Loneliness Is An Unconditional Ally.

2020 is an age of outrageous misinformation and propaganda, and to add insult to injury the prevalence of the Coronavirus has hampered the flow of truth and facts. In the past if a crisis of this magnitude occurred then the extraneous journalists would be divested of their positions and only experts would be drafted in to provide the necessary information to the public. However a small yet vocal minority opinion has grasped this tragedy to disseminate their poisonous rhetoric, even stooping to acts such as sabotage to impose their view upon others.

(Picture is of BLM extremists in Bristol, who damaged a statue of Edward Colston before throwing it into the canal. These activists took it upon themselves to destroy a statue that most Bristolians were actually quite fond of, but in an extraordinary act of self righteousness they believed that they should get rid of it themselves due to Colston`s link with slavery. Infantile actions like this were not condemned by the liberal minority in the country but celebrated, thereby demonstrating their own ignorance, philistinism and illiteracy as they failed to distinguish between artistic interpretations of the past and idolatry- believing that the statue was an example of the latter when it was actually the former).

Sabotage, slander, libel and the deliberate perversion of history were all utilised by a left wing cult. However the suppression of free artistic expression, sometimes violently was the most alarming aspect to this movement. Art is merely a reflection of history and society, as soon as any political dimension infiltrates its creation then the art will simply die. This is especially true with literature, which represents all facets of the human experience including those aspects which we would categorise as immoral.

Fifty years ago this month Yukio Mishima died. Mishima was a Japanese writer with a distinct and uncompromising view of his nation, its history and culture. He was fiercely patriotic and the disturbing circumstances that surrounded his death have been chronicled, examined and analysed. This notoriety overshadows his literary brilliance. He chronicled the lives of those on the margins of society, the miscreants, the deviants and the people that we instinctively avoid. These are characters who are more interesting to read about as they are belligerently individual. 

In 1968 he was nominated for the Nobel Prize, but the nihilistic style that imbued his fiction seemed to be the factor that prevented him from receiving the award. Contemporary literary critics are almost overwhelmingly left-wing and it is dispiriting to realise this fact. The utopian vision of society idealised by those on the left is severely inhibiting creativity and thought. These are fixed ideas held by people too obstinate to consider alternatives and as a consequence entire sections of the literary community have been effectively silenced. In conclusion we need to read more fiction which is transgressive to allow the art form to innovate and to progress.