I can’t move on, not just yet…Still thinking about Tom Stoppard’s trilogy, Coast of Utopia, and about Isaiah Berlin’s insightful Russian Thinkers, the book that launched Stoppard’s interest in writing about this historical period in the first place. Here is another quote from Aileen Kelly’s excellent introduction to Berlin’s book, a quote that is so apropos to our current circumstances, politically and culturally:
Berlin suggests that pluralist visions of the world are frequently the product of historical claustrophobia, during periods of intellectual and social stagnation, when a sense of the intolerable cramping of human faculties by the demand for conformity generates a demand for “more light,” an extension of the areas of individual responsibility and spontaneous action. But, as the dominance of monistic doctrines throughout history shows, men are much more prone to agoraphobia: and at moments of historical crisis, when the necessity of choice generates fears and neuroses, men are eager to trade the doubts and agonies of moral responsibility for determinist visions, conservative or radical, which give them “the peace of imprisonment, a contented security, a sense of having at last found one’s proper place in the cosmos.” He points out that the craving for certainties has never been stronger than at the present time; and his [writings] are a powerful warning of the need to discern, through a deepening of moral perceptions–a “complex vision” of the world–the cardinal fallacies on which such certainties rest.
In addition to that larger arc of America’s current political mindset, this quote also addresses the predicament of life on a personal level as well. My good friend Susana Jacobson poses the following question to her students to help them determine if the life of a fine artist was for them: Can you imagine living your entire life in uncertainty? That’s what being an artist is: You’ll never know if your work is any good, you’ll never get the kind of feedback that other professions provide. So if certainty is important to you, find a different path.
I love your friend’s questions. John Berryman said something very similar about being a poet. And even worse may be the sense that, having achieved something once (or at least having a glimmering feeling that you have), it will so much tougher to do it again.
Some artists seem to love uncertainty and others seem immune to it. I can see how the social context might favor one type or the other. Certainly no one is uninfluenced by the world, but who influences artists more, the world or other artists? What the “market” wants seems more colored by circumstances. The artist can seem a sort of gyroscope, involved in his or her vision to such a degree that, ultimately, he or she guides the world…and not the other way around.
The conversation about the role of the artist is ongoing. There is the assertion that a great artist is a visionary who sees where the world is going. Others say they are a precise mirror. Some claim that artists see and speak the deeper truth for the zeitgeist, a generation, or a nation. And of course the theory that artists channel genius and are not fully conscious of the full import of what is being written or created. These are just a few of the ongoing “explanations” for the furtive bubble under the tablecloth.
It just may be that the answer is the handiest for any multiple choice question: e) all of the above.
Apropos Susana Jacobson’s advice to students considering art as a career, I have a friend, Isy Monk, an actor, who talks about life in the theatre to teenagers in inner city schools. She has the school assemble all the kids interested in professionally acting, dancing and/or singing, then she sweeps into the room, and regards her audience from behind a lectern.
“Is anyone here really pretty smart?” she asks. “Whoever likes math or English or history, hold up your hand.”
A few hands always go up.
“Good!” she exclaims. “You all can leave the room. Do it. Leave the room.”
They always leave. No one disobeys or offers an argument.
“Now!” she continues. “Let’s talk about money. Anybody here can’t live without it? Show me your hands. Come on.”
Many hands go up, always.
“Leave the room,” she says. “Just go.”
They leave.
“OK, now I want to talk about respect. Just the simple kind of respect you get if you walk into a room looking not too desperate. Looking like you belong. Anybody need that? Don’t lie to me — show me your hands.”
Hands go up.
“Then leave the room. GO from here. DO it.”
They exit. And several kids remain.
“Well,” she says, peering out at the few still gathered. “You’re the ones I’ll talk to.”
I love this anecdote, Elatia. Thanks for sharing it.