The Beauty of Brevity
“You are not Proust. Do not write long sentences.”
I feel good about every playlist I post, but I feel real good about this one. The opening song makes you be in the right mood.
Perhaps the mission of those who love mankind is to make people laugh at the truth, to make truth laugh, because the only truth lies in learning to free ourselves from insane passion for the truth.
I was wrong. Really. Very. Wrong. Dystopia waited not for the Apocalypse. The plan to become leader of the Broken Free World, surviving underground after President Harris initiated a “Limited Tactical Nuclear Strike” in response to Russia storming across Finland’s border, is in flux. It’s on a need-to-know basis at present. It may yet come to be. But I need to know first.
Prudence demands a hedging of bets. The notion that I could become the leader of anything, much less the remnants of humanity searching for survival, says more about the condition of the world than my qualifications. Let’s just say the pool of qualified applicants had been reduced. It was dependent upon the Apocalypse being the cause of the Dystopia. I have certain skills. Some would say. Others would laugh. Fair enough for me.
Let’s back up a bit, not to the beginning, but to about 69%. At least that position makes us equals. Relative to each other, relatively speaking. Maybe Mr. Eco would appreciate my clumsy attempts to structure the search for truth in humor. Using comedy to illustrate the flaws of power, and riskier to the jester, the flaws of the powerful, literally creates the phrase “The pen is mightier than the sword”.
Here is an informative synopsis I read in a piece by Douglass Merrell, author of Umberto Eco, The Da Vinci Code, and the Intellectual in the Age of Popular Culture.
"Semiotics is concerned with everything that can be taken as a sign. A sign is everything which can be taken as significantly substituting for something else. This something else does not necessarily have to exist or to actually be somewhere at the moment in which a sign stands for it. Thus semiotics is in principle the discipline studying everything which can be used in order to lie. If something cannot be used to tell a lie, conversely it cannot be used to tell the truth: it cannot in fact be used 'to tell' at all. I think that the definition of a 'theory of the lie' should be taken as a pretty comprehensive program for a general semiotics" (A Theory of Semiotics, 1976, p. 7).
Why would Eco define semiotics, which studies language and all other aspects of human culture, as a theory of the lie? As the linguist Derek Bickerton explains, language gives us the ability to think "offline" (Language and Species, 1990). All other species, so far as we know, only think "online" by being hard-wired to the sensory world. Humans also "think" online through instinctual reactions to sensory stimuli. But, in addition, because of language, humans have a parallel capacity to think "offline," apart from the sensory world, through signs. As a result, we can think of things that are not immediately present to us but exist somewhere in the world. For example, I can think of an "iceberg" that exists as a fact even though it is remotely distant from me and I have never actually seen one firsthand. But, I can also think of things that don't actually exist in the world such as a human with wings. Because of the language capacity, I can bring to mind such an image, and I can refer to it with sounds and graphic symbols through the English word "angel."
The language capacity thus makes us distinct from all other species because we can not only refer to physical objects in the world whether they are present to us or not, but, more significantly, we can imagine possible worlds and then alter the "real" world according to that vision. This state of separation and freedom from being hard-wired to the sensory environment allows us to create the world of human culture in all its glorious diversity through our modes of dress, cuisine, music, architecture, art, society, etc. (emphasis mine) But, as Eco indicates, we can only do this because the signs that we use to refer to things are separate from them. That language enables us to "lie" does not make us inherently deceptive, but it is the necessary condition for our ability to create a world according to our human aspirations separate from the constraints of nature. Consequently, language can be seen to function through the "lie."
It’s concepts like these that make me feel like The Village Idiot sometimes. I share his ideas, but it goes deeper than just sharing a conceptual kinship. Professor Eco, not the idiot, just to be clear. He makes ideas earn their keep; both in his head and in his life. String Theory is beautiful and elegant, especially the way Sheldon explains it. But . . .
If I write a doctoral thesis, even about String Theory, I’d start with How to Write a Thesis, According to Umberto Eco. Did I say if? Pssh, I meant when. He speaks of rhetoric with reverence and requirement. It’s fabulous only if functional. Conversely, it’s only wonderful if it works.
Indeed, the wise teacher instructs as follows:
The advice in this book is especially useful for these students, as well as for high school graduates who are about to embark on their college studies and who wish to understand the alchemy of the university thesis. With this book, I would like to convince these students of two points:
1. One can write a decent thesis despite being in a difficult situation resulting from inequity past and present.
2. Regardless of the disappointment and frustration that these students may experience at the university, their thesis provides an opportunity to regain a positive and progressive notion of study. According to this notion, studying is not simply gathering information but is the critical elaboration of an experience. Through study, students acquire the capacity to identify problems, confront them methodically, and articulate them systematically in expository detail. These skills will serve students for a lifetime.
