DEPTH OR CONFUSION?

 

This is a rather sentimental entry devoted to the notable English classical scholar and editor George Long (1800-1879), whose commentary on Marcus Aurelius impressed me so much that I decided to give him an entry of his own, which now happens to find its home in this section. I know that there are many notables objectively more deserving than he is to receive such an entry, which they have not, but, I repeat, this is an entirely subjective choice of mine, which allows no objective argument on respective merits. So be it then!

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George Long is not on anybody’s list of persons deserving to be remembered. I know of him only from his Commentaries to Marcus Aurelius’ Thoughts. But his insights are preciously charming, if not too original in their own right. I have used several of them throughout this collection, and I see nothing wrong in doing it. Anyone who makes your mind click, big or small, deserves such attention!

Here now is an exceptionally thoughtful, a great deal provocative, and hilariously entertaining, in the best philosophical sense, passage from Long, which may explain my special partiality for him: “There is much in Antoninus that is hard to understand, and it might be said that he did not fully comprehend all that he wrote, which is in no way remarkable, for it happens that a man may write what neither he nor anybody can understand. The confusion sometimes may be in the inevitable ambiguity of language, rather than in the mind of the writer, for I cannot think that some of the wisest of men did not know what they intended to say.” On the strength of this gem alone, Long merits inclusion in my list of the great and memorable!

This is all very funny, but when it happens to me, I would not attribute it to some ambiguity of language. It only means that the passage requires a lot of work or a complete revision, to take care of the problem. The reason why I am making this note at all, is to make a memo to myself that, on second reading, everything ought to be made comprehensible, or else thrown out.

However, the legitimate question does exist, whether, from the linguistic point of view, it is possible to get lost inside a great labyrinth of complicated thoughts, so that while you are writing, you may think that you are on the right track, but when you are later on reading back to yourself what you had written, as if retracing your steps through the meandering passages of the labyrinth, then only do you realize that you have lost your way, and so, you try to recover that almost invisible thread of wool that your friend Ariadne had prudently provided you with, so that you can now overcome your dilemma, and triumph over the very angry bull that threatens to destroy your fragile mental composure.