Page 15 - Art First: Simon Morley: Lost Horizon

imagination is capable of conceiving and what can actually be achieved within
the complex conditions of real life is obviously of crucial importance for a soci-
ety’s well-being. e danger is that the Utopian dream denies or belittles the fact

that the only social advances possible are small gains made piecemeal against the
background of a world characterized by unpredic ta bility and oen by misfortune.
Paradise isn’t carved in stone. Indeed, as George Orwell wrote with his usual
insight: ‘Nearly all creators of utopia have resembled the man who has toothache,

and therefore thinks happiness consists in not having toothache’.

Jean-Paul Sartre claimed that in his time communism was the ‘unsurpassable
hori zon of our time’. It was the only emblem for the eternal desire to discover

or rediscover true community. But it is blatantly obvious that this emblem is no
longer valid, except for a few. But for the rest of us, who are witnesses to the
betrayal of the communist dream, no other dream has arisen to take its place.
In this sense, we have truly lost our horizon.

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René Daumal’s Mount Analogue: A Novel of Symbolically Authentic Non-Euclid -

ean Adventures in Mountain Climbing (1952) casts a surrealist light on humanity’s
timeless quest for a perfect land, a perfect society. It was the author’s final work
and remained uncompleted due to his premature death, and so was published
posthumously. Mount Analogue suggests why such visions are so important,

despite their dangers. It tells the story of a group of intrepid men and women