-A window ajar is a prelude in building to the joy of being limitless! That uneasiness of being familiar somehow, sometime, somewhere.......

Saturday, September 16, 2006

Quarantine...

"What do you mean by isolation?" I asked him.



"Why, the isolation that prevails everywhere, above all in our age -- it has not fully developed, it has not reached its limit yet. For everyone strives to keep his individuality as apart as possible, wishes to secure the greatest possible fullness of life for himself; but meantime all his efforts result not in attaining fullness of life but self-destruction, for instead of self-realisation he ends by arriving at complete solitude. All mankind in our age have split up into units, they all keep apart, each in his own groove; each one holds aloof, hides himself and hides what he has, from the rest, and he ends by being repelled by others and repelling them. He heaps up riches by himself and thinks, 'How strong I am now and how secure,' and in his madness he does not understand that the more he heaps up, the more he sinks into self-destructive impotence. For he is accustomed to rely upon himself alone and to cut himself off from the whole; he has trained himself not to believe in the help of others, in men and in humanity, and only trembles for fear he should lose his money and the privileges that he has won for himself. Everywhere in these days men have, in their mockery, ceased to understand that the true security is to be found in social solidarity rather than in isolated individual effort. But this terrible individualism must inevitably have an end, and all will suddenly understand how unnaturally they are separated from one another. It will be the spirit of the time, and people will marvel that they have sat so long in darkness without seeing the light. And then the sign of the Son of Man will be seen in the heavens.... But, until then, we must keep the banner flying. Sometimes even if he has to do it alone, and his conduct seems to be crazy, a man must set an example, and so draw men's souls out of their solitude, and spur them to some act of brotherly love, that the great idea may not die."

~ Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Brothers Karamazov.

13 comments:

Anonymous said...

wow. how then is self-realization attained?

Ubermensch said...

Hey adhoc,
According to me, Not be to attained and all. It is all arbitrary. If you are happy for a moment you are thats all. its no end point.
cheers

Rajesh said...

...that and everything else in that book are unforgettable. At any point in time I can find myself flounder somewhere between Alyosha and Dmitri. Besides the grand inquisition part is out of this world. A Bible beyond the bible.

Reading this bit had me thinking once again: how much ever one is amassing - physical or intellectual wealth that takes him/her away from the joys of sharing and accessibility, he must deal with the eventual break down. I think I have seen both.

Time to celebrate my mediocrity :)

Ubermensch said...

I agree Rajesh. I have posted that as a part of rechecking all my premises, a complete expurgation into anonymous mediocrity to justify all the worth.Silent stringing into highest arc and all. Although unforgettable, i must remind myself constantly. Just like some html, some exile should be of help.
cheers

Anonymous said...

well...donno what to say.
whatever i had known abt Fyodor Dostoyevsky was something abt his influences on Kafka, Camus n all and also some of his works were talked abt existentialism but whatever this quoted passage says simply contradicts existentialism..

Anonymous said...

I tried to reply to this awhile back but it obviously didn't take... :-)

Anyway... wow. Thank you. I will put this on my "to read" list :-)

Finny Forever said...

meanwhile. where have u gone away to? so completely?

junat said...

well i think that soltitude ,literally and not the one developed by self intrest , help one to become self dependent and a stronger character .

Anonymous said...

Hey, whats up? no posts?

- viju

Anonymous said...

painfully real.

yet it contest its message, heart n' soul
..why believe that individualism must end in self-defeat?

there must be another way.

Tony J. said...

i didn't expect to find this here. hadn't expected anything, really, but this is...eery. don't know why but i feel such isolation from everyone these days. and the more i try to close the space between myself and others, the wider it gets. funny that i happened to drop in to find this here.

i miss your presence in my pocket, by the way...hope you are well...

Anonymous said...

do you drive a volvo?

Ubermensch said...

thanks everyone.

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