In case you weren't there

"And it’s not that I have a particular animus against self-help philosophy. I think it works; it’s even worked for me on a short-term basis. But no matter how much it’s spun as philanthropic, how it’s really about spreading the good vibes to everyone, self-help is a self-ish philosophy: The source of happiness or unhappiness, of health and disease, is always within, your fault rather than the product of political or cultural, forces, the flawed nature of human nature and the societies it gives rise to. Or the fault of the moral order (or lack of one) of the cosmos."

This essay, by the delightful Ron Rosenbaum, who brought us Manhattan Passions (that essential element to any well-rounded collection of 1980s literature), has now very nicely summarized a certain aspect of my play. Not so much in the quote above, but certainly in Mr. Rosenbaum's questioning the validity of an optimistic mandate. It's something that has found itself into much of my writing of late.

The following passage in particular -- I think this is perhaps a rite of passage for many of us:

"Pessimism is impermissible because it challenges the American orthodoxy that there’s always an answer, always a solution to every problem. And if there’s an answer, a solution, there’s no need to despair, because eventually we’ll find the answer and act accordingly. As if "acting accordingly" was a given. I know I grew up thinking, in a very American way, this was true. That eventually reason would prevail and all parties in any dispute, however grave, would come together on a compromise. No matter what the dispute, it could be resolved, with patience and good will. Some have called this, after a school of optimistic British historians, "Whig history," history as inexorable progress.

I don’t believe in it any more. My answer to Rodney King: Sorry, my friend, on the evidence, in fact, we can’t all get along. We’re too twisted by the irresistible push and pull of bad impulses and bad ideas. If history teaches us anything, it teaches us that. History is the nightmare we can’t escape from."

The rest of the story: Errol Morris Has A Very Blue Line: Curse Darkness

By the way, if anyone would like to *read* the play I will happily provide.