Hegel and Robert Penn Warren

I have to say, for as quirky as Hegel can be, I quite like the old chap. I think the notion of identity is fascinating, and how we achieve it is quite a feat. Now, I might not agree with all of Hegel's theories, but I do think that the question of identity still has to be considered. Reading Hegel made me think instantly of Robert Penn Warren's All The King's Men, and Jack Burden's struggle for identity in that novel (for those of you who have not read it, a) that's a shame and b)I promise not to spoil anything so you can still read this blog). At one point in the novel, Jack muses "they say you are not you except in terms of relation to other people. If there weren't any other people there wouldn't be any you because what you do, which is what you are, only has meaning in relation to other people. That is a very comforting thought when you are in the car in the rain at night alone, for then you aren't you" (192). I bet Hegel would have been all over that. But, if we are to take Warren's novel as any sort of warning, Jack's character suggests the copious problems with this kind of theory. Throughout the novel, Jack struggles to find his identity because he constantly falls into this category of building it around other people or his position in life. And if we truly are defined by other people, needing this "middle term, through which each mediates itself with itself and unites with itself," then what would Hegel say about hermits, or someone shipwrecked on an island, or anyone just living alone? (542). By his standards, it seems as if they would never be able to have a consciousness of themselves. This necessity Hegel places on other people forms a dependent relationship that suggests if someone is alone, they are no longer capable of functioning as an individual, or a "being-for-self" (542). I don't think I can agree with that, both because of the people that seem to function in a solitary state and because then we all end up like Jack Burden. And Hegel also states that "what is 'other' for it is an unessential, negatively characterized object" and thus we learn what we are by knowing what we are not (542). This negative approach to understanding just doesn't seem incredibly effective, because of the infinite number of things to be, the vast majority will be the not, so to go through and find the "is" would be incredibly difficult. And just saying "I am not you" does not make me "me," it merely means I have found yet another thing I am not. However, in spite of my reservations about Hegel's theory, I do think there is an interesting foundation to them, and that the influence of others on the individual is striking. And yes, recognizing what we are not does tell us something about ourselves, even if simply in a negative form. And in many ways, our interactions with other people help to solidify and justify personal identity and the individual "being-for-self." But I do think that there is a danger in this entirely dependent relationship Hegel creates. In All The King's Men, Jack is so used to this relationship he cannot "exist essentially and actually in his own right" (Hegel 546) and eventually, after trying to find himself in others so long, he states "they all looked alike to me then. And I looked like them" and all individual consciousness is lost (Warren 629).