Revisiting Joe Allston

 

This is my first effort towards the Capstone Project, and the planned collection of essays. As I sit down to write, I’m conscious of a quote from Wallace Stegner, from his curmudgeonly alter-ego Joe Allston, the protagonist and narrator of “The Spectator Bird”: 

 

“Writing your life implies that you think it worth writing. It implies an arrogance, or confidence, or compulsion to justify oneself [...]. Did Washington write his memoirs? Did Lincoln, Jefferson, Shakespeare, Socrates? No, but Nixon will, and Agnew is undoubtedly hunched over his right now.” 

 

I first met Joe the summer between my Sophomore and Junior years, after picking “The Spectator Bird” off my parents’ shelf. I’d been on a reading kick, largely motivated by a search for knowledge and sophistication that I hoped would save me from the depths of a depression (a pattern that would repeat). 

 

Joe spoke to me in an unexpected way, something I remarked on in the ‘Notebook’ I wrote about the book for my application to the Daily’s ‘Arts’ section (which is definitely better than any of the few pieces I actually wrote for the paper). What was most relatable about Joe was his paralysis - mental, not physical - and his constant self-judgement. I reasoned in the article that the solution to such issues as Joe faced is fairly simple: Action. 

 

Acting, rather than thinking about acting, was clearly what must be done to help Joe, and to help myself. But as easily gleaned from the book as that dictum was, its facility of expression disguised its difficulty of application. And so here I am, thinking about Joe again. 

 

Is my production of this collection not an act of self-justification? An effort to come to terms with parts of myself that I hold in poor regard? Is writing not the expression of some unfulfilled, subconscious need? Is that admirable? Maybe Joe’s right. Maybe writing about one’s life is born of a compulsion to justify oneself, but does that invalidate it? 

 

Though there are levels and degrees of good and bad writing, and of validity, there is first the requirement that writing be done - that you be exposed. Doesn’t my writing this, in itself, constitute an act of vulnerability? When we write, are we not admitting, even if only to ourselves, a kind of deep ontological discomfort? A desire to rationalize one’s existence? To establish meaning? The person who writes strikes out into uncharted, boundless waters, prodding at the edges of the infinite horizon, running into only the limits of their imagination, discovering themself along the way.  

Cerebral and self-contained as it may be, the act of writing is what justifies it - the content is secondary to the production. I’ll try to remember that.