the burden of the mystery

I have been reading and re-reading this passage from May Sarton's Journal of a Solitude. Here she is quoting Humphrey Trevelyan, who is paraphrasing Goethe:

"It seems that two qualities are necessary if a great artist is to remain creative to the end of a long life; he must on the one hand retain an abnormally keen awareness of life, he must never grow complacent, never be content with life, must always demand the impossible, and when he cannot have it, must despair. The burden of the mystery must be with him day and night. He must be shaken by the naked truths that will not be comforted. This divine discontent, this disequilibrium, this state of inner tension is the source of creative energy. Many lesser poets have it only in their youth; some even of the greatest lose it in middle life. Wordsworth lost his courage to despair and with it his poetic power. But more often, the dynamic tensions are so powerful that they destroy the man before he reaches maturity."

Sometimes I think about the connection between the greatest geniuses of history and the degree of madness or manic depression they sustained. But I think we tend to dwell on the extreme examples like van Gogh, Einstein, Mozart, or Dylan Thomas. There are certainly creative geniuses that lived a more moderate life and did not suffer the swings from deep melancholy to pure elation. But I am starting to realize that even among the most ordinary of us creative types, that internal conflict is absolutely essential. What I don't know is if some of us are more prone to it, and that is why we have painters and sculptors and musicians and poets and the like...or if we all have it and only some of us are aware that we can dispel it and use it in this way. Does that makes sense? Something in me believes that every human being has creative genius..and what I want to know is...what is it that urges one person to explore it and use it, and another to ignore it?

And have you ever stopped and wondered if you just might need melancholy more than happiness? Sometimes I really think that is true for me. And yet, I would say externally people see me as a cheerful, joyful person. Which I am. But the inner life? Most of it isn't so happily simple. And maybe that constant exchange between light and dark is what creates the spark...what ignites the longing to express the interplay of shadow and reflection...because sometimes it gets so full and heavy in my chest that I think I might explode...and so I write it down. And then I wonder about those of us who break the law, or turn to violence...I wonder if it's not just all that divine discontent, only misdirected?

Of course much of it is a result of environment, genetics and conditioning, and I'm not going to try to come to any conclusions about that, but I do think about it...and I know social workers and psychologists have studied it and even applied it to prisoners and mental health patients...guiding that energy into something healthier and creative. We have all heard stories of cases where artists have gone into prisons and mental health hospitals and shared their gifts with those who struggle with demons that have put people on the fringe of what society deems as normal. I suppose it's the mystery of how creative outlet can transform the dark parts into something beautiful and that might shed light on the difficulties of the human experience for all of us.

As it often happens, I'm not sure of how to make sense of what I'm trying to say...but maybe some of you have thoughts on this as well...sharing our questions and thoughts about things is often just what's needed to bring more light, and even to spur more questions...

Yesterday I was fortunate enough to share the day with eight writers at a beautiful log home out in the layered hills of East Otto, New York. It was my job to feed them, and there are few things that make me happier than feeding people :) But I also got to listen to their discussions and what they shared with one another. I took home many things to think about and write about in my journal. One of the discussions was about the importance of prose...and if we are in danger of losing it to newer forms of story telling and information sharing such as film and digital media...ideas and images that play out visually in a concrete way, or float through the ethers instead of being printed onto paper and held in our hands to leaf through and read, requiring all of our own intelligence and imagination to bring it to life. I have my own opinions on this, which I did not share, but I don't believe there is any danger...for there will always be those who appreciate and even prefer the experience of a book over a film, or the internal thoughts and ideas and emotions that can only be expressed through the novel, or essay or poem, just as there have always been those who prefer another way. Was there ever a time in history where the majority of human beings read on a regular basis? No. Readers have always been in the minority. But for me, the interesting part is to think about what it is that makes us readers, or writers, or both. Again, I will turn to May Sarton...because her's is the voice I hear most clearly of late:

"...I believe we learn through the experiences of others as well as through our own, constantly meditating upon them, drawing the sustenance of human truth from them, and it seems natural to me to wish to share the apercus, these questions, these oddities, these dilemmas and pangs. Why? Partly, I suppose, because the more one is a receptacle of human destinies, as I have become through my readers, the more one realizes how very few people could be called happy, how complex and demanding every deep human relationship is, how much real pain, anger, and despair are concealed by most people. And this is because many feel their own suffering is unique. It is comforting to know that we are all in the same boat."

At its very essence, this is why I think we read and write.

And then I meander to the forms of writing I rely on most...and what it is that makes me lean towards poetry for some things, and to prose for others.

