Message from the Director, Dr. John Glavin: "Living out It Shoots"

What it’s like to actually live out “It Shoots?”

One answer might be taken from the remarkable British novelist, Rose Macaulay (1881-1958), author of 35 books of fiction and non-fiction. Her last novel, The Towers of Trebizond (1956), is generally regarded as her masterpiece and one of the great comic fictions in the language.

At one point, this novel urges that we avoid what it calls the “second string emotions,” which it names as: sentimentality, jealousy, envy, self-righteousness, and indignation.

Macaulay only names the quintet, so from this point on, you have to settle for my interpretation, for which she cannot be held responsible. But I do want first to note with admiration her choice of “second-string” rather than the harsher, perhaps more obvious, certainly cruder, second-rate.  Second string is particularly appropriate for "It Shoots" because it comes to us from archery.  A second string is originally defined as the reserve bowstring carried by an archer in case the first breaks.  And thus by extension a second-string anything is a substitute, a replacement for the regular, the first-string.  In theater terms, it’s the understudy not the star. In this case, then, a second-string emotion is one that substitutes for another that is altogether better suited to the situation.

So one way to define these second string emotions would be to ask what’s the first string, the better, deeper, stronger thing for which each is a sub?

And, curiously, the answer would seem to be  – not another emotion.  These are second-string responses principally, fundamentally, because they substitute mere feeling where action should take the lead.    

Sentimentality remakes demands on us so that they prompt reactions, not actions. If we only feel, then we’re always only sentimental. Sentimentality is about buying the card, rather than paying the visit or, better still, helping out.  

Jealousy hates a mirror; it turns away from candid self-appraisal to a fantasy of who we are and what we deserve. Jealousy is always a carte blanche for under-performance, our under-performance, or simple lack.

Envy, jealousy’s first cousin, is the lazy person’s antidote to labor; energetic people get down to work, lazy folks envy. Envy’s an alimony we pay ourselves after we divorce Emulation.

Self-righteousness is the distinctly second-string replacement for doing justice.  Anybody actually doing justice would be too tired or too humble to feel self-righteous.

Indignation is how cowards displace anger, because anger prompts action, and action is risky. Avoiding risk, indignation merely stews in self-assuring impotence.  

Finally, for a nice summary of how these five might combine in practice, here’s a longer passage from the novel,  a general and generous manifesto for a well-lived life.

“One mustn’t lose sight of the hard core, which is . . . love your friends and like your neighbors, be just, be extravagantly generous, be honest, be tolerant, have courage, have compassion, use your wits and your imagination, understand the world you live in and be on terms with it, don’t dramatize and dream and escape.”

Doing all those things? Then you can be sure "It Shoots".

JG