author: Maurice Blanchot
content: "But what else results from this? Whoever acknowledges effective action in\
  \ the thick of history as his essential task cannot prefer artistic action. Art\
  \ acts poorly and little. It is clear that if Marx had followed the dreams of his\
  \ youth and written the most beautiful novels in the world, he would have enchanted\
  \ the world, but he would not have shaken it. Thus it is Capital that must be written\
  \ and not War and Peace. We must not depict the murder of Caesar; we must be Brutus.\
  \ These associations, these comparisons will appear absurd to contemplative minds.\
  \ But as soon as art measures itself against action, immediate and pressing action\
  \ can only put it in the wrong. It suffices to remember what H\xF6lderlin wrote\u2014\
  H\xF6lderlin about whom it would not be enough to say that his fate was linked to\
  \ poetry\u2019s, for he had no existence at all except in and for poetry. And yet,\
  \ in 1799, speaking of the revolution which he saw imperiled, he wrote to his brother,\r\
  \n\r\n> And if the kingdom of darkness erupts after all in full force, then let\
  \ us throw our pens under the table and go in God\u2019s name where the need is\
  \ greatest and our presence the most useful.\r\n\r\nArtistic activity, for him indeed\
  \ who has chosen it, proves insufficient at the decisive hours\u2014those hours\
  \ that ring every hour\u2014when \u201Cthe poet must complete his message by renouncing\
  \ himself.\u201D\r\n"
id: 28f0e703-045c-46ed-93f2-5a005fd0cce2