An artist revolves in a cycle of masterpieces, the first of which is no less perfect than the last. Averageness is a quality we must put up with. Men march toward civilization in column formation, and by the time the van has learned to admire the masters the rear is drawing reluctantly away from the totem pole. A man can be a hero if he is a scientist, or a soldier, or a drug addict, or a disc jockey, or a crummy mediocre politician.
Wealth establishes a man as a hero, and so does poverty.
Virtually any circumstance in a man's life will make him a hero to some group of people and has a mythic rendering in the culture-in literature, art, theater, or the daily newspapers. Failure after long perseverance is much grander than never to have a striving good enough to be called a failure. Oh, the holiness of always being the injured party. The histor-icaly oppressed can find not only sanctity but safety in the state of victimization. When access to a better life has been denied often enough, and successfully enough, one can use the rejection as an excuse to cease all efforts.