopefully the majority, accept this with stoic resignation. Others, unable to cope with the ruthless process of the inevitable diminution of the Self, revolt against it by creating, and subsequently beginning themselves to believe, and even worse, forcing the others to accept it as real, the myth of their highly exaggerated eminence and importance. If successful in maintaining this myth they can make themselves reasonably happy. But if not, they become the most miserable of all and, in addition, make the lives of those close to them miserable too. 229.Suddenly it occurred to me that my whole life has been, probably, one perpetual struggle against the overwhelming totality of banality. By now, after the countless defeats have left me bruised and scarred for life, I know that I can't win this futile war. But neither can I stop fighting, as if something outside me, almost against my will, is prodding me to carry it on seemingly forever. 230. When one pours out his soul into one's writing does one become as empty as a vessel from which its contents had been completely drained? For the more I write the more I am beginning to catch myself, while speaking, with saying again and again what I have already written. But even worse, I find myself constantly comparing, perhaps half-consciously, what I'd written before with what, when speaking now, I'm saying. And to my dismay, I often find the latter to be somewhat wanting, i.e. to be poorly phrased, more or less confused and always incomplete, all the while forgetting that the perfection of the written as compared with the spoken word is, more often than not, a product of a long deliberation, self-editing and labourious search for a better word and a better, if not the best sentence which is, of course, impossible during the normal, mostly spontaneous conversation. 231. Those internal monologues and dialogues that are so clear and eloquent, clever and persuasive, and which each of us continuously carries on while remaining externally silent, is the stuff the art is made of. And the true artist is the one who first has the courage, and second the talent to say publicly what each one of us feels and thinks privately, but either wouldn't dare to say it aloud or has no ability to do so in a way that can be understood by others, or most likely, both. Thus, the primary task of Art is to translate the silent cry of the soul into the audible speech of public discourse, giving in the process at once the unique and common voice to the voiceless many. 232. "The truth shall make you free" said Jesus. But what he forgot, or deliberately have chosen not to mention, is that it shall also make you very disillusioned and extremely depressed. 233. Most of one's life is spent in fear: fear of being harmed, fear of abandonment and rejection, fear of losing one's possessions and/or position, or of not even getting either, fear of being thought of as unattractive (or even ugly), ridiculous, silly, fear of not being loved and of not deserving to be loved, or worse, of being hated, ..., and, ultimately, fear of death. So, it is not surprising then, that being such an all pervasive human emotion Fear is also the one of the major forces governing human behaviour. Though fear certainly helps us to survive physically, spiritually it inevitably destroys us, for in the realm of social and personal interaction, where most of our lives are spent, fear more often than not leads to betrayal. Again and again, through our lives, we find ourselves in that unfortunate situation, most of the times not of our doing, when, in order to protect ourselves from the real or imagined threat, we have to (or so it seems to us) betray others - people we go to school with, co-workers, acquaintances, friends, relatives, our spouses, etc., all who had a misfortune to be on a losing side of that most common and the most predictable of human choices: it is either me or he/she/them etc. And, of course, in making these choices we are continuously betraying not just people but also our principle, ideas, morals and, ultimately, our essential Selves, or what we believe it to be. Thus, one's life is spent not only in fear but also in betrayal engendered by fear, in betraying others and, in turn, in being betrayed by them too. Yet, though people are constantly betraying each other, they cannot do without each other either, and this combination of antagonism and mutual dependency is what the human relations are all about. 234. There is a point in everyone's life when, usually after the seemingly endless period of persistent and nagging psychological discomfort bordering often on a depression, one suddenly, almost as if by revelation, becomes aware, painfully and unmistakably, of one's profound unhappiness. For this time it is quite unlike the many but temporary unhappinesses each one of us experiences occasionally through life, when the immediate cause of this or that particular unhappiness is either known or, at least, seems to be known, and therefore the suitable remedy can be found to alleviate it. But such is the nature of the profound unhappiness that no real or even imagined reason for it ( since none of the old and tried causes or remedies seems to be applicable any more) is apparent to us. One just experiences the all-pervasive feeling of helplessness and desperation without a name and a cause, the feeling that stubbornly refuses to free us from its soul-stifling grip. Yet, to continue living, we have to find The Cause, for if we don't this profound unhappiness wouldn't go away by itself. It will only get progressively worse, until it destroys our life completely. Having been conditioned by our life's experience to derive pleasure from satisfaction of the desire to possess, to use and to do, we, quite naturally, tend to look for the cause of our profound unhappiness in the absence of some things or some actions, believing that as soon as we find them everything will become normal again. And so, one embarks on some new, untried before activities and also on a long search for some new, not yet experienced things to possess and to use, hoping that they would help one to regain at least previous, however fragile contentment, if not the lost happiness. But since we know neither what exactly we are looking for nor where and how to look for "it", the search, of necessity, lacks any outward plan or internal logic. It simply becomes a perpetual exercise in trial and error, a game of chance, a lottery. There will be, of course, as in any lottery, a few lucky winners, but the majority, as always, will spend the rest of their lives constantly losing, viz. never getting happy or content, never finding the real reason for their unhappiness, and yet, never losing hope that the next time theirs might be the lucky draw. And who knows, perhaps that is the best one can hope for. 235. And yet another line dividing people: on one side of it are those who are always getting what they want to-day, on the other - those who, also always, are told to wait till to-morrow. 