I've read a lot of articles over the years about how athletes used the resentment they felt from a perceived snub as a motivator to achieve greatness. Warriors basketball player Draymond Green remembers all 34 players taken in front of him in the 2012 draft. Michael Jordan's Hall of Fame induction speech was sort of a litany of all the wrongs done to him. A lot of players get traded and use that as proof that the team that got rid of them never saw the value that was there, and they become all-stars the following year.
I can see how convincing yourself that the world is against you and you need to pay them back is a good way to get the most out of your off-season workouts. But it's obviously false motivation. No team intentionally throws away talent. It's just hard to evaluate. If they had known how good someone would be, they'd have taken that person. But until the moment talent shows itself, it's extremely difficult to judge.
Some people have suggested using resentment as a motivation for writing. One day, I'll have a Pulitzer or a best-seller, and then I can laugh at everyone who missed their chance at me. When I found out I was getting a book published, people suggested I throw it in the face of others. I just don't feel that way. For one thing, after facing so much rejection, whenever I get the least bit of acceptance, I feel nothing but grateful. Secondly, I know that nobody is rejecting me because it's personal. It's just hard to decide what's good enough to publish.
But mostly, does it make any sense to write from resentment? The best writing I've ever read, your Shakespeare or Melville or Vonnegut or Cervantes, can often have a caustic, derisive sense of its subjects, but it's also infused with love for the same fools it's deriding. You cannot write about humanity while full of hate. That's like being told as a young man that you'll never achieve your dream of becoming a missionary, then motivating yourself through Bible college by telling yourself I'll show these assholes. I'm going to show these fucking starving people the love of Christ like a motherfucker. Some means annul the hoped-for ends just by invoking them.
Genealogy of Morals....
ReplyDeleteI can understand resentment as motivation: anger generates lots of energy, whereas feeling inadequat puts a damper on things. As a short-term means of getting through a rough patch it might be helpful. But I suspect it colors the work whether in sports or writing – both of which can have elements of aggression, though it’s more overt and encouraged in sports.
ReplyDeleteWhat your post really brought to mind is a poem by Jeffrey Harrison – “Fork”. I discovered it while researching another poem of his that was in a Pushcart of years past, and then I found this amazing video done by high school kids – I keep trying to figure out, at the end, if it’s straight up or ironic, and I’ve kind of decided it’s both, like those bistable images of a rabbit/duck or old/young woman. Here’s the link if I’ve made you curious - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6Ttnd3o7Kw&index=57&list=LL6FhsmDDdLpzM_VwJLM0exw&t=186s
(and I'd love to hear more about how Nietzsche relates to this - sounds like the sort of thing he'd hook on to)
I rather believe Harrison's note that his teacher is an amalgam, rather than a specific person. I know several people who could have more or less fit the description. You know who one of them is not? My advisor from grad school. When I contacted her a few months ago to tell her I'd gotten the book published, she went out of her way to set me up with a review, even though she has nothing to gain by doing so.
DeleteI think Badibanga's nod to Nietzsche is from the resentment the slave feels toward the rulers, perhaps? Nietzsche feels the resentment of the ruled changed the meaning of "good" over time, to where we as a society valued the weak over the strong. I think maybe the comment was just an acknowledgment that the same ideas Nietzsche brought up are at play in when I'm considering whether resentment is a legitimate motivating factor for me. But I'm not sure: I've been called a philosopher before, but as I've pointed out, the title really isn't appropriate. I have a rather limited training in philosophy.
I have got to get you moocing. Philosophy and math are kind of my mooc majors. I have managed to avoid Neitzsche for the most part, though.
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