A philosopher fallen to betting is hardly distinguishable from a Philistine under the same circumstances: the difference will chiefly be found in his subsequent reflections . . . .
Reading this quote immediately put me in mind of a conversation I'd had with a Kenyan friend, Marianne, about my interest in Karen Blixen, Denys Finch-Hatton, and their social set. "They weren't like the 'Happy Valley' crew that came in the decade after they arrived," I'd told her. "The 'Happy Valley' group just got drunk and slept with each others' spouses."
"Which is what they [Blixen and friends] did, too," she replied, challenging my categorization criteria.
"Well, yeah," I admitted, recalling Bror Blixen's alcoholism and philandering, Karen Blixen's affair with Denys while she was still married to Bror, Deny's affairs while he was with her, the wine-swilling, dope smoking and opium taking that went on in Karen Blixen's parlor . . . .
What could I say? Yes, Blixen & Co's behavior paralleled that of the Happy Valley entourage, but Blixen et al. were . . . cultured? Karen and Denys read poetry and listened to classical music?
The question needled me until I read that above-quoted passage from George Eliot, and then I understood my own reasoning. The colonists of Blixen's generation - perhaps because of their proximity to the Victorian era and its endorsement of exploration and discovery, especially by amateurs - were remarkably reflective about their lives in Africa. An astonishing number of them wrote books about their experiences: Bror (African Hunter), Karen (Out of Africa, Shadows on the Grass), Llewelyn Powys (Black Laughter), Beryl Markham (West with the Night), Paul von Lettow-Vorbeck (My Reminiscences of East Africa), to name but a handful.
By contrast, the Happy Valley menagerie - Idina Sackville, Lord Errol, Diana Delamere, Alice de Janzé,Sir Jock Delves Broughton - bore a much closer resemblance in their conduct to Los Angelinos in the 1980s. They were too busy being drunk, stoned and otherwise zonked out of their minds - and in-and-out of each others beds, trousers and every other locale and crevice - and shooting each other - to do much reflection, never mind writing. Though a number of books have been written about them - White Mischief, The Bolter - reflection is not a characteristic attributable to their modus vivendi.
Yet reflection - that most distinctly human activity - is what interests me. The critical mind that perceives, questions what it perceives, and experiments in the arrangement of those perceptions into coherent narratives - along with the benefits and limitations of such an approach - is what captures my attention.
However much damage the colonists of Karen Blixen's era wrought - ecological destruction, biodiversity diminishment, discrimination, denial of human rights, theft of land - they were reflective about their actions. Why those philosophers were unable to prevent themselves from being as harmful (to themselves, and to Kenya) as the Philistines that followed - and whether their reflectiveness made any difference - is a question worthy of reflection.
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