Wise Fools

ou will never be happy if you continue to search for what happiness consists of. You will never live if you are looking for the meaning of life.” — Albert Camus “Intuitions: Deliriums,” in Cahiers Albert Camus II: Youthful Writings, first written 1932

In another passage that foreshadows some of his more mature thoughts on Absurdism, this stood out as some good advice. Even if it was from a fool. The sections of “Intuitions” that contain the interactions with the fool are interesting to say the least. They often feel like the musings of an angsty youth, But I guess that’s why they’re his youthful writings. It feels a lot like he’s testing out narrative devices, and here is trying his hand at the “Wise Fool” archetype. This is a thing, in case you didn’t know it. You’ve seen it before, you just may not have recognized it. It comes from sources as early as the Greeks, definitely in Shakespearean works and depending on your reading of the Bible…

In fact, a bit more search brings me to a BBC article on other modern equivalents (albeit in Shakespearean comparison): https://www.bbc.com/news/magazine-17476117 and a list of Shakespearean fools: Shakespearean fool and a touch more search-magic gets me some Wikipedia summaries of general cultural archetypes of the Fool. There’s a link at the bottom for “Fools for Christ” if you’re looking for some examples of another extreme. No wonder hes’ trying it out. Maybe I should add his to the list? Been a while since I did any Wikipedia editing.

This reminds me of one of my favorite takeaways from Harold Bloom’s book Genius: A Mosaic of One Hundred Exemplary Creative Minds https://amzn.to/2VYhejq (Camus is not included, an oversight in my opinion, but I recognize he had a criterion that Camus did not necessarily fit into, I like Bloom’s works). That takeaway was that (me paraphrasing a very large book, if I can find relevant quotes, I’ll insert later) there are some geniuses that write genius-ly, some that live genius-ly and are written about or write about their lives, and a rare few that do both. Sorry HB for butchering that. I’ll go back and read it again, it’s been nearly two decades after all. Which brings me back around. Live genius-ly and don’t look for meaning, don’t search for happiness, just live and be happy. Be an Absurd Hero, or at least a Wise Fool.

-DA

P.S. Thinking about Bloom makes me think of Goethe. Need to maybe go do some re-readings there to look for content. Hmmm.