CategoryClues to Reality

The Self behind the Self – Juan Ramon Jimenez and Jim Carrey (yes, That Jim Carrey)

In certain of these posts, I’ve put together two stories or quotes that go at one thing from different directions, or whose common ground isn’t obvious on the surface, aiming to spark for you some realization that can’t just be given or explained.  This time, the two sets of words that I’ve joined come from two seemingly-almost-comically-different sources.  The first is a poem by Juan Ramon Jimenez, the Spanish poet who won the 1956 Nobel Prize for Literature and was a leading figure in what is sometimes called (with good reasons, like the writing of his kinsmen Antonio Machado and Lorca).  The second set of words is from a speech by the American comic actor Jim Carrey.  Jimenez may not have had the same kind of extremely zany humor that Carrey has shown in his movie and TV career, but Jimenez was anything but a stiff.  One of his most wonderful books is a work of prose, Platero y Yo (Platero and I).  Platero was his donkey.