'I first met D.H. Lawrence at a party given by Lady Ottoline Morrell, who because she liked us both, seemed to think that therefore in some sense we should like each other.' - Bertrand Russell, commenting on his first meeting with D. H. Lawrence. Russell had an affair with Lady Ottoline at about the same time as Lawrence, but then so had quite a few others in her coterie.
ROTATION OF CROPS
______________________________
A VENTURE IN A THEORY
OF SOCIAL PRUDENCE
Chemylos .................. at last one can have too much of everything
of love
Karion bread rolls
Chemylos the arts
Karion and sweets
Chemylos of honour
Karion cakes
Chemylos bravery
Karion and dried figs
Chemylos of fame
Karion fried eggs
Chemylos authorities
Karion and vegetables
(See Aristophanis Plutus, v.189ff)
People with experience maintain that proceeding from a basic
principle is supposed to be very reasonable; I yield to them and
proceed from the basic principle that all people are boring. Or
is there anyone who would be boring enough to contradict me
in this regard? This basic principle has to the highest degree the
repelling force always required in the negative, which is actually
the principle of motion. It is not merely repelling but
infinitely repulsive, and whoever has the basic principle behind
him must necessarily have infinite momentum for making
discoveries. If, then, my thesis is true, a person needs
only to ponder how corrupting boredom is for people, tempering
his reflections more or less according to his desire to diminish
or increase his impetus, and if he wants to press the
speed of the motion to the highest point, almost with danger
to the locomotive, he needs only to say to himself: Boredom
is the root of all evil. It is very curious that boredom, which
itself has such a calm and sedate nature, can have such a capacity
to initiate motion. The effect that boredom brings about is
absolutely magical, but this effect is one not of attraction but
of repulsion.
How corrupting boredom is, everyone recognizes also with
regard to children. As long as children are having a good time,
they are always good. This can be said in the strictest sense, for
if they at times become unmanageable even while playing, it is
really because they are beginning to be bored; boredom is already
coming on, but in a different way. Therefore, when selecting
a nursemaid, one always considers essentially not only
that she is sober, trustworthy, and good-natured but also takes
into aesthetic consideration whether she knows how to entertain
children. Even if she had all the other excellent virtues,
one would not hesitate to give her the sack if she lacked this
qualification. Here, indeed, the principle is clearly acknowledged,
but things go on so curiously in the world, habit and
boredom have gained the upper hand to such a degree, that
justice is done to aesthetics only in the conduct of the nursemaid.
It would be quite impossible to prevail if one wanted to
demand a divorce because one's wife is boring, or demand
that a king be dethroned because he is boring to behold, or
that a clergyman be exiled because he is boring to listen to, or
that a cabinet minister be dismissed or a journalist be executed
because he is frightfully boring.
Since boredom advances and boredom is the root of all evil,
no wonder, then, that the world goes backwards, that evil
spreads. This can be traced back to the very beginning of the
world. The gods were bored; therefore they created human
beings. Adam was bored because he was alone; therefore Eve
was created. Since that moment, boredom entered the world
and grew in quantity in exact proportion to the growth of
population. Adam was bored alone; then Adam and Eve were
bored together; then Adam and Eve and Cain and Abel were
bored en famille. After that, the population of the world increased
and the nations were bored en masse. To amuse themselves,
they hit upon the notion of building a tower so high
that it would reach the sky. This notion is just as boring as the
tower was high and is a terrible demonstration of how boredom
had gained the upper hand. Then they were dispersed
around the world, just as people now travel abroad, but they
continued to be bored. And what consequences this boredom
had: humankind stood tall and fell far, first through Eve, then
from the Babylonian tower.
On the other hand, what was it that delayed the fall of
Rome? It was panis [bread] and circenses [games]. What is
being done in our day? Is consideration being given to any
means of amusement? On the contrary, our doom is being expedited.
There is the idea of convening a consultative assembly.
Can anything more boring be imagined, both for the honourable
delegates as well as for one who will read and hear about
them? The country's financial situation is to be improved by
economizing. Can anything more boring be imagined? Instead
of increasing the debt, they want to pay it off in instalments.
