Yesterday's Heroes (and a Bloke on a Floe)

 

(Photo (detail) by Steve Shapiro in Life Magazine  from November 16 1964, article by Frank Kappler)

Here is Dr Norman Alcock, a Pacifist Physicist (and scourge of the tongue-tieable), standing on a Lake Ontario ice floe to dramatize his plea for peace. The image, unsurprisingly, accompanies an article about Jean-Paul Sartre(JPS).

According to Life, the picture above is an accidental but striking symbol of Sartre's beliefs. The Scientist on the ice floe not only looks as poignantly abandoned as M.Sartre says all men are, but just by being in this odd situation he shows that he has committed himself - as Sartre says all men are obliged to do if they are to escape a meaningless life'. And here was me thinking it was simply a Bloke on a Floe. (It would also appear, then, that I am not the only one who makes gargantuan, over-imaginative leaps in the interpretation of images).

Growing up, as I did, surrounded by Theologians, Existentialism and Humanism always had a certain forbidden allure for me. (In fact, I wanted to call this post "Sexistentialism On Ice!!" but found the inclusion of the word "sexist" in that title somewhat unpalatable.) You may have observed by now that one of my many missions in life is to demonstrate that even the Poignantly Abandoned can have a few feeble laffs now and then. So I need not expand much further on the appeal that this image and the article hold for me. But, as ever, I will.

The article exudes a general mistrust of JPS. It states that, like any good existentialist, he had for years acted on his thoughts with bravado. Most significantly, perhaps, it states that he was resigned to being walleyed and short.As if somehow that explained everything - the whole angst-ridden kit and kaboodle, a good deal of Twentieth Century Thought, hell being other people and all that. The writer is at pains to emphasise that, despite his potentially life-altering insight, JPS still had to live in a house and get about being all bourgeois and stuff. He coyly hints that the open relationship of Those Swingin' Sartre-De Beauvoirs' was really as conventional as any marriage, and equates JPS's Existentialism with religion. It is as though the author is saying, 'Ha! You fancy pants Existentialists are just like the rest of us mugs! Sucked in!' But, come now, what did the author expect? A Bloke on a Floe?

Existentialism seems rather quaint now. Does anyone still come up with these new, highly debatable philosophies? Philosophies that would have such an impact on popular culture as to appear on the pages of Life Magazine? Or are we all too preoccupied with buying bibelots and other forms of gimcrackery, destroying everything, or eking out some kind of tremulous existence from the dust? 

Finally, in discussing the ephemeral nature of Schools of Thought, I must explain that Jean Paul Sartre(JPS) is not to be confused with Australian singer from the 1970s, John Paul Young(JPY)*.  This is despite the alarming similarities between the two. JPY's first hit single was the eerily prophetic 'Yesterday's Hero' which, while not exactly Nausea, exhibited considerable self-awareness: 

Take a look at me, I'm yesterday's hero
Yesterday's hero, that's all I'd be-ee-ee-ee-ee-ee-ee..

JPS, by comparison, once said:

I don't mind if my fellow men forget about me the day after I am buried. As long as they're alive, I'll haunt them, unnamed, imperceptible, present in every one of them just as the billions of dead who are unknown to me and whom I preserve from annihilation are present in me.

Uncanny, I know. But neither a patch on The Bloke on a Floe.

 

*or Sarah Jessica Parker(SJP), for that matter. Or Justices of The Peace(JPs). Or Pajamas(PJs). 

 

Comments

[elizabeth]

May I just vent for a moment and say I hate philosophers and their philosophies? My father-in-law is a philosopher and a crazier, more self-centered man you could not (and would not) hope to meet. There. I feel better now and can even admit to a teen-aged flirtation with the Monsieurs Sartre and Camus, and some deep tete-a-tetes with Mme. de Beauvoir.

But, finally, I'm more of a bloke on a flow kind of person. Some of us float alone. Some of us (e.g. me) keep pulling more and more people onto their floe. But we all call back and forth between our floating islands of life - 'How's your mum?' or "Sharks over there. better go this way...." Sometimes we even send frivolous gifts because if something that makes me laugh also makes you laugh, then we've knit our floes together with the bond of laughter.

I like the title (S)existentialism on ice! Sounds way more fun than philosophy (in its hobnailed boots and humorless dark clothing) skulking down the cement sidewalks of the gritty city, sitting in dive bars smoking serious cigarettes, and thinking serious thoughts.

And as for JPY, didn't he also write those deathless words, "Every time you go away, you take a piece of me with you."? That's very much the bloke on a flow school of thought - my floe is finite, so your removal of yourself from it lessens it.

And as for SJP, she's just a gal in a cab. Which is similar to a floe, but less dress and shoe ruining.
Sooooo I'm completely confused! Goodnight!

[a thousand shades of twilight]

Thanks for your comments, Elizabeth - I love them! Whatever philosophies your father in law is espousing, they don't seem to be working. Perhaps he needs to have a big old re-think. I couldn't agree more about philosophy - it seems rather self-indulgent and silly, and quite a strange career choice. Or, as we say here, a huge wank. I don't have the patience for it and would rather get on with living and enjoying myself. I'm all for accepting and, to the extent that it is possible, embracing the mystery and messiness of life.

I love what you wrote about us all being on our own ice floes. You're welcome on my floe any time, darling! Our floes have been long knit together by laughter and it feels like we are close neighbours in Floeville. And just imagine the scope for gentle prankery on all that slippery ice...tee hee!

As for JPY, just to add to the confusion, I believe those words were actually written by the English Paul Young (simply known as PY), but I love the sentiment!

I also love your description of SJP as just a gal in a cab - it is the withering understatement of the year. While I wish her no particular ill will, I must say that her appeal has always been somewhat elusive to me...

Anyway, dear, keep warm and sleep well..