I’ve written a lot on this blog about writing. And specifically, reasons for writing when the nature, status, and future of writing, publishing, and reading are at best highly uncertain: in the era of climate chaos, all bets are off. The literary institutions already totter, the ceremony of ignorance is drowned. Whatever writing was, it won’t be long.
It seems to me that the reasons for writing in such a period are also the reasons for living therein. For instance: Gratitude. To God(s), to others, to the earth, to oneself. This is not a theme explored very much in U.S. literature. But we thank people who are dying, and vice versa, so why not do so when your world may be, too? Gratitude acknowledges that much of what one enjoys is the result of chance – accidents of birth, upbringing, location, timing – in other words, that one is beholden. And that all of those things will be taken away, sooner or later – or returned, depending on how you look at it. Be here now. Curiosity. If you like narrative, you want to know what happens next. If you really like narrative, you’ll keep reading even if you know the ending – even if the ending is not a happy one – and then read the sequel. The only reason I can think of to be unsettled by the thought of my consciousness’ evaporating or winking out after death is the notion that I won’t know what happens next: that was the last episode, but the series hasn’t been cancelled. But if it has been cancelled, don’t you want to see the season finale?? Observation. The phenomenological philosophers thought of artistic consciousness as an ethos: it implies attention to things for their own sake in the present, rather than their utility to oneself in the future. People who have terminal diagnoses report being more intensely aware of their surroundings, their loved ones, their lives, than they were before. In contemporary “western” culture, observation is often what writers do, and often it is the extent of what they do. Or they make observations about language itself (and all the social implications thereof). Perspective. Contemplating world-historical events can make our quotidian, routine lives look rather paltry. Climate change is shaping up to be the world-historical event (and maybe the final one). Kinder makes y’think, don’t it? Certainly puts things into perspective – makes you take stock. I have that “pale blue dot” photo, the picture of earth taken from Voyager 2 from the edge of the universe. We’re barely a pixel from out there. We’re barely a pixel even here. Said another way: if you knew the earth were going to be hit by a giant meteor that would destroy all life on earth, and Elon Musk invited you to join his party in the spacecraft that was taking off beforehand, would you go? Would you want to see it happen, knowing that the food and water on the ship would run out b/c there’s no place to go? Even if you had to talk with Elon Musk? Talk about epiphanies . . . Seeing the lights go out AND seeing how smoothly the rest of the universe goes about its business – that experience might finally give one an inkling of who one is and how things are. But what if we could start doing this on the ground? That is, what if we could look in the mirror and see the giant meteor? Who knows – it might make some folks wake up.
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June 2021
Kristin Prevallet Author/Editor
I'm a writer & teacher in Lawrence, Kansas who actually believes the scientists. I wrote a book of poems called Of Some Sky that seems to have something to do with all this. |