From what I know about the political situation, it would be easy for Denmark to borrow fifteen million rix-dollars. Why does no one think of this? Now and then we hear that someone is a genius and does not pay his debts; why should a nation not do the same, provided there is agreement? Borrow fifteen million; use it not to pay off our debts but for public entertainment. Let us celebrate the millennium with fun and games. Just as there currently are boxes everywhere for contributions of money, there should be bowls everywhere filled with money. Everything would be free: the theatre would be free, prostitutes would be free, rides to Deer Parks
would be free, funerals would be free, one's funeral eulogy
would be free. I say "free," for if money is always available,
everything is free in a way.
No one would be allowed to own any property. An exception
should be made only for me. I shall set aside for myself
one hundred rix-dollars a day deposited in a London bank,
partly because I cannot manage on less, partly because I am the
one who provided the idea, and finally because no one knows
ifI will not be able to think up a new idea when the fifteen million
is exhausted.
What would be the result of this prosperity? All the great
would stream to Copenhagen: the greatest artists, actors, and
dancers. Copenhagen would become another Athens. What
would be the result? All the wealthy would settle in this city.
Among others, the emperor of Persia and the king of England
would undoubtedly also come here. Here is my second idea:
kidnap the emperor. Someone may say that then there would
be a revolution in Persia, a new emperor placed on the
throne-it has frequently happened before-and the price of
the old emperor would slump. In that case, my idea is that we
should sell him to the Turks. They will undoubtedly know how
to make money out of him.
In addition, there is yet another circumstance that our politicians
seem to ignore entirely. Denmark holds the balance of
power in Europe. A more propitious position is inconceivable.
This I know from my own experience. I once held the balance
of power in a family. I could do as I wished. I never suffered,
but the others always did. Oh may my words penetrate your ears, you who are in high places to counsel and control, you king's men and men of the people, you wise and sensible citizens of all classes! You just watch out! Old Denmark is foundering-it is a matter of life
and death; it is foundering on boredom, which is the most fatal
of all. In olden days, whoever eulogized the deceased most
handsomely became the king. In our age, the king ought to
be the one who delivers the best witticism and the crown
prince the one who provides the occasion for the best witticism.
But how you do carry me away, beautiful stirring enthusiasm!
Should I raise my voice this way in order to address my
contemporaries, to initiate them into my wisdom? Not at all,
for my wisdom is really not zum Gebrauch für Jedermann [for
use by Everyman], and it is always most prudent to be silent
about rules of prudence. Therefore, I want no followers, but if
someone were standing beside my deathbed and if I were sure
it was all over for me, then in a fit of philanthropic delirium I
might whisper my doctrine into his ear, not quite sure whether
I would have done him a favour or not. There is so much talk
about man's being a social animal, but basically he is a beast
of prey, something that can be ascertained not only by looking
at his teeth. Therefore, all this chatter about sociality and community is partly inherited hypocrisy and partly studied perfidy.
All human beings, then, are boring. The very word indicates
the possibility of a classification. The word "boring" can
designate just as well a person who bores others as someone
who bores himself. Those who bore others are the plebeians,
the crowd, the endless train of humanity in general; those who
bore themselves are the chosen ones, the nobility. How remarkable
it is that those who do not bore themselves generally
bore others; those, however, who bore themselves entertain
others. Generally, those who do not bore themselves are busy
in the world in one way or another, but for that very reason
they are, of all people, the most boring of all, the most unbearable.
Certainly this class of animals is not the fruit of
man's appetite and woman's desire. Like all lower classes of
animals, it is distinguished by a high level of fecundity and
propagates beyond belief. It is incomprehensible, too, that nature
should need nine months to produce such creatures,
which presumably could rather be produced by the score. The
other class of human beings, the superior ones, are those who
bore themselves. As noted above, they generally amuse
others-at times in a certain external way the masses, in a
deeper sense their co-initiates. The more thoroughly they bore
themselves, the more potent the medium of diversion they offer
others, also when the boredom reaches its maximum, since
they either die of boredom (the passive category) or shoot
themselves out of curiosity (the active category).
Idleness, we are accustomed to say, is the root of all evil. To
prevent this evil, work is recommended. But it is just as easy
to see from the dreaded occasion as from the recommended
remedy that this whole view is of very plebeian extraction.
