"1984" is the Manual: "I Dont Like Mondays" is the Anthem
"I Dont Like Mondays" is the Anthem
Publication date: 2022-08-19
A reading of this article is available.
Reading the compositions of Caitlin Johnstone is a daily joy. She has a few themes which constantly echo through her work. Her prose is clear and beautiful. She is a dreadfully honest journalist who brings her life experience to respond to the world and the events which characterize its current malaise.
We are fortunate to have access to many prophetic writers, most of whom are deceased and some of whom are approaching the recycling to which we shall all submit. Of those still standing, Messrs. Chomsky and Hedges maintain themselves. From the pool of dearly departed one name has been stamped on our age, Orwell.
The book "The Prince" by Machiavelli contained such insightful and dastardly instruction that the work evolved from noun to an adjective. Machiavellian was a common refrain during the 20th century by authors commenting upon political affairs. In our early 21st century the Italian author has been replaced by a later English counterpart, George Orwell. Orwellian is the adjective stamped on our era's political commentary.
This newsletter is fortunate to have an advisor, an ideological but practical sub-editor who has inspired and guided the publication from its beginning. When my prose wanders into literary effect or is just plain confused, it is the proper name of Mr. Orwell which is whispered to the author. George Orwell is the nom de plume of Eric Blaire.
Mr. Blaire was a complex character who was flushed with great powers of observation, insight and literary discipline. From serving as a policeman in British Imperial Burma, to living "down and out" on the streets of Paris and London, to fighting fascists in Spain he forged his great work "1984" while dying of tuberculosis on the lonely island of Jura in the Scottish inner Hebrides. Pathos is writ large across his life.
Many a parent has wasted time and breath informing a child that they have two ears and one mouth which informs the ratio of time to be spent listening and speaking. The same holds for reading and writing, though the ratio is more extreme. While my sub-editor and conscience play an active role inspiring and limiting my writing, it is the words and advice of Chris Hedges which ring in my mind.
He offers two pieces of advice to authors in training. One shall read, and read, and read and read. Then one may write. If one wishes to know how to write, the most informative guides are those by Blaire. His essay "Politics and the English Language" is direct. Direct is perhaps the single word which best summarizes Blaire's advice. Or to use more words than necessary, Orwell prefers “I think” to “in my opinion it is not an unjustifiable assumption that.”
Mr. Blaire describes the condition of writing, on which Mr. Hedges has also commented. Though I am a terrible student I share their conclusions on the nature of the frustration of authorship.
Writing a book is a horrible, exhausting struggle, like a long bout with some painful illness. One would never undertake such a thing if one were not driven on by some demon whom one can neither resist nor understand.
Eric Blaire
But going to El Salvador as a reporter was not something the Presbyterian Church at the time recognized as a valid ministry, and a committee rejected my “call.” I told my father, who was waiting outside the meeting room, that I was not to be ordained. It must have been hard for him to see his son come so close to ordination, only to have it slip away, and hard to know that his son was leaving for a conflict in which journalists had been killed and would be killed. What the church would not validate he did. “You,” he said, “are ordained to write.”
Chris Hedges
These luminaries have assisted me in learning the craft of language and to come to terms with the demon, the outrage against injustice, which drives my writing. There is also an ephemeral, a non-analytic, an emotional spectre which shadows my prose. The mother figures who have graced my life have all been artists. I turn to art when seeking solace.
Most of the articles published in this newsletter end with a "Culture" section. Almost all of these are musical. While the eye sees, the mind translates letter symbols into words and then sound. "In the beginning was the word" does not mean the written, it means the spoken. In the beginning was sound.
Following the placement of "I Dont Like Mondays" in a recent Culture section, my mind refused to let the song be quiet. I saw its echoes across the topics toward which I was being driven to write. As 1984 has become the Orwellian manual of our age, "Mondays" is an anthem.
The event which inspired the song were the murders of the principal and custodian, and injuring of eight children, during a school shooting at Cleveland Elementary School, San Diego, California on January 29th 1979. Senseless violence. The song's refrain asks "Tell me why" to which the answer is given "And he can see no reasons 'cause there are no reasons".
This chronic epidemic of children being murdered by other children has continued for 40 years. The complete failure of the USA's governments to address the root causes of the nightmare are more depressing than this horrifically beautiful song. The problem is not guns. The problem is mental health, or lack thereof.
The same stupidity can be seen as weapons are flooded into Ukraine rather than seeking a diplomatic solution. Equivalently, the European Union is destroying its industry and thus a major source of employment as it attempts and fails to bankrupt Russia. Meanwhile a flood of USA law makers are visiting Taiwan to goad a conflict with China in accordance with their military's doctrine of "Great Power Competition".
Senseless violence.
The current state of insanity is akin to seeking a scientific explanation for events based upon the day of the week.
Like Mondays.
To seek solace from this stupidity I read Caitlin's beautiful prose. My subconscious replays the refrain "Tell me why" with reply "There are no reasons".
Sources
Politics and the English Language, George Orwell, 1946
Do NOT watch this crap video. If you want to watch use the original video. But, don’t do that either. Just listen. Let the musicians and sound engineers assault your ears.
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