Tuesday, May 19, 2009
Clarifying Fitzgerald post
Regarding part of the discussion in the comments following yesterday's post by TigerHawk concerning the "false promise of idle retirement," I thought it might be helpful to provide full context for the quote that was mentioned:
"Of course all life is a process of breaking down, but the blows that do the dramatic side of the work - the big sudden blows that come, or seem to come, from outside - the ones you remember and blame things on and, in moments of weakness, tell your friends about, don't show their effect all at once. There is another sort of blow that comes from within - that you don't feel until it's too late to do anything about it, until you realize with finality that in some regard you will never be as good a man again. The first sort of breakage seems to happen quick - the second kind happens almost without your knowing it but is realized suddenly indeed. Before I go on with this short history, let me make a general observation - the test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function. One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise."(emphasis added)
Excerpted from The Crack-Up, by fellow University Cottage Club member F. Scott Fitzgerald '17. I would trade him a healthy liver for 1% of his writing talent.
4 Comments:
By 
Dawnfire82, at
Tue May 19, 10:25:00 PM:
"test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function."
I think this is one of those quotations that seems correct and insightful at first glance, but really isn't.
By 
, at
Wed May 20, 10:31:00 AM:
I agree with Dawnfire. Furthermore, the money quote is actually the line that follows: One should, for example, be able to see that things are hopeless and yet be determined to make them otherwise."
It's hard to think of another case of cognitive dissonance so powerful that it would denote a first rate intelligence. For that matter, determination in the face of hopelessness speaks more to character than intelligence.
By , at
Wed May 20, 06:26:00 PM:
I've always thought Walker Percy was as close as we've come to a latter-day F. Scott Fitzgerald.
The last line in the quoted passage seems like something he might have come up with.
By Noumenon, at
Sat May 23, 09:59:00 AM:
The quote as I always seem to hear it says "If you can do mental gymastics and withhold judgment, you are superior." The quote as it was actually intended says "Don't let knowing better keep you from trying." Intellectuals like to stroke ourselves with the first quote; the real version actually points out one of our failings! Good post.
