Festival

FESTIVAL* ROGER H. HILDEBRANDi The Festival ofthe Arts has been developing through the winter and spring. This month we shall celebrate its efflorescence—or metamorphosis. Howwill it burst upon theworld?The outcome should'strikeus agreeably ifwe make the festival an expression ofourselves. Let us not be too serious about it: Closeyour texts, cap yourpens, sheath your slide/ules, forget the PeloponnesianWar and even the Indo-ChineseWar. Only remember that to make self-expression genuine, you must heed the maxim, Know Thyself . One does not come to know so abstruse a subject as oneselfby idle reflection: Self-knowledge comes with the effort ofself-rendering and the shock ofserf-exposure. Common discourse protects us from the effort and the shock. The shield is up until we drop it, in proper festival decorum, or until someone pierces it—not a roommate, probably, since we are skilled at fending offfamiliar thrusts, but, more likely, some unshielded alien. You dial a number. A soft voice answers, and you say, "Hi beautiful, I want to offer you a little gift—namely, me!" "Oh?" she says, "You say you are a gift without saying what you are." "I'mJoe, the same fellow you met last night." "Well, you've identified yourself, Joe, but you haven't told me who you are. I have never seen you. That was my roommate who met you last night. You see, I'vejust arrived from Tierra del Fuego. But ifyou are still interested in philanthropy, tell me, what sort ofa gift are you?" "You're being difficult." "Is it difficult to say what you are?" * Speech delivered at the opening ofthe Festival oftheArts, University ofChicago, May I, 1970. t The Enrico Fermi Institute, University ofChicago, Chicago, Illinois 60637. 477 "Of course not. I'm sort of a handsome dog. I remind me of the Sundance Kid but with a scar on my left cheek, and I'm big and strong like John Wayne." "Joe, your props are no help to me. In Tierra del Fuego we worship different gods. I've neverheard ofthe Sundance Kid; I don'tknowhow big John Wayne is; and I'm confused about your word left." "You know, right and left—like your two hands." "Yes, but which is which?" "Oh come on, the curved part of the letter D, as in DOG, is on the right; the straight part is on the left. Write that down and you'll have it: D LR There. Now about my character." "Wait! Don't try character ifyou can't describe a simple thing like your face. I have written the letter d as you suggest, d r · 1 (curved part right, straightpart left), but I stilldon'tknowwhat youmean by right and left. In Tierra del Fuego we are taught to write starting from either side of a sheet. doq pob r · 1 1 r I suppose you would say that one way is backward." "Oh good heavens, feel your heart. It's on the left side!" "You Americans may be lopsided, but in Tierra del Fuego we are symmetrical ." "Then look at the Big Dipper circling around the pole at night. When the bowl is up, the handle extends to the left." "There may be a dipper overyour pole but not over mine. And besides, how can you look at the sky and say whether a constellation points up or down? Doesn't 'up' mean different things, depending upon where you are? You are forgetting that until today I had never seen anything that you have seen." "Oh yes you have, you have seen the earth—another part of it to be sure—but still the earth. And you have seen the sun rise and travel through the sky. Now look toward Tierra del Fuego, and the rising sunwill fall on 478 Roger H. Hildebrand · Festival Perspectives in Biology and Medicine · Spring 1971 your left cheek. Remember, it is my left cheek that bears the scar. But this is ridiculous. With all your questions, you make me use the Earth and Sun to tell the smallest thing about myself." "That beats using thisJohn Wayne, doesn't it? Or are you giving up?" "No, let me try again. I can...