The paradox is not a variation of the classical topos of “the world upside down.” The latter is mechanical, it foresees a universe where animals talk and humans make animal noises, fish fly and birds swim, monkeys celebrate mass and bishops swing through the trees. It proceeds through accumulation of adynata or impossibilia without any logic. It is a carnival game.
In order for it to become a paradox the reversal has to follow a logic and be circumscribed to a portion of the universe. A Persian arrives in Paris and describes France the way a Parisian would describe Persia. The effect is paradoxical because it forces one to see everyday things not according to established opinion.
One of the proofs for distinguishing a paradox from a transposable aphorism consists of trying to reverse the paradox. Pitigrilli quotes a definition of Zionism from Tristan Bernard, which was clearly valid before the establishment of the state of Israel: “One Jew asking another Jew for money to send a third Jew to Palestine.” The fact that this paradox can’t be reversed is a true sign that its original form genuinely contained a truth, or at least what Bernard wanted us to accept as truth.
Now let us consider a series of Karl Kraus’s famous paradoxes.* I will not attempt to reverse them because, if you think about them a little, it is not possible. They contain an unconventional truth that goes against the grain of common opinion. They cannot be twisted to express the opposite truth.
The scandal starts when the police put an end to it.
To be perfect all she needed was just one defect.
The ideal of virginity is the ideal of those who want to deflower.
Sexual relations with animals are forbidden, but slaughtering animals is allowed. But has nobody reflected on the fact that that might be a sexual crime?
Punishment serves to frighten those who do not want to commit sins.
There is an obscure corner of the earth that sends explorers out into the world.
Children play at being soldiers. But why do soldiers play at being children?
Mad people are definitively recognized as such by psychiatrists because after being interned they exhibit agitated behavior.
Of course, Kraus too falls into the sin of transposable aphorisms. Here are some of his sayings that can be contradicted easily, and therefore reversed (the reversals are, obviously, my own):
Nothing is more unfathomable than the superficiality of a woman.
Nothing is more superficial than the unfathomability of a woman.
Easier to forgive an ugly foot than ugly socks!
Easier to forgive ugly socks than an ugly foot!
There are women who are not beautiful but have an air of beauty.
There are women who are beautiful but do not have an air of beauty.
Superman is a premature ideal that presupposes man.
Man is a premature ideal that presupposes superman.
The true woman deceives for pleasure. The others seek pleasure to deceive. The true woman seeks pleasure to deceive. The others deceive for pleasure.
The only paradoxes that almost never seem to be transposable are those by Stanislaw J. Lec. Here is a short list from his Mysli nieuczesane ( Uncombed Thoughts): If one could only pay the death penalty by sleeping through it in installments!
I dreamed of reality: what a relief to wake up!
Open Sesame: I want to get out!
Who knows what Columbus might have discovered had America not blocked his way!
Horrible is the gag smeared with honey.
The prawn goes red after death: what exemplary refinement in a victim!
If you knock down monuments, spare the pedestals: they can always be used again.
He possessed knowledge, but was unable to make her pregnant.
In his modesty he considered himself an incurable scribbler. But he was actually just an informer.
Burning pyres don’t light up the darkness.
You can die on Saint Helena without being Napoléon.
They embraced each other so tightly there was no room left for feelings.
He covered his head in ashes: those of his victims.
I dreamed of Freud. What does that mean?
Cavorting with dwarves ruins your backbone.
He had a clean conscience: he had never used it.
Even in his silence there were grammatical mistakes.
I admit I have a weakness for Lec, but until now I have found only one of his aphorisms to be transposable:
Reflect before thinking.
Think before reflecting.
Now we come to Oscar Wilde. When we consider the countless aphorisms scattered throughout his works, we have to admit that this is a fatuous author, a dandy who does not distinguish between aphorisms, reversible aphorisms, and paradoxes, so long as he manages to épater le bourgeois. What is more, he has the nerve to present as aphorisms witty statements that, aside from the wit, turn out to be wretched commonplaces—or at least commonplaces for the Victorian middle classes and aristocracy.
Nevertheless, this kind of experiment can help us see whether and to what extent an author who made provocative aphorisms the true essence of his novels, plays, and essays was a real author of penetrating paradoxes or a sophisticated collector of bons mots. My experiment is purely exploratory of course, and aims to encourage (and why not?) someone to do a thesis that will take the research to a systematic conclusion.
I will herewith provide a series of genuine paradoxes, and challenge you to try to reverse them (excluding the production of nonsense or of a maxim that is false for people with common sense):
Life is simply a mauvais quart d’heure made up of exquisite moments.
Selfishness is not living as one wishes to live; it is asking others to live as one wishes to live. The ugly and the stupid have the best of it in this world. They can sit at their ease and gape at the play. If they know nothing of victory, they are at least spared the knowledge of defeat. A sensitive person is one who, because he has corns himself, always treads on other people’s toes.
Everybody who is incapable of learning has taken up teaching.
When people agree with me I always feel that I must be in the wrong.
A man who is much talked about is always very attractive. One feels there must be something to him, after all.
Every great man has his disciples, and it is always Judas who writes the biography.
I can resist everything except temptation.
Falsehoods [are] the truth of other people.
The only duty we owe to History is to rewrite it.
A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it.
Relations are simply a tedious pack of people, who haven’t the remotest knowledge of how to live, nor the smallest inkling of when to die.
However, there are countless Wildean aphorisms that seem to be easily reversible (the reversals are obviously my own):
To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all.
To exist is the rarest thing in the world. Most people live, that is all.
Those who see any difference between soul and body have neither.
Those who see no difference between soul and body have neither.
Life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about it.
Life is too unimportant to joke about.
The world is divided into two classes; those who believe the incredible, like everyone else, and those who do the improbable, like me.
The world is divided into two classes; those who believe the improbable, like everyone else, and those who do the incredible, like me.
The world is divided into two classes; those who do the improbable, like everyone else, and those who believe the incredible, like me.
Moderation is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like excess.
Excess is a fatal thing. Nothing succeeds like moderation.
There is a fatality about good resolutions—they are always made too late.
There is a fatality about wicked resolutions—they are always made at the right time. To be premature is to be perfect
To be premature is to be imperfect.
To be perfect is to be premature.
Ignorance is like a delicate exotic fruit; touch it and the bloom is gone.
Knowledge is like a delicate exotic fruit: touch it and the bloom is gone.
The more we study Art the less we care for Nature.
The more we study Nature the less we care for Art.
Sunsets are quite old-fashioned. They belong to the time when Turner was the last note in art.
To admire them is a distinct sign of provincialism.
Sunsets are back in fashion. They belong to the time when Turner was the last note in art. To admire them is a distinct sign of one’s modernity.
Beauty reveals everything because it expresses nothing. Beauty reveals nothing because it expresses everything.
No married man is ever attractive, except to his wife. And often, I’m told, not even to her.
Every married man is attractive, except to his wife. But often, I’m told, even to her.
Dandyism, in its own way, is an attempt to assert the absolute modernity of beauty.
Dandyism, in its own way, is an attempt to assert the absolute unmodernity of beauty.
Conversation should touch everything but should concentrate itself on nothing.
Conversation should touch on nothing but should concentrate itself on everything.
I love talking about nothing. It’s the only thing I know everything about.
I love talking about everything. It’s the only thing I know nothing about.
Only the great
