Fear Itself

Abstract

John Hollander Fear Itself AS A PRELIMINARY TO FURTHER CONSIDERATIONS OF FEAR, PARTICULARLY in a political context, I would like to comment on the language by which we have traditionally designated fear of various kinds: for exam­ ple, acute (such as fright) and chronic (such as dread), personal and collective. I shall discuss one celebrated pronouncement about fear in a political context at the beginning: it is only toward the end of my remarks that I shall return to the political agenda of the Fear confer­ ence for which this paper was prepared. We might start by acknowledging both acute and chronic kinds of fear—as we might do with rage (the chronic modes of which are certain forms of hatred and resentment). William James wrote of “grief, fear, rage, love, in which everyone recognizes strong organic rever­ beration” as “coarser emotions” that he opposed to “subtler emotions .. .whose organic reverberation is less obvious and strong” (James, 1983: 1063).1 But it may be that the coarser emotions have subtler counter­ parts, often unacknowledged in discourse about them. Darwin on fear (quoted by James at length [1983: 1062-3]) speaks of a very coarse fear, what I will call acute fear. I think a lot of what was discussed at the Fear conference was, in James’ terms, a subtler emotion, which I will classify as chronic fear. And we could also recognize metaphorical “fear,” as we do when we use figurative “hunger,” a metonymy for all desires, and— most particularly in the twentieth century—metaphorical “pain.” The word “fear” can figure in public discourse, even on political matters, in just such figurative senses, even as literal fear, acute and chronic, can be instilled and controlled with brutal delicacy for political purposes, tactical and strategic, as well. Acute fear is usually experienced more social research Voi 71 : No 4 : W inter 2004 865 intensely, and for much shorter periods, than chronic fear. But it does not necessarily follow that (again, when speaking of political purposes) it maybe produced tactically, as opposed to chronic fear’s being instilled strategically. If acute fear was studied by Darwin and his followers as an emotion, it may be more useful to consider chronic fear as a condition, but a condition whose character can itself vary along many axes, such as, for example, from apprehension pointed and specified—which may sharpen and focus other aspects of awareness—to vaporous and gener­ alized, which may dull and depress other aspects of consciousness. But before confronting either of these terms and what they may imply, or the relations of fear to other feelings, I will consider for a moment how fear has been assigned a preeminence in the past. “There is no other [passion] whatever,” wrote Montaigne, “which carries our judgment away sooner from its proper seat” (qu’il n'en est aucune, quiemporteplustostnostrejugementhorsdesadeueassiete)(Montaigne, 1955: 52). He explains that sometimes [fear] gives “wings to our heels . . . sometimes it nails down and fetters our feet,” calling attention to how acute fear can produce either the hyperactivity of panic or the momentary catatonia of astonishment. It is only the circumstances of each particular case, with chance always playing a part, that determine whether heels in flight or rooted to the ground will turn out to have been prudent or foolish. But in neither case could a successful outcome have been other than inadvertently arrived at—one cannot be said to have been wise by accident. This argument suggests that both running and being unable to run could be considered equally an obvious, or a counterintuitive, default. And when reflexive, as in panic, it is in no way the result of proper judgment. In any event, behind all this seems to be the view that what is wrong with human fear is that it is human and not animal. (And, with some circularity, that what is wrong with humans is that this fear is the fundamental emotion, driving other drives.) Such a deeply chronic fear is itself to be feared—not, as with Montaigne, in its acute attacks, but rather as a distrust of the human condition itself. 866 social research The text that will leap most to mind on...