Our Birthday
Our Birthday
From G. K.s Weekly, March 21, 1935. This was written on the occasion of the paper’s 10th anniversary.
As this is a Birthday Number, I propose to write about birthdays in a futile and irresponsible manner, as befits a festive occasion; and to leave for a later issue some of the serious questions that are raised in this one. I remember that long ago, in one of my countless controversies with Mr. Bernard Shaw, I commented on a scornful remark of his that he did not keep his own birthday and would not be bothered with anybody else’s; and I argued that this exactly illustrates the one point upon which he is really wrong; and that if he had only kept his birthday, he might have kept many other things along with it. It will be noted that, with the magnificent magnanimity in which he has never failed, especially in dealing with me and my romantic delusions, he has contributed to this special number an article dealing with very vital matters. I hope to answer that article, in greater detail, in due course; here I will only give a very general reply upon the particular aspect which is excellently and exactly represented by Birthdays.
For one happy hour, in talking about Birthdays, I shall not stoop to talk about Birth-Control. But when Mr. Shaw asks why I doubt that he and I, not to mention Mr. H. G. Wells and Mr. Bertrand Russell, can form a committee to produce a creed, not to say a cosmos—my general answer is that the difference begins with the very birth of the conception. A Birthday embodies certain implicit ideas; with some of which he agrees and is right; with others of which he disagrees and is wrong. In some matters the difference between us seems to amount to this: that I very respectfully recognize that he disagrees with me; but he will not even allow me to disagree with him. But there is one fundamental truth in which I have never for a moment disagreed with him. Whatever else he is, he has never been a pessimist; or in spiritual matters a defeatist. He is at least on the side of Life, and in that sense of Birth. When the Sons of God shout for joy, merely because the creation is in being, Mr. Shaw’s splendid Wagnerian shout or bellow will be mingled with my less musical but equally mystical song of praise. I am aware that in the same poem the patriarch Job, under the stress of incidental irritations, actually curses the day he was born; prays that the stars of its twilight be dark and that it be not numbered among the days of the year; but I am sure that G.B.S. will not carry his contempt for birthday celebrations to that length. The first fact about the celebration of a birthday is that it is a way of affirming defiantly, and even flamboyantly, that it is a good thing to be alive. On that matter, and it is a basic matter, there really is a basis of agreement; and Mr. Shaw and I, giving our performance as morning stars that sing together, will sing in perfect harmony if hardly with equal technique.
But there is a second fact about Birthdays, and the birth-song of all creation, a fact which really follows on this; but which, as it seems to me, the other school of thought almost refuses to recognize. The point of that fact is simply that it is a fact. In being glad about my Birthday, I am being glad about something which I did not myself bring about. In being grateful for my birth, I am grateful for something which has already happened; which happened, sad as it may seem to some, quite a long time ago. Now it seems to me that Mr. Shaw and his school start almost everything in the spirit of people who are saying, I shall myself select the 17th of October as the date of my birth. I propose to be born at Market Harborough; I have selected for my father a very capable and humane dentist, while my mother will be trained as a high-class headmistress for the tremendous honor and responsibility of her position; before that, I think I shall send her to Girton. The house I have selected to be born in faces a handsome ornamental park, etc., etc.” In other words, it seems to me that modern thinkers of this kind have simply no philosophy or poetry or possible attitude at all, towards the things which they receive from the real, world that exists already; from the past; from the parent; from the patriotic tradition or the moral philosophy of mankind. They only talk about making things; as if they could make themselves as well as everything else. They are always talking about making a religion; and cannot get into their heads the very notion of receiving a revelation. They are always talking about making a creed; without seeing that it involves making a cosmos. But even then, we could not possibly make the cosmos that has made us. Now nobody who knows anything about my little tastes and prejudices will say that I am not in sympathy with the notion of making things. I believe in making thousands of things; making jokes, making pictures, making (as distinct from faking) goods, making books, and even articles (of which, as the reader will sadly perceive, there is no end), making toys, making tools, making farms, making homes, making churches, making sacred images; and, incidentally also, making war on people who would prevent me from doing these things. But the workshop, vast as it is, is only one half of the world. There is a whole problem of the human mind, which is necessarily concerned with the things that it did not make; with the things that it could not make; including itself. And I say it is so with any view of life, which leaves out the whole of that aspect of life; all receptivity, all gratitude, all inheritance, all worship. Unless a philosopher has a philosophy, which can make tolerable and tenable his attitude towards all the actualities that are around him and before him and behind him—then he has only half a philosophy; blind, though he is the wittiest man in the world, he is in that sense half-witted.
