John Ralston Saul Keeps His Balance Amid Furor
Author sparks unexpected debate over freedom of speech
"So, what's it like to wake up each morning knowing you're the smartest man in Canada?"
At least, that's what I briefly considered asking John Ralston Saul, author of On Equilibrium, husband of Governor General Adrienne Clarkson and, according to the Canadian Alliance, public enemy number one. But I didn't. For one thing, it might not be true: I have no idea what Saul knows of quantum mechanics, the human genome or the inexplicable popularity of U2. And for another, it was simply not worthy of a man who, for the most part, wears his learning and erudition so casually. I'm sure he wakes up with completely other thoughts on his mind.
On Equilibrium is Saul's latest book, and in some ways it brings to an end a philosophical journey that began with Voltaire's Bastards and continued with The Doubter's Companion and Unconscious Civilization. As with those previous works, it's impossible (not to say insulting) to summarize On Equilibrium. That said, however, the book's central theme is the nature of and search for a balanced life.
"What struck me over the years," says Saul, "is the sort of sense that we're powerless, that events are somehow beyond us." On Equilibrium is about how to reclaim that sense of control, through a balance of our various and often conflicting qualities.
No easy task, this. Aristotle, Thomas Aquinas and Shakespeare, among others, have all tried to do it, to varying degrees of success. Saul focuses on what he sees as six major human qualities – Common Sense, Ethics, Imagination, Intuition, Memory and Reason – and, as he puts it, "tries to peel away the built up facts and sinew around these terms." For example, is it possible to keep reason and intuition in harmony with each other, or to balance ethics and reason in everyday life? Maybe, says Saul, but it's imperative that we should at least try.
"Here are the tools," he says of his own explorations, "here's what I think you can do with them. It's not a bad thing to do to take check of yourself each day."
If all this sounds a bit flighty, a bit... well, John Ralston Saulish, fear not. On Equilibrium is easily Saul's most accessible book to date, each chapter more or less self-contained with considerate headings to help the reader along. All the same, the sheer breadth of Saul's scope and research is truly impressive. The index alone runs for 20 pages, with entries for "R" (for example) ranging from racial violence to rap music to Ronald Reagan to reality (denial of) to Reichstag to Arthur Rimbaud to romantic fools to John Ruskin to Rwanda. Phew.
Despite the vast richness of Saul's examples, and the care and quality of his argument, the man himself has recently come under attack for his comments on the terrorist attack of September 11. The criticism has been twofold. First, some critics – notably from within the Canadian Alliance – have objected to his characterization of President George W. Bush as "a rather fragile, awkward man" in his address to Americans that evening, and to Saul's suggestion that America and/or the West had somehow brought the attack on themselves by keeping "the world awash in weaponry."
These are, in fact, passing observations in Saul's much bigger and more important argument, namely that terrorism "is not so much generated as made possible by instability, disquiet, confusion somewhere." It is the task of "conscious civilizations – those which use their qualities in concert," Saul concludes, to "deal with the causes of that instability and loss of direction in order to shrink that context from which terrorism feeds."
The second criticism of Saul is that he abused his position as spouse of the Governor General in speaking out in the first place. Asked how being married to Clarkson has changed his habits or role as a writer, Saul replies simply, "Not at all."
What's more surprising than their condemnation itself, perhaps, is that his critics happily ploughed all the way through On Equilibrium before they came to the offensive bits, buried away on page 318. By then, Saul had delivered pronouncements on literally hundreds of other events, individuals and ideas without, apparently, causing any offence.
I suggest that Saul should add "selective perseverance" to his list of human traits. Tactfully, he makes no reply.
John Ralston Saul will be in Calgary to discuss On Equilibrium on Tuesday, January 22 at 7:30 p.m. at the Jack Singer Concert Hall. |
