PLEASE READ!
A beautiful excerpt that I took the time to type up because I thought it would mean something to a lot of you:
"Far back in the impulses to find this story is a storyteller's belief that at times life takes on the shape of art and that the remembered remnets of these moments are largley what we come to mean by life. The short semihumorous comedies we live, our long certain tragedies, and our springtime lyrics and limericks make up most of what we are. They become almost all of what we remember of ourselves. Although it would be too fancy to take these moments of our lives that seemingly have shape and design as proof we are inhabited by an impulse to art, yet deep within us is a counterimpulse to the id or whatever name is presently attached to the disorderly, the violent, the catastrophic both in and outside us. As a feeling, this counterimpulse to the id is a kind of craving for sanity, for things belonging to each other, and results in a comfortable feeling when the universe is seen to take a garment from the rack that seems to fit. Of course, both impulses need to be present to explain our lives and our art, and probably go a long way to explain why tragedy, inflamed with the disorderly, is generally regarded as the most composed form of art.
"It should be clear now after nearly forty years that the truculent universe prefers to retain the Mann Gulch fire as one of its secrets--left to itself, it fades away, an unsolved, violent incident grieved over by the fewer and fewer still living who are old enough to grieve over fatalities of 1949. If there is a story in Mann Gulch, it will take something of a storyteller at this date to find it, and it is not easy to imagine what impulses would lead him to search for it. He probably should be an old storyteller, at least old enough to know that the problem of identity is always a problem, and not just a problem of youth, and even old enough to know that the nearest anyone can come to finding himself at any given age is to find a story that somehow tells him about himself.
"When I was a younger teacher and still thought of myself as a billiards player, I had the pleasure of watching Albert Abraham Michelson play billiards nearly every noon. He was by then one of our national idols, having been the first American to win the Nobel Price in science (for the measurement of the speed of light, among other things). To me, he took on an added luster because he was the best amateur billiards player I had ever seen. One noon, while he was still shaking his head at himself for missing an easy shot after he had a run of thirty-five or thirty-six, I said to him, 'You are a fine billiards player, Mr. Michelson.' He shook his head at himself and said, 'No. I'm getting old. I can still make the long three-cushion shots, but I'm losing the soft touch on the short ones.' He chalked up, but instead of taking the next shot, he finished what he had to say. 'Billiard, though, is a good game, but billiards is not as good a game as chess.' Still chalking his cue, he said, 'Chess, though, is not as good a game as painting.' He made it final by saying, 'But painting is not as good a game as physics.' He then hung up his cue and went home to spend the afternoon painting under a large tree on his front lawn.
"It is in the world of slow-time that truth and art are found as one"
-Norman Maclean, "Young Men and Fire"
A beautiful excerpt that I took the time to type up because I thought it would mean something to a lot of you:
"Far back in the impulses to find this story is a storyteller's belief that at times life takes on the shape of art and that the remembered remnets of these moments are largley what we come to mean by life. The short semihumorous comedies we live, our long certain tragedies, and our springtime lyrics and limericks make up most of what we are. They become almost all of what we remember of ourselves. Although it would be too fancy to take these moments of our lives that seemingly have shape and design as proof we are inhabited by an impulse to art, yet deep within us is a counterimpulse to the id or whatever name is presently attached to the disorderly, the violent, the catastrophic both in and outside us. As a feeling, this counterimpulse to the id is a kind of craving for sanity, for things belonging to each other, and results in a comfortable feeling when the universe is seen to take a garment from the rack that seems to fit. Of course, both impulses need to be present to explain our lives and our art, and probably go a long way to explain why tragedy, inflamed with the disorderly, is generally regarded as the most composed form of art.
"It should be clear now after nearly forty years that the truculent universe prefers to retain the Mann Gulch fire as one of its secrets--left to itself, it fades away, an unsolved, violent incident grieved over by the fewer and fewer still living who are old enough to grieve over fatalities of 1949. If there is a story in Mann Gulch, it will take something of a storyteller at this date to find it, and it is not easy to imagine what impulses would lead him to search for it. He probably should be an old storyteller, at least old enough to know that the problem of identity is always a problem, and not just a problem of youth, and even old enough to know that the nearest anyone can come to finding himself at any given age is to find a story that somehow tells him about himself.
"When I was a younger teacher and still thought of myself as a billiards player, I had the pleasure of watching Albert Abraham Michelson play billiards nearly every noon. He was by then one of our national idols, having been the first American to win the Nobel Price in science (for the measurement of the speed of light, among other things). To me, he took on an added luster because he was the best amateur billiards player I had ever seen. One noon, while he was still shaking his head at himself for missing an easy shot after he had a run of thirty-five or thirty-six, I said to him, 'You are a fine billiards player, Mr. Michelson.' He shook his head at himself and said, 'No. I'm getting old. I can still make the long three-cushion shots, but I'm losing the soft touch on the short ones.' He chalked up, but instead of taking the next shot, he finished what he had to say. 'Billiard, though, is a good game, but billiards is not as good a game as chess.' Still chalking his cue, he said, 'Chess, though, is not as good a game as painting.' He made it final by saying, 'But painting is not as good a game as physics.' He then hung up his cue and went home to spend the afternoon painting under a large tree on his front lawn.
"It is in the world of slow-time that truth and art are found as one"
-Norman Maclean, "Young Men and Fire"
VIEW 3 of 3 COMMENTS
Either way, I definitely plan to come back.
By the by, this
The short semihumorous comedies we live, our long certain tragedies, and our springtime lyrics and limericks make up most of what we are.
reminds me very much of a few lines from one of my very favorite songs ever.