Mr. Bernard Shaw is certainly one of the wittiest men in the world, and about whole huge aspects of life, one of the wisest. But if I am to sit down with him at a committee of evolutionists, to draw up a creed for humanity, I fancy I foresee that this is the line along which I shall eventually come to issue my Minority Report. I shall find myself the representative, and I suspect the only representative of the implications of my Birthday. I do not even mind calling it the pride of birth, which of course has nothing to do with the pride of rank; so long as it involves the humility of birth also.
Our Birthday
Our Birthday
From G. K.s Weekly, March 21, 1935. This was written on the occasion of the paper’s 10th anniversary.
As this is a Birthday Number, I propose to write about birthdays in a futile and irresponsible manner, as befits a festive occasion; and to leave for a later issue some of the serious questions that are raised in this one. I remember that long ago, in one of my countless controversies with Mr. Bernard Shaw, I commented on a scornful remark of his that he did not keep his own birthday and would not be bothered with anybody else’s; and I argued that this exactly illustrates the one point upon which he is really wrong; and that if he had only kept his birthday, he might have kept many other things along with it. It will be noted that, with the magnificent magnanimity in which he has never failed, especially in dealing with me and my romantic delusions, he has contributed to this special number an article dealing with very vital matters. I hope to answer that article, in greater detail, in due course; here I will only give a very general reply upon the particular aspect which is excellently and exactly represented by Birthdays.
For one happy hour, in talking about Birthdays, I shall not stoop to talk about Birth-Control. But when Mr. Shaw asks why I doubt that he and I, not to mention Mr. H. G. Wells and Mr. Bertrand Russell, can form a committee to produce a creed, not to say a cosmos—my general answer is that the difference begins with the very birth of the conception. A Birthday embodies certain implicit ideas; with some of which he agrees and is right; with others of which he disagrees and is wrong. In some matters the difference between us seems to amount to this: that I very respectfully recognize that he disagrees with me; but he will not even allow me to disagree with him. But there is one fundamental truth in which I have never for a moment disagreed with him. Whatever else he is, he has never been a pessimist; or in spiritual matters a defeatist. He is at least on the side of Life, and in that sense of Birth. When the Sons of God shout for joy, merely because the creation is in being, Mr. Shaw’s splendid Wagnerian shout or bellow will be mingled with my less musical but equally mystical song of praise. I am aware that in the same poem the patriarch Job, under the stress of incidental irritations, actually curses the day he was born; prays that the stars of its twilight be dark and that it be not numbered among the days of the year; but I am sure that G.B.S. will not carry his contempt for birthday celebrations to that length. The first fact about the celebration of a birthday is that it is a way of affirming defiantly, and even flamboyantly, that it is a good thing to be alive. On that matter, and it is a basic matter, there really is a basis of agreement; and Mr. Shaw and I, giving our performance as morning stars that sing together, will sing in perfect harmony if hardly with equal technique.
Il Nostro Compleanno
Il Nostro Compleanno
Da G. K.’s Weekly, 21 marzo 1935. Scritto in occasione del decimo anniversario della testata.
Poiché questo è un Numero di Compleanno, mi propongo di scrivere sui compleanni in modo futile e irresponsabile, come si conviene a un’occasione festiva; e di lasciare a un numero successivo alcune delle questioni serie che vi sono sollevate. Ricordo che tanto tempo fa, in una delle mie innumerevoli controversie con il signor Bernard Shaw, commentai una sua sprezzante osservazione secondo cui non festeggiava il proprio compleanno e non si sarebbe scomodato per quello di nessun altro; e sostenni che questo illustra esattamente l’unico punto sul quale ha davvero torto; e che se solo avesse conservato il suo compleanno, avrebbe potuto conservare molte altre cose insieme ad esso. Si noterà che, con la magnifica magnanimità nella quale non è mai venuto meno, specie nel trattare con me e le mie romantiche illusioni, ha contribuito a questo numero speciale con un articolo che affronta questioni vitalissime. Spero di rispondere a quell’articolo, più nel dettaglio, a tempo debito; qui darò solo una replica molto generale sul particolare aspetto che è ottimamente ed esattamente rappresentato dai Compleanni.
