Arquivo de Notes | Page 243 of 282

Do the Diplomas Confer Indispensable Quality for Literature?

The day is likely to come when a diploma will be needed to formally publish a poem. And so the question will be even more exposed: do diplomas confer indispensable quality for literature? or, rather: do diplomas confer indispensable quality for anything? Of course, the obvious answer will come to light: no, houses have always been built by those who never had a diploma. And I imagine clandestine sonnets infinitely superior to those bearing the stamp of academic quality, showing that the academy has become much more of a bureaucratic institution, a business that generates employment and revenue, an obligatory prerequisite for performing any function than an entity that teaches what is relevant to exercising a professional activity. In the use of time, independent study is radically more profitable in the face of academic bureaucracy and the many hours employed in nothing when studying at a university—it is enough to evaluate, for example, the time spent moving to the institution and its weight in the equation, not to mention the quality of what is taught or the absolutely useless subjects. Laboratories, expensive physical structures, will probably continue to be monopolized by universities. For the activities of the intellect, however, the conclusion cannot be different: if one day they are rewarded for their merit, the world will be of the self-taught, and the gigantic and costly academic structure will be fatally doomed to collapse.

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Perhaps There Has Never Been a Profession as Prostituted as That of Writer

Being a man of letters is almost always a thankless task. And perhaps there has never been a profession as prostituted as that of writer. It is true, the distinction between the qualities of the great writer and the successful writer has always seemed very clear. But today, in a world where success is a sovereign qualitative criterion, it seems more than ever that the man of letters must adapt to the terrible reality that drives him to be, as well as an artist, a salesman—and refusal seems to be the certainty of oblivion. Well, it has never been so honorable to be ignored in life and to follow, obstinately, in the opposite direction of contemporary conventions. Penury! Contempt! And the unsubmissive spirit will know, alone, what it is to think out of chains.

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My Newspaper

I dreamed of creating a newspaper. The scene was the following: around a table, my team, very excited, started to discuss the editorial line of the periodical, when the spirits were exalted. We would fight the injustices of the world: of course, of course! And representativeness would be a must! Of whom, where? This is what the cries were trying to express. Everyone shouted their own opinion. I was silent, afraid to say what I thought—but I thought: “Oh, magnificent nonsense!”; and, obviously, to say it would be my ruin, since some opinions are socially forbidden…—Then, in the middle of the verbal war, when everything seemed irresolvable, they asked me for the word of the owner of the newspaper. Suddenly, having to express in a few words my opinion about which class was the most wronged of all times, about which guidelines I thought most noble for the newspaper, and taking care not to offend the team that I needed motivated, I answered: “Let’s do the following. All the guidelines are very important”—and I led them all to a crematorium. I asked for an interview with the oven operator; I asked him: “Explain to us, friend, what your work consists of”. Of course, my newspaper never published the first edition.

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The Human Being Lives in a Vegetative State

I believe it was Hegel who said that “one learns from history that man never learns from it.” Unquestionable truth. But only the symptom of a bigger problem. The human being lives in a vegetative state, although sometimes it seems the opposite. It is not only the lessons of history that he is incapable of grasping, but reality itself. Rationally, living seems an impossibility. If the human being reasoned and used the judgment he thinks to dispose to assimilate his existence, he would immediately put himself on the curb crying. But that is not what happens. It is necessary for a close friend, for a relative to die for him to awakens from the vegetative state and reason something like “it could have been me.” However, the impulse is fleeting: the consciousness awakens and, immediately afterward, puts itself once again into a heavy sleep. Then the being returns to his usual state, in evidence of the vicious character of his judgment. It is incredible! This seems to be an adaptive psychological mechanism, that is, if not plunged into deep unconsciousness, who would move a single straw? Would they build the Titanic, if they knew its end? And of life, the end is very clear… But we are already rambling. “One learns from history that man does not learn from it”: man, the being who ignores everything, the smiling blind being. And it seems the same mental programming that demands numbness to justify from individual stupidity to the collective foolishness of a world that, for more than half a century, has not faced a great war…

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