Choose Your Form of Frustration

I reached voting age right in the middle of the former Yugoslavia's self-implosion, so that entire, painful conflict still looms large for me, just as a Cold War atmosphere defined my childhood. And in spite of following the bloody mess in depth at the time, these days, it's hard for me to keep straight who did what to whom when and why. I remember seeing, and loving, Cabaret Balkan-- just as much for the film itself as for the fact that I was watching it in a small theater in Paris-- and having a distinct feeling that I was part of "a time," as in "my time," when X particular historical events occurred, and Y particular qualities were often prevalent in people of a certain age.

Since then, my head's been filled with so many political, historical, personal, etc., etc., situations that I sort of lost the thread of that particular narrative. But then last night, I watched Emir Kusturica's Underground, and got so eager to sort things back out in my head that I reached for two books that've been on my shelf for way too long without being read: Ivo Andric's The Bridge on the Drina and Leslie Benson's Yugoslavia: A Concise History. Admittedly, the former will only give me an historical background, via fiction, to what led up to the Balkan conflicts of the late 20th century; the latter, published as it was in 2001, won't get me anywhere near where we stand today. But patience is not my forte, so of course, I just rushed in with what was at hand, polishing off a chapter of the novel before making a leap to pore over the maps in the history book. And since all of this was taking place way past my bedtime, predictably, I didn't get far-- so judgments about it all will have to be made later.

At any rate, that word debauchery was a welcome change from another volume that's been sitting on my shelf for a while, John Macquarrie's Two Worlds Are Ours: An Introduction to Christian Mysticism. As part of TA'ing the same class for a couple of years, I was granted a free copy-- but irresponsibly, I never read it, since it was part of the "for further reading" section of the syllabus, and I had my own interests to pursue and a dissertation looming over my head. But after the Buber episode of last week, I decided to check it out. I'll finish it, but I was annoyed from the second I set eyes on the preface-- not for anything the author had done wrong at that point, but because there was one more dude thanking his patient wife for "preparing the material for the publishers." (1) I just didn't want to hear about one more lady apparently waiting around to type up her husband's manuscripts and do all the drudge work so that he could rest his delicate brain for the thinking of further big thoughts. I have never once read any female scholar thanking her husband for the same services, not because she was being miserly with her gratitude, but because that situation never ensued.

But I'll get off my gender-centered soapbox and talk about the aspects of the work itself that are bothering me: a theologian still being worried about so many "dangers" of potential flubs in doctrine, or of dismissing (probably not consciously) others' practices as unworthy means "of escape from the harsh realities of life into new and exhilarating areas of consciousness." (2) And then, there's the maddening refusal to get my man Nietzsche right when he alleges that the Übermensch "seeks and believes he can attain to domination over the world." (3)

Now, from what I hear, Macquarrie was a good egg, and was all in favor of everyone being able to practice his/her own religion without being condemned for it or being seen as a potential target of conversion. I think my grumbling is, more than anything, evidence of the fact that I should just stop reading theology, since I've imbibed enough for at least a few lifetimes, and can pretty much predict by now who'll make which tired argument, and who'll sprint right out into left field to try and save a tradition at all costs. Maybe I'm saying that I should just stick to good literature and complex civil wars and real-life, unimaginably horrible conflicts. At least with the former, the chances that any action that emerges out of personal frustration might actually make a bit of difference.


(1) John Macquarrie, Two Worlds Are Ours: An Introduction to Christian Mysticism (Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 2004), viii.

(2) 12. In this case, Macquarrie was partially referring to "the taking of the drug psilocin derived from a mushroom and inducing an expanded consciousness" in "some forms of religion" in Mexico, which he seems to see as illegitimate and insincere, and doesn't take the time to differentiate from a bunch of college kids going goofy on 'shrooms. Say what you will about Carlos Castañeda, but his field studies, and the people with whom he interacted, were hardly out to "escape from the harsh realities of life."

(3) 19.

