The Creative and the Criminal
The bi-polar essence of us
In his seminal tome, A Criminal History of Mankind, Colin Wilson states:
Crime is the negative aspect of creativity.
Humankind evolving into becoming astoundingly creative and inventive — from plays like Hamlet, novels such as War and Peace, symphonies like Beethoven’s Fifth, the poetry of Keats, the creation of vast skyscrapers and cathedrals of gothic splendour, journeys of wonder into space, and unlocking the codes of life through our DNA — has been realised by our incredible story of exploration and discovery in the arts and sciences.
Yet whenever this force has been obstructed, or somehow frustrated by perhaps lacking the self-discipline to control it, the outcome has been chaos and destruction. Our creative impulse sours and we descend into criminality.
Wilson notes there are two modes of perception: the bird’s eye view and the worm’s eye view. The latter is normally located in the left side of the brain. It is concerned with focusing on problem solving, logic and working out detail. It deals with all the nitty gritty of daily existence, our daily living tasks, our everyday reality.
The right hemisphere of the brain is the residence of dreams and creativity, it is the domain of the artist…
