Percy-L: Literary, Religious, Scientific, and Philosophical Discussion of Walker Percy

[Michael Larson <larsonovic AT gmail.com>]

Lauren, I don't think liberalism and conservatism are rotations but are rather fundamentally different postures toward reality. It's true that someone might convert (rotate) from one to the other in the event of a sea-change in beliefs, but that would not be rotation in the Percyan sense, which, as I understand it, is caused by boredom with one's current method of reentry (thus the need to rotate to a new one).

I think you're right, though, that Percy wasn't satisfied with simply categorizing people and then using that label as a means of pigeonholing them or, worse yet, dismissing them.

Janet, I never got the sense that Percy liked any categorical definitions. Which is not to say that he himself did not have any classifiable characteristics, only that he was leery of the tendency to reduce people to labels. The individual is always more complex than the set of labels that describe him--even if they are true as far as they go.

John, it's always tenuous (and probably unwise) to give one-sentence definitions of complex concepts like liberalism and conservatism, so there is, by nature of the concision, much elaboration, clarification, and nuance left unsaid. But I was responding to Janet's comment about Percy's having had seemingly contradictory views, some "liberal," some "conservative." My thought was that these litmus-test issues usually don't go deep enough, as a means of identifying a person's orienting beliefs, to be very useful. And that's why you can have apparent contradictions in the same man--because the surface-level litmus tests may appear to be opposed, even if the underlying convictions are not actually so. And this is what I was trying to address with my definitions: I was trying to get a level below (i.e. "the root") the knee-jerk label associations and identify the philosophical orientation that makes a person tend toward one or the other posture.

Without belief in an objective moral order, there is little, if anything, to conserve, except individuality--that is to say, individual liberty. You could argue, I suppose, that this principle (of individual liberty) is, in fact, the objective moral code of liberalism, but that is something of an illusion, because individualism is subjective by nature, which means, among other things, that it is subject to change, depending on the  influence of the age in which the individual lives; and in all ages, the will of some individuals is inevitably going to clash with that of other individuals. Out of this clash comes democracy as the liberal solution to government, whereby individual liberty is still the highest good, but conflicts are resolved by the will of the majority. And before the modern democracies came the preparatory Reformation, which was the liberal principle applied to Christendom, whereby the State would be eventually loosed from the bonds of the Church, and the individual would be eventually freed to make of his religion what he will ... as an individual. And so it has come to pass. We live in the age of the liberal principle.

In that sense, we're all liberals. Shoot, the United States was founded on the idea, and we've taken now to exporting it, in its economic and governmental forms, for decades, so the world is being made in our image (though it doesn't always go so well with Islamic states ... or with Russia!).

My contention that Percy was a conservative, though, is based primarily on his conversion to Catholicism in 1947. By his own admission, he accepted that, in matters of faith and morals, the Catholic Church was the arbiter of truth. To my knowledge, he never retained for himself the liberty of choice to be at variance with any of those teachings. In other words, he was not an a la carte Catholic. Such submission to what he understood to be the objective moral order of things, the true nature of things, had an obvious and lasting effect on his life and his work. He had a thing outside himself that was the object of his personal liberty, the reason for his free will. By this subtle demotion of individual freedom to the role of means rather than of end, he took the path of conservation rather than liberality.

There's always more to be said, of course, but I've gone on too long already. Let me say, though, that I agree with your assessment of Percy's broad appeal. Seems like just about anybody who likes to think, likes Walker Percy. I thought I heard once that Tim Robbins was going to star in The Moviegoer. But that was back when he was Binx's age. Alas.

Karl, Thanks for your comments. Percy was, no doubt, a man living in the new South, and I think he liked to acknowledge that about himself just to make it clear, in case anybody wondered, that he did not retain any airs from having been to the manor born. And I agree that he stayed persistently clear of endorsing or identifying himself with either liberals or conservatives. An aversion to labels, I think. But one label he never avoided was that of Catholic. I would think that this is because he took it quite seriously. That is to say, I don't think he viewed the Church's teachings on faith and morals as "man's concoction." Rather, like most converts, and especially maybe those who converted before Vatican II, he saw the Catholic Church as a divine institution, though peopled by humans.

Regarding your definition of liberalism, it sounds more like what I would call progressivism or even evolutionism. Not that those three ideas are unrelated. I think liberalism, in its elevation of individual human liberty, grows faith naturally in the collective human experience as well--the idea that we are progressing or evolving as a species. But I think this belief is a result of liberalism and not its root. My reason for thinking that liberalism, at its root, rejects an objective moral order is that it simply must do so in order to give individual liberty its elevated place. If my obligation is to adhere to something outside myself, to a truth that exists indifferent to my personal preference, then my liberty is curtailed, and the fundamental principle of liberalism is thereby undercut.

