Otis Escapes, parts 4127 - 4130

 4127. Therefore, you might consider that art is a thing that cannot be created by the efforts of any group of people over a short period of time. It wants incubation, and half a century would hardly be an adequate time for the process to unfold.  

 4128. What Otis and the Rooster wanted to do was similar to the hopeless task referred to above. They wanted to create a body of work all at once, and so it is not surprising that they accomplished nothing at all. 

 4129. When creative people hit an impasse, what is it that they do? I have often watched them; the creative people that is, and so I will tell you exactly what they do to occupy their time while they wait for an idea.

 4130. They play games, they solve crossword puzzles. They play solitaire over and over with old cards. They enter the studio where there is a blank canvas on the wall, and proceed to throw darts at a dartboard till late at night.

Otis Escapes, parts 4123 - 4126

4123. It was not that the former plays could not be adapted; it was just that they felt no enthusiasm for a remake of the old works. They had both arrived at a new place in their lives and, by unspoken agreement, they both wanted to embark on the creation of an entirely new series of dramatic ideas. 

4124. Now it just so happens that great theater comes about from almost unseen humble beginnings. You might see some troupe of actors who have been in the business for half a century. On the stage you see a great Grandfather playing the role of a lame thief with one eye.

4125. His granddaughter is in the role of an abducted noblewoman’s child, and will be rescued by a convict, played by the child’s uncle by a second marriage. 

4126. The family has been at work all these years, any yet they have entirely forgotten how it all began. Their creative life started one time as a prank played by children to distract a vendor so that some fruit could be stolen. From the fruit that was taken, a hundred years later unfolds an extended family’s history of dramatic performances.

Otis Escapes, parts 4119 - 4122

 4119. The Rooster knew that Otis would never solve his problem, and even if he did, a bird’s role in things would always be precarious, so he sympathized with his friend. Otis wanted to know what the point was if they did a presentation for some rocks covered with moss. Sarcastically he said, “When we conclude our act, with the rocks applaud us, will they give us a favorable review?”

 4120. “Can we take the silence of the rocks and moss for approval, and will our humor be foiled and our sense of timing thrown off, without the echo of laughter our antics always produce?”

 4121. The Rooster had no ready answer for Otis’ questions, but he knew that the wolf had no choice in the long run but to agree, and so they went on their way, with no plan, no destination, and no works in mind to perform. 

4122. In the evening, after dinner Otis and the Rooster settled down to consider what their first performance was going to consist of. They began by discarding every skit they had ever performed. At first they tried to consider how they might adapt their former repertory for their new audience, but that idea came to a dead end.

Otis Escapes, parts 4115 - 4118

 4115. “So,” concluded the Rooster, as he explained his ideas to Otis, “I think you can clearly understand that we have to give up for all time any desire to please people with our art, and confine ourselves to our appropriate audience, that being birds, animals, and also nature in general, including inanimate objects.”

 4116. Otis could not help but agree with the Rooster, even though what he was saying was troublesome for him. It is easy to see where they were bound to differ. Just consider what a rooster’s encounter with people usually looks like, and compare that with a dog’s life, if one considers Otis to be just another dog. 

 4117. Both Otis and the Rooster had performed many times with a troupe of people, and most recently they had worked together for the Fowler, presenting a form of entertainment to spectators in the dog fighting rings.

4118. But as soon as Otis disappeared, the Rooster went on the menu for dinner, and so it is no wonder that he was anxious to concentrate on creating works for a more appreciative audience. Otis did not have negative experiences to overcome, on the contrary, he was simply in a quandary as to how to effectively translate his concepts into a form people would be able to understand and appreciate.

Otis Escapes, parts 4111 - 4114

 4111. Works began to be manufactured of such indifferent aesthetic quality that even the most obtuse observers could no longer overlook it.

 4112. So crow judgments fell into disrepute, and pigeons gained the ascendance. But even though the pigeons were in fashion for a while, it did not last long, because their observations and analysis continued to be too verbose and confusing and it often happened that after a lengthy critique of some performance nobody understood if their comments amounted to praise or blame.

 4113. “All you ever want to know is, do we think a thing is good or is it bad?” muttered the pigeons when they were criticized for their esoteric pronouncements, “Things are never just good or bad, there is much more to art that such silly pronouncements.”

4114. The majority of birds are rather simple in their tastes, so the reign of the pigeons came to an end even before the end of the Republic, and everyone returned to listening to the crows, and their former transgressions were all but forgotten.

Otis Escapes, parts 4107 - 4110

 4107. “The crows, as you probably know, are our most astute judges of plays. Since most of them can’t read, and the ones that do read only manage about three or four words a minute, they restrict themselves to live presentations. They also often offer valuable observations about painting and sculpture as well.” 

 4108. New works among we fowls are always presented to a tribunal of a few crows, and there is hardly any example of a work succeeding if a few crows have rejected it. Crow authority in the arts has a long history, but was unfortunately discredited in the Roman era when it was discovered that some crows were accepting bribes to make favorable judgments about mosaic murals. 

 4109. Since mosaic murals were not an important branch of the visual arts at that time, the fraudulent favorable assessments of the works by the crows went unnoticed except by the pigeons.  The pigeons noticed it immediately and created a commotion. 

 4110. Unfortunately pigeon critical judgments had never been respected because they tend to be too abstruse and convoluted for ordinary animals to understand, and so their accusations were ignored. The bribing of the crows went unnoticed for a few years, and then the mosaic artists began to lose all restraint, as often happens when critical opinions are for sale in the arts.

Otis Escapes, parts 4103 - 4106

 4103. This is how the Rooster's analysis of Otis’ dream ended and it lead to an interesting discussion. The Rooster felt that everything about the dream pointed to a simple and obvious conclusion; if they wanted to become serious theatrical performers, they should abandon people as their audience altogether and not even bother creating works for the human population. 

 3104. “They are not worth it, and there is no point to it at all,” said the Rooster, launching into a dissertation. “Obviously when the people see a dish and a spoon they know it is a dish and a spoon, but as soon as you start delving into what that dish and spoon mean, what they signify, what they portent, then the human tribe is left behind in a cloud of intellectual dust.”

 4105. “It sometimes happens that some smart person pretends to understand the symbolism of things but it is never true, because people are in the habit of simply projecting their own thoughts and emotions onto anything that comes in handy. This habit of their thinkers, if you want to call them that, leads them into endless confusion.”

4106. “If I were to write a play and it was preformed in a huge theater and received endless praise and critical reviews I would be entirely unmoved, but if some random crow found it to be dull and insipid, I would be devastated.”