Some thoughts about wanting and getting

The American science fiction writer Frederik Pohl wrote a book of memoirs called The Way the Future Was. 

I read something in this book that made a big impression, got me thinking, and eventually inspired a small article:

“An observed fact of my life is that I have almost always gotten everything I wanted, sooner or later. Another observed fact is that sometimes by the time I get it I don’t want it any more.”

Fred Pohl's words contradict the proposition that nothing dies that is not lived out, or, in other words, you have to give it a go before you can give it up! In his experience, the desire for something can definitely die of its own accord before the object is achieved or obtained.

There are several reasons why people may lose interest in and any inclination for something that at one time they wanted very much. For example, they may have outgrown it or realised that it wouldn't be suitable and moved on. Perhaps the desired object came too late in life to be of any use to them.

Fred Pohl's words about almost always getting but sometimes no longer wanting something got me thinking about people who always want - or even need - something but never get it. That is a very painful position to be in. Some of them may well adopt a sour grapes attitude, persuading themselves that it isn't worth having; others may realise that they have little choice but to try to come to terms with things as they are, not as they would like them to be.

Fred Pohl's experience may seem rather sad, but the other situation is worse.

Doris Lessing on books, reading and public libraries

This blog contains many posts about books, reading and public libraries. Some articles feature writers' words on these topics of interest; L. M. Montgomery and the compulsion to read and write is just one example.

I recently came across some relevant quotations from the writer Doris Lessing. Although her words were new to me, they are similar to some material that was already on here.

This is interesting:

“I didn't go to school much, so I taught myself what I knew from reading.”

Isaac Asimov said something similar, and being mostly self-taught also applies to me.

Doris Lessing is yet another writer who has nothing but praise for public libraries and promotes the positive effects of reading:

“A public library is the most democratic thing in the world. What can be found there has undone dictators and tyrants: demagogues can persecute writers and tell them what to write as much as they like, but they cannot vanish what has been written in the past, though they try often enough...People who love literature have at least part of their minds immune from indoctrination. If you read, you can learn to think for yourself.”

This is interesting in the context of the article about cults that restrict their members' reading. 

In her novel The Golden Notebook, Doris Lessing advises readers to be very selective when deciding what to read:

“There is only one way to read, which is to browse in libraries and bookshops, picking up books that attract you, reading only those, dropping them when they bore you, skipping the parts that drag—and never, never reading anything because you feel you ought, or because it is part of a trend or a movement.“

I mentioned skipping some off-putting material in the final article about Elizabeth Goudge's Valerians. 

I mentioned browsing the shelves as a way to find something good to read in the article about the reader's dilemma of so many books, so little time.

There is no harm in just taking a quick look at recommended and fashionable books though: our radar will soon tell us whether or not a book is worth reading! 

Doris Lessing with some books:

Something about Jonathan Stroud’s magicians

Terry Pratchett's wise words about magic and witches have been featured or mentioned in several articles. I said this in More magic and witch wisdom:

“The points he makes and the warnings he gives have a much wider application than to just his imaginary world and characters.”

The above extract has a wider application than to just Terry Pratchett: it has relevance to Jonathan Stroud and his magicians, an elite group who operate in an alternative modern London that is ruled by magic.

The Amulet of Samarkand, the first book in Stroud's Bartimaeus series, has been referenced in an article about William Gladstone and in one about disowning unworthy people in favour of books. I have selected some more material from The Amulet in order to highlight some of what Stroud says about his magicians. 

While Terry Pratchett respects and is fond of his witches, Jonathan Stroud obviously dislikes and despises most of his magicians. They certainly seem to be a very unpleasant bunch indeed; they remind me of David Icke's reptilians! 

Some characteristics of magicians
Jonathan Stroud's magicians are very status conscious. They seek out opportunities for social climbing. Image is everything; they are fixated with the trappings of wealth. They are always greedy for more. 

The magicians are hierarchical and authoritarian; they flatter their superiors and are arrogant with anyone they see as their inferior. They have nothing but contempt for ordinary people or 'commoners', i.e. those with no magical abilities.

Who is being described here?
These extracts remind me of another group of people:

“With magicians it's usually pretty simple: they fall into three distinct types, motivated by ambition, greed, or paranoia.”

“Magicians are the most conniving, jealous, duplicitous group of people on earth, even including lawyers and academics. They worship power and the wielding thereof, and seek every chance they can to undercut their rivals.“

“You believed in the notion of the honourable magician, who takes responsibility for his actions. Mere propaganda. Such a thing does not exist. There is no honour, no nobility, no justice. Every magician acts only for himself, seizing each opportunity he can. When he is weak, he avoids danger—which is why second-raters plod away within the system.”

This sounds rather like something that Taylor Caldwell  would say about politicians!

Another edition of this entertaining book:

Archy and Mehitabel: the cockroach and the cat

Archy and Mehitabel (usually written as archy and mehitabel) are the names of two fictional characters created in 1916 by Don Marquis (July 28 1878 to June 16 1937), who was a columnist for The Evening Sun newspaper in New York City. 

I first came across these two endearing characters during my schooldays; memories of them surfaced from the depths recently and inspired a short article.

Great friends Archy, a cockroach, and Mehitabel, an alley cat, appeared in hundreds of humorous verses and short stories in Marquis’s daily column. The cartoonist George Herriman was the main illustrator. This material was later published in book form.

