Maybe we're all imperialists in that way, wanting to conquer the world with names and metaphors, to ostensibly define everything we see and then tame all that is in our path. Or maybe we simply can't understand something without projecting thoughts and feelings onto it. Or it could be that naming, relating helps us stop being scared by things that can hurt us.
Of course nature is really indifferent to what we do and why we do it. And even that statement anthropomorphizes it. Because it is not even indifferent. And maybe that's what we find so hard to wrap our heads around—its lack of care for us, for itself, for anything at all. Dynamic and vital and beautiful it might be, but feeling or loving, reflective or cruel, nature is not.
But, still, we persist in seeing nature as a child to protect, sometimes, a vicious adversary at others. And where nature in art was once a reflection of God or The Divine, in our own, post-expressionistic, psychological times we're more apt to see it as a reflection of ourselves, of consciousness. That nine-tenths beneath the water is, of course, seen as our subconscious. (As if the tenth above water isn't plenty to contend with and troubling enough of its own accord.)
But Elizabeth Bishop wrote about icebergs (albeit imaginary ones) in a way that neither excessively sublimates or anthropomorphizes them. And I'd like you to think for a moment how hard that is to do. To write about nature without making it into something it's not, to admire it without reference to yourself. And think how hard that is to do for the maker of pictures too. To look and capture without projecting feelings, agendas, politics or romance.
The Imaginary Iceberg
We'd rather have the iceberg than the ship,
although it meant the end of travel.
Although it stood stock-still like cloudy rock
and all the sea were moving marble.
We'd rather have the iceberg than the ship;
we'd rather own this breathing plain of snow
though the ship's sails were laid upon the sea
as the snow lies undissolved upon the water.
O solemn, floating field,
are you aware an iceberg takes repose
with you, and when it wakes may pasture on your snows?
This is a scene a sailor'd give his eyes for.
The ship's ignored. The iceberg rises
and sinks again; its glassy pinnacles
correct elliptics in the sky.
This is a scene where he who treads the boards
is artlessly rhetorical. The curtain
is light enough to rise on finest ropes
that airy twists of snow provide.
The wits of these white peaks
spar with the sun. Its weight the iceberg dares
upon a shifting stage and stands and stares.
The iceberg cuts its facets from within.
Like jewelry from a grave
it saves itself perpetually and adorns
only itself, perhaps the snows
which so surprise us lying on the sea.
Good-bye, we say, good-bye, the ship steers off
where waves give in to one another's waves
and clouds run in a warmer sky.
Icebergs behoove the soul
(both being self-made from elements least visible)
to see them so: fleshed, fair, erected indivisible.
And of course, there's nothing wrong with relating to nature or to wanting to name things. But I wonder how it effects our actions and our permanent sense of ourselves as beings-in-the-world if that world is always relating back to us. And I wonder what art looks like, what words are used when it tries to make no such connection, but simply lets be. Maybe that's just the art of silent looking, of accepting the unutterable.
(Note: In many ways, this post is in large part a response to / inspired by certain sections of Gopnik's Winter, which you can from all these mentions, is a book I completely recommend).
Image credits:
1. Sealers Crushed by Icebergs by William Bradford (1866), via
2. The Last Iceberg Series II/Floating Icebergs in Drift Ice II, Ross Sea (2006) by Camille Seaman, via
3. The Iceberg by Frederic Edwin Church (1891), via
4. The Last Iceberg/Stranded Iceberg I, Cape Bird (2006) by Camille Seaman, via
5. Iceberg at Night by Jeremy Miranda from Etsy
What a gorgeous post, Jane. Your writing is sublime (as usual), and these paintings and photographs are so inspiring.
ReplyDeleteThanks for sharing the lovely poem and images! Hope you're staying warm :)
ReplyDeleteHm, interesting. I like how this post stops me. I don't think that I ever 'simply let be'. (Also love these images.)
ReplyDeleteA brilliant, well-written, simply wonderful post. Thank you so much.
ReplyDeletei actually think us human beings NOT relating to nature in any way at all has far greater implications (of the negative sort) than using it to understand ourselves, our world, our inner life, our human predicament.
ReplyDeleteI love posts, such as this one, that make you stop and think and go back for more. Thank you for sharing your thoughts, Jane.
ReplyDeleteJane, I just clicked on your blog after writing a new post on my own blog today, and although our subject matters are different, I can't help but think we must have had a silent agreement to write about similar ideas. I guess you'll see what I mean when you read my latest post. I've been thinking about "accepting the unutterable" quite a lot lately.
ReplyDeleteIronically, this post made me think of Edmund Burke's theory of the Sublime, which is all about using nature for our own benefit and our own sense of self. I think it never occurred to him that sublime scenes of nature aren't there for our own enjoyment or personal development. It requires a huge leap away from our preoccupations with ourselves to appreciate nature for its own sake, and I admit, I'm not always willing or ready to make such a leap.
What a brilliant post Jane, so much to think about - I feel like my response here is a bit inadequate.
Hila!
ReplyDeleteI just read your post - we must be crossing paths - and felt I needed to sit on my response for a bit because we seem so peculiarly aligned right now!
Of course, the unutterable and our need to give utterance is a HUGE Beckettan preoccupation that I'm very susceptible to.
The very impulse of writing seems to come most when we're moved by things that are ineffable and therefore unutterable, so we're set up for failure in some respects. And sometimes I crave wordlessness as the perfect expression and yet find myself using words to express that desire.
And yes, Edmund Burke - of course! - a great Irish philosopher and another fellow Trinity-graduate! I love that you mentioned him. His causal explanation of the sublime hinged on the very concept of self, (interest to contrast with Schopenhauer when he considered aesthetic experience the negation of Will, detached from time and space and appetite.)
Hooray likemindedness! Your comment made me so happy!!
I remember seeing them below when I flew over Greenland 20 years ago. I'll never forget it. They are so mysterious and beautiful. Makes me think of The Group of Seven paintings, Lawren Harris.
ReplyDeletefascinating. I fail utterly to see nature without reference to myself, though not in an anthropomorphic way. Simply, it places me: back in my body, small in the vastness. I take comfort that even Bishop can't help conflating icebergs with souls :)
ReplyDeleteI was lucky enough to see Gopnik speak in St. John's, not as an official part of the lectures but as a stop over to give an overview of all the lectures. He was a great speaker, and his book has been sitting on my bedside table waiting for me to decide it is really winter – you've inspired me to get reading already.
ReplyDeleteWe went up to see icebergs this summer in Newfoundland too, up on the Northern Peninsula. We didn't get off the coast in a boat to see the big ones, but were able to see hundreds from the little beaches and coves. They are beautiful to watch - and the sounds they make are amazing.