The Reader Critic
Ben Hecht, Chicago:I congratulate you on the roseate misconceptions of “Life Itself.” Long live your fancies—mine didn’t. The perfumes of Araby are short-lived in a slop-jar.I envy you your dogmatic naïveté until I remember something I thought of long ago:—that ideals are for the weak; that people who live on fancies starve for lack of sorrow, shrivel for lack of cynicism, and finally die of inhibition.I remember, in a discussion on art the other evening, your crying out about “the eternal standard” and I feeling it was true but not knowing what it meant. I know now. It meant nothing. It is just another fancy.Vive la divinité!Remember what Homo Sapiens discovered: the limitations of the infinite—of his brain. They are as nothing to the limitations of our Gods.GOD’S GARDEN—THE WORLD(Yes, this still happens. We get hordes of such letters.)I feel sure that at heart your idea of freedom is right, but I do not believe that you altogether understand how to carry it out.To get at the bottom of things—you want to be just a natural, normal human being. You want to live, to grow, to expand like a flower. How then is this most easily accomplished? Simply this, to be what nature or God or the power back of the universe intended for you to be. What then is your place in the universe, and what is your relation to it? You are by God’s grace a woman; then the greatest thing you can do is to be a woman. But what does it mean to be a woman? To love, to create, to protect, to uplift, and to purify. What do these words mean? You can love the out-of-doors, you can love books, music, art, people, all the world, everything your heart desires. All that you love you can create by writing, by making things grow, by building and constructing. You can protect by being a mother to all those weaker than yourself who need your help. You can uplift and purify by inspiring all you meet with goodness and high ideals.Yes, you say, but how can I be free to do these things when I am hampered and bound by conventionalities and surroundings? No one is bound down who knows that freedom comes from within, not from without. The girl in the factory, the girl in college, the girl in her own home, or the girl out of doors can be just as free as she makes up her mind to be. Freedom is not a matter of clothes or environment.As to conventionalities—most of them have been formed because time and culture have taught us to have regard for our fellow beings. There is nothing immorally wrong in a man going to the opera in his shirt sleeves but it might not be agreeable to the gentleman seated next to him. Then the psychology of the close relationship between thoughts and actions—free thoughts result in free actions, likewise carelessness in our habits of daily life make careless thinking. I believe in keeping your own individuality above all things if you can back up your ideas by good reasons; but you will find that there is a reason for most conventionalities that can’t be overthrown. If we were not an integral part of a whole we could do just as we pleased because no one would be affected and no one would care; but everything we do, every move we make, affects some part of the whole, and that is why we care and why everybody cares.Stick to your idea of freedom and of being natural, but be careful how you apply it and of its effect on others. Whatever is good and helpful will live and what is not good will die.Remember, too, that this is America, 1915, not Greece, B. C. 400.Do not think I mean to be critical for I love you just the same as I love everybody and all things in God’s garden, the world, so much so that I want you to fully understand what it means to be a real woman.
Ben Hecht, Chicago:
I congratulate you on the roseate misconceptions of “Life Itself.” Long live your fancies—mine didn’t. The perfumes of Araby are short-lived in a slop-jar.
I envy you your dogmatic naïveté until I remember something I thought of long ago:—that ideals are for the weak; that people who live on fancies starve for lack of sorrow, shrivel for lack of cynicism, and finally die of inhibition.
I remember, in a discussion on art the other evening, your crying out about “the eternal standard” and I feeling it was true but not knowing what it meant. I know now. It meant nothing. It is just another fancy.
Vive la divinité!
Remember what Homo Sapiens discovered: the limitations of the infinite—of his brain. They are as nothing to the limitations of our Gods.
(Yes, this still happens. We get hordes of such letters.)
I feel sure that at heart your idea of freedom is right, but I do not believe that you altogether understand how to carry it out.
To get at the bottom of things—you want to be just a natural, normal human being. You want to live, to grow, to expand like a flower. How then is this most easily accomplished? Simply this, to be what nature or God or the power back of the universe intended for you to be. What then is your place in the universe, and what is your relation to it? You are by God’s grace a woman; then the greatest thing you can do is to be a woman. But what does it mean to be a woman? To love, to create, to protect, to uplift, and to purify. What do these words mean? You can love the out-of-doors, you can love books, music, art, people, all the world, everything your heart desires. All that you love you can create by writing, by making things grow, by building and constructing. You can protect by being a mother to all those weaker than yourself who need your help. You can uplift and purify by inspiring all you meet with goodness and high ideals.
Yes, you say, but how can I be free to do these things when I am hampered and bound by conventionalities and surroundings? No one is bound down who knows that freedom comes from within, not from without. The girl in the factory, the girl in college, the girl in her own home, or the girl out of doors can be just as free as she makes up her mind to be. Freedom is not a matter of clothes or environment.
As to conventionalities—most of them have been formed because time and culture have taught us to have regard for our fellow beings. There is nothing immorally wrong in a man going to the opera in his shirt sleeves but it might not be agreeable to the gentleman seated next to him. Then the psychology of the close relationship between thoughts and actions—free thoughts result in free actions, likewise carelessness in our habits of daily life make careless thinking. I believe in keeping your own individuality above all things if you can back up your ideas by good reasons; but you will find that there is a reason for most conventionalities that can’t be overthrown. If we were not an integral part of a whole we could do just as we pleased because no one would be affected and no one would care; but everything we do, every move we make, affects some part of the whole, and that is why we care and why everybody cares.
Stick to your idea of freedom and of being natural, but be careful how you apply it and of its effect on others. Whatever is good and helpful will live and what is not good will die.
Remember, too, that this is America, 1915, not Greece, B. C. 400.
Do not think I mean to be critical for I love you just the same as I love everybody and all things in God’s garden, the world, so much so that I want you to fully understand what it means to be a real woman.