Idleness as such is by no means a root of evil; on the contrary,
it is a truly divine life, if one is not bored. To be sure, idleness
may be the occasion of losing one's property etc., but the noble
nature does not fear such things but does indeed fear being
bored. The Olympian gods were not bored; happy they lived
in happy idleness. A female beauty who neither sews nor spins
nor irons nor reads nor plays an instrument is happy in idleness,
for she is not bored. Idleness, then, is so far from being
the root of evil that it is rather the true good. Boredom is the
root of evil; it is that which must be held off. Idleness is not the
evil; indeed, it may be said that everyone who lacks a sense for
it thereby shows that he has not raised himself to the human
level. There is an indefatigable activity that shuts a person out
of the world of spirit arrd places him in a class with the animals,
which instinctively must always be in motion. There are people
who have an extraordinary talent for transforming everything
into a business operation, whose whole life is a business
operation, who fall in love and are married, hear a joke, and
admire a work of art with the same businesslike zeal with
which they work at the office. The Latin proverb otium est pulvinar
diaboli [idleness is the devil's pillow] is quite correct, but
the devil does not find time to lay his head on this pillow if one
is not bored. But since people believe that it is man's destiny
to work, the antithesis idleness/work is correct. I assume that
it is man's destiny to amuse himself, and therefore my antithesis
is no less correct.
Boredom is the demonic pantheism. It becomes evil itself if
one continues in it as such; as soon as it is annulled, however,
it is the true pantheism. But it is annulled only by amusing
oneself-ergo, one ought to amuse oneself. To say that it is annulled
by working betrays a lack of clarity, for idleness can
certainly be cancelled by work, since this is its opposite, but
boredom cannot, as is seen in the fact that the busiest workers
of all, those whirring insects with their bustling buzzing, are
the most boring of all, and if they are not bored, it is because
they do not know what boredom is - but then the boredom is
not annulled.
Boredom is partly an immediate genius, partly an acquired
immediacy. On the whole, the English nation is the model
nation. The true genius of indolence is seldom encountered; it
is not found in nature; it belongs to the world of spirit. At
times one meets an English tourist who is an incarnation of
this genius, a heavy, inert woodchuck whose total resource of
language consists of a single monosyllable, an interjection
with which he indicates his highest admiration and his deepest
indifference, for admiration and indifference have become undifferentiated in the unity of boredom. No nation other than
the English produces such oddities of nature; every individual
belonging to another nation will always be a bit more lively,
not so altogether stillborn. The only analogy I know is the
apostle of empty enthusiasm, who likewise travels through
life on an interjection, people who make a profession of being
enthusiastic everywhere, who are present everywhere and, no
matter whether what happens is something significant or insignificant, shout: Oh! or Ah! because the difference between
what is important and unimportant is undifferentiated in the
emptiness of blind, clamorous enthusiasm.
The boredom that comes later is usually a fruit of a misguided
diversion. It seems doubtful that a remedy against
boredom can give rise to boredom, but it can give rise to boredom only insofar as it is used incorrectly. A mistaken, generally
eccentric diversion has boredom within itself, and thus it
works its way up and manifests itself as immediacy. Just as a
distinction is made between blind staggers and mad staggers in
horses, but both kinds are called staggers, so also a distinction
can be made between two kinds of boredom that nevertheless
are both joined in the category of boredom.
Pantheism ordinarily implies the qualification of fullness;
with boredom it is the reverse: it is built upon emptiness, but
for this very reason it is a pantheistic qualification. Boredom
rests upon the nothing that interlaces existence [Tilva'reisen];
its dizziness is infinite, like that which comes from looking
down into a bottomless abyss. That the eccentric diversion is
based upon boredom is seen also in the fact that the diversion
sounds without resonance, simply because in nothing there is
not even enough to make an echo possible.
Now, if boredom, as discussed above, is the root of all evil,
what then is more natural than to seek to conquer it? But here,
as everywhere, it is primarily a matter of calm deliberation,
lest, demoniacally possessed by boredom in an attempt to escape
it, one works one's way into it. All who are bored cry out
for change. In this, I totally agree with them, except that it is a
question of acting according to principle.
My deviation from popular opinion is adequately expressed
by the phrase "rotation of crops." There might seem to be an
ambiguity in this phrase, and if I were to find room in this
phrase for a designation of the ordinary method I would have
to say that rotation of crops consists in continually changing
the soil. But the farmer does not use the expression in this
way. For a moment, however, I will use it in this way to discuss
the rotation of crops that depends upon the boundless infinity
of change, its extensive dimension.