"Why is it that poetry always seems to me so much more a true work of the soul than prose? I never feel elated after writing a page of prose, though I have written good things on concentrated will, and at least in a novel the imagination is fully engaged. Perhaps it is that prose is earned and poetry given. Both can be revised almost indefinitely. I do not mean to say that I do not work at poetry. When I am really inspired I can put a poem through a hundred drafts and keep my excitement. But this sustained battle is possible only when I am in a state of grace, when the deep channels are open, and when they are, when I am both profoundly stirred and balanced, then poetry comes as a gift from powers beyond my will.

I have often imagined that if I were in solitary confinement for an indefinite time and knew that no one would read what I wrote, I would still write poetry, but I would not write novels. Why? Perhaps because the poem is primarily a dialogue with the self and the novel is a dialogue with others. They come from entirely different modes of being. I suppose I have written novels to find out what I thought about something and poems to find out what I felt about something."

I know exactly what she means. And I think the same applies to reading. At least for me. A novel engages my imagination, the way I see and think about things. A poem takes root in my heart and how I feel about things in a deeper, more unexplainable and visceral way.

I'm done thinking for now...time to clean my house and make time for some kind of creative work. Two friends came over for breakfast this morning and didn't seem to mind all of my messes, or my unswept floors...but I am beginning to mind them and want to have a fresh start for the work week. Before I go I will share a few of my favourite images from yesterday---it was filled with interesting and lovely people, stormy weather with breaks of incredible light, and views that went on forever...a beautiful day from every angle.

Comments

[Paula]

All of us walk on a very fine line in life. Some of us have a very strong will to survive and some of us because we have been enablers all our lives fall apart and try to find our way in life. It is important to look at the talented artists and see that they too experience outside influences which have effected their quality of life. Meloncholy and happiness work together. You learn to appreciate all the important non material things in life. The first snowfall, the clean crisp smell of the first fall day, the raked leaves, the early departure of the sun in the winter, a walk in Emery Park, your first ski run for the season. Those are precious memories that create poetry and pictures of peace,tranquilty and a healthy mind set for us. It is the material things, cars, boats, airplanes that send us all in the wrong direction and pull us apart from being human. Human in the way that we can reach out to one another. Think about it. All the bad feeligs arise with one another when you have so much. The ability to reach out to people when you need them they are not there. Suddenly you start loosing those material things and suddenly the jealousy is gone. The need for each other in bad times appears to happen suddenly.
I have always put people first before any material things in life. This is where in life I feel we are tested with RIGHT AND WRONG decisions. Should I go see my mother or will my husband be mad if I do? Should I go to my Neices graduation or will my husband be mad at me if I do. I have fought with Material things and peace of mind for 30 years. Now I am becoming like him. Depressed, seeking therapists to help me fell better about myself. Running to work so I do not loose my mind like the artists you refer to did. It can easily happen, it is happening to me. If one is fortunate to have a home to call their own and escape to God has truly blessed you. Sometimes going thru times like these you realize again, the importance of HOME. The value of HOME. It is a comfort zone for all of us, especailly for our children It is a place to run HOME too when things are not right. It is that small room or the smell of Home that brings such contentment to our well being and peace of mind. I want peace of mind and tranquility again. I want to walk thru Emery again, look at the mountains at the lake again. Change in ones life is essential for peace of mind. If one stays in a realtionship that is depressive and destructive the other person will allow themselves to be destroyed. You are on your way to such a beautiful life. It took unbelievable strength and the shoulders of such good friends that we both have to lean on. You can't lean on a plane,a car, for emotional support. But when you wlak thru the front door of a HOME...a happy peaceful home to experience melonchly....thats when happiness begins.

I want that door to open for me...I am loosing all hope though. My son is my sunshine and my hope...I get up for him..I dream his dreams when I go to work...when I get my paycheck...when he sends me his new song that he made with such a Good Friend, and we know who that is. They are such an inspiration for each other and I know they will make it....thats what keeps me going is my Brandon.

[Elizabeth]

oh how you feed my soul-- seriously, this was EXACTLY, precisely, what I needed to read today to bring me back into myself from the drifts of cloudbanks I have been lumbering through.

Thank you for taking the time to put this post out there for all of us.

[leah]

what a great post. you put into words so eloquently what i often feel in my bones about art and poetry. i've been thinking about this recently (the difference between poetry and prose, etc) and i think it has something to do with the limits of language to express what's within our souls. With poetry (and art) we can stretch language in a way not normally accepted that gets closer to what we feel in our hearts.

as for divine discontent, yes, i do believe that people need a creative outlet and without it, people often turn to a less healthy form of expression. perhaps for people who contend with more inner turmoil, they're not necessarily more creative, but simply need that creative outlet more than others in order to function properly.