We will begin with an
historical comparison and then offer a possible “Why” and end with a “How” for
those who wish to improve their own game.
Readers of Civil War
era letters home from presumably young and ill-educated men, and the journals, diaries,
and reminiscences of mountain men, ranchers, cowmen, lawmen, circuit riders,
miners, et al. reveal a remarkable display of gorgeous evocative prose-and, in
many cases poetry. [Many a soldier, explorer, young cowboy would compose in
camp or on the trail.]
The language often
bordered on the flowery and can be likened to something found in a Victorian
novel. Readers of Charles Portis’ well-researched novel True Grit, or
the Coen Brothers faithful 2010 adaptation catches some of the flavor of the earthy
stateliness of speech and writing even when “in the midst.”
When one reads letter
after letter, journal after journal of men and women with little to no “education”
producing bracing prose and expressing themselves with a grandeur that rivals
the “best” produced today by the “well educated” we must ask ourselves: How
did this population of mostly “uneducated” people express themselves with such
beauty and such vigor?
Ponder this extract
from Colonel John “The Gray Ghost” Mosby’s Mosby’s War Reminiscences
[1887]
“The martinets who
controlled it were a good deal like the hero of Moliere’s comedy, who
complained that the antagonist had wounded him by thrusting in carte, when
according to the rule, it should have bee in tierce. I cared nothing for the
form of a thrust if it brought blood. I did not play at foils.”
Now, here we have
noted guerrilla warrior, some in the Union considered him no better than a
lawless bushwhacker, and yet we have a man who even when discussing violence
has an easy facility with vocabulary [“martinet” over an easy slang insult say,
“clowns in Richmond” or “antagonist” over “enemy” or some other epithet.]
Mosby also assumes
that his readers were familiar with the sword-dueling lesson from Moliere’s
play Le Bourgeois gentilhomme, [The Bourgeois Gentleman] he was likely
correct in this assumption.
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Compare that with the
following similar complaint from a West Point educated warrior. [I leave the
name off, we are merely comparing styles and not performance in the field.]
“What do these assclowns
away from it all, not understand? We need gloves off—end of story. Period.”
Again, we compare styles
not performance, but I would ask the intrigued to read a volume of young “uneducated”
men’s letters to home from the Civil War era and then a volume of letters,
tweets, or status updates from our recent conflicts from a presumably better educated
cadre and ask yourself if you notice a considerable difference.
Let’s go with one more
extract. This one is from the Dimsdale’s 1865 The Vigilantes of Montana.
It is the true account of rough and ready “take justice into your own hands”
times by an eyewitness.
Life in mining camps
was Tough with a capital T. The extract I have chosen strikes me as apt, as
many see improving language, speaking-writing facility as “putting on airs” whereas
those in the midst and at the time simply did not see communication eloquence
as a detriment or sign of “weakness.”
“’Putting on style,’
or the assumption of aristocratic airs, is the detestation of everybody. No one
but a person lacking sense attempts it. It is neither forgotten nor forgiven,
and KILLS a man like a bullet. [Caps in original.] It should also be remembered
that no people more admire and respect upright moral conduct, than do the
sojourners in mining camps, while at the same time none more thoroughly despise
hypocrisy in any shape.”
Rough and ready mining
camp—phrases such as “assumption of aristocratic airs” vocabulary such
as “sojourners.”
And yet this prose itself
was not seen as “assumption of airs,” as it was part and parcel of life,
just as Colonel Mosby’s likely correct assumption that, “Y’all remember
Moliere’s play, right?”
So, again, where does
this general overall level of what we would now consider “high falutin’” prose
and expression come from in a time of no organized schooling and lack of easy
access to “educational” apps, videos, blogs, podcasts?
The Rocky
Mountain College
Let’s look to this
mountain man phrase for our education.
To many modern
mountain man enthusiasts “Rocky Mountain College” means learning woodcraft and other
such outdoor ways.
This is a misunderstanding.
That is not actually
the use of the phrase as bandied about by the mountain men themselves. It was a
given that you would have your scoutcraft down, that was your livelihood, your life-or-death
day in day out.
Rock
Mountain College referred to your activities in the long hard winters.
The Mountain Man
custom was to read, voraciously, avidly and continuously during the winters.
Popular volumes were the works of Shakespeare, Byron, the novels of Walter
Scott and Jane Porter, the Bible, any “high falutin’ work” that was big in
England or Continental Europe that could make the transition across the Ocean
and could be tucked into a pannier, a saddlebag, a “possibles” bag was manna.
When meeting another
on the trail, book lending was a treasured privilege and honor.
The Rocky Mountain
College reading was often dipping into the same volumes again and again, many is
the story of “Hard Men” and “Stalwart Women” who could quote long favored passages
from memory.
Informal lending libraries
in some “stations” and central homesteads were treasured destinations.
Many an illiterate young
man [and many a mature man] would ask to “winter over” with one who could teach
them to read.
Reading to the self, reading
aloud, and telling many tales [as mountain men loved to do at Rendezvous] in an
improvised Baroque manner was the norm.
Rocky
Mountain College was auto-didacticism at its finest.
How to Create
Your Own Rocky Mountain College
Long-hard winters, many
days on the trail, and remote locales created distraction free zones.
Mountain men, miners, “illiterate
“cowboys”, homesteader wives, et cetera., they turned to what we now consider the
components of a Classic Education as their go-to entertainment.
Distraction-free they
settled in for the “hard work” of deciphering the best of literature, science,
and philosophy. [Volumes of Darwin, Lyell, Bacon, Seneca, Cicero, and many
others all turned up in the hands of the “ill-educated.”]
And to be frank, it likely
was not “hard work” to them. It was as refreshing as our palate cleansing
browse of Facebook posts, or the leisurely viewing of a new Marvel show.
Rocky Mountain College
signals that not only were these self-sufficient hard men and women rough and
ready for the adventure of everyday life, they were also very well-read bright
and bracing conversationalists and letter writers.
If we want a piece of
this Old School well-roundedness, we are wise to create our own version of The
Rocky Mountain College.
We must wean ourselves
from some of our tech besotted, easy “entertainment ways and lift heavier weights
to have souls with more gravity.
We have to create our
own “long winters” of fewer distractions, our own remote locations which can often
be as simple as turning off a signal.
Of course, the choice
is yours as to whether to enroll or not. Tuition is free, by the way.
I do ask
this, indulge a simple test.
Read 10 Civil War
letters then read 10 Facebook Posts and 10 tweets.
Then ask yourself who
is the better-educated?
[As you may guess, time, effort and love goes into this historical research and testing endeavor. It don't come free. If you happen to enjoy what is freely given here, and have a generous spirit, well, then feel free to hit the link and "Buy the Old Man a cup of coffee." As little or as much as you like. Of course, if nothing is your speed...]
Or our
brand-spankin’ new podcast The Rough and Tumble Raconteur available on
all platforms.
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