Friday 17 November 2017

On exile and perception

On exile and perception..Last night i wstched a programme about the Roman poet Ovid.He was exiled from Rome and died in exile 2000 years ago. Like Dante exiled from Florence he wrote his best work while miles from the place his heart and mind thought of Perhaps when we have distance from the place we are seeking to understand and describe then we are most able to percieve it. Perhaps as we look back at the people we were we understand ourselves more. Perhaps exile is the best way to contemplate on upon the past. Ovid complained that writing poetry that no one would listen to was like dancing in the dark. Perhaps in the days of social media all exile becomes irrelevant. However distance still remains and we can all be the social scientists..we can all be the professional outsider observing and thinking about the society we live in. Bishop Berkeley commented " to be is to be perceived" and clearly shows that perception is the key to coping with the nature of the place we are in. Exile helps all of us at timeperceive the places we were in and the people we were..Exile can be created though by time place and psychology.. but it is always the case that it is creative ....

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