“She might be a great person, but life is so much bigger than just loving someone,” writes Kazuo Ishiguro.
We often hopefully say this place is great, this thing is great and this person is great. We also say that this field is great and will prove to be propitious for you. This person is great and will prove to be expedient for you. This book is great and will prove to be a great vehicle to transport you to a great world. All the time we talk up or dilate upon something which merits our appreciation we use the adjective: great. But what precisely is this greatness?
When we say something is great, what do we really mean by that? Does something really peculiar and resplendent inheres in that place, thing or person? What makes something truly and authentically great? Is the grandeur of a nation, a society or an ideology an illusion or a speciously designed sham where it becomes desperately tough to sift authentic grandeur from inauthentic grandeur? I will endeavour to answer the question regarding greatness by drawing on Sir Kazuo Ishiguro.
Kazuo Ishiguro in his third and the most celebrated novel, the remains of the day, writes: “And yet what precisely is this ‘greatness’? Just where, or in what, does it lie? I am quite aware it would take a far wiser head than mine to answer such a question, but if I were forced to hazard a guess, I would say that it is the very lack of obvious drama or spectacle that sets the beauty of our land apart. What is pertinent is the calmness of that beauty, its sense of restraint. It is as though the land knows of its own beauty, of its own greatness, and feels no need to shout it.”
In this particular episode, Stevens the narrator and the protagonist of this novel has set himself for an excursion on the insistence of his employer in Darlington hall. He begins his journey with driving a ford and redolently starts remembering his past when he had a different Lord and his values were completely disparate. When he reaches a hill station, he is gripped by the serenity of that place and stops there to see the place. I premeditatedly did not use any other verb like enjoy or bask since Stevens is a very earnest man and for him everything is seen in the prism of professionalism. He alights and encounters an old man who goads him to climb the ladders and reach to the highest point of that place. Stevens enquired but why? The old man blurts that the place is the best and he would find such a place nowhere.
The place he finds looks: “What I saw was principally field upon field rolling off into the far distance. The land rose and fell gently and the fields were bordered by hedges and trees. There were dots in some of the distant fields which I assumed to be sheep. To my right, almost on the horizon, I thought I could see the square tower of a church.” But what is truly great and resplendent in this place piques my interest and nudges my curiosity to dive into it and form a meaningful answer. I find nothing absolutely refined and of utmost greatness in this place but what we can surmise from this point is that it is necessary to understand that grandeur is not a universal phenomenon nevertheless the thing which makes it great is almost invariable for all objects of greatness.
At one point on hard heels of the term greatness, Stevens says: For it is true, when I stood on that high ledge this morning and viewed the land before me, I distinctly felt that rare, yet unmistakable feeling – the feeling that one is in the presence of greatness.” This is exactly what defines a great thing, a place or a person: that you are inexplicably in the presence of greatness. Moreover, one cannot scientifically prove that the thing which one considers great is absolutely great. Similarly, one cannot foist upon others the grandeur. When something is truly great, it does not foist upon others its plenary grandeur but the seer feels it in an ineffable and mysterious sense of appreciation. The obvious lack of drama and spectacle sets something truly apart and makes that thing outstanding. Anything imbued by spectacle and melodrama and the systematic way of foisting upon the seer the grandeur is simply beyond the pale of truly something great.
Furthermore, personally when I see skyscrapers such as Burj Khalifa and many more, I feel the object is clamorously beseeching my attention and is devoid of that refreshing candour which sets apart an object of true greatness. Neon lighting and buntings might decorate something superficially but will robe it of winsome beauty and greatness. Everywhere you go you bump upon different kinds of modern designs which extraneously decorate things. For example, string lights glistening and lighting up walkways in wedding ceremonies are total drama and do not exude originality. But again I am not coaxing anyone to buy into my discomfiting idea of greatness, I am only developing an enterprise to question and uphold a sense of debate upon greatness.
Lately someone came to me and quite in a dismal mood said: there is no maturity and people, his acquaintances, are cantankerous, they banter, poke fun at you or get angry at you. I asked what he means by maturity. He was clueless. I helped him and said do you mean by maturity that you are in the presence of greatness. He was discombobulated but was waving his head in agreement. What I inferred from his discomfiture was that he was overwhelmed by the knowledge of his acquaintances and they were unabashedly making him feel inferior. Precisely, this exclusionary behaviour and the domineering way of abasing others is anything but great. For someone, something or some place to be great and doppelganger of grandeur it is critically essential to be devoid and free of any extraneous and unwanted drama. People who pose themselves in intellectual frames are called by Nietzsche sublime servants.
What I am trying to arrive at is that greatness is not a monopoly of a solitary area. A person can be as great as a place or a thing. It is not so that a person is differently great than a place. The element which brings them together is curt absence of superficiality. There is a common denominator which ungirds and fastens all things which are truly great. They all are equally substantial and powerfully valued no matter in what incarnation they are insofar as they do not mislead and trick with their spurious veneers. For me a human could be as great as a tree or Alps.
French proponent of romanticism JJ Rousseau once lamentingly noted that since learned man has appeared; honest man is nowhere to be seen. By learned man Rousseau must have meant someone who has designed himself with buntings of scientific facts and mathematical equations. Here Rousseau’s remark has a very cardinal corollary. The corollary is that honesty and greatness are kind of conterminous and are expressions of the same idea. Being honest is tantamount to greatness. Being great is tantamount to honesty. Again the sheer lack of drama and spectacle.
When something is great, there is no need for it to shout its beauty or greatness. As Ishiguro notes: What is pertinent is the calmness of that beauty, its sense of restraint. It is as though the land knows of its own beauty, of its own greatness and feels no need to shout it. However, this sense of restraint and being aware of your greatness is the hallmark of anything great. There is no need to demonstrate and conspicuously exude anything inasmuch as the greatness gives the freedom to its appreciator to take stock of it and then come to a sensible conclusion whether it is great or not. For me intellectual who shouts its eminence, prominence and greatness is anything but great. For me any landscape which uproariously cajole me to buy into its resplendency is anything but great. For me anything which begs my attention to appreciate it by its string lights and neon lighting is anything but great.
The writer is a student, based in Turbat. He Tweets at @shahabakram6 and can be reached at [email protected]