David wrote: No, war doesn't make me despair of
man. Yes, all the rules of civilization are
suspended and yes, people behave in ways that
shock us into horror. But people also sometimes
behave well, and that should encourage us. As
Christians are wont to tell us, humans are a
flawed lot. But they must also give us cause for
hope; they are all we've got.
Eric: I wasn't trying to suggest that war makes
one despair of homo sapiens, so much as to suggest
that reading military history, for me anyway,
conveyed a sense of how little had changed. It was
a leveling. It made me expect less of human
behavior in war. Like the famous Dulce et Decorum
est...only without the bitterness, the
disillusionment. Just the thing itself.
This is what we are. This is how we do it. This
will not change soon. It cannot because this is
who and what we are. And that's not to despair,
but to recognize what is, where we start from, as
Richard Wilbur says in "Walking to Sleep," ... "to
stare your brother down/ though the swart crows
have pecked his sockets hollow." We have to start
somewhere don't we? If we are to start at all?
So refreshing when people do behave well, briefly
manage to behave well, and even I manage to do it.
As for the Ustinov play John Wager mentioned, I
don't know it, but will look for it at the Strand.
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