Having indulged myself to the full in that vastly superior manner of blogging, to wit, not blogging at all, I take up my pen once more. The definite disadvantage of this new method is that I have to write. The dubious advantage is that other people can read. I am often led to reflect upon the genius of Diogenes Cunctator, the great Epicurean philosopher whose contribution to philosophy was writing nothing. A very Epicurean accomplishment. He always did intend to produce an oeuvrage, but he contrived never to be at his desk at the right time, entered and exited life in total ignorance of the whereabouts of the publisher’s office, and never knew that his innocent assumption that his pen was sharpened and ready whenever he needed it was in fact false. He didn’t realise that he owned no pens. His life, as you can imagine, was the most profound commentary upon the Art of Procrastination ever composed. Bacon’s essay of the same name is also worth consulting.
I myself was determined to imitate this admirable if fabricated philosopher, and indeed had met with some success; but it so happened that I stumbled upon my desk one morning, and found that, unlike Cunctator, I did own a pen, and it was not quite hopelessly blunt either. The damage was done; I discovered with horror that I was disposed to verbal idleness rather than the more innocuous varieties, and that this inclination was incurable. The result was the chapters that follow.
They are about a philosopher who has been pooh-poohed from the academy; a scientist who is regularly denied that honour; a writer whose style is seen as his chief virtue, but whose chief virtue as a stylist is generally thought to be his incomprehensibility. Needless to say, Sir Thomas Bronwe has an exalted rather than a broad following.
Since Coleridge, Charles Lamb, Herman Melville and Borges have all been enamoured of his work, it is hardly necessary to write another eulogy for him. I could hardly find better praise for him than they already have. Well, I come to unbury him, not to praise him: and that labour might not be wholly. For a man who was ancient in his own time, whose works smelt of the grave before they were written, and who was, as it were, buried before he was dead – and he has been dead three centuries and more, now – a little exhumation seems necessary.
That said, it is not my purpose to modernise him. I have standardised his spelling in these essays, but I am convinced that the original spelling should be retained in new editions of Browne, even if that means that they are originall spelynges. Quaint presentation fits quaint thought, and sober spelling can make him sound dull when he is not. But it does no good to put his erratic spelling next to the monotonous rectitude of modern standardised English; it either makes it harder to take him seriously, or it makes it harder to take us seriously. I mention this not because spelling is all that important, but because it illustrates the attitude I have taken toward him generally. I have attempted the same thing with his ideas: I have shown that they are relevant to ourselves, but with a view to showing that they are relevant to issues for broader than the present generation’s. Like all true philosophers, he is eternally up to date because he is eternally out of date; as he was relevant in his own day, though he had no interest in current affairs, so he is relevant in our day though he could not have foreseen our current affairs.
For my contention is that he is not a mere stylist. His philosophy and personality matter more than his prose. That is to say, he is a good writer. No good writer is truly concerned with writing for its own sake. You will hear otherwise from critics and litterateurs who have the advantage (or disadvantage) of days on end with nothing to do other than idle reading, btu the truth is that no book is ever worth reading for its style alone. No book is ever interesting, however fine its style, if it is devoid of content. And if that ever seems to be the case – as it has seemed to many with Browne – then you ought to consider the possibility that it is the style of thought, not the style of the prose, that is gripping your attention. So it is with Browne. And I might as well confess from the start, that I think his works ought to be more popular, because I think his style of thought ought to be more popular.
theparsnipoftime 