Much Ado About Everything
Описание книги
Following the suggestion implied by Shakespeare in the title of his 'Much Ado About Nothing', I offer my thoughts on Nothing and Being, on Creation and Annihilation, on Goodness and Truth, on Knowledge and Wisdom, on Nature and Grace, on Conscience and Innocence, on Sense and Nonsense, on Humor and Humility, on Humanity and Divinity, on Man and Woman, on Medieval, Renaissance and Modern, on Tradition and Revolution, on Culture and Christendom, on Education and Evolution, on Ecology and Economics, and on Everything, as it were through Shakespeare's eyes. In these chapters there is an undercurrent of contrast between the «mighty opposites» of Shakespeare, as looking back to the ideal of Christendom, and Bacon, as looking forward to the rise of Science and the British Empire.
Отрывок из книги
There are two ways of literary composition. One way is to begin with the title, a really interesting, imaginative title, one that positively demands a book to be written in pursuance of it. I wonder how many books have been written with such an inspiring title as their starting-point. Quite a few, I imagine. And many more poems.
The other way, which may well be called “the beaten path”, is for the book to be written and then an appropriate title to be devised whether by the author or (more frequently) by the publisher. So let it be with this book.
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“In the wedding ceremony?” you may ask, taken aback by the sudden answer, as if it were a rabbit pulled out of a magician’s hat. Yes, I say, in the wedding ceremony. For in that ceremony what word is so important, so crucial, so central to the validity of the wedding, if not “Yes”. That is the word the bride and bridegroom are say to each other when questioned by the priest, “Will you, NN, take her, NN, to be your wedded wife?” Then he is supposed to answer, “Yes.” And then, to the similar question posed to her, she is also supposed to answer, “Yes.” And then their two Yeses make one, and thus, as Friar Laurence tells Romeo and Juliet, holy Church can incorporate two in one.
That is what the bride and bridegroom are supposed to say to each other on such an important occasion. That is what, in other words, they are groomed beforehand to say to each other. But what if they don’t say it? What if one or the other, and first the bridegroom as he is the first to be posed the question, what if he says not “Yes” but “No”? Then what happens? Then, of course, there is the above-mentioned “Much Ado”.
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