The Horizon: The Potential of Idealism

In one of Jack's recent blog posts, he describes Eatonville as giving off a sort of Utopian vibe when Jody begins to build it up. This led me to  re-examine the idealistic value in Janie's nature  that we have seen so far in Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, in a new light. It is clear that Janie has some in-articulated ideal she dreams her life to live up to -- an ideal that is very much connected to some part of who she is that she is waiting for the right moment to reveal -- and it's intriguing to compare her to Bigger and the narrator who were also initially unable to articulate what it was that was propelling them towards where they were going in their journey to self discovery and increased awareness of circumstances.

It was surprising to me just how controversial Janie's idealistic nature was to others from discussions on recent blog posts and in class. It seems like she can be easily viewed in two ways: as bravely admirable or selfishly/childishly impractical. To me, however, she must fall somewhere in between as all idealistic approaches to anything must. People will praise and glorify the idealist who succeeds and scoff at the ones that don't, saying that they knew it along, that he or she had her heads too high up in the clouds. Last year, I took the "Utopias and Dystopias in Literature" course taught by Ms. Linder. I can see how Janie sees the potential of "Utopia" in the people she meets. It's not a exactly a romantic possibility she is searching for then -- although that is certainly part of it - but the potential of infinite possibilities in general. This is very much evident in the strength she has to marry Logan motivated by her belief that she may realize love and motivation to follow Joe Starks because of his big talk about creating something out of nothing, representing to her the "horizon." I feel a sense of foreboding with how smoothly things have been running in Eatonville (though I may of course be wrong) and in a similar way there is a sense of foreboding in all of Janie's hope, manifesting itself for instance through the revealing of Joe's true nature. As with most Utopian/Dystopian literature, things fall apart, or turn out to be more than they seem. I remember I'd open a book for last year's class already mentally preparing myself for that moment. In all honesty, I was under the impression that my initial belief that there was no point in attempting to make things perfect, or to be extreme, to even try and make things better if it will never exactly live up to the ideal, would be confirmed. I ended up realizing something else however. At the same time I was reading Arcadia, I was writing a paper about the Port Huron Statement for U.S History. (Please forgive me if this is too much of  a digression for you.) I was particularly struck by the last line of the document which reads, "If we appear to seek the unattainable, it has been said, then let it be known that we do so to avoid the unimaginable." Striving for Utopia is not particularly meaningless then, having a powerful, if unrealistic ideal that drives you is not completely pointless and childish. In essence, and I don't mean to sound platitudinous, there is something to be gained from trying. Perhaps it was the norm of the time to marry a Logan and stay with him, perhaps a real life Janie would leave and not find ideal love elsewhere but there would have been no possibility of change had she not left -- any revolution we have gone through throughout history was started out by an idealistic fringe that gradually became the norm.

I realize of course that there are many downsides to idealism. The ideal that one is chasing may not be a beneficial ideal or perhaps it deludes one from seeking truth -- which there is fulfillment in -- in being so consumed with the hope of seeking happiness. At times however, having an ideal in mind can help one to seek truth. It comes down to articulating the ideal so that one is self aware enough to avoid the dangers of idealism. I suppose in reality we all have our own, maybe subconscious versions of an ideal, ranging on different levels. Perhaps we are so quick to judge Janie because her ideal is illustrated so deliberately and instilled into the motif of the novel with such fervor by Hurston. The narrator in Invisible Man initially believes he just wants to climb up the ladder to the highest point imaginable for him but in the end he is able to articulate and realize that the "ideal" he is actually seeking is to realize his identity and in turn is able to come closer to truth. I understand that telling Bigger to go for it, go be a pilot, follow your dreams, is unrealistic but at the same time, in changing, in doing something (albeit killing women and writing a kidnap note), attempting to manipulate someone else for once, he is able to articulate more of what has been constricting him. However, it is significant neither Bigger or the narrator are ever able to completely articulate/figure things out, fulfill their own realized version of an ideal though they gain something from getting closer. Not to digress too much again but I can connect what I am trying to say about the potential of idealism to Plato's Symposium which we are reading in Intro to Philosophy. He has Diotima define love as the perpetual desire for absolute good. This absolute good is the ideal we are all striving towards but the truth of the matter is that we can never fully reach it -- we can never fully uncover the truth and yet we still love. In some ways, there is something to be said about giving up, living by the rules of a religion you may doubt just in order to cope and try to be happy. However, there is also something to be said about continuing to search for the truth you will never find because the search itself is the method of "coping." I do not see Janie's ideal as illustrated so far as detrimental and I am intrigued to see where Janie's idealism takes her.