:: time warp
meandered into a time warp! Two and a half months and where the heck have I been?
WWII through the lense of
Herman Wouk, that's where. Two thick juicy tomes full of populist history in the guise of great fiction:
The Winds of War, and its encore,
War and Remembrance. It is at root a family saga, following the lives of the Henry family: Victor "Pug" Henry, the stalwart, conservative Navy career man; his wife Rhoda of the "chorus girl figure" and EMPHATIC way of talking; his prize son Warren; son number two Byron, who appeals and cannot so easily be summed up; daughter Madeline, willful, naive, and modern; and of course their loves and entanglements, played against a backdrop of the political and military events that inflamed Europe, Asia, and the world during the last world war.
I say last world war. Last as in one of a list, still awaiting the next item. It sparks the realization that throughout my life, WWII
was The Last World War, as in the final one, one so horrific that yet another was in a fantastic future, far beyond my life, even beyond the life of our children's children.
Fed no doubt by vast quantities of science fiction gobbled in my early college days, I imagined that a WWIII would be sparked by a rebellion of subjugated but well fed working slaves against over-mechanization, or by rogue robot clones feeling the quiver of soul, or territorial wars fought in planets rich in unobtanium ore, light-years from earth in a galaxy far, far away.
This reading of
War and Remembrance, perhaps because it cuts through history with the razor of excellent fiction, reminds me. Reminds me that memories are short, that human nature is one of desire and gullibility trumping, always trumping, fear and the unknown. So that he who controls the fear, obfuscates the unknown be it with disinformation, false hopes, or countless simple or elaborate tricks, controls our very destiny, and that of our children's children.
Remember. If your own memory doesn't span the ages, remember through the memories of those that came before. It is easy to get lost in the past or in the future, forgetting that forging the future happens on a daily basis, through awareness of what has been and courage to make real what can be. Choose well!
The beginning of the end of War lies in Remembrance.
Herman Wouk, preface to War and Remembrance
The lesson was writ plain by Thucydides centuries before Christ was born. Democracy satisfies best the human thirst for freedom; yet, being undisciplined, turbulent, and luxury seeking, it falls time and again to austere single-minded despotism.**
Herman Wouk, War and Remembrance, through the character of Aaron Jastrow
[**Do not interpret this critique of democracy as a vote for its anti-thesis socialism; rather, it is a gentle reminder that excess of any sort leads to a necessary correction]
