Forests: The Shadow of Civilization

In ‘Forests: the shadow of Civilization’, Robert Pogne Harrison discusses the three universal institutions: religion, marriage and burial of the dead and their relation to the forests, which he finally suggests are the origins of our human civilizations. Harrison’s work leaves me as a reader questioning myself two main things. Firstly, why does civilization finally go back to their origins or feel the need to do so, and where do we, humans, stand – What is human?

Throughout the whole text it is implied that forests are an abomination to human civilizations. Although they are discussed to be the antecedent to human, forests represent the archaic world, a world of gloom, mistery and fantasy, where giants, creatures that appeared after Noah’s flood, lived with what Giambattista Vico described in ‘New Science’, as “Bestial Freedom” – a freedom from terror and authority. However, Harrison arrives to the conclusion mentioned previously: forests are the origin of civilizations, further suggesting that the order of human institutions is: “first the forests, after the huts, then the villages, next the cities and then the academies”.

According to Harrison and Vico, human civilizations and their ‘universal institutions’ are based on the forests of prehistory, and with the burial of the dead, men or so called ‘sons of the earth’ are able to return to its origins. Nevertheless, and one of the ideas that most caught my attention from this reading, is that humankind has found religion and divinity in the sky, and most civilizations from then have been ‘sky-worshipers, children of a celestial father’. Why then if we are so called ‘sky-worshipers’ do we have to find eternal rest in the ground? One of the ideas we came up as a group in our discussion was the adoration towards the sky is only because of pure curiosity, fear and perhaps even ambition. The sky represents to humans the unconquered and unknown world; a world that goes beyond what we know down here, and its inmensity overwhelms us. This might even explain the construction of the ‘Integral’ in “We”, the dystopian novel we read for the course, since the Numbers in the One State are building it in order to go to space and conquer new worlds. Another way to see human adoration to the sky is that it might represent the future, whereas burials denote the past and the ancestry.

Why then, do we feel the need to go back to our origins? (represented by the burial of the dead, one of the universal institutions of humankind). One of the conclusions one can arrive to is that life is cyclical, thus must and will go back to what it started. In his work, Harrison supported by Vico’s ‘New Science’, explains how it has always been like that, and how from animal or forests we develop into civilizations, but always will return to our origins. The idea of the forests and beast suggests the scary and unknown, what is out of our control, whereas civilization seems almost as a machine, no soul, emotions or interactions. What might differenciate us, humans, from these extremes, is that we have been able to form institutions and find something to which hold on to, our religion, matrimony and our ancestry.

Throughout the entire text, one comes up with the idea that mankind is always trying to crush nature in order to build its civilizations, and is according to Harrison the way it is, has always been and will continue to be. Not only it applies to Rome, “Rome can become Rome only by overcoming, or effacing, the forests of its origins”, but I think it applies to the One State in “We”, because as a nation they have grown overcoming nature, leaving it exclusively behind the “Green Wall”, where beasts and animals roam around like the numbers in the One State.

One of the conclusions I have arrived from this reading, is that ‘nature’s battle against humans’ and civilization’s need to go back to its origins, thus creating a ‘cyclical life’, are closely related to Zamyatin’s idea of infinite revolutions, since nothing is finite. 

"Questions of Conquest" & "Freedom and Democracy"

Conquest, Freedom, Democracy, Society, and Individuality. These five words reflect the main ideas portrayed by these two essays; “Questions of Conquest” by Peruvian writer and thinker Mario Vargas Llosa, and “Freedom and Democracy”. A reflection of both pieces of work will also lead to a connection to dystopian novel “We”, by Russian writer Yevgeny Zamyatin.

I shall start by reflecting on Vargas Llosa’s work “Question of Conquest”, Llosa’s reflection and analysis of Latin American Societies and the impact of Spanish Colonization during the 16^th century onwards on them. My inmediate reaction to this essay was the realization that Vargas Llosa’s reflection was and still remains completely valid to Latin American countries, and also the bizarre feeling of identity and pride towards my culture. As I read the essay I came to realize and began to ask myself the same questions Vargas Llosa himself asks at the very beginning: How were the Spaniards able to conquer such a powerful, sophisticated, and organized society like the Incas?  Why have the post colonial republics failed to improve the lives of their Indian citizens?.

The key to answering these questions is unfortunately what enabled the Incan empire to grow from its sacred city Cusco to a vast Empire, which in only a century was able to dominate almost three quarters of South America in a territory they denominated  as ”Tahuantinsuyo”. It was the unification of their society and the Incan totalitairan structure which led the Empire to fall into pieces during the Spanish Conquest. The loss of their leadership (the capture and assassination of their Inca Atahualpa) left the Indians in confusion, indians who lacked the ability to make their own decisions, incapable of individual initiative and independence. Confusion. Desperation. Lack of authority. It was all it took the Spaniards to break down the system, to come through what we all kept thinking was a strong and unified society. Leading us to the question, to what extent is a unified society and a powerful and authoritarian regime strong enough to avoid its own destruction?

