I recently went to a kick-ass lecture delivered by Sir Christopher Ricks, and it blew my mind. He’s a freaking KNIGHT. And have you seen his credentials? This is an exerpt from the memorandum:
Christopher Ricks is the co-director of the Editorial Institute and the William M. and Sara B. Warren Professorof the Humanities at Boston University, having formerly been professor of English at Bristol and at Cambridge. He is a member of the Association of Literary Scholars, Critics, and Writers, of which he was president (2007-2008). He has edited and also teaches in the Core Curriculum. He was elected Professor of Poetry at Oxford in 2004, and is known both for his critical studies and for his editorial work.
He’s a total badass, right? So I made him sign my denim jacket right below Abysmal Dawn’s autographs. That was pretty sick. Anyway, so much for introductions. Here’s the stoner epiphanies I had that (k)night.
The entire high-octane hellride started out with a monologue from Othello, wherein the titular character eloquates thus:
Soft you; a word or two before you go.
I have done the state some service, and they know’t,
No more of that. I pray you, in your letters,
When you shall these unlucky deeds relate,
Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate,
Nor set down aught in malice: then must you speak
Of one that loved not wisely but too well;
Of one not easily jealous, but, being wrought,
Perplex’d in the extreme; of one whose hand,
Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away
Richer than all his tribe; of one whose subdued eyes,
Albeit unused to the melting mood,
Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees
Their medicinal gum. Set you down this;
And say, besides, that in Aleppo once,
Where a malignant and turban’d Turk
Beat a Venetian and traduced the state,
I took by the throat the circumcised dog,
and smote him- thus.
The lecture was not just on Shakespeare, but on T.S Elliot’s criticism thereof. To quote Elliot from the essay
Shakespeare And The Stoicism Of Seneca, “He is endeavouring to escape reality… Othello succeeds in turning himself into a pathetic figure, by adopting an aesthetic rather than moral attitude, dramatising himself against his environment.” This critique was similar to my musings on the psychological aspects of
mosh pits. Sometimes the only way to feel better about your situation is to exaggerate it to the point of melodrama.
Such exaggerations may reflect realities that would otherwise remain concealed. For instance, after losing a close friend to cancer, I realized that mosh pits were my only true catharsis. If such a purgation was not a “constructive outlet”, it was at least close enough. Similarly, Othello had suffered a loss, and repaired the damage by indulging in a different kind of pain. It’s like a spiritual version of “hair of the dog”. You take what hurts you and remedy it with a controlled dose. Such is the act of self-dramatization.
At any rate, I appear to be rambling. I adore Sir Christopher Ricks and his brilliant observations, but I don’t want to just parrot him.
I fear plagiarism laws, and I also know that knights tend to be armed to the teeth.
Huh. So that’s how knights work.
… Wait, is that how Sabaton really got their name?!
Ahem. Stay tuned for Part II.
