Ten
People I Would Like To Meet
by
Jeffrey A. Tucker
Blog
memes can be annoying,
so this is no attempt to start one. It is merely an interesting
exercise that yields interesting information about both the subjects
and the person doing the choosing.
The
idea is to choose ten people who you would most like to meet in
all of history, five men and five women. To make it more challenging,
let’s exclude family and primary religious figures such as JMJ,
etc., and exclude elected politicians and bureaucrats just because
their profession is such an obviously shoddy means toward achieving
immortality.
The
idea isn’t to meet them to pester them with some question, like
asking Socrates precisely what he was teaching the youth, or Shakespeare
whether he really is Shakespeare. Nor is it about some time-travel
thing that allows you to ask Kennedy who he thinks shot him.
No,
the idea is to meet these people as you might meet anyone today
in a casual setting in which you have a few minutes to visit, just
to see what impression he or she makes. The goal is to discover
what it is like to be in their presence, to hear their voices, to
look in their eyes, observe how they manage the space, to engage
in polite introductions and small talk and, perhaps, to convey to
them what their lives and work have meant to you.
Here
are my choices.
 Gustav
Mahler (1860–1911). In this conductor and composer we have
a mind and an imagination that surpasses human understanding, and
yet at the same time his art reveals a grinding human struggle.
His nine symphonies contain enough depth and meaning to captivate
a person for an entire lifetime, since it’s my view that it takes
ten years to come close to fully grasping even one of them. You
sense that if you did succeed in fully grasping all nine, you would
know all that it is possible to know about life, death, love, joy,
sadness, and the entire range of human emotion and experience. A
non-practicing Catholic Jew in Vienna, he drew from all the cultural
sources within himself to cultivate the capacity for truly universal
expression – it came but only with intense work and deep pain.
He was known more as a conductor in his time than a composer, which
is an astounding fact. By the way, I just heard Mahler’s reorchestration
of Beethoven’s 9th symphony. Presumptuous, yes, but somehow
with Mahler, it seems right. There are many photographs of him available:
dashing, deeply intelligent, far seeing.
 Ludwig
von Mises (1881–1973). Murray Rothbard puzzled many times
how it is that the 20th century gave us this man who
seemed destined to resist all the evil of his times, and stand on
principle despite every pressure to compromise. He paid a huge price.
He was educated in security and spent his early career accumulating
a European-wide reputation for pioneering contributions to economic
science. He refuted socialism. He integrated money into macroeconomics.
He put the whole social sciences on a new epistemological basis.
Then the tables turned. Positivism advanced, and the liberals began
to cave and support the state. The Nazis advanced. He was run out
of his native country, run out again of his sanctuary in Geneva,
and ignored by academia in the US. He had every reason to give in,
give up, or otherwise regret his fate. But he never did. It’s as
if his internal constitution would never permit him to relent. This
is why he was so hated, feared by some, and also respected. God
bless people like this. All accounts report that he had old-world
manners, inner cheer, and surprising warmth. Can you imagine meeting
him?
 Thomas
Jefferson (1743–1826). Yes, I know this seems to violate
the rule against including elected officials, but two considerations:
his presidency is the least important thing about him, and he only
agreed to it because the Hamiltonians were in the process of completely
shredding what was left of founding ideals embodied in the Declaration
of Independence, and they had to be stopped. He didn’t mention his
presidency in his chosen tombstone inscription! All that aside,
has American history given a greater gift to humanity than the mind
and thought of Jefferson? He was best as a radical libertarian in
every sense: secessionist, revolutionary, decentralist. His faith
in the capacity of people to organize their own affairs remains
the driving force behind political revolutions the world over. His
stature seems to grow larger as time goes on. He was a polymath
and yet he strikes me as a humble man – not at all the person
whom public-school kids study. His letters reveal a very careful
writer with no pretensions but an explosively creative intellect
who wanted to somehow make a difference in human history on behalf
of liberty. He seems so much larger than life itself. To meet him
would somehow prove that he really did exist.
 Oscar
Wilde (1854–1900). The least important thing to know about
Oscar is what everyone knows, and how tragic that is. Here is what
really captivates me. He wrote plays and books in the late 19th
century that were snappy and edgy and funny and triply ironic –
and the same plays and books sound just as contemporary and snappy
and ironic in 2005. Few writers have ever made humor timeless but
he did. His works are for the ages. And they are all "adult"
in the right sort of way: you have to be a certain age to comprehend
all the meanings and implications. To read him is to be on the in-crowd,
part of a private crowd that knows what’s what. He flatters you
that way. Also, he had a huge range. The Picture of Dorian Grey
is as serious a story of the corruption of the soul as has ever
been written. His poetry is wonderful. It is said that he had not
an ounce of malice in him. I believe that. His teeth were slightly
yellowed, and this embarrassed him so he tended to speak with his
hands across his mouth. You might think that would be an impediment
to communication but no: all reports are that no one in London for
generations could so completely captivate a roomful of people. People
just adored this amazing man. Star quality doesn’t quite describe
it. He had god-like ability to enthrall and charm. This was a good
man and a great talent. Legend has it that his last words were:
"Either these curtains or I have to go." Funny, but not true. His
last words were the Act
of Faith. May the special-interests leave him alone and may
he one day be appreciated for the artist he was.
