Resist the clandestine attacks

To suffer woes which Hope thinks infinite;
To forgive wrongs darker than death or night;
To defy Power, which seems omnipotent;
To love, and bear; to hope till Hope creates
From it's own wreck the thing it contemplates;
Neither to change, not falter, nor repent;
This, like thy glory, Titan, is to be
Good, great and joyous,beautiful and free;
This is alone Life, Joy, Empire, and Victory

Percy Bysshe Shelley

There are a lot of quotes and catch phrases going around, but for some reason I was looking for something more substantial. Something that can turn a negative into a positive. So I went fishing in my Byron and Shelley and found this.

It got me thinking, about the eras of the great poets. The metaphysical poets who lived and wrote in a time when we as a country were swinging between  Catholic and protestant on the whim of the monarch of the time. Then you have the likes of Byron and Shelley and the climate of social upheaval they were living through. Through both periods there was also the very obvious outbreaks of talent in composition and playwright. It's like oppression breeds talent.

Now I studied various arts to varying levels and one of the constant questions is what are the authors trying to project in this piece. But looking at it a different way is it not what they are trying to say but rather what do they feel the need to say?

Another key author who uses the times of oppression is John Steinbeck and his dust bowl trilogy. I always struggling when I had to read of mice and men because I couldn't understand the treatment of Lenny to the point it made me mad with anger. But I went back to it and dubious battle recently and released my anger was because for a brief moment we had moved on from that mentally. Unfortunately recently we have taken a massive leap backwards and those issues are now relevant again.

To be honest I am really scared I will have to reread the great gatsby, a book I loathe, if we take any more leaps backwards. But it is frightening how perceptive some of these artists are at the underlying struggle of the masses when things go horribly wrong. And while the world is paddling furiously to stay afloat great artists emerge to document, create, notated and reflect in the most beautiful way imaginable.

Each has a different style and thus capture the times in different focuses, Remember Constable and Turner were contemporaries as much as Mozart and Haydn were. Very very different styles but both reflections of their social existence. Some people opt to follow the Haydon or Constable fashion, calm, pleasant not wave making focus on the positive, others myself included go the Turner Mozart route of blatantly defying and questioning the conventional. But both ways are just as valid and both offer the same thing. Comfort and reassurance there is a way forward.

The arts in turbulent times are often at their peak, for they are at the core of the resistance. When all else is crumbling and the oppression is being sneaky and achieving their objectives by every means fair and foul. The clandestine attacks are meet, documented and exposed by several if not all the arts. Hence you will find a lot of the great artists of the time being the most vocal. The birth of social media is making this even more obvious with their direct call to arms. They are aware of their audience and choose to help educate them. 

The best way to sum other up is remember any great leader can be brought to his knees by the skill of humour from the jester.