Date: Tue, 02 Sep 1997 16:33:05 +0100 From: Chris Burford <cburford-AT-gn.apc.org> Subject: M-G: The heart of a heartless world My favourite opponent, Hugh, has expected me to gush. And he was right that I have wanted to post something since Sunday, but was trying to prepare something for marxism-psych. Anyway Hugh has not been too continent himself. and the gush of witty and cynical remarks are partly a commentary on the reaction to Diana's death and partly it seems to me an expression of a sense of anger. Where Hugh is wrong is in putting himself outside the range of public opinion in the name of marxism. True, here is much hype, much hypcrisy and not a little kitsch, in the public responses. And the rapidly amplifying effects of instant media reporting have created an avalanche of reaction which is a new stage in global culture. But it is not all kitsch and hype. Diana Spencer was a complicated individual psychologically and socially, but she played a role instinctively that shifted something in global culture because of her intuitive response to modern communications technology. Starting off as a fairy tale it ended as a Greek tragedy, said one commentator. Judging from the reports about the photographers at the scene of her death, it ended as a Fellini film. (How many film versions of her life can we expect? And by which directors?) She flew too close to the sun. She felt driven to meet too many projections from too many people, and did it too well. Starting off as a callow Sloane ranger, she became a patient of a modern, anglo-american psychotherapist, Susie Orbach, and had the psychological strength to cap Charles's tv interview, take on the Royal Family fighting, and win. Yesterday telephone calls obliged Windsor Castle to lower its flag to half mast in honour for someone who had left the Royal Family. On Saturday Charles will have to go through the most humiliating experience of his life, because of public opinion, because Blair insisted on a state funeral for "the people's princess". Diana was both Diana and Actaeon, the Goddess of Hunting and the hunted. Her seductiveness was in her vulnerability. And here she was subtly difference from Lady Bountiful: rich, privileged and self indulgent, the message nevertheless was not that the people should graciously accept charity, but that we are all vulnerable. She had suffered from a disgusting and humiliating mental disorder; she had tried to kill herself; she needed to be touched, like she argued that HIV victims needed to be touched. Whom the gods love, die young, and she has all the makings of an icon. We can smirk. We can use our marxism to sneer. Or we can use our marxism to understand and to describe what is happening underneath so that we can unite with the democratic impulse of the people. Diana is becoming an icon in a pluralist theology. It transcends formal religions. It has been created by the conditions of late 20th century capitalism. She made links across five continents. Her role in global civil society is good in campaigning against landmines, and may still have a good role to play in challenging the capitalist ownership and control of communications. Most subversively she died at the moment she was contemplating marrying a muslim, despite being the mother of the future king of England. She is a sort of divinity in a new secular religion. That divinity to the extent that it has validity is a reflection of the divinity of the people who saw something of themselves in her. As marxists we do not have to respect for idealist reasons a flawed, confused and spoiled 36 year old, whose life could hardly have gone out at a higher moment. We should respect the responses of ordinary people. They are our god. Every one knows it is futile to leave flowers. They will die too. They will be buried under other flowers. But they have been left not just in London but in many other places. A feature of the mourners is their quietness and dignity, as well as their determination. It is an eidectic display. The sigh of the oppressed is being heard. It is a warning. "In London last night mourners waiting to sign a book of condolence at St James's Palace were told that they might have to wait until 4am to add their name to the list, but even those who had a six-hour wait ahead were undeterred." Have I gushed enough, Hugh? By all means bring back the allusions to classical polytheism, but without the cynicism of the patrician, or would be patrician, commentators. Chris Burford London. --- from list marxism-general-AT-lists.village.virginia.edu ---
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