236. What can be said in just few words should not be said in many, the brevity has some rewards which are as good as any. 237. The classical poetry of the Eighteenth and, especially, of Nineteenth century could be compared to a well-organized park of word and ideas. Here are the flowers-words, there are the trees-thoughts. The walks and alleys of the narrative are clearly visible and well defined, and, at the end, inevitably lead to an open space occupied by a flower-bed, fountain or sculpture - the final crowning conclusion. The visitor-reader can enter such a park with more or less clear expectations of what is awaiting for him and without fear of not finding his way out. The modern poetry of the 20th century, on the contrary, is like a jungle of colourful, exotic and mysterious words and sentences, more often than not without any apparent connection to each other, sprung in a chaotic profusion, simultaneously seductive and frightening, luring and repulsive. To cross this seemingly impenetrable jungle an explorer-reader needs a guide-critic (or a poet himself as a critic and interpreter of his own, invariably vague and ambiguous writings). Left alone, the wanderer-reader usually right from the start, becomes disoriented and confused. Very soon, if he has enough intellectual honesty and courage, he will have to admit that he is completely lost in this impassable forest of numerous words and multiple meanings, where the pathways are either invisible or leading nowhere, and to ask for help. 238. To have friends who aren't his friends is the fate of a lonely man (and friends like these make one feel even lonelier) To love those who don't love him and whom he doesn't like is the fate of a lonely man (and such love makes one even lonelier) To talk to those who don't understand what he is saying and whom he doesn't understand either is the fate of a lonely man (and such conversations make one feel even lonelier) To be with people he would rather not be with is the fate of a lonely man (and being with them makes one feel even lonelier) To live as a stranger amongst strangers is the fate of a lonely man (and such living makes one feel even lonelier) To always search and never be able to find what he is looking for is the fate of a lonely man (and this futile search makes him feel even lonelier) To know all this and yet to continue doing it over and over and again is the fate of a lonely man (and these repetitions make him feel even lonelier). 239. We spend the first half of our life accumulating the illusions, and the second disposing of them, until, at the end, we have to part with the last and the most stubborn one - the illusion of our own immortality. 240.For some time now, Capitalism has been responding, however half-heartedly, to the inherent in such a system problems of inequality by trying (and on rare occasions even, if only for a short time, succeeding) to make both the wolves and the sheep happy simultaneously, however contradictory their interests obviously are. Socialism, on the other hand, thought till quite recently that the solution to this problem lies in the elimination of the wolves as a species altogether. But when and where this commendable goal has been accomplished something strange and unexpected started to happen: certain sheep, as if by metamorphosis, began turning into wolves. And as these new wolves were being eliminated too, some of the remaining sheep kept turning into other new wolves again and again. Eventually this strange phenomenon had to be accepted as a irrevocable law of Nature i.e. when sheep are the only ones to exist some of them will inevitably turn into wolves and the only probable explanation for this metamorphosis is that there are always present among sheep the wolves in sheep's skin waiting for an opportune moment to become what they potentially always have been - the real wolves. 241. When your opinion and evaluation of something is different from that of the others, first, in objection to it, they would tell you that "the beauty is in the eye of the beholder", which in itself and as a general statement sounds rather innocuous and attractive with its implied sense of the all-encompassing tolerance. But then they immediately proceed to bludgeon you with theirs, not so tolerant any more arguments, all designed not only to prove that something is definitely wrong with your "eyes", but also to force you to admit it and to accept their point of view as the only correct one. 242. Freeing themselves from the constrains imposed by the Rhyme, and quite often sacrificing even the Rhythm as a burdensome restriction on their creativity, the modern poets, unfortunately, as if throwing the baby out with the bath water, have discarded in the process of this liberation the organizing discipline provided by both. As the result, most of the modern poets tend to abuse this newly founded freedom by indulging into the seemingly endless and unrestricted verbosity, characterized by the narcissistic preoccupation with dazzling words and gorgeous lines, which too often have no other apparent function but to say to the reader: "Look how beautiful and exquisite my sentiments and imagination are. Wouldn't you just love me for that?" And even if the poet succeeds in seducing the reader into the adoration of such a senses-numbing display of the verbal pyrotechnics, this love won't be a lasting one since it lacks, as a family counsellor would say nowadays, the most important element in human relations - communication, because most of the readers most of the times (as difficult as it may be for many of them to admit) simply do not understand what the modern poets write, which makes communication virtually impossible. 243. Women are very good at building up a monument to a man, but they are even better, much better at shattering it into pieces. And if it's true that from the exaggeration to the belittlement is but one step, nobody can make it as easy as a woman who is keen today, for whatever reason, on reducing to the ridiculous the man she only yesterday considered to be the greatest of them all. 244. I think to understand, I speak to be understood. 245.One should never become a slave of one's own self-definition. |
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