A Vision of Prodesse and Delecta
Sometimes I can see them so clearly.....
He is uncompromising and stern in appearance, yet as illuminated as his allegorical function would imply---pale skin, bright hair (red-gold), tall, straight, solid, completely self-possessed. His eyes, I think, are penetrating. He is the kind of person who sees right through you, but who has no personal ambiguity of his own to hide---at least, none that appear. Transparency and luminosity are characteristic of his skin. When angry, he flushes a pallid red, then becomes whiter than ever. His anger is quiet, no shouting. But his decision and execution are inflexible as death. He reminds me of Luceaferul, the cold, cruel, yet terribly lonely star in a Romanian poem.
Yet he has a beautiful passion---he loves truth. He aches and longs for truth as some men ache for power, or for wealth. Also, where he loves, he loves deeply, fixedly, devotedly. Finally, he wishes to devote his intelligence and truth-passion to the instruction of others, to give them hope. He is attracted to beauty of all sorts, but has a deep value only for the beauty of the real. The chimera cannot long allure him.
Delecta is his opposite, the other half of the human soul. She cares nothing for depths, but only for the sensuous surfaces. If he is sunlight, she is the shifting moonbeam. Her hair is golden but also brown and reddish, with a sheen sometimes as if of silver; and her eyes are blue, but also green and gray. She is no one thing---she is every thing in turn. Delecta is merry, Delecta is charming, Delecta is a liar. She understands little, wants little, is interested only in the way things appear and in their relative beauties. She is vain, observant, clever, obstinate, and quick-witted---also impulsive and generous. Her passion is to please, in all circumstances.
They are a remarkably mismatched pair, but they have been growing for years now in my mind, and their characters are too far formed to be remade.
How is the world to be both taught and delighted by such a team? And how could they ever learn to love one another?
He is uncompromising and stern in appearance, yet as illuminated as his allegorical function would imply---pale skin, bright hair (red-gold), tall, straight, solid, completely self-possessed. His eyes, I think, are penetrating. He is the kind of person who sees right through you, but who has no personal ambiguity of his own to hide---at least, none that appear. Transparency and luminosity are characteristic of his skin. When angry, he flushes a pallid red, then becomes whiter than ever. His anger is quiet, no shouting. But his decision and execution are inflexible as death. He reminds me of Luceaferul, the cold, cruel, yet terribly lonely star in a Romanian poem.
Yet he has a beautiful passion---he loves truth. He aches and longs for truth as some men ache for power, or for wealth. Also, where he loves, he loves deeply, fixedly, devotedly. Finally, he wishes to devote his intelligence and truth-passion to the instruction of others, to give them hope. He is attracted to beauty of all sorts, but has a deep value only for the beauty of the real. The chimera cannot long allure him.
Delecta is his opposite, the other half of the human soul. She cares nothing for depths, but only for the sensuous surfaces. If he is sunlight, she is the shifting moonbeam. Her hair is golden but also brown and reddish, with a sheen sometimes as if of silver; and her eyes are blue, but also green and gray. She is no one thing---she is every thing in turn. Delecta is merry, Delecta is charming, Delecta is a liar. She understands little, wants little, is interested only in the way things appear and in their relative beauties. She is vain, observant, clever, obstinate, and quick-witted---also impulsive and generous. Her passion is to please, in all circumstances.
They are a remarkably mismatched pair, but they have been growing for years now in my mind, and their characters are too far formed to be remade.
How is the world to be both taught and delighted by such a team? And how could they ever learn to love one another?
posted by Praelucor at 11:27 PM
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