Novelists

Friday 21st August, 2020

Reading an article on quotations in literature I was struck by the power of writers and their importance in educating us all. A novelist ( I am unable to recall whom but think  Satre, Mann or Proust ) stated that the value of the novel was the truth of the exploration of character. Novelists were free. Too few of us, it was argued, are able to dissect, analyse or understand the psyche, the characteristics, the very mechanism of motivation or purpose of people. It is the novelist who has the sensitivity, experience, intuition and width of reading and the freedom to verbalise what is the unseen, unconscious or even the unknown of a human.

Certainly I find that characters in novels do strike chords of resonance. Often how they behave, what they say and do and their relationships are very real. As the characters are purportedly fictional so the writer can be brutal, honest and explore what might in a biography be challenged and even end in Courts of Law. Orwell's 'Animal Farm' was the first book I recall which made me glimpse the world of truth in fiction.

I see novels not as a frivolous time wasting yet enjoyable pastime but a way in to understanding. All people are unique, all have idiosyncratic and individualist traits. All have their own experiences, backgrounds and personal make up and chemistry. Yet to understand ourselves we need to have an understanding of so many areas of knowledge and science from biology to chemistry to psychology to sociology. Novelists can help holdup the map.

Often a quotation will ring a bell. I hear myself muttering: ' yes that sums it up. Yes, that resonates. Yes that expresses it clearly and succinctly. Yes, that is a true insight'.

Do you know the Gilgamesh myth of ancient Saumur? Death is inevitable. Scientists today challenge that myth. Do you know Mary Shelley's 'Frankenstein'? The creation of monsters. Scientists challenge that also. Yet both stories excite one to ask the most fundamental of questionings. Without them we merely survive and do not live. To live is to seek wisdom.

" Do I dare

  Disturb the universe?

  In a minute there is time

  For decisions and revisions which a minute will reverse"