|
The Battle with the Dragon |
"The more truly we can see life as a fairytale, the
more
clearly the tale resolves itself into war with the Dragon
who is wasting fairyland." —G.K. Chesterton
Grappling with GKC:
Trying to Pin Down
a 300-Pound Man
by Kyro R. Lantsberger
Wrestling in all of its forms has been a life-long hobby of mine. In the different places where I've lived and visited, I have had the opportunity to get on the mat with exponents of Greco-Roman style, Russian Sambo wrestling, and Japanese Judo, as well as Chinese Shuai Jiao and contemporary Sport Ju-Jitsu. My motivations over the years have ranged from the unabashed love of a good tussle that I had as a younger man to maintaining fitness and the sheer joy of camaraderie shared by those who have shed blood, sweat, and tears on the mat.
Both anthropologists and athletic historians have unwittingly noted the Chestertonian nature of wrestling. Boxing is a very sanguine sport. It is rough on the body and ultimately on the mind. In Roman times, boxers wore what was called a cestus, a Bronze Age version of brass knuckles that increased both the drama and the damage in a bout. Most wrestling styles throughout history, however, have been arts of the community and the hearth, a sideshow of festivals and a source of local pride and fellowship among men. The skill of the grappler is ultimately tuned to mercy; a vanquished opponent gets up from the mat and walks away, hopefully with little more injured than pride. In a Distributist sense, to injure the opponent would be to injure the community, depriving both a household of a breadwinner and the village of an able-bodied man.
Both our language and our literature contain many metaphors from wrestling. Sacred Scripture relates the story of Jacob wrestling with the angel, after which he is renamed as Israel, "One who struggles with God." The Anglo-Saxon era of English Literature gives us Beowulf, owner of the world's nastiest armlock. In common usage, to grapple with an issue indicates a deep, drawn-out struggle with a situation. To pin something down means to capture something and define it. When it comes to being "pinned down," G K Chesterton, the colossal genius, is as indomitable as any Hercules, Achilles, or Hogan whose legendary exploits have come down to us.
The thought of G K Chesterton has influenced the imaginations of fantasy writers such as J.R.R Tolkien and C S Lewis, yet the most enduring of all Chesterton's fictional characters is Fr. Brown, the priest-detective. There are few individuals as divergent in their approaches to national freedom as Michael Collins and Mahatma Ghandi, yet both share the influence of Chesterton. The journalist who praised the virtues of Christendom is also esteemed by many in New Age circles, who hold up Chesterton's Distributist ideals as the basis for a just economy. Robert W. Smith is an individual whom I would like to introduce as one who has spent a lifetime grappling with Chesterton.
Smith was an analyst for the CIA in Asia during the 1960s. A former Marine,
he was familiar with a rough and tumble lifestyle. This led him to seek
out the Asian combat masters in all of the locales he visited. He trained
in Judo with the greatest masters of the day in Japan as well as meeting
Morihei Ueshiba himself, the enigmatic founder of Aikido. His travels
led him to Taiwan, where he met many of the last generation of masters
to be trained before the Communist revolution. In fact, Smith was one
of the first Westerners to be trained in depth in Tai Chi Chuan. Smith
was one of the earliest influences in the development of both Judo and
Tai Chi Chuan in the United States. There are few things more un-Chestertonlike
than Eastern esoteric mysticism, but there is an untold side to this unusual
tale. Robert Smith is a lifelong bibliophile. His 1999 autobiography,
Martial Musings, (Via Media Publishing Co.) is interspersed with quotes
from classical literature. Indeed, Smith even has a chapter entitled,
"My Writers," in which he catalogues the authors and thinkers who most
influenced his life. Surprisingly, this CIA analyst, fighter, and new
age progenitor looks back on his life and says, "Perhaps the greatest
influence on me of all was exerted by the bulky, genial, G.K.Chesterton.
I believed him when he wrote that humans must have a moral slant—.A
fine man and writer, one the phlegmatic Orwell would have hugged if he
could have got his arms around him."
Chesterton discussed the concept of a heresy as one idea taken out of
context of all other ideas. The wide range of his subject matter and the
diverse devotees of his writings are almost unfathomable to our contemporary
sensibilities. In a truly catholic, universal outlook, Chesterton shames
us with his tomes of common sense wisdom and penetrating insight. In the
Illustrated London News of October 11, 1930, Chesterton observes, "I think
there would be a case for maintaining this: that the world has improved
in everything except intellect. In artistic sensibilities, and even in
social sympathies (at least, of a certain kind), I think there has been
a quickening and a response—. I believe I could even prove it, if
people now were patient enough to listen to proof." I have no regrets
regarding the time I have spent grappling with the thoughts of G.K.Chesterton.
I would love to be pinned down sometime and forced to listen to this proof.
