We've been talking about Nothing in class the past few days, and Nothing appears again as an interesting theme in The Enduring Chill. Asbury is after Something, in a big way. He's after drama, heroism, and Truth--and he's always disappointed. Asbury is looking for grand inspiration and spirit in all the wrong places. He goes to New York, and runs out of money: "Now there was nothing" (548). He is an artist who has published Nothing. The obvious nihilism of his friends in college disgusts him because he wants to create and live out a grand narrative. He is not interested in the emptiness of a doctrine in which "there are neither any Bodhisattvas to do the leading nor any creatures to be led." On the contrary, Asbury believes so firmly in his own ego and the existence of the self defined by that ego, that he goes as far as calling his personal narrative "his tragedy," and hopes his mother will someday see "her part in it". Poor Asbury, who doesn't even get the satisfaction of a dramatic, fatal disease.
Asbury wants to play the role of the "dying god," but a page later tells the priest that "God is an idea created by man." Asbury refuses to submit his ego to either the anonymity of nihilism or the anonymity required by obedience to a God. It is not a question of whether or not there is a story and a storyteller-- for Asbury, the question is what role he plays in the story. His crisis of faith is not a conflict between belief and nihilism, but rather a struggle with the disappointment of discovering that even within a religious narrative framework, his ego will remain unsatisfied and diminished.
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It seems to me that Asbury is chafing at the reality that one cannot receive something for nothing, in any circle. Asbury thinks of himself of an artist, and wants recognition of that, but doesn't seem to have any interest in the act of production, or even research towards production(his half-assed attempt to 'understand the negroes' is quickly abandoned). He wants appreciative, interesting friends, but instead of seeking them out he tries to order one from the Jesuits, with comic results. He toys with religious notions, using their very thought to aggrandize himself, but seems totally unable or unwilling to apply humility to himself, or compassion to others. I think his ultimate disappointment comes with realizing that life is not going to just hand him anything, even an epic death.
Very true. Death is not failure in this equation. Impotence, or insignificance is. Death has a certain potency and provides significance. On top of all his other failures, Asbury even fails at this, in a manner of speaking.
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