Archy the cockroach is the reincarnation of a poet; he produces his work on a typewriter, in lower case as he can't manage the shift key. There are few rhymes and no punctuation; he writes in free verse. I recommend taking his creations in small doses!

Mehitabel the cat has a 'past' in more ways than one! She claims to be the reincarnation of Cleopatra. She sings and dances, and Archy transcribes her words. She often uses the expressions 'wotthehell' and 'toujours gai'.

Archy and Mehitabel:

Mehitabel has, she says, come down in the world. She tells Archy about her glamorous past and he types it all up. She may be exaggerating a little!  Here, Archy says “And then, what did the 'Duke' say to you?”:

Mehitabel talks about herself
In this short extract from the rather long "song of mehitabel" as  recorded by Archy, Mehitabel the former queen finds freedom from the royal life:

“i have had my ups and downs

but wotthehell wotthehell

yesterday sceptres and crowns

fried oysters and velvet gowns

and today i herd with bums

but wotthehell wotthehell

…

do you think that i would change

my present freedom to range

for a castle or moated grange

wotthehell wotthehell

cage me and i d go frantic

my life is so romantic

capricious and corybantic

and i m toujours gai toujours gai“

Archy talks about himself
This is an extract from “the wail of archy”, in which he complains about having to live as a cockroach:

“i once was a vers libre poet

i died and my spirit migrated 

into the flesh of a cockroach

gods how i yearn to be human 

neither a vers libre poet

nor yet the inmate of a cockroach 

a six footed scurrying cockroach

given to idiot hexameters 

longfellowish sprawling hexameters 

rather had i been a starfish

to shoot a heroic pentameter

gods i am pent in a cockroach

i with the soul of a dante

am mate and companion of fleas

i with the gift of a homer

must smile when a mouse calls me pal

tumble bugs are my familiars

this is the punishment meted

because i have written vers libre”

Anyone who would like to see some more of the same can find it in books such as these:

Some pessimistic words about politicians from Taylor Caldwell

Taylor Caldwell's wise words on political matters appear in several articles, most recently in one that quotes what she said in Captains and the Kings: The Story of an American Dynasty about the sinister forces that operate behind the scenes.

There may not be much that is particularly original in what she has to say - it may often seem that she is just stating the obvious - but the way she expresses her ideas really brings the depressing messages home.

This proposition comes from the same book:

“A politician, as we know, who serves the people, really serves them out of conviction and idealism, is eventually despised by them as a naïve imbecile. But a scoundrel of color, who can invent a few deadly aphorisms of his own, and can laugh and twinkle and joke, gets their adoration, and even if he is later exposed for what he is—a thief, a time-server, a liar—the public becomes hysterical at the 'attacks' on him. In fact, the public will attack the outraged attackers of their darling.”

This makes me think of a few scoundrelly but colourful politicians, past and present, in the UK! Such people do indeed get away with a lot because of their charming and amusing personas.

Another edition of Taylor Caldwell's best-selling historical novel, which was first published in 1972:

Abraham Lincoln and the books in the barrel of rubbish

The article about Robert A. Heinlein's Citizen of the Galaxy  tells of how a seed was sown in my mind by a story I read 'by chance'. This story eventually influenced my choice of profession – and thus the entire course of my life.

With hindsight, I wonder if it really was just chance that someone came to stay for a short time with his box of books and science fiction magazines, one of which contained the influential story.

I recently learned that something similar happened to Abraham Lincoln.

In his case it was a barrel not a box, he (unwittingly) bought rather than borrowed the reading material, it was a set of books not a magazine, it was a treatise on English common law rather than a science fiction story, and he was the junior partner in a store at the time rather than a child. 

Just as what I read sparked my interest in computers and inspired me to become a computer programmer, Abraham Lincoln became fascinated by what he read of the law and went on to become a lawyer.

These are Lincoln's own words:

"One day a man who was migrating to the West drove up in front of my store with a wagon which contained his family and household plunder. He asked me if I would buy an old barrel for which he had no room in his wagon, and which contained nothing of special value. I did not want it, but to oblige him I bought it, and paid him, I think, half a dollar for it. Without further examination I put it away in the store and forgot all about it.

"Some time after, in overhauling things, I came upon the barrel, and emptying it on the floor to see what it contained, I found at the bottom of the rubbish a complete set of 'Blackstone's Commentaries.' I began to read those famous works. I had plenty of time; for during the long summer days, when the farmers were busy with their crops, my customers were few and far between. The more I read the more intensely interested I became. Never in my whole life was my mind so thoroughly absorbed. I read until I devoured them."

Although this anecdote was new to me, it is very well known and has been quoted in many places. The reason for repeating it here is that it provides a very good example of the unseen influences that appear to be at work in some people's lives.

The books that started it all were first published in 1765:

Two quotations about self-belief

This blog contains many posts in which two writers are featured; sometimes this because of what they had to say about topics of interest.

It is fascinating to see that very different people from different generations and even from different continents sometimes sing from the same song sheet!

The great writer Isaac Asimov, who has been featured in several articles, has also been paired with Noel Streatfeild and quoted in a post about Frances Hodgson Burnett.

May Sinclair has also appeared in many articles, Both she and Isaac Asimov had something to say about the importance of self-belief. Their wise words speak for themselves.

Isaac Asimov said this:

“And above all things, never think that you’re not good enough yourself. A man should never think that. My belief is that in life people will take you at your own reckoning.” 

May Sinclair's words on the subject:

"If you don't believe in yourself, you'll have some difficulty in making other people believe in you." 

These propositions are worth thinking about.