Lion's Honey

Author:David Grossman [David Grossman]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781847676870
Publisher: Canongate Books
Published: 2006-12-26T16:00:00+00:00

‘Samson went and caught three hundred foxes. He took torches and, turning the foxes tail to tail, he placed a torch between each pair of tails. He lit the torches and turned the foxes loose among the standing grain of the Philistines, setting fire to stacked grain, standing grain, vineyards, and olive trees.’

This act of Samson’s is also terribly barbaric and cruel. But what grand, well-crafted, indeed aesthetic revenge it is!

Just think what kind of effort a man must invest in order to catch three hundred foxes, tie them in pairs to one another, tie torches between them and then light them, and then send them out into the fields.

But no less impressive than the physical undertaking are the planning, the idea, the inventiveness. The Bible, of course, abounds in grossly violent and brutal acts. (It would be interesting to compile a full catalogue of the types of mayhem and revenge that were commonplace in those days among Israel and its enemies, from the dismemberment of corpses and the slaughter of hundreds with a cattle prod, to the massive harvest of foreskins.) In contrast to all these, Samson takes a most original revenge that includes a manifestly artistic dimension. (In the language of modern art we would say that Samson’s exploit of the burning foxes constitutes a performance.) This is a demonstration not only of the man’s physical strength, but also of his style, which will continue to be stamped upon all his deeds, large and small, upon his every gesture and contact with the world.

But if indeed there is, in Samson, something of the artist, this is significant not only for the content of his expression but also its form: a feat like this is hardly the product of mere whim. Much thought has been invested, with a precise intention in mind: Samson, after all, could have tied a torch to the tail of each individual fox, and dispatched it to set fire to the stacked and standing grain, and thus dealt the Philistines a far heavier blow! But such a deed, apparently, would not have satisfied his deep impulse, his ‘artistic’ need to draw upon something private and singular in everything he does.

Let us again read the story he’s telling us here, written in letters of foxes and fire. He ties the foxes in pairs. He fixes a flaming torch between them. We can feel what happens to the foxes at this moment, the crazed running as they try to break free of the other fox, their twin, whom they think is the one that is burning them. All of a sudden each is transformed into a dual being, all afire, that cannot be saved from itself. Each fox tries to escape in a different direction but drags his double, his opposite, his nemesis, along with him.

This is apparently what bursts from the depths of Samson’s soul as his hidden ‘artistic signature’, which he heaves with all his strength at the world. His doubleness, the fire raging within

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