Brecht’s The Keenness to Recognize the Truth
Apparently I scowl when I think. I have been told this by numerous people. When at rest, when thinking on far away topics, when walking the corridors of my rest home between call lights, I wear a scowl. What a terrible way to present oneself! My aunt Lisa once told me she wears sunglasses outside at all times of day (at least when she lived in Berkeley) because people thought she was angry as well. But I really can't work with an aged population wearing shades, no matter how cool or hip it might seem.
Anger has always been with me, though. Bile, rage, raising hell. I was told by my family they sometimes feared my rages when I was a small child. I do not totally understand that, since I do not recall being angry child; I recall being a daydreamer mostly. But I also know my brother talks of being terrified of me at times growing up, so there must be some truth in this somewhere, even if it does not jive with my memories. Or, more importantly, the memories I want to believe in.
Anger! What a simple word. I wanted to write something profound about uselessness of anger and how poisonous it is. I wanted, that is, until I came upon Tony Milligan's interesting review of Robert A. F. Thurman's interesting little book on the subject of anger, titled simply: Anger (2005). Parts of Thurman's philosophy directly echo certain points Brecht has been making in his essay concerning the Five Difficulties. Like erotica, anger is a wonderfully powerful tool. And like erotica it is one that is seen as highly problematic, as well, in our society. Milligan notes:
One of the most instructive features of the book is the way in which his outline of (one strand of) Buddhist thought on anger reveals it to be substantially in agreement with Seneca. (Someone whose reading of Seneca is a little closer than Thurman's might find interesting similarities here.) Be that as it may, Thurman structures his case against anger around a contrast between resigning to anger and resigning from anger where the former involves the view that you can do nothing about anger and the latter involves the view that anger can (and should) be totally eradicated. Thurman's middle way between them turns out to involve a gradualist attempt to uproot anger rather than a sudden leap out of it …
… Thurman [also] seems to hint at is the possibility of a 'Good hate' which is 'a perfectly healthy attitude' … Thurman does leave enough clues to indicate that something more systematic could be said. (i.e. 'Good hate' is not directed towards persons; it involves self-control rather than the passing on of suffering; it involves some recognition of the constraints upon their agency, their lack of 'real' freedom.)
Good Hate? To have a good hate? What a strange concept. This morning before work I have been working on Neruda's La United Fruit Co. To me, this is a successful poem of "good hate." Question: what makes a angry poem unsuccessful? Answer: one that is no longer a poem. Perhaps it is a haranguing dressed up like a poem? Perhaps. There is no point in beating up your audience. Your audience is not your adversary. People come to you because they are curious or hungry to hear what you have to say. There is a lot of material passed off as poetry that simply turns on itself and its reader. There might have been a message, but the poet has lost any ability to get the audience to hear what s/he has to say. Self-righteousness in verse is a terrible thing. They are, as Brecht puts it: [those] who deal only with the most urgent tasks, who embrace poverty and do not fear rulers, and who nevertheless cannot find the truth … they are full of ancient superstitions, with notorious prejudices that in bygone days were often put into beautiful words. We must be aware of our own prejudices for when we utter them we stop up the ears of our audience. And the one thing everyone should be taught in MFA workshops is simply this: your audience is your friend, treat them well.
Since it is hard to write the truth because truth is everywhere suppressed, it seems to most people to be a question of character whether the truth is written or not written. They believe that courage alone suffices. They forget the second obstacle: the difficulty of finding the truth. It is impossible to assert that the truth is easily ascertained.
First of all we strike trouble in determining what truth is worth the telling. For example, before the eyes of the whole world one great civilized nation after the other falls into barbarism. Moreover, everyone knows that the domestic war which is being waged by the most ghastly methods can at any moment be converted into a foreign war which may well leave our continent a heap of ruins. This, undoubtedly, is one truth, but there are others. Thus, for example, it is not untrue that chairs have seats and that rain falls downward. Many poets write truths of this sort. They are like a painter adorning the walls of a sinking ship with a still life. Our first difficulty does not trouble them and their consciences are clear. Those in power cannot corrupt them, but neither are they disturbed by the cries of the oppressed; they go on painting. The senselessness of their behavior engenders in them a “profound” pessimism which they sell at good prices; yet such pessimism would be more fitting in one who observes these masters and their sales. At the same time it is not easy to realize that their truths are truths about chairs or rain; they usually sound like truths about important things. But on closer examination it is possible to see that they say merely: a chair is a chair; and: no one can prevent the rain from falling down.
They do not discover the truths that are worth writing about. On the other hand, there are some who deal only with the most urgent tasks, who embrace poverty and do not fear rulers, and who nevertheless cannot find the truth. These lack knowledge. They are full of ancient superstitions, with notorious prejudices that in bygone days were often put into beautiful words. The world is too complicated for them; they do not know the facts; they do not perceive relationships. In addition to temperament, knowledge, which can be acquired, and methods, which can be learned, are needed. What is necessary for all writers in this age of perplexity and lightening change is a knowledge of the materialistic dialectic of economy and history. This knowledge can be acquired from books and from practical instruction, if the necessary diligence is applied. Many truths can be discovered in simpler fashion, or at least portions of truths, or facts that lead to the discovery of truths. Method is good in all inquiry, but it is possible to make discoveries without using any method—indeed, even without inquiry. But by such a casual procedure one does not come to the kind of presentation of truth which will enable men to act on the basis of that presentations. People who merely record little facts are not able to arrange the things of the world so that they can be easily controlled. Yet truth has this function alone and no other. Such people cannot cope with the requirement that they write the truth.