‘Markings’: The Musings of an Original Mind
A review of ‘Markings’, by Dag Hammarskjöld; Alfred A. Knopf, 1963.
Where on earth to begin with Dag Hammarskjold’s Markings? It is, however we think about it, rather an odd little book. Which is not to say it is a bad book, not at all. It isn’t. The opposite, in fact. This part-diary, part spiritual reflection; this porridge of poetry and prayer and (à la Pascal) pensées – it is a window, if you like, into the soul of the author. And its author was the Secretary-General of the United Nations: a man with an intensely rich inner life and an outer life marked by the stresses and strains of global leadership. His jottings-down amount to his attempts to find some inner peace. It is not, to put things more concisely, your ordinary memoir.
As you have probably guessed by now, Markings follows no narrative. It is a collection of entries set down over a period that spans much of his personal life and all of his professional one. No effort was made by his editor, who published the book after Dag’s death, to tie them together into a single story. So if you were hoping for his take on, say, the Cuban Missle Crisis or his view on some UN policy, you will be disappointed. His reflections are decidedly unworldly, and they come together to form a rich tapestry that represents his inner life. There is at least some structure to the thing, however: the first part of his book covers the years up to his election in 1953 as UN Secretary-General; the second, from the point of his electil till his death in 61. His entries are almost uncomfortably personal, chiefly dealing with his struggle to bring his public duties and private quest for spiritual peace into harmony.
His reflections are decidedly unworldly, and they come together to form a rich tapestry that represents his inner life.
And this – the search for a sense of internal order in a world of chaos – is, arguably, his ruling theme. Dag was known for his stoic calm in the face of sundry international crises – at Suez, in the Congo, in Lebanon, in Hungary … His writings are replete with mentions of and citations from the great Christian mystics: St. John of the Cross, Meister Eckhart. And what is really quite striking is that at no point does he consider stepping down from his role. You do not find him ‘stepping way for a time to focus on his mental health’, as we are now used to hearing. He has an enormous sense of duty. He sees his role as an honour, a calling, and a means of serving humanity.
Loneliness is a motif; but it is the loneliness of one who feels alienated from his fellows. It is hardly as if Dag Hammarskjöld was alone very often. His entries paint a picture of a man who is profoundly cut off from others, and one who seems solace in an idiosyncratic spirituality. It is perhaps the loneliness of the leader, who cannot be vulnerable with others lest he lose his authority and their respect. Or it is perhaps the loneliness of – what is now a rather tired and insulting trope – the thwarted gay man. Or perhaps it is both.
Your mileage for aphorisms, diary entries, notes-to-self, and what Nicolas López-Dávila called scolia may differ from mine, reader, but I happen to be quite fond of them. They have a way of capturing the essence of what and how someone thinks, which reveals much about their author. Oakeshott’s Notebooks, Nietzsche’s Thus Spake Zarathustra, Taleb’s Bed of Procrustes and – mentioned above – Nicolas López-Dávila The Authentic Reactionary – books like these are charged with meaning. But I suppose the absence of a robust connecting thread that runs through works like these, and runs through Markings, could present a challenge for some.
They have a way of capturing the essence of what and how someone thinks.
The translator, whose name escapes me, ought to be congratulated for rendering something written in Swedish in such a way that it still comes across as poetic. Dag’s style is sparing, even sparse; profound, melancholy, meditative, disciplined. If the structure of the book reflects the chaos of his life, the entries themselves reveal his internal order, or at least his search for it. Those entries, which range from brief aphorisms to longer reflections, all are infused with this sense of searching – for order, yes; but also for meaning and for the meaning of the wider world. It of course goes without saying that the book comes across as absolutely authentic: Dag was, after all, writing only for himself.
Markings, as I have already said, is an odd little book, but a rich and deep and fascinating one. It is so incredibly personal: almost like an intellectual or spiritual memoir: in fact, I had the impression after reading it that I knew the man much better than I would have had I read a straightforward autobiography. He reflects on life, on duty, on spirituality, on the tension and intersection between the public and private, on the big questions of existence – it is all there: the stuff of an intensely curious and yet highly disciplined mind. Dare I say it? A beautiful mind.
