What Do You Do with Longing?
Updated: 5 days ago
Dead Poets Society, The Catcher in the Rye, and the search for something more.
One of my favorite lines in any movie comes from Dead Poets Society:
"We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life...
But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for."
I remember seeing that movie and hearing that line and thinking yes, that's it! This quote was kind of floating in my head for most of the time that I was working on Sparkle Valley.
Another character I always loved was Holden Caulfield from Catcher in the Rye. And on the face of it, there wouldn't seem to be a direct connection here, but I think there is.
Both Keating and Caulfield sense something missing in the world. That's why I love these characters. Neither one of them is satisfied. Both think that the world needs to be larger, deeper, and more meaningful than the version that they are dealing with. In other words, they're both driven by a type of longing.
How do you remain fully alive in the world that feels so artificial?.
Keating chooses engagement:
“Carpe Diem. Seize the day. Make your life extraordinary.”
But Holden is still searching. He longs for honesty in a world that he sees reeking with phoniness. And he has no Keating to guide him.
He looks up to his younger sister Phoebe because she represents something that we’ve all lost. And that’s why his fantasy of becoming a catcher in the rye is so poignant (and also sad).
"I'm standing on the edge of some crazy cliff. What I have to do, I have to catch everybody if they start to go over the cliff—I mean if they're running and they don't look where they're going I have to come out from somewhere and catch them. That's all I'd do all day. I'd just be the catcher in the rye and all. I know it's crazy, but that's the only thing I'd really like to be." -Holden
He’s trying to protect the innocence he sees slipping away (like Keating), but has no path forward and becomes isolated and cynical.
And maybe that’s why, despite the tragic ending, Dead Poets seems in a way hopeful while Catcher is actually heartbreaking.
Only Keating has found a way to follow the Blue Flower.
