Lockdown has created new forms of boredom – and not all of them are bad | Marina Warner
Rather than seeking distraction, let’s pay attention to people’s thoughts and feelings during this period of monotony
Boredom and ennui used to be counted among the deadly sins, either bundled together with sloth, or denounced separately. Boredom was considered a spiritual torpor that led to despair and nihilism: in Dante’s Inferno, “acedia” is a state of listlessness associated with “tristitia”, sadness, and offenders are plunged into fetid black mud that chokes them as they cry and sob. When I heard some young people in a refugee camp interviewed about their experiences in 2016, it wasn’t the harshness of the conditions or worries about their future that they dwelt on. It was the lack of something to do that made them most weary. Like Dante’s sufferers in the mud of hell, they were afflicted with boredom.
That was five years ago, when isolation happened to refugees and prisoners, or nuns and hermits who had chosen it. But now these conditions have been imposed on many of us. During lockdown, it can be hard to know where the week has gone, yet at the same time life seems to have come to a standstill. Work has been suspended for millions, not all of them furloughed, while others are being overworked and exposed to the virus. I’ve often heard people say the past year has been monotonous and depressing, with nothing to look forward to. The pandemic has created a new boredom: not yawning lassitude, but foreboding, emptiness and a lack of expectation.
Read the original article at The Guardian