{Multiple Viewpoints and Single Minds}[12th February 1988]

[Redbook5:9-16][19880212:1155]{Multiple Viewpoints and Single Minds}[12^th February 1988]

19880212.1155

The obvious counterpart of schizophrenia, multiple personality, fictional characterisation, etc. – which may be located round the J~-G~-R~ quadrant, and most intensely around R~ – is single-mindedness, which one would expect (therefore) to find around U~-M~-A~, and most intensely at U~.

I have noticed at (and since) Cambridge that some of my technical friends – not, on the whole, the high-flyers so much as the methodical plodders, although that may be unfair – do not read novels, [or] attend dramatic performances, etc. (although they are more likely to enjoy music, and possibly some films). I recall one friend* at Cambridge, when I innocently brought up the subject of plays or a play, telling me that (words to the effect of) he had not the time for entertainment.** It was a remark whose force stuck in my mind because it set me thinking for the first time why it is not entertainment – by its purpose at least, whatever its method or effect.

When reading a novel or watching a play, I know with one part of my mind that it is fiction – but with another part of my mind, I believe it wholly. The second part of my mind is subsidiary or subject to the first. The 'willing suspension of disbelief' over a limited context [sic] in time and material occurs by permission of the first part. The two parts (and I do not imply – or deny – any physical compartmentalisation of the brain) operate side by side, or at least interleaved: I may make critical comments to my neighbour about the play as a play, tell someone else to shut up, eat an ice cream, and still follow the dramatic action as though I was within the room which the stage represents.

*[Possibly a College contemporary who went on to become a Professor of economics, business or similar.]

**{cf. [[Redbook5:30-31][19880303:1101]{Occupational Gender (1)}[3rd March 1988],] 31n}

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