Best wishes all,

Mike Larson

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Message: 1
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 2015 21:17:16 -0400
From: Lauren Stacy Berdy <lauren.stacy.berdy AT gmail.com>
To: "Percy-L: Literary and Philosophical Discussion"
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Subject: Re: [percy-l] Percy, liberal or conservative
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I believe that Dr. Percy had what Marcel called
" the gift of presence"
he looked at us with unblinking eyes.
He knew that we humans, including himself, were all unique messy specimens.
He sucked crayfish with Klansman ( citizen council ) and he spoke up for
integration.
we were all equally  in his sights.

Liberalism  and conservatism are just rotations...yes? ( better than
everydayness!!)

Take gd care,
Lauren Stacy Berdy

 

Message: 2
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 2015 17:44:29 -0700
From: "janetcantor37 AT yahoo.com" <janetcantor37 AT yahoo.com>
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Subject: Re: [percy-l] Percy, liberal or conservative
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I am glad to hear these days descriptions. It is what I have always thought but hesitated to say.

?Do you think Percy would like these definitions?



Message: 3
Date: Thu, 8 Oct 2015 20:37:54 -0500
From: John Pearson <jp AT jlarsp.com>
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Subject: Re: [percy-l] Percy, liberal or conservative
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Wow. As a self-described liberal there is virtually nothing in your definition that I recognize about the definition of liberal (it frankly sounds like a definition given by a conservative, so that they can easily knock it down), and little about your definition of conservative.

This is an interesting discussion, and one of the many reasons I love the work of Percy is that he is not easy to categorize, and to some extent, each reader is moved to think and in some sense can find something in his writing they connect with, even when coming from vastly disparate parts of the political spectrum. I think the list has proven this?over the years there have been plenty of conservative and plenty of liberal arguments for and interpretations of Percy?s work.

This has been an interesting discussion and it?s great to see the list jump to life. Something I think Janet said about Percy not being easy made me wonder if living in the twitter age is part of why?in some circles anyway?his popularity has for the moment waned. He deals with complex ideas that cannot be easily summed up in 140 characters. (I?m not saying Yates can, so at best this is relevant to Percy?s decline). It does seem that these things often run in cycles. I also agree that part of Yates renaissance is due to the movie of Revolutionary Road, which was well done and caught the zeitgeist of the moment. There is much in Percy that is universal, and if there was ever a film made of one of his novels, I?m guessing that would boost the sales and readership of all of them. (And of course that is a cart/horse question.) In the meantime, it is wonderful to have a little corner of the internet where those who have been influenced by Percy?s work can gather and discuss.

I don?t post here often, and am always thankful when I see the list spring to life. It inspires me not only to reread Percy, but to think, and to write. So thanks to all who read and post and keep the list going.
Best wishes,

Joh Pearson


Message: 4
Date: Fri, 9 Oct 2015 03:01:46 +0000
From: "Karl M. Terrell" <kterrell AT stokeswagner.com>
To: "Percy-L: Literary and Philosophical Discussion"
        <percy-l AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Subject: Re: [percy-l] Percy, liberal or conservative
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Interesting comments, Michael.  Thank you.  I agree with your observation on the root of conservatism: "... the belief that there is an objective moral order and that society is best when it conserves whatever has been learned (or revealed) about that order and tries to live in harmony with it."  William F. Buckley, Jr. once colorfully expressed it thusly (paraphrasing): "A conservative stands astride the horse of so-called progress, and hollers, Halt!"

But I respectfully take issue with the characterization of the "root of liberalism" as lying within the "belief that there is no objective moral order."  I'll comment further ... but I should, first, address this issue as it relates to our man Percy:

Percy was a son of the Old South, and a beneficiary (in material terms) of an Old South patriarchy.  But he came of age in one of the iterations of the so-called New South, and so identified himself (writing once, somewhere, as evidence of this, that his "earliest memories" were of a "golf course").  In short, he was of his times, and he certainly wasn't oblivious to the 'conservative vs. liberal' issues of his day (i.e., preservation of the ways of Jim Crow vs. civil rights).  That said, it appears to me, this particular divide didn't interest him all that much.  He did use the contretemps of the day, however, as comic fodder in Love in the Ruins, and in some of his essays (comic and otherwise).  As I read these efforts by Percy, though, he endorsed neither the conservatives of his day (racists, on the whole) nor the liberals of his day (which, I think, he viewed as boats without a mooring).

He was also a convert to Catholicism, certainly suggesting a conservative bent.  But, I don't believe Percy adopted that particular faith with a view toward preserving, or in adoration of, "an objective moral order."  The so-called "objective" standard has been concocted by man.  Percy was highly suspicious of man's ability in this regard.  Those more knowledgeable than me of Kierkegaard's brand of existentialism, I am sure, could add to this.

As for the root of liberalism ... my understanding, for what it's worth: It is the belief that mankind, through learned experience, can improve.  This belief doesn't reject or negate an "objective moral oder" (whatever that might be).  Liberalism, in fact, seeks this out - and tries to take it into account - while considering also other evidence.  In my humble opinion, this is what Percy was up to.

Thanks for reading,

Karl Montague Terrell