I am not any kind of big fat fan of David Brooks, but this offering in a chat feature he shares with Gail Collins made me sit up:

The great art critic Kenneth Clark once wrote an essay on what he called the “old-age style.”  He noticed that some artists peak young but others, like Michelangelo, Titian, Rembrandt, Turner and Cézanne, peaked in their elderly years. These artists shared what he called:

A sense of isolation, a feeling of holy rage, developing into what I have called transcendental pessimism; a mistrust of reason, a belief in instinct.

Holy rage? Transcendental pessimism? I’m there. Not sure about the mistrust of reason, but after reading this, I’m clinging to the hope that as I get older, I’ll write something really worthwhile.

Hit the link to the chat; it’s a bagatelle worth your time, over a morning caffeine infusion or while waiting for…