(no subject)

[solitary_summer]

Bought a basket.


Still feeling... happy, smiling at the world.

Reading E. Fromm's Haben oder Sein (To Have Or to Be?). It's almost frightening, but satisfactory at the same time - even while I'm aware I'm far from living his ideas, I've never read an author whose worldview / theories / beliefs fit me so well, in the sense that they allow me to reconcile parts of my personality I thought were at odds, even irreconcilable, or maybe lost, my younger self and my recent self. It's like looking through a prism and suddenly seeing yourself whole where you only saw parts before, or shuffling pieces around and suddenly discover they fit. Seeing a process that led up to something, a foundation, upon which I can build.

The last author who changed my worldview like this was N.Elias, in the sense of shattering my subjectivism; but this, too fits & needed to happen.

It's almost too easy, I sometimes feel I should be wary.

I wonder, too, if it'll last.

[I guess it's probably no coincidence, that this all happenes after I gave up on the diss, though it's not quite clear to me, why, or how. Not so long ago I thought the diss was central to my self-image, my self-respect. I can only presume between the pressure to meet expectations not necessarily my own and the guilt trip it took up too much of my mental energy? But it was a necessary part of my life, too. This doesn't feel like resignation or defeat, rather like rediscovering a person I had lost far too long, with the added experience of what I learned since.]


More in TM's diaries at work, because I was too tired for anything philosophical. Still unable to define exactly why I enjoy reading them, except maybe in a roundabout way: I realise this isn't quite the same thing, but I remember some tv program where M. Reich-Ranicki (a great admirer of Mann), when asked if he ever met him (or would have wanted to meet him, given the chance, I forget which) said something that started with "Um *Himmels* Willen, nein!" ("For heaven's sake, no!") and went on about how supposedly everyone who did was disappointed &c.

Oscar Wilde makes Lord Wotton say something similar in The Picture of Dorian Gray, about great artist always being uninteresting and only bad ones personally fascinating.

I couldn't say how much truth there is in this, but this isn't my point. Personally, I've never managed to wholly separate my interest in a work of art from at least a certain degree of interest in the artist. And yes, especially if you're young you don't want to hear things that would knock your idol off its pedestal. But after all... So what if they're not perfect; no one is. This realisation shouldn't necessarily lead to disappointment, or loss of respect for the artist. It isn't about taking someone down, rather about appreciating them for what they are, but without blind, unreasonable idolisation. IMO this is the fascinating, the beautiful thing, the human being as a whole.

(And I think there's a lot more to be learned/understood this way.)

Does this make any sense at all?


[Will go to sleep early today & try to go running tomorrow, unless it's raining. Which the forecast says it will. Er. So much for fitness.]