Frozen in a Relentless Restlessness

E.A. Poe’s The Man of the Crowd is the man of our crowd, ahead of its time

What separates a masterpiece from the rest is its capacity to transcend time and space, the ability to paint with just a few strokes the permanent traits of humanness.

Written over 170 years ago, in The Man of the Crowd Poe gets its old Polaroid out and takes a shot of a man, a man just like you and me, and while he waits for the photo to dry, he speculates on what he might or might have not been able to capture, colors, lights and shadows, depths and shapes, meanings, identities.

Once the picture is dry, speculation turns into resignation, watching the limitation of one’s ability to lay hold of and decipher the depth of another human being, and maybe even of oneself.

The man of the crowd is not just busy leading his life, he is the 19th century’s version of our crazy busy. A man who has no control over his time, rushing because rushing has become part of his identity, unable to live the present moment, a man like many of us who -let to our own devices — get lost swiping, scrolling, liking and following, in a mindless search. Fear of missing out, before it was even a thing, a man who delegates his status to what is next and lies outside. A man who can not be read and who can not find the words to read himself either.

A contemporary hampster getting all excited on his wheel, driven by a chemical compulsiveness he is hardly aware of; he can not resist the magnetism of the possibility of salvation that might be just around the next corner or in the eyes of a random passer-by.

It’s impossible not to see ourselves and our society reflected in Poe’s story. With 1000 pictures being uploaded on Instagram every minute, people-watching (including self-watching) has become a national sport we are all competing in, the watchers and the watched, all moving through global crossroads, scrolling and swiping without any goal but a self-inflicted search. Mistaking motion for progress, we keep moving, fearing a halt, fearing the sober realization that we are not only running but that we are also escaping from the unbearable fear of the void, depriving ourselves of our own present, presence, and stillness.

The man and the eyes we have often caught among the throng, are most of all our own eyes, moving with “uneasiness and vacillation”, treasure hunting for inclusion, for understanding, for being seen. We keep moving, ready to throw ourselves into the dark, day in, day out, looking for some light or just a moment of rest where we can release the grip and breathe.