Per un’ora felice, parlando di Compleanni, non mi abbasserò a parlare del Controllo delle Nascite. Ma quando il signor Shaw chiede perché io dubiti che lui e io, per non parlare del signor H. G. Wells e del signor Bertrand Russell, possiamo formare un comitato per produrre un credo, per non dire un cosmo—la mia risposta generale è che la differenza comincia con la nascita stessa della concezione. Un Compleanno incarna certe idee implicite; con alcune delle quali egli concorda e ha ragione; con altre delle quali dissente e ha torto. In certe faccende la differenza tra noi sembra ridursi a questo: che io riconosco molto rispettosamente che egli dissente da me; ma egli non vuole nemmeno permettere che io dissenta da lui. Ma c’è una verità fondamentale sulla quale non ho mai per un solo istante dissentito da lui. Qualunque altra cosa egli sia, non è mai stato un pessimista; né, in materia spirituale, un disfattista. È perlomeno dalla parte della Vita, e in tal senso della Nascita. Quando i Figli di Dio esultano di gioia, semplicemente perché la creazione è in essere, lo splendido grido o muggito wagneriano del signor Shaw si mescolerà al mio meno musicale ma ugualmente mistico canto di lode. So bene che nello stesso poema il patriarca Giobbe, sotto la stretta di irritazioni contingenti, maledice davvero il giorno in cui nacque; prega che le stelle del suo crepuscolo siano oscure e che esso non sia annoverato tra i giorni dell’anno; ma sono certo che G.B.S. non spingerà il suo disprezzo per le celebrazioni dei compleanni fino a quel punto. Il primo fatto riguardo alla celebrazione di un compleanno è che essa è un modo di affermare con sfida, e persino con sfarzo, che è una buona cosa essere vivi. Su quella faccenda, e è una faccenda basilare, c’è davvero un fondamento d’accordo; e il signor Shaw e io, dando la nostra esibizione come stelle del mattino che cantano insieme, canteremo in perfetta armonia, seppure con tecnica non proprio pari.
But there is a second fact about Birthdays, and the birth-song of all creation, a fact which really follows on this; but which, as it seems to me, the other school of thought almost refuses to recognize. The point of that fact is simply that it is a fact. In being glad about my Birthday, I am being glad about something which I did not myself bring about. In being grateful for my birth, I am grateful for something which has already happened; which happened, sad as it may seem to some, quite a long time ago. Now it seems to me that Mr. Shaw and his school start almost everything in the spirit of people who are saying, I shall myself select the 17th of October as the date of my birth. I propose to be born at Market Harborough; I have selected for my father a very capable and humane dentist, while my mother will be trained as a high-class headmistress for the tremendous honor and responsibility of her position; before that, I think I shall send her to Girton. The house I have selected to be born in faces a handsome ornamental park, etc., etc.” In other words, it seems to me that modern thinkers of this kind have simply no philosophy or poetry or possible attitude at all, towards the things which they receive from the real, world that exists already; from the past; from the parent; from the patriotic tradition or the moral philosophy of mankind. They only talk about making things; as if they could make themselves as well as everything else. They are always talking about making a religion; and cannot get into their heads the very notion of receiving a revelation. They are always talking about making a creed; without seeing that it involves making a cosmos. But even then, we could not possibly make the cosmos that has made us. Now nobody who knows anything about my little tastes and prejudices will say that I am not in sympathy with the notion of making things. I believe in making thousands of things; making jokes, making pictures, making (as distinct from faking) goods, making books, and even articles (of which, as the reader will sadly perceive, there is no end), making toys, making tools, making farms, making homes, making churches, making sacred images; and, incidentally also, making war on people who would prevent me from doing these things. But the workshop, vast as it is, is only one half of the world. There is a whole problem of the human mind, which is necessarily concerned with the things that it did not make; with the things that it could not make; including itself. And I say it is so with any view of life, which leaves out the whole of that aspect of life; all receptivity, all gratitude, all inheritance, all worship. Unless a philosopher has a philosophy, which can make tolerable and tenable his attitude towards all the actualities that are around him and before him and behind him—then he has only half a philosophy; blind, though he is the wittiest man in the world, he is in that sense half-witted.
