A Heart's World

1Q84 The World of Two Moons

"There is nothing in this world that never takes a step outside a person's heart."
-H. Murakami
1Q84

I will try not to give too much of the context of this quote away for anyone who may be reading 1Q84 right now, but it arrives at the absolute apex of the story in a certain chapter of the second book and it's left me kind of...shaken.

There are many things we keep inside, which we never talk about, write about, or even speak of, not even to our own selves. For this reason we believe they are hidden things, things which no one could ever know maybe never even care to, things which we keep hidden for specific reasons; we keep them locked away tightly and in this way believe that no one can ever perceive them. We all know what this entails. We all do it.

So what could it mean to say that there is nothing in this world that never takes a step outside the human heart? The statement is a total reversal of what we are conditioned to believe is true in our world about well kept secrets. It reminds me of a quote by Oscar Wilde that Christian Bale dropped in an interview I read with him a while back. The quote is in opposition to the statement in Murakami's book but it sets up an interesting debate. The quote was something like, "The artist reveals nothing of himself in his work." Bale was using this quote to support his view of acting as something which in fact does not reveal anything about the actor and therefore does not rely as method acting would disprove on the need to dig into deep emotional wells in oneself to produce the most genuine depiction of reality. In essence, I guess he was saying that acting os merely pretend work or at least that he approaches it that way and not as internally as some would believe. It was not a very good argument but an interesting one. The only real impression I came away with from the interview ultimately was that he afraid of being exposed, as most of us are. So we need explanations, excuses, diversions to keep people from noticing what we are hiding about ourselves, what we are in sense, ashamed of or what we don't "love" about ourselves.

There is a film by David Mamet  I really like, called "House of Cards" wherein the male lead, a seductive con man played by Joe Matengna says to the female lead who has been drawn into his shadowy world something like "Everybody has a tell." You can say or not say what you feel but you can't not feel it. All that is required by whoever is having an exchange with you is a degree of sensitivity to perceive these feelings. But this rarely happens. People are just not that sensitive, not that disciplined. I think religion to some degree creates buy in on a monopoly of these hidden feelings by instilling fear of retribution on those who may not have the "right" kinds of feelings or thoughts about life. God, as the "Thought Police."  Religion as a con game.

It is often said that only God knows what is in our hearts.To some, depending on their particular  understanding about the nature of who God is, this can be a source of great comfort or a source of deep contention and despair. But what if there is another world where nothing felt in our hearts stays hidden, another something that witnesses the deep, conflicted and constant traffic of our hearts? I have always felt that books are one of those places, one of those alternate worlds, where every once in a while you come face to face with the things you think no one will ever know about you or the  things you think no one else ever thinks or feels. That in itself can be comforting, can be jarring, can be disturbing, can be enlightening. But it can never be expected.