Heroes and Heroines – Part 1
Recall from school-days the “Great Man Theory of History”, credited to Thomas Carlyle from the 19th C. History, he wrote, was nothing but a continuous stream of geniuses and hyper-achievers (both male and female) leading, imprinting, forcing, and inspiring their will upon others. Although typical to critique the “Great Man Theory” as conservative, Western, and hierarchical, in truth it’s actually radical,…..I think anarchists and intellectual extremists of various stripes concur.
Maybe only genius understands genius, the greatest minds are more often than not ignored by contemporaries. Example – his first book The Birth of Tragedy barely caused a ripple, and only in a small circle of philologists, yet was his biggest seller despite being followed by what are now considered classic contributions to the Western canon.
Few are aware of what sustained Friedrich Nietzsche in the darkest days of being ignored, his somatic illnesses, and loneliness,………a simple trans-Atlantic letter in 1881 from 3 unknown admirers in Baltimore, MD encouraging him to continue his “depth of thought and sublime diction”. That “epistolary lifeline” was a butterfly’s wings leading to a sublime hurricane. Think every day who might need encouragement in our midst?,…..who wants to be a local champion, a catalyst, a teammate?
Last thought – it’s odd how Nietzsche is cursorily brushed aside as fanatic, a crazed fringe-element,.……but do you know who was a pivotal influence upon his thought nonpareil? Ralph Waldo Emerson,……a widely recognized “Great Man of History”. Only genius understands genius……?
We don’t need geniuses to help us all understand that effective healthcare is at our beckoning: a) attachment 1 – marijuana is unequivocally harmful to the developing brain, and b) attachment 2 – the domino effects of excessive maternal weight gain and gestational diabetes on future maternal and childhood health is gargantuan, but effective preventive measures exist.
Joe Kaempf, MD
District 8 Oregon Representative
Portland, OR
Volume 13, Number 20