Isn’t this a similar case to that shown by Russian author Yevgeny Zamyatin in his dystopian novel “We”? Well, I think it is. The One State is the people, and the Benefactor is the Inca. Both unified, solid, ordered and powerful empires. However, one is destroyed due to this, whereas the other, although attempted to be destroyed, was able to persist.

As I read on through Vargas Llosa’s work and then move on to “Freedom and Democracy” I began to find a similar argument which I further on linked to “We”. That is the individuals powerlesness, lack of ability to question the social organism of which he is part of and the suppresion of spontaneous feelings and creativity, all ideas reflected and portrayed by Zamyatin in his novel.

Pre Hispanic cultures as the Inca, individuals could not morally question the society they lived in, and such is the case of individuals, like D-503, living in the One State. It is this feeling of having someone watching over you all the time, which does not allow individuals to have this notion of sovereignity.

One of the main ideas rescued from my reading of “Freedom and Democracy” was that listed previously; suppresion of spontaneous feelings and creativity, since it linked inmediately to my reading of “We”. “Freedom and Democracy” tries to explain modern era societies, like the American, that build powerless, isolated, anxious and insecure individuals, and the illusion of individuality.

The most important aspect to highlight discussed that guards a direct connection with “We” is the discouragement of emotions and suppresion of feelings in our society. This is done since we are little childs; our education has guided us through a path where we are taught to have feelings which are not entirely ours (lack of individuality), where creative thinking is linked to emotions and thought to be a sign of unstableness, unsoundness and unbalance, and where original thinking is discouraged. All these three ideas remain closely linked to “We”. In the One State, numbers are not “allowed” in some sort of way to possess and develop this creative thinking; if done so, they are believed to have a soul, and having a soul is to them, like having a disease. And everyone appears to be the same to te other.

This is driving me to another question: is the ability to develop creative and original thinking, freedom? Does our society allow us to be free? Or are we constantly driven by rules and limitations? I shall leave you with that thought too.

“Questions of Conquest” further reflection –

I just thought it to be interesting to make a further approach or simply to leave this reflection with a question mark to Mario Vargas Llosa’s work in the following aspect: “westernized Latin Americans, have preserved in the worst habits of our forebears, behaving towards the Indians during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries as the Spaniards behaved towards the Aztecs and Incas, and sometimes worse”.

I just consider that it does apply to Upper Classes in all latin American Societies, conclusion which I have reached after my experience living in Peru for the past years. We have this mentality of “conquistadores”, and feel superior (as Spaniards) than the native population in our country. As Vargas Llosa outlines, it s mostly due to the huge economic gap existing between both communities, and while Indian peasants try to integrate in this modern and capitalist world, the loss of their culture, language, beliefs, traditions and customs are at risk, while they begin to adapt the customs of their ancient masters and “conquistadores”.

Zamyatin - "On Language" and "We"

Zamyatin’s dystopian novel “We”, covers most of the specific internal devices and principles he himself sums up in his essay “On Language”.

In his paper “On Language” Zamyatin discusses the concepts he believes outline literary writing. I have divided and analysed his essay into three main arguments which I consider are expressed in his novel “We”; firstly, Zamyatin’s conclusion that literary works are categorized into lyrical and epic writing rather than prose and poetry, secondly, Zamyatin’s dwelling on the following thesis: “an epic work is theater, acting”, and thirdly in his appreciation of  the spoken and mental language in literature.

First of all, Zamyatin argues that literary works are not divided by prose and poetry, rather by lyrical and epic writing. Thus, according to Zamyatin, his novel “We” would lie under the category of an epic literary work, which leads the reader into a journey through interplanetary space, where the writer must experience the emotions of his characters, these alienated people and personalities.

As far as my reading Zamyatin’s work has allowed me, I am able to say that he is able to lead us, the readers, into this futuristic nation and time he has created, the One State; he leads us into the lives of these foreign people who are named after a series of numbers, and specially into the mind and life of D-503. Zamyatin has achieved what he proposes in “On Language”; he is able to reincarnate himself into the cahracters, period and milieu portrayed (milieu – physical or social setting in which something occurs or develops). This, he is able to achieve from the very beginning of the novel, making Zamyatin possess an “essential psychological condition” that writers must attempt to have.

Thirdly, I consider that one of the most important categories of Zamyatin’s essay that he has been able to achieve in his novel “We” is of the proper creation and use of the spoken and mental language. As readers we are able to easily penetrate D-503 mind through Zamyatin’s writing. He conveys the characters thoughts; fragmented, scattered, as it should be.

Zamyatin also develops in “On Language” an analysis on the method of ommission of psychological lines, the supply of very little hints in literary prose, idea that correlates to my reading of “We”, given that he creates this kind of  futuristic/One State jargon, given by terms such as “the benefactor”, the “green wall” and even the use of numbers to name his own characters. These terms the reader cannot understand until further explanation.

Zamyatin’s “On Language” allows me understand his own writing, which at first is believed to be somewhat complicated and imcomprehensible in “We”. However I am able to realize and understand that that is the only way to portray this novel in a realistic and reliable manner.