This week some Breton musicians came to the village to entertain and a lot of work was done in the school with the children to make sure they had a fun evening. It made me think about the attraction of cities where culture dazzles and is on tap, as against villages like this where everything has to be planned to give the community as much activity and interest as they can. I also recall my friend telling me there is a limit to the number of theatres you can go to even in a city. Sometimes there can be too much choice.
In both instances there is a lot of emphasis upon ‘doing’ upon ‘attending’, getting ‘active’ and I wonder why we have lost contemplation in this world. When I was at school a school master commented to me that when he started teaching the library was full every evening during the boys free time, now he was surprised to find more than five pupils in it at one time.
When human beings first made libraries possible they became wonders of the world, the loss of the famous ones has become the stuff of tragedy because they represented the liberation of the mind and the transference of ideas across ages. Have we lost the knowledge that there is no city in the world that can compare to the universe of imagination inside one’s head?