Man you aren't kidding. against what he foresaw was my design. He called me one morning into his chamber, where he was confined by the gout, and expostulated very warmly with me upon this subject. He asked me what reasons, more than a mere wandering inclination, I had for leaving father’s house and my native country, where I might be well introduced, and had a prospect of raising my fortune by application and industry, with a life of ease and pleasure. He told me it was men of desperate fortunes on one hand, or of aspiring, superior fortunes on the other, who went abroad upon adventures, to rise by enterprise, and make themselves famous in undertakings of a nature out of the common road; that these things were all either too far above me or too far below me; that mine was the middle state, or what might be called the upper station of low life, which he had found, by long experience, was the best state in the world, the most suited to human happiness, not exposed to the miseries and hardships, the labour and sufferings of the mechanic part of mankind, and not embarrassed with the pride, luxury, ambition, and envy of the upper part of mankind. He told me I might judge of the happiness of this state by this one thing—viz. that this was the state of life which all other people envied; that kings have frequently lamented the miserable consequence of being born to great things, and wished they had been placed in the middle of the two extremes, between the mean and the great; that the wise man gave his testimony to this, as the standard of felicity, when he prayed to have neither poverty nor riches. He bade me observe it, and I should always find that the calamities of life were shared among the upper and lower part of mankind, but that the middle station had the fewest disasters, and was not exposed to so many vicissitudes as the higher or lower part of mankind; nay, they were not subjected to so many distempers and uneasinesses, either of body or mind, as those were who, by vicious living, luxury, and extravagances on the one hand, or by hard labour, want of necessaries, and mean or insufficient diet on the other hand, bring distemper upon themselves by the natural consequences of their way of living; that the middle station of life was calculated for all kind of virtue and all kind of enjoyments; that peace and plenty were the handmaids of a middle fortune; that temperance, moderation, quietness, health, society, all agreeable diversions, and all desirable pleasures, were the blessings attending the middle station of life; that this way men went silently and smoothly through the world, and comfortably out of it, not embarrassed with the labours of the hands or of the head, not sold to a life of slavery for daily bread, nor harassed with perplexed circumstances, which rob the soul of peace and the body of rest, nor enraged with the passion of envy, or the secret burning lust of ambition for great things; but, in easy circumstances, sliding gently through the world, and sensibly tasting the sweets of living, without the bitter; feeling that they are happy, and learning by every day’s experience to know it more sensibly. After this he pressed me earnestly, and in the most affectionate manner, not to play the young man, nor to precipitate myself into miseries which nature, and the station of life I was born in, seemed to have provided against; that I was under no necessity of seeking my bread; that he would do well for me, and endeavour to enter me fairly into the station of life which he had just been recommending to me; and that if I was not very easy and happy in the world, it must be my mere fate or fault that must hinder it; and that he should have nothing to answer for, having thus discharged his duty in warning me against measures which he knew would be to my hurt; in a word, that as he would do very kind things for me if I would stay and settle at home as he directed, so he would not have so much hand in my misfortunes as to give me any encouragement to go away; and to close all, he told me I had my elder brother for an example, to whom he had used the same earnest persuasions to keep him from going into the Low Country wars, but could not prevail, his young desires prompting him to run into the army, where he was killed; and though he said he would not cease to pray for me, yet he would venture to say to me, that if I did take this foolish step, God would not bless me, and I should have leisure hereafter to reflect upon having neglected his counsel when there might be none to assist in my recovery. I observed in this last part of his discourse, which was truly prophetic, though I suppose my father did not know it to be so himself—I say, I observed the tears run down his face very plentifully, especially when he spoke of my brother who was killed: and that when he spoke of my having leisure to repent, and none to assist me, he was so moved that he broke off the discourse, and told me his heart was so full he could say no more to me. My father, a wise and grave man, gave me serious and excellent counsel
Haha, thanks for that. I was too lazy to dig it up. Contemplation of "the middle way" has stuck with me for a few months. DeFoe is a better writer than most of us remember or suspect. Maybe its all the shitty retellings of Robinson Crusoe that take so many different forms. "Tom Hanks Stranded, is Robinson Crusoe for the modern age, bring your wife, bring your kids!" The source material is kinda buried in layers of other work. At least that's how I felt when I reread it recently, very thoughtful bit of writing, I was pleasantly surprised.
Never read that one. The excerpt you mention is great though. Would you recommend reading the whole thing?