Did you notice in the first bullet point the phrase? “...being in a difficult situation resulting from inequity past and present.” The entire declaration is a mere 18 words, several being articles and conjunctions. My writing strives for such word brevity. In addition to comprehension abundance. The ultimate teach a man to fish moment, right? My Holy Grail? Three word sentences.
That paragraph lives on Page xx of the book, but in reality is the fifth paragraph of the Introduction. Who else reads the Introduction of a book? Please leave a comment about that. It’s such a binary choice in a non-binary world. So to say.
Back to inequity past and present. Such a clever and precise way to talk about the hyper-focalized but rarely-personified human beings typically described as “lower socieo-economic, racially disadvantaged, at-risk, non-conforming, differently-abled, under-performing, non-binary, and spectrum-residing.”
But the comeback is in the next bullet point. A numbered bullet-point format, mind you. Math is for achievement. Not equity. 2+2 equals 4. 2+2 provides equity for 5? I think not.
Skinny-dipping in polite society’s cesspool of seedy circumstances is my truth. And my humor. And, sometimes, my sorrow. At bottom, it is my story. And mine to tell. Live your story and tell it. The best thing about our stories is that they do not negate each other. The actually complement one another.
Umberto Eco, to his credit as a humanitarian, recognizes that in each soul is a yearning for freedom and liberty. And knowledge is the path to freedom. And education is the path to knowledge. He teaches how to learn.
Just a cursory glance at his most superficial quotes will befuddle you with his brilliance. As an axiom aficionado, his idioms impart intellect without impudence
Daytime sleep is like the sin of the flesh; the more you have the more you want, and yet you feel unhappy, sated and unsated at the same time.
As the man said, for every complex problem there’s a simple solution, and it’s wrong.
When you are on the dancefloor, there is nothing to do but dance.
I won’t repeat the words here, in a sense of brevity, but do read them again. Umberto Eco, whose grandfather was given the family name Eco
Towards the end of his life, Eco came to believe that his family name was an acronym of ex caelis oblatus (from Latin: a gift from the heavens). As was the custom at the time, the name had been given to his grandfather (a foundling) by an official in city hall. In a 2011 interview, Eco explained that a friend happened to come across the acronym on a list of Jesuit acronyms in the Vatican Library, informing him of the likely origin of the name.
Don’t know about you, but I rather think a man whose grandfather was a foundling given a made-up name by priests that found him would be a pretty solid spokesman for the down-trodden? Just a thought. Not a truth. Not a judgement.
Professor Emeritus Umberto Eco was a teacher. He didn’t teach truths or lies. He believed strongly in signs, visual representations of ideas. When I created this project, I had no idea who Umberto Eco was. I had no idea about a lot of things.
Below is the text on my Home Page, I wrote these words on December 30, 2020. The next six months will be rough. Politically, emotionally and financially. I will keep writing about truth and humor, and their intersection. That’s the street corner I stand on.
This paragraph stands out to me in light of Professor Eco’s writings about truth.
I believe that each person lives a truth that is unique but also universally shared. Tensions arise when one values their own truth more than that of their neighbor.
I will share my truth here, and my hope is that by doing so, others will come to understand the common nature of our collective existence.
I make a solemn pledge to you, my readers. I will treat this space with respect. I will respect your truth as well as mine. No matter what you believe or what vote you cast, there will always be a seat at my table for you. We will break bread and drink wine. Let’s talk about truth. Let’s also laugh about it.
Ric
Why Me?
Probably the most asked question of all time. Twice in my life, I have been in lockdown. Once of my own doing, and the other not. When a person has over eight months to muse on that question, many potential answers surface.
I will explore that question in this space. I will write about the confluence of the elements of life that create culture. I express that confluence with this formula
Life / Food + Music + Art + Craft + History = Culture (L/5e=C)
I believe that each person lives a truth that is unique but also universally shared. Tensions arise when one values their own truth more than that of their neighbor.
I will share my truth here, and my hope is that by doing so, others will come to understand the common nature of our collective existence.
My goal when embarking on this adventure was pretty high-minded. I have lived in so many cultures and been accepted into each one. I didn’t appropriate as much as integrate. I learned that people like to teach. I also realized that people like to teach things that they are experts at. And teachers like enthusiastic students. I have learned at the stoves of so many talented chefs, both professional and home-cook. They are experts. They love to share.
Aside from water, which technically could be lumped in with food, the need to eat is the most basic and common similarity amongst us human beings. The capture and control of fire allowed us to cook our meat. Cooking meat allowed us to spend our days thinking and doing instead of foraging and chewing. It grew our brains. It elevated us from the apes.
I contend that five elements create culture, and they are universal in scope. All human beings have an intimate connection with Food/Music/Art/Craft/History. All cultures have these elements. And now we are being told that we cannot participate and share in another’s culture. That is a bad thing.
Stay tuned for Dystopian Dispatches, my new underground platform. Waiting on the Apocalypse, just great!
"Skinny-dipping in polite society’s cesspool of seedy circumstances is my truth."
I shall shamelessly plagiarize that line.
Count on it.