The Guthries have clashed in space and I have not found a lot to write about it.
Original download Guthrie says:
"'They really got to you, didn't they? Wouldn't you like a reprogramming job? Be your own man again.'"
Anti-Guthrie replies:
"'Man? Hah.'"
Each has a part of the truth which is what we should expect.
How can we be our own man? I think that we must at least question whatever beliefs and values we were brought up in even if we later reason our way back to those same beliefs and values. I questioned and reasoned my way to different beliefs and values but cannot set myself up as the measure of all things. Don't just rationalize received beliefs. Consider alternatives. We can buy translations of all the scriptures and philosophies in a good bookshop and can visit many different places of worship. On an evening walk in Liverpool, I passed a parish church, a mosque, a Latin Rite Catholic church and a Krishna temple and then returned to my apartment to practice zazen. In my childhood, we passed three other churches to get to ours and never went into any of the others.
I am glad that I have a conscience but, if my conscience were somehow removed, then I would become a person who was glad not to be constrained by a conscience.
3 comments:
Kaor, Paul!
Commenting on your last paragraph: exactly! Such a person would be a psychopath or sociopath. A moral monster. One of the most frightening books I ever read was Taylor Caldwell's WICKED ANGEL, giving readers a very alarming and, to me, what seems to b a realistic depiction of how sociopaths behave and think.
A smart sociopath learns how to control his amorality, finding out how far he can go before running afoul of the law or what a society finds tolerable. The stupid ones get themselves killed or imprisoned. And the smart ones knows how to be subtly cruel and emotionally abusive and manipulative of spouses and children.
I used to be something of a fan of Taylor Caldwell, before I got tired of most of the books of hers that I read. The last straw was DEAR AND GLORIOUS PHYSICIAN, her novel about St. Luke. I simply could not buy a tall, blond, blue eyed St. Luke who hobnobbed with Roman Emperors. The real St. Luke was most likely short, black haired, olive complexioned, and with brown eyes!
I want historical novelists to respect either what is known to be true or is likely to be true! As of now, I have only two of Caldwell's book: WICKED ANGEL, and THE EARTH IS THE LORD'S. That latter being her novel about Genghis Khan, and which seems to be reasonably factual.
Ad astra! Sean
Sean,
It was to eliminate such a person that Poirot took the law into his own hands in his last novel.
Paul.
Kaor, Paul!
Alas, I never did read that Agatha Christie novel. I used to have a fair number of her books, but not that one. But I can well believe Poirot came up against one of the smart psychopaths, able to hide all or most traces of his crimes.
Ad astra! Sean
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