THAT’S WHAT YOU GET FOR HAVING FUN: Notes from a weekend in New Haven.

* It’s possible–I’m not saying it’s a good idea, I’m just saying it’s possible–to consider Alyosha Karamazov as a zoon politikon. This isn’t really true of the other brothers.

* I seem to equivocate on the difference between “belief” and “feeling.” I’m starting to suspect that I call things feelings if I mistrust them, and beliefs if I don’t. That can’t possibly be the right terminology. I need to find a better way of talking about the fact that certain types of longing do imply facts about the world while other types of longing lead to a pointillist, self-sunken, disconnected view of life. CS Lewis says this, in “The Weight of Glory”:

…[W]e remain conscious of a desire which no natural happiness will satisfy. But is there any reason to suppose that reality offers any satisfaction to it? ‘Nor does the being hungry prove that we have bread.’ But I think it may be urged that this misses the point. A man’s physical hunger does not prove that man will get any bread; he may die of starvation on a raft in the Atlantic. But surely a man’s hunger does prove that he comes of a race which repairs its body by eating and inhabits a world where eatable substances exist. In the same way, though I do not believe (I wish I did) that my desire for Paradise proves that I shall enjoy it, I think it a pretty good indication that such a thing exists and that some men will. A man may love a woman and not win her; but it would be very odd if the phenomenon called ‘falling in love’ occurred in a sexless world.

* I had a really challenging, awesome discussion of the Fall. This led into a dispute over whether responsibility could ever be a part of love (I now think I was right, and it can, because promises are a part of love) and a dispute over whether the Fall changed humans intrinsically or solely changed our circumstances–whether the exile is internal, a warping of humanity, not only the lack of the Garden but the lack of the kind of self who could stand the Garden.

And here I think I may have been wrong–I think I may have been overly wedded to the language of the Fall as imposing an “inclination to sin.” As my interlocutor pointed out, if that’s true, it’s really hard to understand how Adam and Eve managed to sin at all–as he pointed out, it’s not like they held out for a long time! And there can’t really be an intelligible reason for sin, I think–all sins are like Iago’s sins.

But I do think it’s right to say that we’re not ourselves after the Fall. It isn’t only our circumstances that changed. It’s our ability to be distilled, to be the kind of love we as individuals might best exemplify; we aren’t who we are, which is why, as Nietzsche says, we have to become what we are. I think this way of talking acknowledges the (to me) obvious damage in the self, not only in our circumstances. (I’m reminded here of the really excellent passage from Perelandra in which the Earth man in Paradise wishes he could go outside for a smoke–he wants to be free of the stress of God’s regard.)

* Every college student should read Donna Tartt’s novel The Secret History. Ecstasy and its epigones.

* Apparently, I can enjoy a discussion of Cixous, Gadamer, and Lacan, as long as I can make it actually a conversation about Elaine Scarry and the Weakerthans. Score!

(Oh, and hey, people who have seen the Spanish art show at the Guggenheim: What does this image make you think of? …Yeah, me too.)

* Almost every kind of fun I like seems to involve intellectual or social humiliation. Oh well. Offer it up.

* An exception: eating food! New Haven is such a wonderful city in which to feed. If you ever have the pleasure of visiting (it is, really, one of my favorite places, and I don’t care what anyone says!), make sure you get a hamburger at the Doodle, stuffed mushrooms at Anna Liffey’s (drinks also good, sincerely alcoholic and inexpensive, and perfectly situated a mere block from the confessionals of St Mary’s!), and, if possible, baker’s soup at Mory’s. Just sink your muzzle in and experience creaturely happiness.

* Walter Olson, of Overlawyered fame, is really awesome. I mean, I knew that. I just thought you guys might want to know too. …I also got to see Cacciaguida, who emphasized the power of Mozart; Alexander of Macedon, who spewed humility in all directions; Kira, who warred hilariously with the sky; this guy, who got to see Ennio Morricone, for which I think I might kill him!!!!; this guy, who forced me to back down on some of the belief/feeling stuff above; and many other people who skated the thin ice between the beautiful and the sublime. I had a wonderful time. It was very humiliating.