On The Density Of Life

There exists a certain configuration of person, one marked by the unrelenting pursuit towards unfiltered reality, which we can call clarity. These are the people who live "the examined life", those people who feel twice more than they think and think twice more than they feel. They ache to encounter truth above all else.

This configuration hardly ever holds the companionship of docility or comfort. It is reasonable to say that the most common life in the United States is one of the familiar rhythm of tolerable labor, rest through consumption of media at home, and time spent with loved ones. This is a life of comfortable repetition: it does not break the soul, nor does it transfigure it. Neither good nor bad, but by all measures durable and dignified. In contrast, those addicted to clarity's scalding embrace often find themselves in a peculiar relationship to work, to their mind, and to those around them. Employment is often unstable, or else serves a greater meaning beyond the paycheck, joy and suffering coexist and amplify one another under an excruciating gravity, and relationships are sometimes both intense and fraught.

Indeed, this lineage of person is marked by what would be considered early deaths: Simone Weil at 34 in Ashford; Nietzsche at 55 in Weimar; Artaud at 51 in Ivry-sur-Seine; Plath at 30 in Primrose Hill; Pessoa at 47 in Lisbon. It is not that these great thinkers decided one day that they would die early, but it happens by their very nature that each day they lived was characterized, above all, by a depth of attention the body could not long endure. It is not enough for them to feel shame or anger by itself, so they build universal meaning from the specific. This is, in its own way, a type of torture, for even the most debilitating and base emotions become a fundamental structure in their reality. Their intense emotions and ferocious minds amplify each other, and what is often left behind is a cathedral of immense thought, studied and worshiped by many. Compared to the average person, they live dense lives.

It is precisely this density of life that provides some counterbalance to their early deaths. Their early deaths are tragic, but in their pursuit of clarity they have lived the equivalent of many regular lifetimes. In examining their experiences and their thoughts, one often feels that they have touched something more true than almost everyone else. In many ways, I mourn the early death of Simone Weil, and there is nothing more I would have loved than to read the works she would produce at 40, 50, and 60 years old. But if she lived a lighter life, would she have shown the world the light of clarity she briefly touched?

When someone remarked on Simone's fame, her mother Selma Weil responded simply: "I would have preferred that she were happy." This type of happiness, built from a sustainable and lighter life, would no doubt be dishonest to Simone, and would likely be felt as an early death of her spirit, considering she once wrote:

After months of inner darkness, I suddenly had the everlasting conviction that any human being whatsoever, though practically devoid of natural gifts, can penetrate to the kingdom of truth reserved for genius, if only he longs for truth and perpetually concentrates all his attention upon its attainment.

But I feel such a deep sorrow for Simone, even though she would be frustrated by this and mark it as failed attention to see the "gold" within her as she described in a letter just a month before her death, because I see someone who loved the world more than it ever knew, and all I wish for anyone with such character is a life of peace and rest for the terrible weight it bears.

Is it cruel that such configuration of person often tends to be the one who deserve peace the most, yet they are doomed to be unable to grant it to themselves?

I find myself sitting the dark at 9:17 PM, my desk a mess with the blue light of my monitor faintly outlining my keyboard, crying for Simone. It is almost inhumane that someone with such a pure heart, overflowing with love died, felt utterly in the presence of those around her, where she wrote not long before her death:

Darling M[imie], you think that I have something to give. That’s the wrong way to put it. But I do also have a growing inner certainty that there is a repository of pure gold in me that must be passed down. Except that experience and the observations of my contemporaries make me more and more convinced that there is no one to receive it.

It’s indivisible. Whatever is added to it becomes part of it. The more it grows, the more it becomes compact. I can’t distribute it piecemeal.

To receive it demands an effort. And making an effort is so tiring!

Some people vaguely feel the presence of something. But they merely need to say a few words of praise about my intelligence, and their conscience [several crossed out, illegible words] is entirely satisfied. After that, when they listen to me or read me, it’s with the same hasty attention they give to everything, internally making a definitive decision about each scrap of an idea as it appears: “I agree with this,” “I don’t agree with that,” “this is marvelous,” “that is completely crazy” (the latter antithesis was from my boss). They conclude: “That’s very interesting,” and move on to something else. They haven’t tired themselves.

What else can one expect? I’m convinced that the most fervent Christians among them do not focus [several crossed out, illegible words] much more of their attention when they pray or read the Gospel.