This rotation of crops is the vulgar, inartistic rotation and is
based on an illusion. One is weary of living in the country
and moves to the city; one is weary of one's native land and
goes abroad; one is europamüde [weary of Europe] and goes to
America etc.; one indulges in the fanatical hope of an endless
journey from star to star. Or there is another direction, but still
extensive. One is weary of eating on porcelain and eats on silver;
wearying of that, one eats on gold; one burns down half
of Rome in order to visualize the Trojan conflagration. This
method cancels itself and is the spurious infinity. What, after
all, did Nero achieve? No, then the emperor Antoninus was
wiser; he says: ἀναβιῶναί σοι ἔξεστιν ἴδε πάλιν τὰ πράγματα, ὡς ἑώρας· ἐν τούτῳ γὰρ τὸ ἀναβιῶναι [You can begin a new life. Only see things afresh as you used to see them. In this consists the new life (Book VII, 2)].
The method I propose does not consist in changing the soil
but, like proper crop rotation, consists in changing the method
of cultivation and the kinds of crops. Here at once is the principle
oflimitation, the sole saving principle in the world. The
more a person limits himself, the more resourceful he becomes.
A solitary prisoner for life is extremely resourceful; to
him a spider can be a source of great amusement. Think of our
school days; we were at an age when there was no aesthetic consideration in the choosing of our teachers, and therefore they
were often very boring - how resourceful we were then!
What fun we had catching a fly, keeping it prisoner under a
nutshell, and watching it run around with it! What delight in
cutting a hole in the desk, confining a fly in it, and peeking at
it through a piece of paper! How entertaining it can be to listen
to the monotonous dripping from the roof! What a meticulous
observer one becomes, detecting every little sound or
movement. Here is the extreme boundary of that principle
that seeks relief not through extensity but through intensity.
The more resourceful one can be in changing the method of
cultivation, the better, but every particular change still falls
under the universal rule of the relation between recollecting and
forgetting. It is in these two currents that all life moves, and
therefore it is a matter of having them properly under one's
control. Not until hope has been thrown overboard does one
begin to live artistically; as long as a person hopes, he cannot
limit himself It is indeed beautiful to see a person put out to
sea with the fair wind of hope; one may utilize the chance to let
oneself be towed along, but one ought never have it on board
one's craft, least of all as pilot, for it is an untrustworthy shipmaster.
For this reason, too, hope was one of Prometheus's dubious gifts; instead of giving human beings the foreknowledge
of the immortals, he gave them hope.
To forget-this is the desire of all people, and when they
encounter something unpleasant, they always say: If only I
could forget! But to forget is an art that must be practised in
advance. To be able to forget always depends upon how one
remembers, but how one remembers depends upon how one
experiences actuality. The person who runs aground with the
speed of hope will recollect in such a way that he will be unable
to forget. Thus nil admirari [marvel at nothing) is the
proper wisdom of life. No part of life ought to have so much
meaning for a person that he cannot forget it any moment he
wants to; on the other hand, every single part of life ought to
have so much meaning for a person that he can remember it at
any moment. The age that remembers best is also the most
forgetful: namely, childhood. The more poetically one remembers,
the more easily one forgets, for to remember poetically
is actually only an expression for forgetting. When I remember
poetically, my experience has already undergone the
change of having lost everything painful. In order to be able to
recollect in this way, one must be very much aware of how
one lives, especially of how one enjoys. If one enjoys indiscriminately to the very end, if one continually takes the utmost
that enjoyment can give, one will be unable either to recollect
or to forget. That is, one has nothing else to recollect than a
satiation that one only wishes to forget but that now torments
with an involuntary recollection. Therefore, if a person notices
that enjoyment or a part of life is carrying him away too
forcefully, he stops for a moment and recollects. There is no
better way to give a distaste for going on too long. From the
beginning, one curbs the enjoyment and does not hoist full sail
for any decision; one indulges with a certain mistrust. Only
then is it possible to give the lie to the proverb that says that
one cannot eat one's cake and have it, too. It is true that the
police forbid carrying secret weapons, and yet there is no
weapon as dangerous as the art of being able to recollect. It is
a singular feeling when in the midst of enjoyment one looks at
it in order to recollect it.
When an individual has perfected himself in the art of forgetting
and the art of recollecting in this way, he is then able to play shuttlecock with all existence.
