Love. . . Affection. . . Esteem

          Our wills and fates do so contrary run

          That our devices are overthrown:

          Our thoughts are ours, their ends none of our own.

          [Hamlet, III.ii. 207-209] 

"There is the great lesson of 'Beauty and the Beast,' that a thing must be loved before it is lovable." - G. K. Chesterton

"That kind of communication in Persuasion depends upon deep 'affection,' a word that Austen values over 'love.' 'Affection' between woman and man, in Austen, is the more profound and lasting emotion." - Harold Bloom, The Western Canon

"Value in Shakespeare, as Jane Austen admirably learned from him, is bestowed upon one character by or through another or others and only because of the hope of shared esteem ." - Harold Bloom, Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human

 "The reason we all like to think so well of others is that we are all afraid for ourselves. The basis of optimism is sheer terror."  - Oscar Wilde

Are those who are not in relationships of passion, of romance, of love, are they the ones who theorize about it the most? Perhaps not; those who act are philosophers through action, and those who contemplate are actors through philosophy. The question builds from my current state, for I am single, and the question of love, affection, and esteem is strongly and frequently on mind. Granted, as an artist who is at work on a novel, and projecting future projects in which such a matter is important, it is necessarily in my thoughts; however, my personal life, particularly now, seizes the question forcefully and demands an answer.

Of all the people I know and have known, there are two for whom the trinity of my love, my affection, and my esteem reaches its highest and strongest state (I exclude familial relations, since the familial is a different beast). With one, the affection is stronger, and so this person is my best friend; with the other, love rings out, and I "can't help lovin' dat man of mine." This is the cause of perhaps my greatest sadness, the depths of which are so far down that its treblings are not easily felt, but yet manifest profusely. For if my feelings were switched between the two, I would be in a relationship with my best friend which would shame others, and have a friendship with the man after my heart, my soul, and my mind which would do the same. But for love! That which is the truest decimator of reality and pragmatism. That through which our most contrary imaginations thrive and hold onto the spectres of things not even much wished for, for who desires pain? My love demands the impossible, and so instead of focusing on the one person who, so far, was ready and willing to reciprocate, it sets its sights on a man who, unless he holds the secret of ages, cannot reciprocate. Sudden love is the hooking of fish: the sucker takes the bait, and is dragged into unbreathable space. I desire always after the most unavailable of men, but this one is the difference that makes a difference, and I am inspired as I feel like I expire. I should hate him, if I did not also, as I said, have the greatest affection and esteem for him, and if I had not come to a ceasefire with myself, this love would have been the prime reason for not finding love elsewhere; as it is, pride, circumstance, and timidity are what keep me from finding romance.

In the meanwhile, I can at least find comfort in having found a friendship that is really something more. We tried romance, but alas, we are better friends than lovers. The "alas" is a desire more for accurate emotions than it is that this relationship would have worked. And it is through this connection that I side with Jane Austen, and place affection over love. My affections are astoundingly correct; that is, I am made stronger by such attachments, whereas I am made stronger only by my withstanding of the misfirings of my love. Affection is the realization of a bond, while love is the formation of one, no matter how perilous the connection. To receive the love of God is frequently disastrous in the Hebrew Bible: Adam and Eve, when they cross it, are ruined unto death; it kills Abel by means of Cain's envy; Noah is made a survivor into drunkenness and shame towards his youngest son, Ham, father Canaan; it nearly drives Yahweh to senselessly murder Moses, and then Moses is denied the Promised Land after all he has done; it drives Saul, through his earnest foolishness, into great disfavor with God and also into mania; Elijah is driven into the wilderness and deadly despair; Job is ruined to the brink of the grave; and finally "for God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life," yet what kind of life is desired that must be lived in shame at having cast our such sin onto one sacrifice, so that through the shame we are saved, and who should wish to have been made that sacrifice? Yahweh is indeed a jealous god. The women fare only a little better, and that's only because God seems to feel more affection towards them. While such love makes these personages great, they seem like gulls after Malvolio, for greatness is thrust upon them. It would take many centuries before King Lear emerged and the Hebrew Bible had an equal in displaying not only the devastation that over-surpassing love engenders, but also the great aesthetic benefit the observer receives. Affection is the swerve that keeps (romantic) comedy, particularly in the strongest of Shakespeare (As You Like It and Twelfth Night), from becoming tragic, and so it is that Austen's novels are able to achieve their "happy" conclusions. It ignores the pride we have about ourselves, and lands upon the pride, no matter how hidden, that we have in the others who receive it.

So we come to esteem. Do we come to esteem through affection, or does it grow independently? Indeed, is it possible to have esteem without affection or love? The experience of history suggests yes, but it seems, in such cases, that we either respect a person as a vessel that accomplished a few approved achievements in spite of a multitude of other actions, and certainly apart from their character; or who has become something we wish to be (or already think we are), but yet we also despise them for it (I think of the movie "Kill Bill"). The "hope of shared esteem" engenders value, but can we accept it when it is born of terror for ourselves? When something is loved, it becomes lovable, but the reverse holds true, if the rest is true, of esteem: when we esteem someone, we ourselves become estimable. Those who put themselves last will become first; mankind, at least those with hearts, has a natural propensity for holding an inverse relation of given value and perceived self-value: the more modest a creature, the higher we want to think of it. Yet, the more expressively great a person is, the more we tend to be awed by them. The matter of esteem causes me much trouble, for, more than love and affection, I constantly equivocate about it.

Love. . . affection. . . esteem. . . an arbitrary order, in constant flux, despite my usual preference of affection. Yet, a life is greater when difficult pleasures, that is pain-that-creates, are met with the fullness of one's self, and an easy life can be had by resting on affections. The recognition of bonds is hardly a cause for change, and only brings about an unfolding. Love, the seeming ex nihilo creation of connections, and esteem, the invitation we send to those whose highly regarded presence itself raises the value of the party, are of the three the real progenitors of change. The former inspires us to actively and consciously remold so that we can attain the love-object, while the latter is more of an undercurrent, a subterranean stream chipping away at our crust and whose effects only later bubble to the surface. Or do I mean that the other way around?