The Bounty Trilogy is great. I recommend it but almost no one will bite. mk might have read it on my recommendation back in the day but I'm not certain. It gave me nightmares. The first book is about the mutiny led by first mate Fletcher Christian against Captain William Bligh. It's the part of the story that you are more likely to be acquainted with. It's the story of a paranoid and vicious captain pushing his crew to the breaking point. It's brutal and gripping. The second book is the the most boring of the three. It chronicles the voyage of a score of men, including Captain Bligh, cast out to sea in a long boat with few provisions and inadequate navigational tools. They survive a journey of some four thousand miles. People eat their belts, their shoes, lose their teeth and their minds. It's a story of pain and drudgery. If Bligh was a terrible captain in the first volume he's and amazing navigator and leader in the second. I found the final volume the most interesting. It follows the lives of the half of the crew that wasn't set out to sea to die. One group scattered across the world and part of the book is an account of the English Navy hunting them down and bringing them to justice. The half that didn't scatter packed up the H.M.S. Bounty and sailed it with a group of Tahitian islanders (mostly women) to the uninhabited island of Pitcairn. Pitcairn was a dot on the map that had only been seen by western eye's once before. By the next time a non-mutineer westerner would see it there was only one man, a bunch of Tahitian women and a bunch of kids alive on the island. The bulk of this third book is the story of the men dividing up into factions and killing each other off on the island of Pitcairn largely over women. The three books taken together really dig into the nature of power, the fragility of the bonds of humanity and society, the amount of suffering a man can go through before he will break. Lots of scholarship on the Mutiny has bloodied peoples regard for Nordoff and Hall's trilogy in the past few decades. Some of the criticism is petty stuff along the lines of weather Fletcher Christian put on his left sock or his right sock first other objections study the rate of and quality of the discipline of Royal Navy and say that Captain Bligh wan't so bad a guy. I think it's a worthy read even if some of the scholarship is a bit shaky. If you can find a copy at a reasonable price, Preble's Boys; Commodore Preble And The Birth Of American Sea Power is a great overview of the early U.S. Navy. Looks like there is a new book that has been well reviewed that might be a good substitute Intrepid Sailors: The Legacy of Preble's Boys and the Tripoli Campaign. Stephen Decatur, The Tripoli Campaign and the Sea Battles of 1812 are facinating historical subjects that few people know much about. A generation of young men trained as midshipmen under Edward Preble and went on glory in Americas early Navy. I'm writing at work so I don't have my library at hand but another guy with a fascinating story is Oliver Hazard Perry. He was one of the few successful American Naval men that wasn't in the Preble Club. The Battle of Lake Erie is another story from 1812 that is too little known. I can't recommend one in particular, I'm sure the internet could, but Horatio Nelson is a guy worth reading about. He was a small, almost effete dandy of man, missing an eye and an arm by the end of his career and he had BALLS OF STEEL. Arthur Wellesley might have beaten Napoleon but Nelson gave him the space to do it. Nelson was one of the most courageous, insubordinate and successful Admirals of all time, he was the perfect foil for Napoleon. Guys getting shipwrecked is a whole sub genera of the Nautical cannon. I've read a bunch but the one that has stuck with me most recently is Skeletons on the Zahara: A True Story of Survival I'm sure there are a few other good nonfiction picks if I combed my library but these are some that come to mind as I sit here at work. I'll post a few fiction picks later on.Everywhere hailed as a masterpiece of historical adventure, this enthralling narrative recounts the experiences of twelve American sailors who were shipwrecked off the coast of Africa in 1815, captured by desert nomads, sold into slavery, and subjected to a hellish two-month journey through the bone-dry heart of the Sahara. The ordeal of these men - who found themselves tested by barbarism, murder, starvation, death, dehydration, and hostile tribes that roamed the desert on camelback - is made indelibly vivid in this gripping account of courage, brotherhood, and survival.
You started with the Bounty trilogy, I'm starting with the Bounty trilogy. I had to look twice - all three books are only fourteen hours read! I'm on Book 5 of frickin' Durant and by the time I'm done, that'll be 220 hours done with another 280 to go. What I've read is already longer than the first five Game of Thrones books. A fourteen hour trilogy starts to sound like a one-act play.
Thanks for the documentary, it's great to see people totally gripped by the story of the Bounty. Those three books really stayed with me. All three are chronicles of terror and desperation. Few things I've read have given me nightmares like they did. Age of sail books were like my Star Trek and just like Star Trek, lots of people don't see the appeal. I hope you do, tell me what you think when you are done.
