Brain Food #587

On celebrations between catastrophes

Thoughts of the day

When was the last time you celebrated something?

A topic I keep returning to with Brain Food is that of suffering, which first caught my attention while working my way through most published Greek tragedies, a good number of years ago.

Life is filled with suffering of different magnitudes. Arthur Schopenhauer even went as far as claiming that we are only happy in those moments in which we find temporary relief from our suffering. Perhaps we don’t celebrate enough because the bad moments seem to outnumber the good. Perhaps we are just being too hard on ourselves.

Anne Carson’s translations of Euripides’ tragedies have darkly comic undertones. Even the most tragic -in its true sense- of characters might momentarily acknowledge their terrible fates, and still find reasons to celebrate, even if their perils were in many ways infinitely worse than ours.

Amidst the suffering, there are countless reasons to celebrate, even the reasons that seem too insignificant on the surface. To the ancient Greeks, being alive was enough.

Celebrating encourages us to stop and savour the moment. Find something to celebrate tonight. It might not all be as catastrophic as it seems after all.

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Taken from Grief Lessons: Four plays by Euripides

“Come here, let me share a bit of wisdom with you.
Have you given much thought to our mortal condition?
Probably not. Why would you? Well, listen.
All mortals owe a debt to death.
There's no one alive
who can say if he will be tomorrow.
Our fate moves invisibly! A mystery.
No one can teach it, no one can grasp it.
Accept this! Cheer up! Have a drink!
But don't forget Aphrodite--that's one sweet goddess.
You can let the rest go. Am I making sense?
I think so. How about a drink.
Put on a garland. I'm sure
the happy splash of wine will cure your mood.
We're all mortal you know. Think mortal.
Because my theory is, there's no such thing as life,
it's just catastrophe.”