"Yes, yes, the past gets in the way; it trips us up, bogs us down; it complicates, makes difficult. But to ignore this is folly, because, above all, what history teaches us is to ignore illusion and make-believe, to lay aside dreams, moonshine, cure-alls, wonder-workings, pie-in-the-sky — to be realistic."
Once, not so long ago, a young student at Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, was writing his English 32 Mid-term Examination from Hell. English being his second language, this young man was a virgin to the rich pageant of English literature and having a bitch of a time with said Examination from Hell. But comparing Waterland, by Graham Swift, and Great Expectations, by Charles Dickens, he was struck by the truth and beauty of the two works. He was dazzled by their styles of narration*, in which both authors interrupt their stories to speak directly to the reader and to inject brilliant analyses and wise generalizations and try to make sense of the whole process of memory and recounting. He was intrigued by the mystery of the novels, the gradual epiphany of the relevance and repercussions of events long past, a clandestine meeting by the sea with a criminal, a forbidden interlude between father and daughter (this passage so shocked him that he suffered spells of dizziness and, for days thereafter, he could not blink his eyes in unison.) He was captivated by the social background of the books, the direct and indirect influence of the French Revolution, which asserted that history can be changed by people, that people are ruled by both reason and emotion, and that people are naturally good and that society is evil.
This captivating social background manifest itself in Swift's presentation of liberal progressivism, the idea that man can drain marshes and build factories and otherwise change the environment to make life better. It was also manifest in Dickens' stirring social criticisms of the penal system, materialism, and, of course, the class system. The young student was moved to tears by the universal truths of the two story-telling novels about the urgent importance of telling stories. He realized that events never quite fit the story that they are molded into, the old art vs. life, or in Dickens' case, preconceptions vs. reality, dilemma. He nodded his head in agreement that stories are never quite true but that they are 'true enough' for their purpose, which is to make sense of the desperate chaos of this great wrong place in which we live. He was so overcome by the beauty of these works that he ripped off all his clothes and ran out onto the lawns of Pembroke Campus, writing in ecstasy amid the shrubbery, shouting "Beauty!" and breaking off branches until he died of cardiac arrest. His friends found him soon after and he was buried in the huge cemetary on South Main Street, with a tombstone that read, "Once, not so long ago, a young student at Brown University, Providence, Rhode Island, was writing his English 32 Mid-term Examination from Hell. English being his second language, this..."
Last modified 1989