allegory that has long been a fixture in Western literature and art. The
allegory depicts a vessel populated by human inhabitants who are deranged,
frivolous, or oblivious, passengers aboard a ship without a pilot, and seemingly
ignorant of their own direction.” Jose Barchilon explains in his introduction
to Michel Foucault’s Madness and Civilization that
"Renaissance men developed a delightful, yet horrible way of dealing with
their mad denizens: they were put on a ship and entrusted to mariners because
folly, water, and sea, as everyone then "knew," had an affinity for each
other. Thus, "Ship of Fools" crisscrossed the sea and canals of Europe with
their comic and pathetic cargo of souls. Some of them found pleasure and even
a cure in the changing surroundings, in the isolation of being cast off, while
others withdrew further, became worse, or died alone and away from their
families. The cities and villages which had thus rid themselves of their
crazed and crazy, could now take pleasure in watching the exciting sideshow
when a ship full of foreign lunatics would dock at their harbors."
Katherine Ann Porter’s novel Ship of Fools invokes the Narrenschiff motif in her depiction of representative figures aboard a ship who are oblivious to the forces at work to create World War II.
I thought of the tradition of Das Narrenschiff while on a cruise around the boot of Italy as part of my Wanderjahr. Except for crossings of the English Channel or the Irish Sea I had not traveled on a ship for over thirty years and looked at ship travel exclusively as transportation. (I did not risk air travel until 1977, when I was already 39 years old.) I knew, however, that “cruises” had become popular over the intervening years. Cruises take place on ships fitted with amusements of all kinds, including gambling. Disneyland and Las Vegas influence the planning of the ships as do luxury resorts and grand hotels. All entertainment having been concluded, the cruise returns to the port from which it set forth.
The ship that my companion Diane and I were on was the Costa Fortuna, an Italian ship but staffed largely by people from South America and Asia. The ship is so massive--over 100,000 tons--and so thoroughly stabilized that one is rarely aware of being on the ocean. Indeed, unlike the ships on my Atlantic crossings, it is difficult to find an open deck from which to view the sea. The experience is that of life in a grand hotel although the sense of enclosure made me at times remember the Beatles’ song that sees us all living in a yellow submarine. The Costa Fortuna attempts to reproduce some of the most impressive features of the famous Italian ships of the 1920s and 1930s: the slightly ominous result--if one remembers Porter’s Ship of Fools--is that the décor might well be described as Mussolini Modern.
But was this a Ship of Fools, a Narrenschiff? Not exactly, we were fools not because of madness but because of being fooled. It was a ship of the fooled. The genuine boom of the post-war years and the credit bubble that followed encouraged ordinary people to aspire to consumption that was previously only possible for the wealthy . The cruise ship is part of that fantasy world in which everyone is “middle class,” a fantasy that is a feature of the economy now winding down. It is a good thing that these pleasures seem available for all, and the cruise is democratic in character once you have paid the stiff price of a ticket. It is meant as “affordable luxury.“ Every large ship on which my late wife Donna and I had previously sailed--with the exception of the Soviet ship the Alexander Pushkin--had a First Class from which we were firmly excluded. I remember that we tried to get a peek into First to spot celebrities--the kind of people who now travel by private yacht or private jet. Dress is now casual, and there were no tuxedos even on Gala Night. One meal a day is served with traditional restaurant service, but breakfast and lunch are usually taken from a buffet of one’s own choosing, including one always offering hamburgers and hot dogs. The entertainment was for all ages, but I would say 70s disco music got a heavy play. I did like the Cole Porter and Sinatra era piano music in the bars. The only entertainment that I disliked was an event in which fat men from among the passengers--not me though!--dressed in drag, but were mostly bare-chested with their layers of fat hanging out as they postured sexily (with bumps and grinds) to compete for applause and a prize. Well, different strokes for different folks.
People had fun, and that’s a good thing. Because port visits were on quick bus tours, I can’t say that anyone experienced a new country or culture. It reminds me of the resorts that I hear about where guards with machine guns protect the hotels used by Americans lest they come in contact with the natives. It also reminds me of some executives and university administrators who boast of their international experience, which seems to consist of having stayed in the Hilton in numerous cities around the world. Cruises will soon suffer from the brutal fact that the affluent “middle class” for whom cruises were created will find themselves again a struggling working-class.
While we were on our cruise, the protests against austerity programs contined across Europe. We, however, pushed on to Amsterdam, where the fantasy world that began in the the mid-70s there, continues, especially for narco-tourists, including many American students. Even there, however, there is a sense that the party is winding down. Proposed new regulations would turn the coffee shops that sell cannabis into private clubs that would not be open to foreign visitors, and the Dutch do not themselves smoke more dope per capita than people in neighboring countries. Earlier we had been in Ireland, where the Celtic Tiger economy is dead, and a grim reality is being faced. A strong protest movement in which the Socialist Party of Ireland (CWI) plays a leading role is, in effect, demanding default on Irish debt and independence from the Eurozone. Amsterdam and Dublin had been Ships of Fools during the bubble economy.
Opposition to the austerity measures is rapidly bringing large groups into protest. Diane and I got off the train at Charing Cross just as the huge protest against tuition increases was occurring at nearby Trafalgar Square. The station was in a chaotic condition, and we were hampered by too much baggage, so Diane’s wallet was snatched. What Marx calls “the dangerous classes" see opportunities in times of crisis, and so does the fascist movement. The challenge is to build the movement for socialism even more rapidly than the forces of barbarism grow. It’s time to disembark from Das Narrenschiff.
