Embrace the Adjective

This is Alan with too much time on his hands.

Essentially over the last four months I've had this little thing called "Post Secondary Education" distracting me from the responsibilities of my blog. As my friend Rachel used to point out in her link to my blog, quite bluntly, "doesn't blog very often and won't get a more descriptive title until he does". Well, that was true. I've been quite reticent to blog recently mostly for time purposes. I spent the majority of my day thinking and writing, so why would I bother continuing to think and write when I instead have the opportunity to sit back and relax while watching mindless explosions?

However, seeing as school is finished (and I did rather well. Of the three classes I've gotten final marks back from, I've got straight A's. I haven't had that since elementary school) I have plenty of time on my hands to sit back and think; to reflect upon the world as I perceive it.

Last night I watched the movie "Dead Poets Society", featuring Robin Williams. I had seen it before, but this time I think I was better able to appreciate the message and/or themes of the film. One of the most obvious ideas that stems from this film is the idea of "Carpe Diem", or "seize the day". I'm not sure if this is the original that we're introduced to this Latin term, but it certainly has become an iconic moment in movie history, being parodied in various films since it's inception. Clearly the idea here is the encouragement for young boys to get what they want in life, and if they can't, blow their brains out.

Actually the thing I found most beautiful was the section where the main characters finally enter into Keating's English class, where he tantalizes them with this quick monologue:

"We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman, "O me! O life!... of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless--of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life? Answer. That you are here - that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse." That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?"

We live to read and write poetry. What is it about the rhyming verse that touches our soul? Is there some hidden deeper beating of our hearts that is inaudible to the ear and insensible by the hand? Why, when I think of love, can I only paint pictures in my mind using the vocabulary that I've been breed to use? I must learn more words to begin to comprehend the vast entirety of this deep emotion that beats beneath my ribs; an unquenchable yearning for an intimacy so beyond myself it pricks at my skin to think about it.

Later on in the film this exact thought is played out between Keating and one of his pupils:

Keating: A man is not "very tired". He is exhausted. Don't use "very sad." Use, come on Mr. Overstreet, you twerp.

Knox: Morose?

Keating: Exactly. "Morose." Language was developed for one endeavor, and that is, Mr. Anderson. Come on, are you a man or an amoeba? Mr. Perry.

Neil: Uh, to communicate?

Keating: Nooo!! To woo women!

I cannot express the love that I have using biophysics. I am unable to dance out my desire to be intimate. One is too austere, the other too recondite. Language, somehow, captures the best of the abstract and the literal, combining them through simile and metaphor. Embrace the adjective, express your love.