Whatever we may think of War and Peace as a novel, we have to recognize that it does tell us quite a bit about the unfolding of history and the role played by supposedly great men in this unfolding. In War and Peace Tolstoy does even more: he shows us something often left out by conventional theories of history, that is, it brings in the little guy—the you and me—and shows us how we too, as well as the big guy, help to shape history. The video does this by focussing on two main historical figures and events. The first figure is Napoleon, whose successes and failures in Russia (and by extension everywhere else in Europe) are attributable more to the actions and inactions of small or secondary figures than to his own. The second figure is Luther, who is commonly given credit for the breakup of the Church when in reality the forces the led to this breakup preceded Luther and merely culminated with him.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Dmj3HjtdtQQ .
This raises an important question. If Tolstoy is right about Napoleon, is he also right about such figures as Stalin and Hitler? And if so, are the excesses of these two figures, and of others like them, the fault of others, and not their own? The example of Hitler will speak for others too, I think.
Would Hitler ever have gained prominence had Germany and many Germans not felt humiliated by the Treaty of Versaiiles, that led to the sort of war reparations that in the years following crippled Germany economically? A reading of Hans Fallada’s Wolf unter Wölfen gives a pretty good idea of the sort of social and economic conditions existing at that time, conditions that were clearly receptive of anything and anyone who would promise a sort of healing and redemption for a humiliated Germany—even of someone who under different circumstances might have been ignored or brushed off as totally unbalanced. Hitler was in a real sense the product of his time. Should he then be absolved for what he did? No, but the point is that he wold never have become what he became had conditions in Germany been different. And to this extent Tolstoy is right. The same can, it seems to me, also be said of Mussolini in Italy. He too, after all, was seen as the guy who could make the trains run on time. So once again, megalomaniac that he was, he was the product of his time. So, I suppose, it comes down to this: the social conditions enable a person to stand out; the same social conditions may enable the person to gain more and more power as he implements policies that the people who chose him see as desirable. At some point, though, the person goes much beyond just making the trains run on time: he begins to do things that sour many of the people who enabled him, and at this critical point he starts losing favour, but by now it’s too late: by now he has enough power in his hands to really subvert the will of the people. And, at least in the case of Hitler and Mussolini, things will go on from bad to worse till they crumble and a new order develops. And the big man is replaced with onother one, or with a movement, that will be the latest reflection of the people’s will.
Enter Trump.
It shouldn’t be too hard to see how Trump himself is the product of circumstances. Needless to say—as was the case with Hitler and Mussolini and, one could go on to say, figures like Stalin and Mao and so forth—there has to be something in the personality of the man that makes him stand out. In one of his miniature poems Ezra Pound once said:
The apparition of those faces in the crowd—
Petals upon a wet black bough.
It is unlikely that these faces are references to either Mussolini or Hitler, though, given his admiration for Mussolini, one never really knows. What is true is that these faces are so attractive for Pound precisely because of the powerful contrast they offer to all the other faces that surround them. And in comparison, the other faces are indeed dreary.
Can a parallel be made with Trump?
Trump runs to replace Obama. Obama is a dignified man of soaring rhetoric: trump is buffoon-like and—to be kind—plain–spoken, even vulgar. In terms of the Pound analogy, Obama should trump Trump big time. Except that by now the Obama figure has worn thin for a lot of people, who see in Trump someone whose language is—yes—vulgar, but vulgar in the sense of being a reflection of the vulgus, or of the common people; and so the vulgus identify with him.
In his plain-spoken way Trump also plays on the things people crave and/or fear: people want jobs, and he promises jobs; people fear losing their jobs, and Trump promises to get rid of illegal immigrants, the job robbers; for the sake of the environment Obama had put a damper on the coal industry and on the building of oil pipelines; Trump promises to reverse that trend and to open up more and more jobs, and more and more people rally behind him. If there is an echo here of what happened in Europe in the 20s, that’s because the echo is loud and clear. Now as then, a figure from the crowd shows up and becomes a projection of their wishes—or at least a projection of the wishes of a sufficient number of disaffected people.
Donald Trump, it is true, has mocked a good number of people since announcing his candidacy, but it is even truer that he himself has been endlessly mocked by the media, by the people he ran against ( remember Rubio’s joke about the small hands?), by the Democrats, who all along thought that Hillary Clinton’s best chance to win was to run against buffoon Trump. And perhaps the best examples of the contempt levelled against him date back to long before he announced his candidacy—way back to 2011 in fact, to the Correspondents Dinner. Here is how President Obama made fun of him on that occasion, as the Washington Post of Feb. 27/17 recalls.
“All kidding aside, obviously, we all know about your credentials and breadth of experience,” he said. “For example, no, seriously, just recently in an episode of ‘Celebrity Apprentice,’ at the steakhouse, the men’s cooking team did not impress the judges from Omaha Steaks. And there was a lot of blame to go around, but you, Mr. Trump, recognized that the real problem was a lack of leadership and so, ultimately, you didn’t blame Little John or Meatloaf — you fired Gary Busey. And these are the kinds of decisions that would keep me up at night. Well-handled, sir. Well-handled.”
The WP reminds us that on that same occasion comedian Seth Mayer, the host of that dinner, was even more dismissive of Trump with jokes that got everyone laughing at the humbling of the man who would indeed be driven to run for president by these very jokes.
“Donald Trump has been saying that he will run for president as a Republican — which is surprising, since I just assumed that he was running as a joke.”
Being the butt of the joke at that event must surely have been a very humiliating experience for Trump, but it must also have been the moment that crystallized his determination to sort of show’em all. That, in a very real sense, was the moment of conception of the man who would become the next president of the United States. All the media taunting that was to follow simply strengthened his resolve and made the whole birthing process (no, not of Obama) easier.
To that event, too, is surely owed at least in part the stance the current president has taken with respect to domestic and foreign affairs issues. Obama was soft on Islamists? Then Islam must be fought tooth and nail. Obama favoured the Affordable Care Act? Then it must be dismantled. Obama was against the coal industry? Then the coal industry must be supported. Ditto for pipelines, and good riddance to environmental concerns. And so forth.
Last night (Feb. 28/17) Trump spoke for the first time to a joint session of Congress. Anyone watching the event will have seen a house divided: the Republicans cheered and cheered; the Democrats sat pretty much silent and gritting their teeth throughout. But no one—no one—any longer felt that the guy speaking was a joke.
Many, even outside Congress, are shaking their heads in disbelief: how could we have let all this happen! Well, as Tolstoy would say, we didn’t just let it happen: we helped it happen, and so if things end up in a bad way, lots of mea culpas should ring out, and a lot of chest thumping.
No comments:
Post a Comment