Diane Johnson in NYRB in 2015: ‘Perhaps jealousy is too reductive a term finally for the enormous complications in human (and in animal) lives arising from the fundamental disappointment we all feel when first we realize that life is unfair.’

And: ‘In her vengeful but rueful memoir, [Valérie Trierweiler] doesn’t bother to dissemble her socially disapproved, uncool emotion: “I will readily admit to it: I am jealous. I have been jealous with every man I have loved. I do not know how not to be when I am in love.”’

As well: ‘“Jealousy, jealousy,” remarked Winston Churchill, “the most barren of vices.” Maybe, but like many vices, a little adds a lot to life.’

Maybe more than a lot. What would competition be without envy and jealousy? Darwinism without jealousy? Johnson leaves open the possibility that mankind would be doomed without jealousy.

Another reason to celebrate at least this vice.

(a sf 2238)