A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man

James Joyce explores the world of beauty and art within the development of the artist in the novel A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. Initially, this character development, confined not to one man, but paralleling the development of the (as opposed to a)artist appears somewhat straightforward, with a inner conflict with morality and purpose. However, Stephen’s quest emobdies contradiction.
"White roses and red roses: those were beautiful colours to think of. And the cards for the first and second place and third place were beautiful colours too: pink and cream and lavender. Lavender and cream and pink roses were beautiful to think of. Perhaps a wild rose might be like those colours and he remembered the song about the wild rose blossoms on the little green place. But you could not have a green rose. But perhaps somewhere in the world you could."
Joyce’s writing style begins simply, utilizing extremity to further propogate Stephan’s youth. As the character develops, so does the writing style. The most significant change with the physical written word occurs withing the concepts. The story begins to sing of contradiction and possibility and throughout a thread of truth is carried. Perhaps Joyce purposes the lack of truth in an absolute in everything but purpose. Stephan’s purpose is undeniable, his will consistent. And the development of his purpose, as opposed to the work he produces, proves important.

The Stranger

The short novel The Stranger by Albert Camus embodies contradiction. While the understanding the novel provokes remains undeniable, the stylistic value may prove even more emblematic of the underlying theme.

The facts are understood by everyone. Or just some people maybe, I don’t know. The Stranger proposes a message: “Live in the now. Death comes tomorrow.” But that doesn’t mean anything. Maybe it was just some people.

The action is absolute. And so are the feelings. The page turns. And the reader grasps the plot, easily. But when discussed, the individuality of interpretation comes into play.
He was happy. She was used to it. Men always understand each other.
It was natural, naturally.

Here Camus distorts traditional notions. It is the facts that prove ambiguous (his mother’s age, the reason for killing, the location of Salamano’s dog) while the feelings are absolute. This shift of societal norms, written in a basic way, proclaims complexity and substantiates a need for personal experience and understanding.

Crime and Punishment

What is insanity? Is selflessness a type of love? Does man crave tragedy?

These are a few of the questions proposed by Dostoyevsky in Crime and Punishment. On the surface level, this novel seems to propose that Roddy is mentally instable and may suffer from bout of insanity. But his hunger for power, his self-delusions, and his inability to process failure remains starkly familiar in the human condition. This realization and Roddy’s immediate but disturbing commonalities with the reader suggest that his initial appearance of lunacy is merely a façade. Leaving the reader questioning as to whether morality is a truer source of insanity. Sonia cares for Roddy on a level that remains immensely incomprehensible. Her preserved morality despite the depravity of her situation sharply juxtaposes Roddy’s lack-there-of. She commits herself to his revival and redemption. But it remains vastly unclear as to whether this selflessness equates love, or merely a desire for duty. This novel arises some excellent questions concerning the abilities and privileges of men, and again confirms the idea that an absolute remains difficult to find, and harder to justify.

King Lear

"Nothing will come of nothing." And with it everything.

This play breaks the preconceived bias towards insanity. People often believe lunacy to be a sign of deterioration, and whilst Shakespeare supports that it can be he says so non-absolutely. For, the madman, in a sense, has transcended beyond his humanity, embodying a man-like physique in which he alone may highlight the corruption of good and the majesty in evil, alone he may examine the world with an other-worldly eye. To exclaim that there exists “reason in madness” seems contradictory and quite mad itself. However, those that society deem as “crazy” often simply lack the social awareness that constricts man and enforces moral lies and obligations. It is the mad who no longer worries about his own status that can often observe the lunacy in structure and state an undiluted truth (if that exists).

One of the lesser acknowledged messages in King Lear is that of absolutism.
What in this play is absolute?
Power? no...
Not pride, not love, not lust. Neither understanding nor ignorance.
Even sanity remains far from absolute. The only object that appears to obtain an absolute image is the concept of “nothing.” But even “nothing,” itself practically personified in the play, consists of a complex riddle of understanding. Nothing can, and does, speak volumes. But sometimes it tells of the truth, and other times: the truth one desires heard. Nothing is absolute only because it is undeniable, unalterable. However, it remains absolute only in onset, the composition and influence are far from non-variable. So maybe nothing exists as a moment of always, absolute in its silence, but flexible in its interpretation.

