Another, subtler root of Trumpism–this from the blithely insufferable Scott Simon of the obliviously unbearable NPR, ululating on progressive agitprop playwright, Tony Kushner:
A good weekend to you. I had the honor of interviewing Tony Kushner, the esteemed playwright, onstage to receive the Carl Sandburg Award from the Chicago Public Library Foundation this week. He’s best known for his Pulitzer-winning play, Angels in America, and the Oscar-winning film Lincoln.
“I write about politics and history,” Tony told me, “not because I have anything like confidence that what I write will get people to take action or see the world a certain way. I’m actually quite glad that I have no such confidence. I wasn’t elected by anyone to wield power and I often wonder if I know what I’m talking about.
“If I do my job well, if I figure out how to really set the dialectics spinning, not only do I not need to be right, but it’s also useful if sometimes I’m wrong, as long as I maintain a sharp awareness of my errant imagination.”
I found it inspiring to hear from a great artist that the mistakes we make along the way can teach us as much as any success.
“You find some way to make this squirming, ineffable, divided, frantic-to-escape thing,” he told me, “this truth, into something vivid, a dream or a nightmare, something an audience can tear into, puzzle over, put away, and someday return to, or even completely forget.” * Kushner is not describing any species of truth with which I am familiar, and certainly not art, but pure rhetoric. Dionysus wept.
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Another, subtler root of Trumpism–this from the blithely insufferable Scott Simon of the obliviously unbearable NPR, ululating on progressive agitprop playwright, Tony Kushner:
A good weekend to you. I had the honor of interviewing Tony Kushner, the esteemed playwright, onstage to receive the Carl Sandburg Award from the Chicago Public Library Foundation this week. He’s best known for his Pulitzer-winning play, Angels in America, and the Oscar-winning film Lincoln.
“I write about politics and history,” Tony told me, “not because I have anything like confidence that what I write will get people to take action or see the world a certain way. I’m actually quite glad that I have no such confidence. I wasn’t elected by anyone to wield power and I often wonder if I know what I’m talking about.
“If I do my job well, if I figure out how to really set the dialectics spinning, not only do I not need to be right, but it’s also useful if sometimes I’m wrong, as long as I maintain a sharp awareness of my errant imagination.”
I found it inspiring to hear from a great artist that the mistakes we make along the way can teach us as much as any success.
“You find some way to make this squirming, ineffable, divided, frantic-to-escape thing,” he told me, “this truth, into something vivid, a dream or a nightmare, something an audience can tear into, puzzle over, put away, and someday return to, or even completely forget.”
*
Kushner is not describing any species of truth with which I am familiar, and certainly not art, but pure rhetoric. Dionysus wept.
Tom
Sheridan, WY
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