A new confessional? A dumping ground for the stray bits and pieces? A short term solution to a long term problem? Or maybe a short term solution to a short term problem? The napkin that I've never written on? Time to get started with all this.
And as good a place to start as any is the title. I read a biography on Hemingway that mentioned a disposition of his for double dichos. From Hotchner's Papa Hemingway, the following is a conversation Hotchner had with Hemingway (who was writing The Old Man and the Sea at the time):
"There is at the heart of it the oldest double dicho I know."
"What's a double dicho" I asked.
"It's a saying that makes a statement forward or backward. Now this dicho is: Man can be destroyed but not defeated."
"Man can be defeated but not destroyed."
"Yes. that's its inversion, but I've always preferred to believe that man is undefeated."
The double dicho does not indicate a fundamental truth, but rather presents a poetic set of non-binding counter-conditions. Can man be defeated and destroyed (the death row inmate, spirit crushed, no defiance as he is led to a premature end)? Can man be undefeated and undestroyed?
Defeat is surrender. It is hanging one's head and giving up. The little quiet death of a dissatisfying life without standing up. It is the fire slowly dying as the night wears on.
Destruction is combat. It is the rage of vitality against any that seek to end it. Destruction is the loud contentious death. It is the inferno. The gas explosion. There for a flash and then gone.
For Hemingway, the encroachment of his aging body on his ability to write was the looming spectre of defeat. His eyesight started to fail. His ability to write faltered. Physical limitations started to impact his ability to participate in the activities he had always sought for recreation. The little ravages of old age, coupled with bipolar disorder led him to choose destruction of the body, rather than the defeat of old age. He embraced his dicho. He chose to wrap himself in these counter-conditions and committed suicide. He now lies in a cemetery in Sun Valley, Idaho.
There is heroism in tragedy. There is tragedy in heroism.
The title of the blog is based on another double dicho of Hemingway's:
"Thought is the enemy of sleep. Sleep is the enemy of thought."
2 comments:
When you try to fall asleep, do you think of nothing or try to think of one thing so clearly that you can't help but forget about trying to fall asleep?
And thanks for a one-stop comic strip linkbar!
When I try to fall asleep, I tend to try not thinking about falling asleep. Whether this involves thoughtlessness or not tends to vary.
Very few occassions have left me grasping for sleep in the wake of the overwhelming thought of trying to get to sleep (mostly from childhood - Christmas Eves spent with the knowledge that the night would last an eternity, the sole thought of trying to Rip Van Winkle my way through that eternity, the burning desire to achieve sleep acting as the greatest obstacle to it).
I tend to find the reverse of dicho to be more applicable to myself. Sleep invariably tends to present itself to me as a timesink. I carve minutes and hours away from my sleep schedule to try and fit more into a day.
Post a Comment