Oedipus Rex

“My Children...” and so Oedipus Rex begins, a fatherly opening to a father so utterly doomed. Oedipus Rex is a play that delves into the powers of fate and the demands of destiny. Oedipus fails to shirk away from the truth and enlightenment seasons his downfall. He is a fated man, and no act of kindliness or understanding can save him; there exists no redemption. This play embodies an interesting idea of predestination and the lack of control.

But even in this world, where an individual can not absolve himself, do there exist moments of always?

The potency of the unwritten law seems absolute. Oedipus could not avoid his fate and his desire to eradicate his own ignorance, in a sense defining his humanity, disallows him from living in the dark. In the end his path may appear to hold little relevance; the end is both predictable and easily understood. And yet, the importance of this play lies in the how. And it is here that the absolutes dissipate.

Oedipus exercises power over his people and he lives contently for a time. This may mock his ultimate ending but this happiness is something. He maintains his morality and lives justly in most respects. This heroism, denoting a tragic hero, challenges the rigidity of his future.
But the actions after discovering this absolute are really what mold the flexibility of the play. Jocasta commits suicide, a gruesome end where she can ultimately apply power over her own fate. Oedipus blinds himself. This may appear as an escape from the ensuing visual horrors, but in reality it accentuates the shocking pain that requires no sight. It is an act of redemption, in a place where redemption is impossible. But perhaps the effort is all. And it is all his own.

In Oedipus the future may be absolute. But so is the past. And Oedipus's non-predetermined actions of the present sculpt this past.

The Big Question

The big (can I rightly describe it so?) question:

Where are the moments of always within never?
- complements of Muriel Barbery. Commentary from the novel The Elegance of the Hedgehog perpetuated this idea.

Conversely, what is the no of all nothing?
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She pulls a crayon out of a coloring box. It is grey. Grey like the sky. Grey like the sea. Grey. Or perhaps she feels meticulous. She describes the hue as light grey. Or dark. But in the end the color is still grey.

It was a hot summer's day, the type of day where one knows not where the sun lies; for its presence is everywhere. Above-behind-below I felt the fiery rays. The blistering warmth pressed my glistening skin against the rubber-burning concrete, holding me in a hug so intensive that I could feel my glands bruising. Bruising and spouting out the salty sweat that is their blood. I ducked into a store, any store, in order to escape the oppression. Lo and behold it was a bookstore. Standing in a room that one scarcely believes can remain in the greedy, technology-simple world of today, my eyes perceived no-one (though I am certain the store was packed with chill-seeking bodies). All I saw was a book. A book with a grey cover.

Any other day I would have picked up a novel I was familiar with, a recommended piece of literature, but on that day (whose date is lost to time) I extracted a novel of contradiction, a book about the beauty in ugliness and the wonder in monotony.

And although the outer cover has long since rested on the mass of pages beneath, closed, the story has never again sensed oblivion in my life. And this question, in my mind, lingers...

I wonder what these moments are. I gape at the beauty provided by true contradiction. I wonder what defines breathing oxymoron's. I wonder if an absolute can truly exist.
I wonder. I gape. I wonder. I wonder. And I will search.

So, why does this question grab me? Because I do not know the answer. And yet... answers are everywhere.

Atonement as a novel, as a concept, and as a feeling truly embodies this question. While digesting this book the reader is all but forced to ask if anyone is innocent. Are association and ignorance simply a type of sin? However, in this world of relatively absolute guilt, there persists a hope. An ultimate hope of always quite despite the concept of never. The love between Robbie and Cecilia does not work. It is awkward and impractical, impersonal and obsessive. It is simply not meant to be.

But on it persists.
So, can a trace of absolute exist within the picture of impossibility while in the element of barbaric and essential love?

I think it may be able to.


Reaching beyond literature - one may propose that anything that touches upon life runs the border of this question. But is that absolutely true? Probably not.

I guess I will see. Or find out...