Context: So, 10pm is looming, and I'm eying my bedroom. I put down the beer over an hour ago and I'm drinking tea that's sold as both a digestive and sleep aid. By the time I finish this comment it will be past 10pm and that will bug me a wee bit. I was listening to freaking Garrison Keillor. There's several discrete points that this article is addressing, in my mind. First point - Social Media and the internet at large is really messing with people. We are hyper exposed to situations and realities that we otherwise would have gone our whole lives in ignorance of. It's one thing to kind of dream and fantasize about how 'the other half lives.' It's something else entirely to be aware of the rich kids of Instagram. In the context of human history, visiting another continent might happen once in a lifetime. Rich young nobles of various European houses used to go on the Grand Tour of Europe as a life-changing experience, that they might get a taste of the myriad cultures and peoples that created Europe and therefor be 'cultured' when they returned home. I have been intentionally reducing my intake of social media (only food on my 'gram) because of the specific pain this causes. I have physical limitations (And because yay, American medicine) financial limitations that make the exploits of lots of my peers literally impossible for me. It's not a question of budgeting, or frequency, I can't take multiple multi-week international 'adventure' vacations a year. I can't stay up 'till 4 doing various different intoxicants with various different C and D list celebrities and their entourages. These people live in a completely different world than I do, I don't gain anything from being deeply aware of their lives/lifestyles, and in fact I suffer for it. It takes a legitimate concern "I am afraid that I'm not going outside of my comfort zone enough to grow as a person." and warps it into something terrible "My personal growth isn't as valuable on social media as someone elses paid-for experience, therefore it is of less value both subjectively and objectively." There's more nuance to that distinction too, but it's late and I can't elaborate further. Someone else can if they smell what I'm stepping in. Second point - Defining your life on your own terms is important. I'm struggling with it now, and it's causing me endless grief. _refugee_ and I have been talking for a long time, and one of the things she first said to me that really made me start listening to her was basically "Y'know, it's possible to desire personal growth, and work towards it without thinking you're a total and irredeemable piece of shit." I was raised /encultured to believe that personal change only occurs when a person completely and totally hates what they are, and they then must pass through an unpleasant crucible to be purged. What this model fails to account for is growth. It's a reductive way of looking at a person. "You are these discrete things/behaviors. Things cannot be added, but they can be taken away." This is a frank denial of human potential. If I may be so brash as to generalize, I think an adult's concept of self consists of three conjoined selves. The self that was, the self that is, the self that could be. I think that it's possible to look forward to being a future, improved version of yourself without it being negative, without it being pathological. I think that it's possible to be honest and frank about who and what you are without being abusive or narcissistic. All possible, just damn difficult.
That’s it. Nice and straightforward. If there’s not a logical reason to want that thing? You don’t need it—and more likely, you don’t really want it, either. I think I can find the middle ground by making sure I'm asking myself why I'm traveling or adventurous. The rest of the time I'll be in bed by 10 or 10:30.Ask yourself why you want the things you want.
Key #1: You want other people to think you are boring Key #2: You want to find your life, personally, the opposite of that. When a vast majority of other people find your life entertaining, interesting, worthy of being discussed, either you are extremely exceptional (and in your twenties, this is highly unlikely, although I guess you could be Chance the Rapper), or you are extremely dramatic. People love drama. It makes for great conversation fodder. Drama is bad for a stable life. However, you should never be bored by your life. You should do what you love and what entertains you. On the other hand, if "doing what you love" involves a) kicking up a lot of interpersonal fuss, or b) fussing up a lot of other people's lives, you should probably seriously re-think your motivations and why you need to be the center of attention all the time. Be boring - to other people. Be immensely entertaining - to yourself. Me, traveling to another country or staying at home - there is nothing inherently interesting to other people, generally, speaking, about that. Specifically, if I went to, say, Italy, and some person who knew me really wanted to go to Italy, that would or could be very interesting to that single other person. It would not be interesting to society in general. Me, fucking someone's boyfriend while lying to my boyfriend about it - well, that's very interesting to a lot of people. All my friends, all that girl's friends, all that boyfriend's friends, all my boyfriend's friends. That's what you don't want to be. Or me, getting wasted at the bar so much so that I take my top off indoors and dance on a table. That's very interesting to everyone who sees me. You don't want that. Or, well, I know I don't want that. Do you? (And if you do: why?) Me failing a class is interesting gossip. Me doing well in a class is not. And so on. I have all sorts of adventures. I entertain myself immensely. I think I am hilarious, and clever, and that my Twitter is full of unappreciated gems. That is all well and very good. You should have that about yourself. But if a bunch of other random unattached or tertiarilly attached people start to find your life very interesting, you should really start to ask yourself why. And I doubt it will be because you are really great at making hilarious quips in 160 characters or less. But it might be because you [insert dramatic, aka attention-grabbing, thing here]. At best, maybe you're supremely attractive. But hey, if you are, how did all these randos find out?
Yeah...this article was all over the place. The first 2/3rds I enjoyed (up to the dog photo), and I know the area of NY he's talking about and it's an economically depressed hellhole with nothing other than those colleges, and some skiing/snowboarding...probably caused the tone of this article.
I get the basic idea - "don't live for Facebook." At the same time, people go places and enjoy stuff because it's... enjoyable? Here's my hypothesis: 30-35 is where you cease to give a fuck about doing stuff for the sake of impressing people. I found myself pondering how I would write "I finished the novel you didn't know I was writing" on Facebook, grew disgusted with myself, and effectively left Facebook for a year or two in retaliation. It didn't seem appropriate to put something that momentous in amongst all the breakfast shots... and it still feels inappropriate to read about my friends' struggles with breast cancer and lupus in amongst all the breakfast shots. FFS, my dead cousin's husband still likes my posts in the personage of my dead cousin. There's a cottage industry of pop psychologists investigating what it is to live in public on the Internet. But these very real issues aren't well-served by the article. It's kind of a "I've decided to be an old person because I hate adventure" screed.
The author should stick to writing his shitty movie reviews and leave the philosophy to the adults. Then again it is late and I spent most of the evening teaching astronomy to over 200 people. And that site is broken as hell with my adblockers and DNS trap.