A person's resiliency can actually be measured by his power
to forget. He who cannot forget will never amount to much.
Whether or not a Lethe wells up anywhere, I do not know,
but this I do know-that this art can be developed. But it by
no means consists in the traceless disappearance of the particular
impression, because forgetfulness is not identical with the
art of being able to forget. What little understanding people
generally have of this art is readily seen, for they usually want
to forget only the unpleasant, not the pleasant. This betrays a
total one-sidedness. Indeed, forgetting is the right expression
for the proper assimilation that reduces experience to a sounding
board. The reason nature is so great is that it has forgotten
that it was chaos, but this thought can appear at any time.
Since forgetting is usually thought of in relation to the unpleasant,
it is generally conceived of as a wild force that stifles.
But forgetting, on the contrary, is a quiet pursuit, and it ought
to be related to the pleasant just as much as to the unpleasant.
Furthermore, the pleasant as a bygone, specifically as a bygone,
has an intrinsic unpleasantness with which it can awaken
a sense of loss; this unpleasantness is cancelled by forgetting.
The unpleasant has a sting - everyone admits that. This, too,
is removed by forgetting. But if one behaves as many do who
dabble in the art of forgetting, who brush the unpleasant away
entirely, one will soon see what good that is. In an unguarded
moment, it often surprises a person with the full force of the
sudden. This is completely at odds with the well-ordered pattern
in an intelligent head. No misfortune, no adversity is so
unfriendly, so deaf that it cannot be flattered a little; even
Cerberus accepted honey cakes, and it is not only young
maidens one beguiles. One talks around it and thereby deprives
it of its sharpness and by no means wishes to forget it but
forgets it in order to recollect it. Indeed, even with reminiscences
of such a kind that one would think eternal forgetfulness would be the only means against them, one allows oneself such cunning, and the fakery is successful for the adept. Forgetting is the scissors with which one snips away what cannot be used, but, please note, under the maximal supervision of recollection. In this way, forgetting and recollecting are identical, and the artistically achieved identity is the Archimedean point with which one lifts the whole world. When
we speak of writing something in the book of oblivion, we are
indeed suggesting that it is forgotten and yet at the same time
is preserved.
The art of recollecting and forgetting will also prevent a
person from foundering in any particular relationship in life-and
assures him complete suspension.
Guard, then, against friendship. How is a friend defined? A
friend is not what philosophy calls the necessary other but
the superfluous third. What are the rituals of friendship? One
drinks dus; one opens an artery, mingles one's blood with the
friend's. Just when this moment arrives is difficult to determine,
but it proclaims itself in a mysterious way; one feels it
and can no longer say De to the other. Once this feeling is present,
it can never turn out that one has made a mistake such as
Gert Westphaler made when he drank du's with the executioner.
-What are the sure signs of friendship? Antiquity
answers: idem velle, idem nolle, ea demum firma amicitia [agreement in likes and dislikes, this and this only is what constitutes true friendship] -and is also extremely boring. What is the meaning of friendship? Mutual assistance with counsel and action. Two friends form a close alliance in order to be everything
to each other, even though no human being can be anything
for another human being except to be in his way. Well,
we can help each other with money, help each other into and
out of our coats, be each other's humble servants, gather for a
sincere New Year's congratulation, also for weddings, births,
and funerals.
But just because one stays clear of friendship, one will not
for that reason live without contact with people. On the contrary,
these relationships can take a deeper turn now and then,
provided that one always-even though keeping the pace for a time-has enough reserve speed to run away from them. It may be thought that such conduct leaves unpleasant recollections, that the unpleasantness consists in the diminishing of a relationship from having been something to being nothing. This, however, is a misunderstanding. The unpleasantness is indeed a piquant ingredient in the perverseness of life. Moreover, the same relationship can regain significance in another way. One should be careful never to run aground and to that end always to have forgetting in mind. The experienced farmer lets his land lie fallow now and then; the theory of social prudence recommends the same thing. Everything will surely come again but in a different way; what has once been taken into the rotation process remains there but is varied by the method of cultivation. Therefore, one quite consistently hopes to meet one's old friends and acquaintances in a
better world but does not share the crowd's fear that they may
have changed so much that one could not recognize them
again. One fears, instead, that they may be altogether unchanged.
It is unbelievable what even the most insignificant
person can gain by such sensible cultivation.
