Some mute inglorious Milton

In “Lycidas” Milton referred to fame as “that last infirmity of noble mind.” Andy Warhol more recently predicted that in our own time everyone will have their own fifteen minutes of fame. Of course, there is something cynical and oxymoronic in such a notion. Fame, for Milton as for Homer, was the mortal equivalent of immortality. Fame was supposed to be earned, by words if not by deeds, thus the poet’s desire to achieve immortality. Thomas Gray’s “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard” offers a commentary on the many who strive and fall into oblivion:

Full many a gem of purest ray serene
The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear;
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Some village Hampden, that with dauntless breast
The little tyrant of his fields withstood,
Some mute inglorious Milton, here may rest,
Some Cromwell, guiltless of his country's blood.

Some mute inglorious Milton would not have much claim on the sort of fame Milton had in mind. That could only come of some noble accomplishment. In the classical world fame was achieved; it came as a reward for greatness. Nowadays fame seems to be something we seek for its own sake. Everyone wants to be famous for something, even if it’s only being famous for being famous. Even if it’s only for fifteen minutes. But beneath our much discounted quest for fame (and fortune, but that’s matter for another day) is the same infirmity that troubled Milton and Gray and Homer’s Achilles: the desire to be remembered. What is it Hamlet asks Horatio?

Absent thee from felicity awhile,
And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain,
To tell my story.

Don’t we all want someone to tell our story? And lacking a faithful Horatio, sometimes we must set aside our muteness and speak for ourselves.