The Eternal Wonder

“Ah, but I always choose a special name for someone I like very much—as I do you. I shall call you Rann— two n’s.”

“If you wish—”

“But do you wish?”

“Rann—yes, I like it. I’m too big for diminutives.”

“Much too big! Where were we? Emotion! It’s still not at all clear to me, however, why we feel compelled to create art. I suppose it began in an awareness of beauty—dim, at first, perhaps merely surprise at a sudden sight of a flower or a bird. But the ability must have been there—the ability to perceive—which must have meant a step in intelligence, an awakening, a wonder.”

He listened to Sharpe’s voice in the same way he listened to music, half sensuously, and only now and again venturing to speak.

“But when did science begin?” he asked.

“Ah, very late,” Sharpe replied. “Natural man, the uneducated mind, poetized in myth and dream before he analyzed, I suppose, contradictorily enough, science began with religion. Priests had to learn time-telling and so they had to match the seasons and the stars—accuracy, in a word, which is the basis of science—and this led to factual truth. Galileo laid the foundation of modern science, of course, experimentally speaking, using bodies in motion and measuring and observing until he affirmed a theory—the theory—that the sun was the center of the universe, for which he died in banishment. Later, Isaac Newton put this same theory into mathematics! Yes, science is creativity as much as art is—the two go together—must go together, for each is basic and indispensable to human progress.”

Hours passed while he listened, now and then asking a question, but all the while yielding to the fascination of the man. The clock on the mantelpiece striking midnight startled him.

“Oh, I must go home—I still have a theme to finish for your class tomorrow, sir!”

Sharpe smiled. “I’ll give you an extra day. You’ve given me a pleasant evening. It’s not often that I have a listener who knows what I am talking about.”

“You’ve clarified my own wondering and thinking, sir.”

“Good! You must come again. A teacher keeps searching for the ideal pupil.”

“Thank you, sir. The search is mutual.”

They clasped hands, and Sharpe’s hand strangely felt hot and soft. It surprised him and he withdrew his own hand quickly.

When he reached home, his mother was sitting up for him in the kitchen.

“Oh, Rannie, I was wondering—”

“I’ve had a wonderful evening. I’ve learned a lot. And—Mother!” He paused.

“Yes, Rannie?”

“I wish you wouldn’t call me Rannie anymore.”

“No? Then what? Randolph?”

“Just Rann—with two n’s.”

“Very well—if you wish. I’ll try to remember.”

“Thanks, Mother.”

She looked at him strangely, nevertheless, as though she were pondering a question. But he put off questions.

“Good night, Mother,” he said, and was gone.

He was sleepless. Donald Sharpe had awakened his whole being. The question now focusing itself in his mind was himself. What was he, artist or scientist? He felt the impulse, the urge, the necessity to create somehow compelling him—but to what? How could he know what to do when he did not know himself or who he was? How was this to be discovered? He felt a mighty impatience with going to school. What was the use of learning about the past, and of studying what other people had done? Yet was it not helpful to know what they had done? Galileo, for example, had been everything—musician, painter, scientist. But had he learned all this in school or had he learned by himself and for himself?

He was kept awake by his own questions. Around him the house was dark and silent. Downstairs in the dining room the old grandfather clock, which had belonged to his Dutch great-grandfather on his mother’s side, twanged out the early morning hours, one and two and finally three. The moon sank below the horizon before dawn brought him to sleep. It was a troubled sleep, broken by confused dreams. But the confusion was dominated by the recurrent appearance of Donald Sharpe.

When he woke in the morning, the sun was streaming through the eastern window of his room. He woke in a strange and quiet peace, altogether different from the turmoil of the night. This peace, as he lay enjoying it, savoring its rest, centered about Donald Sharpe. He relived again the hours that had passed so quickly the night before. Not since his father’s death had he enjoyed anything as much as the evening. Indeed, perhaps he had never had such enjoyment before; the stretching of his mind to meet Sharpe’s had been stimulated by the charm of the man, his youth, his maturity, even his physical beauty stirred the very soul, an attraction beyond any person he had ever known. And this attraction was to a living person, someone who might become, perhaps already was, his friend. He had never had a real friend. Boys of his own age might be partners in sports and casual occupations, but he had met none with whom he could talk on terms of equality. Now he had a friend!

The certainty ran through his blood, an elixir of joy. He sprang out of bed and rushed to meet the day, a shower, clean clothes, an enormous breakfast. He had not been hungry for days. Now he could scarcely wait to get to his breakfast. His first class of the morning was with Donald Sharpe.

“YOU MUST PAY HEED TO your conscious mind,” Donald Sharpe said.

He stood before his class, a hundred or more students sitting before him, rising tier upon tier until the last row under the ceiling. He spoke to them all, but Rann, seated in the middle seat of the first row, met his warm, half-caressing gaze.

“Feed it and then heed it,” Sharpe said, smiling. “The subconscious mind is different. Feed it by not heeding it. Let the subconscious mind be as free as a hummingbird in a flower garden. Did you ever watch a hummingbird? No? Next time watch! A hummingbird is the swingiest of birds. It darts here, there, everywhere, tasting this flower and that, trying one garden and another. So with your mind! Let it be free. Read anything, everything, go everywhere, anywhere, know something about everything and all you can about as many things, as many people, as many worlds, as you can. Then when you pose a problem, heed your subconscious mind. Wait for it to draw out of its stores the information you need, upon which you can base your decision. Sometimes the information you need will express itself in a dream while you sleep, or even in a daydream. I believe in daydreaming. Don’t let your parents—and teachers—tell you that daydreaming is idleness. No, no—it gives the subconscious mind a chance to speak. Newton pondered gravity in many daydreams until one day a falling apple triggered his subconscious mind and told him that gravity was an interplanetary force. Two brothers—the Montgolfiers—were daydreaming before a fire they had lit on a chilly evening and they noticed that the hot air carried bits of paper up the chimney—why not a balloon of hot air to carry a man into the sky?

“And not only scientists, but artists use the subconscious mind. Coleridge dreamed his poem Kubla Khan before he wrote it, which he did the moment he woke—and forgot when a friend interrupted him, alas! Our modern artists, some of them, use the subconscious mind before it is directed into its crystal form—example: James Joyce in literature, Dali in art—interesting, but perhaps too literal to convey meaning. The subconscious mind has to be pressured by need, by demand, before it will focus and produce the necessary information in organized form. This is the method of art.”

Rann raised his hand and Sharpe nodded.

“Doesn’t a scientist have to imagine, or dream, as much as an artist does—perhaps more? Because he knows so definitely what he wants to achieve.”

“He knows,” Sharpe said, “and therefore his search among his dream materials is directed. But sometimes it is not. Sometimes his focus comes out of wonder. Wonder—then ask why! That’s a technique too—though a technician is not a pure scientist. Yes, I’d say a real artist and a pure scientist are related. Matter of fact, most top scientists are also musicians, painters, and so forth, as you will discover when you come to know them.”

“Can artists be scientists?” Rann asked.

Question and answer sped between them like lightning and thunder.