The Meaning of Despair

[vdansk]

Two decades ago I wrote my Honor’s Thesis on Edna St. Vincent Millay, cyclical imagery, and despair. Millay used conventional imagery—winter, night, the tide—in such a way that she actively denied the cycle. “Oh, Autumn, Autumn—what is Spring to me?”

Twenty one years later, I still love her poetry; she is perhaps the only poet to make unrequited love dignified, and she used the traditional forms of centuries past, notably sonnets, to showcase concepts that were new and original; sonnets about Euclid, and Chaos, taxes and irony. Now, however, from the grand age of 43, her frequent use of despair gets a very different reaction from me.

Grief, as RJ Anderson wrote in her excellent LJ blog some months ago, is not a sin—but I would argue that Despair, the renunciation of Hope and the future, is a purely selfish emotion. In Despair, we renounce not just the next phase of our own cycle, but also our responsibilities, our affections, our own strength. We deny every lesson we have ever learned, every gift we have ever received. It is a peculiarly adolescent emotion, completely forgivable in the young. Aren’t all young creatures selfish?

Perhaps unfairly, I cannot forgive that level of selfishness in a parent. Crawling across broken glass, at least figuratively, is part of the job description of parenthood. We may cry our eyes dry in the night, and meet the morning raging or despondent, but we still must get up, feed the children, live the hundred thousand small obligations of our lives, and believe, for the sake of the lives in our care, that Spring will come. Grief we may, and often should, embrace. Despair, however, is irrelevant.

Comments

[chris-warrior.livejournal.com]

Anne Shirley: Can't you even IMAGINE you're in the depths of despair?
Marilla Cuthbert: No I cannot. To despair is to turn your back on God.

i thought you'd appreciate that quote.

that said, i think despair can be extremely cathartic. and it can be extremely temporary. i'd argue that despair is like hitting a low note on an piccolo - you can only hold it so long before the normal register takes over. but, while it lasts, it's a counterpoint to the normal run of things, the vinegar in the ice cream of life.

or perhaps it's because i don't really think "despair", as defined by "losing all hope" is, well, possible. i don't believe it's irrelevant but i suppose i may believe it's impossible.