This small book by actor and playwright Wallace Shawn seems at first to be disconnected "thoughts" with headings like Murder, Night, and Anxieties. But some of the headings eventually start to repeat, and the section Upheaval (43 ff.) shows that the smaller pieces have been groundwork for the single long essay that comprehends the whole text. The essay is worked through to a point of closure in several subsequent pieces.

The scope of Shawn's meditation is global, although he inserts his personal situation and feelings. While it concerns what others might call "social justice," he uses the simpler and more shopworn "morality." He regards the imperialist domination and ecocide that have been the great products of civilization, and he ponders the possibilities and character of any course correction. He refers to elites as "the lucky," using homier diction and the sense of "fortunate" rather than "best," in what I read as a very fair assessment of human material conditions.

In 2017, the great wellsprings of organized violence seemed to be US empire on the one hand and Islamist resistance ("Bin Ladenism") on the other. The chill of the new cold war with its latest proxy conflicts had not complicated the picture. But I don't think the political analysis here has aged poorly. Much of it concerns phenomena repeated over long scales of time.

Shawn seems to understand that "If power asks why, then power is weakness" (CCXX II:31), and he is nevertheless resolved to ask why, despite little hope of an answer. This mental quest has reconciled him to a position "halfway to decadence" (64). He expresses gratitude to teachers who helped to orient him in this direction of renouncing the privileges that accrue from domination. He also remarks the attraction and hazards of vengeance, ultimately adopting a sort of fatalist psychology--refusing to condemn others in order to resist the role of punisher (cf. Liber XXX, pt. 6).

In Night Thoughts Wallace Shawn offers his ideas and opinions based on both his studies and his life experience. Those ideas and opinions are about the state of the world: physically, politically, and with regard to the idea of morality.

There is little to truly argue against as far as his observations are concerned. Only the most arrogant would claim that what came before has not affected what is currently, or that what came before wasn't built to a very large extent on the labors of those who were not justly compensated, if they were compensated at all. The real place where people can begin to disagree is with the very part that will determine the world's future: can an extremely large gap between the "lucky" and the "unlucky" be sustainable without destroying the world?

Shawn makes many points that will, and should, make the reader uncomfortable. He excludes no one from observation and then, even when pointing out the worst that the "lucky" have done, makes a case for not fully trying to make them some type of evil. He acknowledges their humanity at the same time that he acknowledges the humanity, often neglected, of the "unlucky."

Some will not reflect beyond the kneejerk reaction of defending their position in the world, usually by trying to diminish Shawn personally rather than refute his ideas. Some will say Shawn didn't take things into account in his assessment but they did not read the book very closely because Shawn does give credit where credit is due. He readily acknowledges what great minds and thinkers have done, but he also acknowledges that by treating some kinds of knowledge as lesser we diminish ourselves. But those with these kinds of responses are the ones not willing to reflect honestly so they claim, incorrectly, that Shawn simply didn't take into account or ignored the "greatness" of those who came before, when Shawn did no such thing. But weak minds make weak arguments, ignore them.

I would recommend this to anyone willing to try to grasp some uncomfortable truths as well as some uncomfortable ideas. The truths are pretty much irrefutable while the ideas certainly follow logically but are not the only ideas that could follow logically, and that is where the beauty of this book really is located. If you have honestly engaged and thought about what you were reading you will still be thinking about what you read long after closing the book. For those who truly believe they are exceptional because of where they happened to be born, or to whom, or any of the many other purely lucky advantages one can be born into, you may not like this book. It requires looking both inward and outward and doing so honestly. A belief in your exceptional status based on your luck pretty much means you will take offense to these truths.

Reviewed from a copy made available by the publisher via Edelweiss. ( )

Musings on wealth and the historical underpinnings of the wealthy in this short set of essays. This is very much in sync with his movie, "The Fever."

Shawn is simultaneously guilty for his wealth and unwilling to just give it up. He admires comfort, and says in his twenties he found a pleasurable life a good thing to aspire to. But it gnaws at him, in the back of his mind, and constantly.

He muses that in reading about murderers and victims, he puts himself in the shoes of the murderer.

He talks of the fertility of the Nile, and bemoans how niggardly it was of them not to share the food surpluses with their luckless brethren in the surrounding deserts.

So, he assumes that God or Nature just randomly scattered people about, and only the "lucky" ones ended up in the good places, like along the Nile. It shows an ignorance of science, specifically archaeology and biology.

"For the lucky ones on the banks of the Nile, the lucky ones who were right there at the right place at the right time when the river overflowed."

He doesn't understand that people would have moved there, grown there, because it was good. It wasn't some fluke of luck.

He speaks critically of his Marxist teachers.

"...many of these teachers...were rather decadent characters...who despised the generally applauded virtues of heroism, manliness, and devotion to "the group." ...the example many of them set us was one of languid self-indulgence and unembarrassed pleasure-seeking."

"Morality...refers to a very simple thought: we shouldn't accept this principle that strong inevitably triumphs over weak."

He returns again and again to his "lucky" theme.

"'the lucky' are...a very large number of the citizens of the U.S. and Great Britain and most European countries...whether they know it or not, their relatively comfortable lives are made possible by the twist of luck that arranged for them to be born in prosperous countries..."

There is Zero acknowledgment or even consideration that it could be due to the history of Western thougnt and philosophy. All that wrestling with the ideas of government and society, of beauty and justice, century after century, is utterly ignored. All the war and struggle peculiar to that place. He's talking as if people the world over are completely interchangeable, histories and behaviors and adaptations irrelevant, just blobs of flesh scattered about.

Some sense:

"...the person who says, ''I'm better than you," is taking a serious step in a very dangerous direction. And the person who says, "Even if I'd had your life I would never have done what you did," is very probably wrong. "
...
"Gorgeous and delicious fruits, grown by seductive geniuses, sit on the plates of these lucky people but remain uneaten. A process of decay has infected the lucky...leading many...to turn...against...the cultivation of the intellect..."

It is overall an admirable piece of self-study by a wealthy, indulged leftist. ( )