Coming Of Age

The past wasn't better. Nor was it less complicated. Consider any period of the recent or distant past and look at the conditions under which people lived and the things that were going on. (Yes, life may have been elegant for the wealthy few during the Regency- but there was a European war in progress, people died of what are now curable conditions- Jane Austen for instance- and most people lived in conditions of serfdom or slavery.) There may have been a better time in the very far past- in Atlantis or Lemuria or the Garden of Eden- but no time you can name that belongs to the historical record was better than the present.

I'll go further. All of them were worse.

What we're going through right now is a period of transition, of accelerated change. Old certainties are failing us and we don't know what's going to replace them. We can chose to see this as frightening or full of potential. One thing that's trending- across the globe- is intolerance of oppression in all and any of its forms. The forces of oppression are fighting back- of course they are- and may score some victories along the line- but they won't win in the long term because the human spirit- which is coming of age- won't stand for it.

Hellas

I've been reading Shelley's Hellas- once to get the gist of it, a second time to feel its power.

The year is 1821. The Greeks are in revolt against the Ottoman Empire. The Turkish Sultan receives news of defeats and victories- and struggles with the knowledge that however many he kills and however many times his armies win, he and his tyranny belong to the past- and a new world- a greater Hellas- is struggling to be born.

The verse teems with abstractions and coruscates with images of natural forces- earthquake, storm and fire. I have held Shelley at a distance for a long time- ever since adolescence in fact. Suddenly I find him timely.

The world’s great age begins anew,
The golden years return,
The earth doth like a snake renew
Her winter weeds outworn:
Heaven smiles, and faiths and empires gleam,
Like wrecks of a dissolving dream.