Faulkner and Dick, Gods and Monsters

In an interview with German writer Uwe Anton, Philip K. Dick cited William Faulkner's Nobel Prize acceptance speech to describe the purpose of his protagonists, which he described as neither heroes nor anti-heroes. Here is what Faulkner said, "I believe that man will not merely endure: he will prevail....because he has a soul, a spirit capable of compassion and sacrifice and endurance... [The writer's duty is] to help man endure by reminding him of ... the glory of his past."

And here is what Dick said: "The entire universe and all the parts therein continually malfunction. But the great merit of the human being is that the human being is isomorphic with his malfunctioning universe....And when he recognizes that he is a malfunctioning part in a malfunctioning system instead of succumbing to this realization and just lying down and saying...there's nothing that can be done, [h]e goes on trying.
...And I think that it's certain Faulkner's man will not merely endure, he will prevail. That in the midst of the rubble, there will still be the sound of a man's voice planning, arguing, and proposing solutions. I think Faulkner caught the essence of what is really great about human beings, and so I don't write about heroes. "

I think that they are saying this: there is greater beauty in mankind's strivings for perfection than in the achievement of it.

One of my favorite paintings is a large representation of massive waterfalls. It hangs in a library I frequent and is mediocre at best with its dull colors and dumb cliches, such as the stripe slathered across the abyss, a sulking rainbow. The amateur artist invoked the auteur and failed. He probably knew it was no Rembrandt, seeing it through to the end.

When I see the painting, I see the struggle of man -- the gasps for the divine breath that made Adam animate, and could make us more than mammals. Marked with the scars of that conflict, the work transcends banality and enters the inspired.

In the classic film The Super Mario Bros. Movie, there is this great line. Daisy (a character) says, "It’s beautiful. It’s almost as if he was a monster trying to be a human being..."
The artist, the writer, the creator, is a human being trying to be a god.