A Curious Possible Parallel

Well, I finished the collection of Wilde essays. Not only was it increasingly easier to get through as it went along; an almost-constant question also began to lodge itself in my brain. Namely, what would a conversation between Wilde and Nietzsche have looked like? The query really took on urgency when I came across this sentence: "... the contemplative life, the life that has for its aim not doing but being, and not being merely, but becoming-- that is what the critical spirit can give us."* It was the "becoming" there that struck me-- because so much of what Nietzsche wrote about was "becoming who one is." The two men died in the same year, but my pure speculation is that neither probably read the other's work, especially given the fact that poor old Friedrich spent his last eleven years in madness-induced silence.

I was relieved to know that more than a few others are interested in at least a variation on that question; a quick search yielded plenty of published offerings. Until I can check them out, I'll set down a few preliminary thoughts, admittedly limited by my relatively narrow exposure to Wilde.

First: the matter of style. For both men, it's essential, and requires claiming one's own individuality and rejecting conformity with a variety of concerns. But I'm not sure we can easily say each author meant the same thing by it. For Nietzsche, having the strength to stand on one's own meant, among other things, blasting through expectations of written style. Sure, his aphorisms had predecessors in masters of the genre such as LaRochefoucauld-- but when you're running in a scholarly milieu (at least until you ditch that, too, as he did), deviating from standard form is a bold and risky move. Wilde's celebration of and involvement in aestheticism seems too "social" for someone like Nietzsche, who unlike his contemporary, did not run in fashionable circles. Even while Oscar was pleasantly scandalizing people with the unique self he presented through plays, wit, and dress; and even as he called for changes in attitude and thought; I don't get the sense that he would have gone in for Nietzsche's demand for a revaluation of all values. Still, Wilde's doubt that "we have ever seen the full expression of a personality, except on the imaginative plane of art," would most likely have gotten a nod from his German contemporary.**

Not that Nietzsche wasn't witty; pick up anything starting around Human, All Too Human, and any doubt about that will immediately be erased. (Most of his chapter headings in Ecce Homo, including "Why I Am So Clever," seem to be poking some seriously dark and critical fun at a world that's closing in on him.) But even at his most apparently angriest, he seems to hold an earnestly committed faith even in the decadent whiners he takes such pains to condemn. Things for him were always at such a state of emergency that even the lightness and dancing he wanted everyone to be doing had something intense about them. Wilde, on the other hand, even when he's being deadly serious, still seems to present his thoughts in the arch manner of a Louis XIV courtier.

Then: the question of democracy. Wilde doesn't say much directly about it in this collection, but in "The Soul of Man Under Socialism," he states that "democracy means simply the bludgeoning of the people by the people for the people."*** So many of his essays are also criticizing public taste and behavior, and it seems that democracy is implicated in those criticisms. I'm guessing Nietzsche would have agreed with Wilde's sentiment, but, strangely enough, would have done so with a little less cynicism. The German's disgust with democracy and socialism (the latter of which Wilde was for) lay not in equal treatment for all, but in the resentment that springs up between free individuals when one person gets more of something than someone else. Starting out from the same conditions isn't the problem here; it's the sense of resentment and jealousy certain people feel when, opposed to those certain people, one individual has a greater amount of skill at some activity, or another individual works especially hard and reaps a big reward for it. The resentful bunch will demand that no one receive more-- of anything, whether talent or anything else-- than the next person, and will use democracy to level the entire population to the same state of stagnant mediocrity. Nietzsche envisions a democracy of the future, freed of this resentment, and so also freed for achievement and self-actualization (although he wouldn't use that term) for everyone.

There is, of course, the third question of art, but I'm running out of steam and time, so I'll just say that I'm pretty sure Wilde, with his assertion that art is non-rational and immoral (and of course, he'll mean something very particular here), would have been down with Nietzsche's ruminations in The Birth of Tragedy, with his celebration of the right balance of the Dionysian and Apollonian that makes for great art.

Maybe more to come on these topics. Whether or not that happens, though, I'm beyond pleased that Intentions picked up speed and interest-- and that I found another possible connection to my beloved curmudgeon, Nietzsche.

* "The Critic as Artist," in Intentions and Other Writings (Garden City, NY: Dolphin/Doubleday, no publication year), 107.

** "The Soul of Man Under Socialism," in Intentions, 199-200.

*** "The Soul of Man Under Socialism," in Intentions, 204.