Jane Kenyon, "Not Writing"
Lyrics stuck in my head: "When you're in the party b-b-bumpin' that beat / 666 with a princess streak / I'm everywhere, I'm so Julia"
I want to begin this newsletter by thanking Teresa and Marelyn Bravo for their readership. It's always a good feeling when people say "Hey, that thing you wrote? That was cool." In this case, Marelyn pointed back to something I wrote in January: Philosophy and Advertising. In that post, I wondered about branding, credibility, and philosophy. I'd like to be known as someone who got people thinking about issues that matter. Does that mean I should write exactly that ("I help people ask big questions") every single place I possibly can? That doesn't seem right.
Benjamin Sandofsky, "Fast Crimes at Lambda School"
This longform article on Lambda School–I can't believe I didn't hear about this "school" at all before–will have you wanting to break everything in sight. What is Lambda School and who is Austen Allred, its founder? Allow Sandofsky to explain:
Austen co-founded Lambda School, one of the largest educational startups of all time. It promised to teach you to code in a matter of months, a common claim in 2017, a time when code bootcamps were commodities you could find in any strip mall. But you don't score $120 million in funding from the biggest names in venture capital by building a better boot camp. He took on college.
As you read the article and note how obvious this scam was, I'd urge you to think about how fashionable it is in some circles to attack college. (There are, of course, circles that value college in not-so-helpful ways.) I'm wondering about why the attacks are so vicious. Okay, someone went and learned about how to talk about Leonardo da Vinci's grotesques or can explain what exactly a large language model is. This is bad? We need endless tirades about how bettering oneself was actually a ripoff and that it would have been better to beg for change in a Walmart parking lot?
The attack, I submit, is ultimately not on college. It's on the very idea of an education. With multiple states wanting to put younger and younger children to work, it's clear where this is headed. No one is allowed to know anything, because ignorant rich people need to feel comfortable being ignorant and rich.
Jonathan M. Katz, "Did Joe Biden really threaten to throw my phone?"
One of the best FAQs I've ever read. Katz was invited to the White House to hear some remarks by POTUS. Katz, being a serious journalist, asked some hard questions about Gaza and got a not-so-positive response. Make sure you read to the end, where he talks about his other experiences with heads-of-state. George W. Bush's identification of him calls to mind one of the greatest things ever written:
Jane Kenyon, "Not Writing"
Kyla Houbolt's "On Not Writing" brought back memories of this poem, "Not Writing," by the inimitable Jane Kenyon. I used "Not Writing" as an epigraph in the last post to provoke thinking about how a wasp trying to enter its own nest compares with moving shadows of leaves. These are two distinct images about the times we struggle to write. In today's post, I want to add another complication. Kenyon's "Not Writing" is a poem I've known for years, and the last time I wrote on it was during quarantine, when work was scarce and acceptance, respect, and companionship were distant possibilities. It was not easy to write then; I felt abandoned no matter what I did.
Not Writing (from Ann E. Michael) Jane Kenyon A wasp rises to its papery nest under the eaves where it daubs at the gray shape, but seems unable to enter its own house.
The immediate problem of the poem is not loneliness, but frustration and isolation. Kenyon suggests that her inability to write is like not being able to join her own brain. The wasp rises to the nest, daubs at the gray shape, but can’t get in. The wasp—all credit to it!—tries. It makes painting-like motions, multiple but clumsy attempts to enter. A writer trying to enter her “papery nest,” one would assume, has done all the prewriting exercises. She’s done freewriting for hours, read the work of others and made notes, checked her own diary entries, tried to write on an object she remembers from childhood, etc.
I must confess that many times I have not made such Herculean efforts, but I would like credit anyway. On the one hand, it simply can’t be given–I’ve done nothing. The wasp built that house and is trying to get in. Other writers are spending their time crafting something unfit by their standards or struggling to put words on paper.
On the other hand, there is a more fundamental issue, that of fumbling around with one’s own mind. That fumbling links those of us who aren’t even trying with those who are trying with all their might.
A wasp rises to its papery nest under the eaves. There’s an ascent towards home for the wasp. Home isn’t some imagined promise. It’s real, “under the eaves,” anchored to a location, of substance itself. A writer’s products are real: the poems, essays, journals, stories, novels, even the bad ones, get readers and attention.
“Attention”–my present concern–requires disambiguation. I think of those who can never go without a significant other, not for one moment. There's always someone, and if they’re about to break up with one, the next is ready to go in a matter of seconds.
Then I think of those who desperately need respect. Everything is a show of authority. I’m not speaking of those who insist on the respect they deserve and use it to benefit everyone. No, there are some who can’t show the least amount of respect, who try to make everything an excuse to act out, or some who create artificial standards for everyone they meet.
It helps to have the confidence someone will listen. This, weirdly enough, helps to enter one's own head. Those who lack a sense of being loved or being in control are my silent compatriots when I can't write. I can't enter my own brain. It would help if someone else could point to what's of value there.
It daubs at the gray shape, but seems unable to enter its own house. Our minds are not fixed entities, always producing thoughts the same way. The painting-like motions of the wasp hint at what it actually takes to get to thoughts and words.
The wasp creates two things. Lots of motion, lots of aerial patterns, which will eventually reveal an entrance. Also, the poem at hand. The failure and frustration ultimately does create. The outstanding question: if we know that to be true, does that make a situation less taxing? Why can't I replace anger and disappointment with patience?
I mean, the answer is somewhat obvious. I'd like thought to move into action and yield a good. We'd all like that. The wasp shows that nothing actually works this way. Thought itself is more like an art project where an insect dances around, looking for an opening. That dance does not engender patience, as nothing is literally being thought except "why isn't anything happening." You'd have to change the definition of rationality completely–e.g. we are reasonable when we understand and aim for satisfaction of our needs–to get us to look at the dance differently. What can be engendered is empathy, which may also act as a creative force.