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is that I fail to see manifestations of it among the intellectuals I
know. I disqualify myself as possible evidence, since I am, clearly,
victim to the sentiment or dogma of a lost cause. But the writers
who have turned to liberalism, who find comfort in the virtues of
moderation and mildness, why is their work so often drenched in
gloom?
The intellectuals of liberalism must face this problem: how
can they believe the ADA program offers a proper amelioration for
our social problems while they find in Kafka the image of the
quality of our life? It may be said that the human condition, at
any time and in any society, is basically tragic, and politics a mere
tinkering with its surface. This is plausible, but not much more;
for the truth is that in historical moments when intellectuals felt
self-confident, sure of their ideas and their position, they endowed
such terms as "tragic" with a content quite different from what it
usually has today.
Need we really lose ourselves in such immensities as "America"?
Must one hate or love such a grab-bag of abstractions as "America"
-or "France" or "Ethiopia"? It seems more sensible to take Amer–
ica bit by bit, item by item, person by person. Then one can ad–
mire our easy-going manners and be disturbed by the drive against
civil liberties; enjoy baseball but distrust mass culture; find Whit–
man underrated and Fitzgerald overpraised; love Debs and see
in Roosevelt the confidence man bilked; respect the democratic
tradition, agree that American Marxists have generally undervalued
it, feel disturbed by the trend toward conformism; and more. In–
stead of assuming that America is a person whom one must marry
or divorce, embrace in ecstasy or trample in scorn, I prefer to dis–
tinguish among aspects of its behavior and tradition. And when
the PR editors report that writers now "want very much to be part
of American life," I cannot react with enthusiasm or distaste until
I am told
which part
of American life.
At this late moment there is, of course, no point in striking
the expatriate pose: Paris, alas, is no escape. Here we are, thrive
or wither. And certainly there is much in the American past that
may be cherished and preserved, as there is much in the American
present that should be rejected and discarded.
As
for the assump–
tion that mass culture in all its cheapness and ugliness is an un-
