To all those who reached out to me after yesterday's horrific and saddening event in Paris. Thank you, thank you. Your care offered a path back to calm and reassurance, a moral compass.
Yesterday’s events were shocking and distressing to all of course, especially to Parisians.
At the time, I was less than one kilometer from the shooting incident; in the 11th arrondissement's popular 'le Marais' quarter, near Places des Voges. Thanks to my proximity, every fibre of sensation in me was raped and scorched as the incessant cries of police, ambulance, and fire truck sirens made my ear drums quiver and cause every pore of my skin to lock shut. An indelible carving into my bones.
Freedom of speech, of expression, is a complicated subject. Perhaps I didn’t and don't see the matter in such a 'black and white' fashion as most. An enormous moral responsibility and output of compassion must be exercised to keep the vital right of human expression healthy and honorable.
What comes to mind
'The pen is mightier than the sword', coined by Edward Bulwer-Lytton for his play Richelieu; Or the Conspiracy, 1839:
True, This! -
Beneath the rule of men entirely great,
The pen is mightier than the sword. Behold
The arch-enchanters wand! - itself a nothing! -
But taking sorcery from the master-hand
To paralyse the Caesars, and to strike
The loud earth breathless! - Take away the sword -
States can be saved without it!
"Ecrire c'est dessiner une porte sur un mur infranchissable, et puis l'ouvrir".
(Christian Bobin, L'homme-joie)
(Writing is drawing a door on an infranchisable wall, and then open it)