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From: "Cory Ramage" <a0406@hotmail.com>
To: moq_focus@moq.org
Subject: MF Only the Isolated Speak
Date: Fri, 17 Dec 1999 13:23:11 CST
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Only the Isolated Speak
I have been enjoying this month's topic for discussion very much. Like
others I have many favorite passages in Lila and I wish to share more with
you now, if you care to read. First I would like to thank Marco for the
wonderful poem by Eugenio Montale. The title for this essay comes from
Montale as well, for he said "only
isolated people speak, only isolated people communicate; the others - the
people of mass communication - repeat, echo... "
I believe this fits Pirsig and his writings very well, as John observed in
his essay too: "What I seek is something that transcends that isolation.
Quality is on the edge of it, or I would not be writing this essay... " In
my heart I feel this is what Pirsig felt too, deep down, and this is why he
chose to write of Quality. We should be thankful for this or we would not be
here at this moment. For who would have told of Quality if not for "the most
isolated individual I have ever seen"?
"There's something obscene about the whole celebrity feeling." Of course
lone wolf Phaedrus would feel that way! But Pirsig goes on to tell me why I
have felt that way my whole life too, something I had never understood
before. "It looks and feels like Dynamic Quality for a while, but it isn't."
Yes, of course! Somehow, some of us know that innately. Others flock around
fame and fortune like moths to the flame. And more often than not they are
burned up in the flame of celebrity. And many others yet simply emulate
celebrities. Elvis impersonaters come immediately to mind. The Elvis Meme.
People of mass communication endlessly repeating and echoing a man long
dead, trapped in his own tragic isolation.
You see, only the isolated speak. People so different from everyone around
them that they have no way of interacting with others except to express
themselves through art, be it writing stories, painting pictures, inventing
something new, whatever. They speak sad truths that others refuse to believe
in themselves. And all too often the isolated are not recognized until long
after they're dead and buried. Sometimes they are never recognized.
Familiarity breeds contempt. We don't want our friends and neighbors to be
famous unless we are also famous, now do we?
Phaedrus cannot come down off the mountain and join mere mortals for long.
For he knows his celebrity flame will burn up those who flock around him.
And this isolation is manifest in all the lone wolf does. There are times
when a wolf can mingle unseen among the sheep but he cannot contain himself
long. His teeth are sharp and his wits far more cunning, and he knows this,
has known it all his life. Thus he prefers his mountain top and yet is
driven forth time after time in a desperate search for an end to the
isolation that drives him, until at last the wolf recognizes his own true
nature and accepts the isolation as the gift that it is.
"... it was an assertion of the Metaphysics of Quality that there exists a
reality beyond all these social mirrors." Only the isolated can see this and
they speak of it in hushed tones lest they be labeled mad and locked away.
The lone wolf knows of what he speaks and knows also that it will not be
comprehended by the social sheep and yet still he speaks, until finally he
is able to say what he wishes.
Then the lone wolf is silent once again. Watching. Waiting with infinite
patience and sadness. Ever-present and yet forever apart. Yes, only the
isolated can speak.
Cory
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