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Sunday, November 15, 2026

Against Charisma

 "You can't have everything. Where would you put it?" - Steven Wright


When Writers Lose Confidence In Free Speech

If democracy is the political system that allows the fullest human flourishing, the novel is the literary form that most fully cultivates our understanding of human possibility and tragedy and endurance. - The 


Similarly, here is a portion of a 1984 interview the Polish poet Zbigniew Herbert gave to two of his American translators, John and Bogdana Carpenter, in the wake of Jarugelski’s neo-Stalinist crackdown and the rise of Solidarity:


Q: “What is the main reason why you write?”

 

A: “Writing—and in this I disagree with everybody—must teach men soberness: to be awake. [Spoken in English.] To make people sober. It does not mean, not to try. But with a small internal correction. I reject optimism despite all the theologians. Despair is a fruitful feeling. It is a cleanser, from desire, from hope. ‘Hope is the mother of the stupid.’ [This is a Polish proverb.] I don't like hope.”

 

Shalamov and Herbert survived Communism. You could say their experiences were too extreme, not typical of humanity’s lot. That’s one way to ignore human nature and its results in the twentieth century.

 

On the other hand, there’s Dr. Johnson, many years before the rise of totalitarianism, writing in theNovember 6, 1750, issue of The Rambler:

 

“Hope, is indeed, very fallacious, and promises what it seldom gives; but its promises are more valuable than the gifts of fortune, and it seldom frustrates us without assuring us of recompensing the delay by a greater bounty.”



“Art Is The Great Democrat”

“Art is the great democrat,” wrote Kennedy, “calling forth creative genius from every sector of society, disregarding race or religion or wealth or color.” He saw art as a means of transcending difference, as both a product of democracy and a contributor to its flourishing. - San Francisco Classical Voice


Gary Fisketjon, R.I.P.
AI slop
Goodbye to Salon
Against charisma
Senji Kuroi, R.I.P.
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