Previous: VIII. Nature and society
For more that six years I trod the pavements, never stepping once upon mother earth -- for the parks are but pavements disguised with a growth of grass. Then the worst was over. Say I the worst? No, no; things far worse were to come; the struggle against starvation has its cheery side when one is young and vigorous. But at all events I had begun to earn a living; I held assurance of food and clothing for half a year at a time; granted health, I might hope to draw my not insufficient wages for many a twelvemonth. And they were the wages of work done independently, when and where I would. I thought with horror of lives spent in an office, with an employer to obey. The glory of the career of letters was its freedom, its dignity!
The fact of the matter was, of course, that I served, not one master, but a whole crowd of them. Independence, forsooth! If my writing failed to please editor, publisher, public, where was my daily bread? ... I marvel at the recollection that for a good score of years this pen and a scrap of paper clothed and fed me and my household, kept me in physical comfort, held at bay all those hostile forces of the world ranged against one who has no resource save in his own right hand.
But I was thinking of the year which saw my first exodus from London. On an irresistible impulse, I suddenly made up my mind to go into Devon, a part of England I had never seen. At the end of March I escaped from my grim lodgings, and, before I had time to reflect on the details of my undertaking, I found myself sitting in sunshine at a spot very near to where I now dwell -- before me the green valley of the broadening Exe and the pine-clad ridge of Haldon. That was one of the moments of my life when I have tasted exquisite joy... The light, the air, had for me something of the supernatural -- affecting me, indeed, only less than at a later time did the atmosphere of Italy...
I had stepped into a new life. Between the man I had been and that which I now became there was a very notable difference. In a single day I had matured astonishingly; which means, no doubt, that I suddenly entered into conscious enjoyment of powers and sensibilities which had been developing unknown to me...
... so intense was my delight in the beautiful world about me that I forgot even myself; I enjoyed without retrospect or forecast; I, the egoist in grain, forgot to scrutinize my own emotions, or to trouble my happiness by comparison with others’ happier fortune. It was a healthful time; it gave me a new lease of life, and taught me -- in so far as I was teachable -- how to make use of it.
Alpha.
I experienced a 20th century equivalent of his life of the “independent” man of letters. For about a decade I made my living as a freelance computer programer. I too was proud not to be a mere employee, only to end up a contractor dependent on a variety of bosses who were pleased to leave me to my own devices whenever there was no work to be done. It all worked out well enough, but the only security was in the knowledge that I was always on my own. Others might be blindsided by a layoff but for me the future was always contingent.
Perhaps this is a bit like the difference between being a theist and an atheist. The theist believes there is a Guiding Hand conducting his life while the atheist realizes he’s on his own. An analogy could be that the atheist is like a free climber on the side of a cliff, carefully negotiating the hand and foot holds, while the theist boldly climbs the rock face secure in his reliance on his safety line -- which is not actually secured to anything.
Beta.
Since my last rereading of Proust’s In Search of Lost Time, I’ve been wanting an illustrated and hyper-annotated versions of all the books I read which are set in an earlier time. Rereading Ford Madox Ford’s Parade’s End added another aspect to this desired annotation, as I also want to know not just what a word like “Tory” means, but what it means to the author. A quick trip to Wikipedia tells you too little or too much in such a case, as the meaning of the term changed from generation to generation and, at times, almost from year to year.
Ideally, I want texts that make clear what the author meant by his use of every word, since the meaning of words changes so quickly. And this doesn’t even touch on the additional issue of a character using a word or term incorrectly. Here’s an example, in The Elegance of the Hedgehog, one of Muriel Barbery’s characters uses the word “Epicurean.” The common usage of that term means the opposite of the word’s original, philosophical, meaning. Epicurus wanted a diet that would be so simple to obtain that there would be little chance of your ever craving something you couldn’t easily supply. The world, however, thinks of an Epicurean as a gourmand, with highly refined tastes.
Given Barbery’s background in philosophy, I’m sure she knows the correct usage. There’s every reason to think her character also should know this, but could Barbery be using it in the more conventional way to be less confusing to her readership? I’m not positive.
There are many other cases where the correct meaning of a term is less certain and where the author or character could well be under the impression that the term means something other than your understanding. If only we could see an image of all the artifacts referenced, hear the music mentioned, and get a quick definition of all the terms used. Is that asking too much?
This is a bit random (joke) but I’m including this Vsauce video here because it discusses the change over time in the use of the word “random”, and also because it talks about Quantum entanglement, something I will refer to later.
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