Life as Art

You can blame this post on Obama, because going by the leading bookstore indicators, Obama fatigue has set in. That is not to say he will not win, but no longer does his mug on the cover of anything guarantee swift sales. Noting this reminds me of the infamous Warhol quote about "15 minutes" of fame. I'll grant Obama more than 15 minutes, but his star is dimming just the same.

Roundabout this time, I come across the book pictured above. It occurs to me that I know very few people who love Hemingway's writing. Those that do seem to be either advanced in years or male or both. Yet Hemingway as a character himself is almost universally beloved. I wonder how the great man would feel that it is his colorful career rather than his spartan prose that excites many readers?

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Fertile ground for rumination, here. After all, there have been a plethora of autobiographies by people who are essentially nobodies. They haven't crossed the Delaware, cured polio, or even performed Hamlet on stage. True, in the modern purview even Willie Loman was worthy of a work of literature. "Could it be that there is something more to this, though?" I ask myself. So...

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Deep, deep thought of the day: In a world in which we deny the existence of great men and women... even Mother Teresa came in for criticism and had her faith questioned... in a world that is increasingly less literate... the average adult American reads four books a year and when was the last time a book of poetry by anyone other than a talented dying boy who appeared on Larry King was a best seller... centered more and more on the ego... could it be that in a stark, post modern world, stripped of furbelows and flounces, our creative impulses have turned inward and we look upon our lives as just so much clay to make a statement? It could explain the inauthenticity which surrounds us. Verry Interresting.

By the way, the book looks interesting. More here.