Mr. Bernard Shaw is certainly one of the wittiest men in the world, and about whole huge aspects of life, one of the wisest. But if I am to sit down with him at a committee of evolutionists, to draw up a creed for humanity, I fancy I foresee that this is the line along which I shall eventually come to issue my Minority Report. I shall find myself the representative, and I suspect the only representative of the implications of my Birthday. I do not even mind calling it the pride of birth, which of course has nothing to do with the pride of rank; so long as it involves the humility of birth also.
Ma c’è un secondo fatto riguardo ai Compleanni, e al canto natale di tutto il creato, un fatto che in realtà discende da questo; ma che, a quanto mi pare, l’altra scuola di pensiero si rifiuta quasi di riconoscere. Il nòcciolo di quel fatto è semplicemente che è un fatto. Rallegrandomi del mio Compleanno, mi rallegro di qualcosa che non ho io stesso prodotto. Essendo grato della mia nascita, sono grato di qualcosa che è già accaduto; che è accaduto, per quanto ad alcuni possa parer triste, un bel po’ di tempo fa. Ora mi pare che il signor Shaw e la sua scuola comincino quasi ogni cosa nello spirito di chi dice: sceglierò io stesso il 17 ottobre come data della mia nascita. Mi propongo di nascere a Market Harborough; ho scelto per padre un dentista assai capace e umano, mentre mia madre sarà istruita come direttrice didattica di prim’ordine, per il tremendo onore e la responsabilità della sua posizione; prima di ciò, credo che la manderò a Girton. La casa che ho scelto per nascervi guarda su un elegante parco ornamentale, ecc., ecc.» In altre parole, mi pare che i pensatori moderni di questa specie non abbiano semplicemente alcuna filosofia o poesia o possibile atteggiamento, verso le cose che ricevono dal reale mondo che già esiste; dal passato; dal genitore; dalla tradizione patria o dalla filosofia morale dell’umanità. Parlano soltanto di fare cose; come se potessero fare se stessi non meno di quanto facciano ogni altra cosa. Parlano sempre di fare una religione; e non riescono a ficcarsi in testa la nozione stessa di ricevere una rivelazione. Parlano sempre di fare un credo; senza vedere che ciò comporta fare un cosmo. Ma anche allora, non potremmo in alcun modo fare il cosmo che ha fatto noi. Ora nessuno che sappia qualcosa dei miei piccoli gusti e pregiudizi dirà che io non simpatizzi con la nozione del fare le cose. Credo nel fare migliaia di cose; fare scherzi, fare quadri, fare (a differenza del contraffare) merci, fare libri, e persino articoli (dei quali, come il lettore mestamente s’avvedrà, non c’è mai fine), fare giocattoli, fare arnesi, fare fattorie, fare case, fare chiese, fare sacre immagini; e, incidentalmente, anche fare guerra a chi volesse impedirmi di fare queste cose. Ma l’officina, per quanto vasta, è solo una metà del mondo. C’è tutto un problema della mente umana, che si occupa necessariamente delle cose che essa non ha fatto; delle cose che non poté fare; compresa se stessa. E dico che così è per qualunque visione della vita che tralasci tutto quell’aspetto della vita; ogni ricettività, ogni gratitudine, ogni eredità, ogni adorazione. A meno che un filosofo non abbia una filosofia capace di rendere tollerabile e sostenibile il suo atteggiamento verso tutte le realtà che sono attorno a lui e davanti a lui e dietro di lui… allora egli ha solo mezza filosofia; cieco, per quanto sia l’uomo più arguto del mondo, in quel senso è un mezzo scemo.
Il signor Bernard Shaw è certamente uno degli uomini più arguti del mondo, e riguardo a interi, vasti aspetti della vita, uno dei più saggi. Ma se dovessi sedermi con lui a un comitato di evoluzionisti, per redigere un credo per l’umanità, mi pare di prevedere che questa è la linea lungo la quale finirò per emettere la mia Relazione di Minoranza. Mi ritroverò a essere il rappresentante, e sospetto l’unico rappresentante, delle implicazioni del mio Compleanno. Non mi dispiace nemmeno chiamarlo l’orgoglio della nascita, che naturalmente non ha nulla a che vedere con l’orgoglio del rango; purché comporti anche l’umiltà della nascita.