Never become involved in marriage. Married people
pledge love for each other throughout eternity. Well, now,
that is easy enough but does not mean very much, for if one is
finished with time one is probably finished with eternity. If,
instead of saying "throughout eternity," the couple would say
"until Easter, until next May Day," then what they say would
make some sense, for then they would be saying something
and also something they perhaps could carry out. What happens
in marriage? First, one of them detects after a short time
that something is wrong, and then the other one complains
and screams: Faithlessness! Faithlessness! After a while, the
other one comes to the same conclusion and a state of neutrality
is inaugurated through a balancing of accounts by mutual
faithlessness, to their common satisfaction and gratification.
But it is too late now, anyway, because a divorce involves all
kinds of huge problems.
Since marriage is like that, it is not strange that attempts are
made in many ways to shore it up with moral props. If a man
wants to be separated from his wife, the cry goes up: He is a
mean fellow, a scoundrel, etc. How ridiculous, and what an
indirect assault upon marriage! Either marriage has intrinsic
reality [Realitet], and then he is adequately punished by losing
it, or it has no reality, and then it is unreasonable to vilify him
because he is wiser than others. If someone became weary of
his money and threw it out the window, no one would say he
is a mean fellow, for either money has reality, and then he is
adequately punished by not having it any more, or it has no
reality, and then, of course, he is indeed wise.
One must always guard against contracting a life relationship
by which one can become many. That is why even friendship
is dangerous, marriage even more so. They do say that
marriage partners become one, but this is very obscure and
mysterious talk. If an individual is many, he has lost his freedom
and cannot order his riding boots when he wishes, cannot
knock about according to whim. If he has a wife, it is difficult;
ifhe has a wife and perhaps children, it is formidable; if he has
a wife and children, it is impossible. Admittedly, there is the
example of a gypsy woman who carried her husband on her
back throughout life, but for one thing this is a great rarity
and, for another, it is very tiring in the long run-for the husband.
Moreover, through marriage one falls into a very deadly
continuity with custom, and custom is like the wind and
weather, something completely indeterminable. To the best of
my knowledge, it is the custom inJapan for the husbands also
to be confined during childbirth. Perhaps the time is coming
when Europe will import the customs of foreign lands.
Even friendship is dangerous; marriage is still more dangerous,
for the woman is and will be the man's ruination as
soon as he contracts a continuing relationship with her. Take a
young man, spirited as an Arabian horse; let him marry and he
is lost. At the outset, the woman is proud, then she is weak,
then she swoons, then he swoons, then the whole family
swoons. A woman's love is only pretense and weakness.
Just because one does not become involved in marriage,
one's life need not for that reason be devoid of the erotic. The
erotic, too, ought to have infinity-but a poetic infinity that
can just as well be limited to one hour as to a month. When
two people fall in love with each other and sense that they are
destined for each other, it is a question of having the courage
to break it off, for by continuing there IS only everything to
lose, nothing to gain. It seems to be a paradox, and indeed it
is, for the feelings, not for the understanding. In this domain
it is primarily a matter of being able to use moods; if a person
can do that, an inexhaustible variation of combinations can be
achieved.
Never take any official post. If one does that, one becomes
just a plain John Anyman, a tiny little cog in the machine of the
body politic. The individual ceases to be himself the manager
of the operation, and then theories can be of little help. One
acquires a title, and implicit in that are all the consequences of
sin and evil. The law under which one slaves is equally boring
no matter whether advancement is swift or slow. A title can
never be disposed of; it would take a criminal act for that,
which would incur a public whipping, and even then one cannot
be sure of not being pardoned by royal decree and acquiring
the title again.
Even though one stays clear of official posts, one should
nevertheless not be inactive but attach great importance to all
the pursuits that are compatible with aimlessness; all kinds of
unprofitable pursuits may be carried on. Yet in this regard one
ought to develop not so much extensively as intensively and,
although mature in years, demonstrate the validity of the old
saying: It doesn't take much to amuse a child.
Just as one varies the soil somewhat, in accordance with the
theory of social prudence (for if one were to live in relation to
only one person, rotation of crops would turn out badly, as
would be the case if a farmer had only one acre of land and
therefore could never let it lie fallow, something that is extremely
important), so also must one continually vary oneself,
and this is the real secret. To that end, it is essential to have
control over one's moods. To have them under control in the
sense that one can produce them at will is an impossibility, but
prudence teaches us to utilize the moment. Just as an experienced
sailor always scans the sea and detects a squall far in advance, so one should always detect a mood a little in advance.
