…fools rush in.
Garrison Keillor, A Prairie Home Companion
In places like Like Wobegon and Minnesota Public Radio’s firing of A Prairie Home Companion creator and host Garrison Keillor for “inappropriate conduct” and MPR’s erasure of all things Prairie Home Companion. MPR will no longer air A Prairie Home Companion re-runs or Keillor’s thoughtful “Writer’s Almanac” and will give a new name to the show hosted by Keillor’s successor. If you opened the last link and it said “Page Not Found – NPR” you get the picture.
President Trump and Roy Moore
Meanwhile the President of the United States gets elected after 20 women have accused him of sexual misconduct or harassment — and continues to deny all allegations as fake new, though he himself has been recorded as bragging about groping — while he and conservative evangelicals in Alabama support the candidacy of Roy Moore whose behavior is alleged to be more than “inappropriate”.
It was English poet Alexander Pope (1688-1744) who wrote the line “Fools rush in where angels fear to tread” in An Essay on Criticism that invites the reader to ponder which is worse: criticism of writing that “judges ill” or writing that is in “Want of Skill”?
‘Tis hard to say, if greater Want of Skill
Appear in Writing or in Judging ill,
But, of the two, less dang’rous is th’ Offence,
To tire our Patience, than mis-lead our Sense
Some few in that, but Numbers err in this,
Ten Censure wrong for one who Writes amiss;
A Fool might once himself alone expose,
Now One in Verse makes many more in Prose.
-Alexander Pope, An Essay on Criticism (1–8).
Fools — both writers and their critics — are rushing in where angels fear to tread. Views from the Edge just became one of the them. Sometimes fools can’t help themselves.
Wishing everyone a nice day from what little remains of the little fictional Minnesota town that just went the way of all flesh. Farewell to thee, Lake Wobegon. We can only wish the same or worse in the nonfictional places of Pennsylvania Avenue and the State of Alabama.
- Gordon C. Stewart, Chaska, MN, November 30, 2017
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