 Juan
de Mariana (1536–1624). Ah, the Spanish Jesuit priest-theologian-economist
who famously advocated the right of an individual to kill the tyrant-king
or any despot. His argument was that when a ruler steals, loots,
and kills in a way contrary to the natural law, it is in accord
with justice to do what is necessary to unseat him. Natural law
supersedes state law. Don’t feel bad for the despot: power corrupts
and with that corruption comes risks. As for the worry that good
kings would be killed unjustly under this idea, Mariana offered
up all history that showed that is not the pattern: good rulers
are not killed and far too many despots rule. After his book appeared,
two French tyrants were slain: Henry III and Henry IV. A mild hysteria
against him followed, the Jesuits repudiated the book, and his book
was burned by order of the Parliament of Paris in 1610. But this
wasn’t his most egregious act. The book that really did him in was
the one that condemned inflation as theft (he was a great monetary
economist). At the age of 75, he was condemned to prison for life.
All reports indicate a man of amazing personal fortitude, as unrelenting
as he was brilliant.
 Mother
Cabrini (1850–1917). Shorter than 5 feet and always dressed
in her habit, St. Frances Xavier Cabrini was one of the great entrepreneurs
of the 19th century, the Bill Gates of charitable work
of her time. From her earliest days she had wild ambitions to be
a missionary to the world’s poor, starting in China. Instead, the
pope sent her to the United States. She founded the Missionary Sisters
of the Poor, but this was resisted on grounds that women can’t be
missionaries. She wrote to Rome: "If the mission of announcing
the Lord’s resurrection to his apostles had been entrusted to Mary
Magdalene, it would seem a very good thing to confide to other women
an evangelizing mission." Well, what could Rome do but agree?
And so it seemed throughout her life. She overcame resistance everywhere
she went and eventually created a vast network of hundreds of orphanages,
schools, and hospitals in the North East, the South, and even the
far West. She was both worldly and holy, an amazing businesswoman
and pious saint. Her business sense was particularly shrewd: she
was once donated some gold mines in Colorado but rather than sell
them she sent some sisters there to run them properly.
 Clara
Schumann (1819–1896). I picture her as a graceful yet powerful
personality, with beauty that flows from the inside. Certainly everyone
who knew her adored her. Her musical brilliance first struck me
when I read a letter to her from Brahms in which he bemoaned the
fact that he was doomed to make a living as a piano teacher whereas
she could grow rich from performing the piano. She had far
more invitations than she could accept. Imagine how many virtuosic
pianists there were in her time, and yet she dominated the field
with masterful performances that drove the likes of Brahms to unemployment!
She made innovative contributions to piano pedagogy as well, in
her position at two German conservatories of music. She was of course
married to Robert, and inspired his grandest compositions but she
is also the reason for the melody behind many pieces of music from
her time. Aside from that, she bore and raised seven children and
wrote many creative works for piano. What a mysterious power she
must have had, the kind of person who walks in a room and fills
the entire space but is not entirely aware of it.
 St.
Cecilia (3rd Century). She was a Roman aristocrat
who became a Christian and found herself in an arranged marriage
to a pagan and refused to consummate it. Her piety converted him,
and so an angel appeared and they were crowned with roses and lilies.
Later he was killed for his faith and his brother too. Roman prefect
Turcius Almachius had her condemned to death, first by suffocation,
from which she escaped, and then by decapitation, which did not
work after even three attempts. The executioner freaked out, and
ran away. She lived three days and served the poor. The only problem
is that none of this is likely to be true. Yet here is what we do
know. She lived and was martyred, and her intervention has been
credited with supporting the arts and music since her death. There
is usually some basis for this, either supernatural or biographical.
I would not be surprised to find that there was something about
her that called her to some massive role in history long past her
death. What it is I would like to know.
 Rose
Wilder Lane (1886–1968). Now here is a wonderful writer,
and a true American! The daughter of Laura Ingalls Wilder Lane,
some people believe that she had more to do with the Little House
series than is generally acknowledged. He writing career began in
1910 and lasted until her last years. She wrote biographies, stories
for dozens of papers, and lived a varied and exciting life. Her
book The
Discovery of Freedom is a classic of libertarian apologetics.
I’ve yet to read her novels (the ones she took credit for) but I
would like to. I like this quotation: "Give me time and I will
tell you why individualism, laissez faire and the slightly restrained
anarchy of capitalism offer the best opportunities for the development
of the human spirit. Also I will tell you why the relative freedom
of human spirit is better – and more productive, even in material
ways – than the communist, Fascist, or any other rigidity organized
for material ends." How dashing she must have been. I’ve heard
reports, though, that she was rather shy.
 Bette
Davis (1908–1989). If she had never made a movie, one senses
that she would have made her mark on history somehow. This was a
remarkable woman with the greatest range in her personality. No
one so fully dominates the screen as does. One almost feels sorry
for her co-actors; they seem to shrivel and dry by comparison. Her
voice, her eyes, her walk, her presence and stamina, they all combine
into a very powerful on-screen personality. She most famously played
ruthless women but this was just a matter of the division of labor
because she was just as great in other roles. She is obviously very
smart, and must have had an explosive personality. I once met Gary
Merrill to whom she married. Actually I was sort of forced to spend
several days with him because of circumstances of time and place,
and I certainly had the impression that he never really recovered
from whatever he went through with her. In any case, how unforgettable
it would be just to be in the same room with her.
 So
that’s my list, subject to change, even as soon as tomorrow.
August
1, 2005
Jeffrey
Tucker [send him mail]
is editorial vice president of www.Mises.org.
Copyright
© 2005 LewRockwell.com
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