Before entering into a mood, one should know its effect on
oneself and its probable effect on others. The first strokes are
for the purpose of evoking pure tones and seeing what is inside
a person; later come the intermediate tones. The more practice
one has, the more one is convinced that there is often much in
a person that was never imagined. When sentimental people,
who as such are very boring, become peevish, they are often
amusing.Teasing in particular is an excellent means of exploration.
Arbitrariness is the whole secret. It is popularly believed
that there is no art to being arbitrary, and yet it takes profound
study to be arbitrary in such a way that a person does not himself
run wild in it but himself has pleasure from it. One does
not enjoy the immediate object but something else that one arbitrarily introduces. One sees the middle of a play; one reads
the third section of a book. One thereby has enjoyment quite
different from what the author so kindly intended. One enjoys
something totally accidental; one considers the whole of existence
[Tilværelse] from this standpoint; one lets reality run
whose chatter I was obliged to listen to because of the circumstances. On every occasion, he was ready with a little philosophical lecture that was extremely boring. On the verge of
despair, I suddenly discovered that the man perspired exceptionally
much when he spoke. This perspiration now absorbed
my attention. I watched how the pearls of perspiration collected
on his forehead, then united in a rivulet, slid down his
nose, and ended in a quivering globule that remained suspended
at the end of his nose. From that moment on, everything
was changed; I could even have the delight of encouraging
him to commence his philosophical instruction just in
order to watch the perspiration on his brow and on his nose.
Baggesen tells somewhere that a certain man is no doubt a
very honest fellow but that he has one thing against him: nothing
rhymes with his name. It is very advantageous to let the
realities of life be undifferentiated in an arbitrary interest like
that. Something accidental is made into the absolute and as
such into an object of absolute admiration. This is especially
effective when the feelings are in motion. For many people,
this method is an excellent means of stimulation. Everything
in life is regarded as a wager etc. The more consistently a person
knows how to sustain his arbitrariness, the more amusing
the combinations become. The degree of consistency always
makes manifest whether a person is an artist or a bungler, for
up to a point everyone does the same. The eye with which
one sees actuality must be changed continually. The Neoplatonists
assumed that people who fell short of perfection on
earth became after death more or less perfect animals according
to their merits; those who, for example, had practiced social
virtues on a minor scale (punctilious people) turned into
social creatures-for example, bees. Such a view oflife, which
here in this world sees all human beings transformed into animals
or plants (Plotinus also believed this-that some were
changed into plants) offers a rich multiplicity of variation.
The artist Tischbein has attempted to idealize every human
being as an animal. His method has the defect that it is too serious
and tries to discover an actual resemblance.
The accidental outside a person corresponds to the arbitrariness
within him. Therefore he always ought to have his eyes
open for the accidental, always ought to be expeditus [ready] if
something should come up. The so-called social pleasures for
which we prepare ourselves a week or a fortnight in advance
are of little significance, whereas even the most insignificant
thing can accidentally become rich material for amusement. To go into detail here is not feasible - no theory can reach that far. Even the most elaborate theory is merely poverty compared with what genius in its ubiquity easily discovers.
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Some Questions:
Well, that is A's theory of Crop Rotation. What is it all about? We might, I think, confine ourselves to this piece. There is enough here to keep us occupied!
What kind of man is this? What do you think he might look like? What would be be like as a dinner companion? Or as a colleague at work or business partner or as a husband?
What exactly is his theory of crop rotation?
Why is nothing to be admired? (nil admirari).
Why is friendship and also marriage to be avoided?
Is boredom so terrible? What exactly is boredom? When does it occur and why?
What do you do when you are bored? Do you go away, become irritable or pick an argument or just throw something at the cat? What is it that is wrong with us when we are bored?
What does the experience of boredom suggest about a person's relationship to him or herself?
What is A's technique?
Is there anything wrong in this approach to life? How does it differ from Frankfurt's 'wanton'?
Is it a sustainable approach to life? And if you think it isn't, why isn't it?
Do you recall Plato's mention of philotheamones (φιλωθεάμονες), people who love to run around from one religious spectacle to another. Is there any similarity to or difference from our man, A?
