In an atomized, de-politicized culture such as ours, there's a tendency to consider people who acutely feel the world's pain as somehow unbalanced or dysfunctional. At the very least, such individuals risk being labeled "oversensitive." If, for example, they respond to human suffering and injustice by becoming dedicated political activists, driven by their idealism for a better world, they further risk being categorized for their "fanaticism."
Of course, not everyone fights the world's wrongs in the same way. For Williams, making people laugh, touching their hearts, was the way he expressed his connection with the larger world. In a sense, he was a "fanatic" about bringing happiness into other people's lives. Indeed, from most reports he was a sensitive, compassionate, and generous man. Perhaps his intense drive to use humor to lighten up our world was motivated by an underlying sense that the world--his world--was actually not such a light and funny place. In humor and public adulation he found an emotional counterweight, at least temporarily, to the extremes of lurking darkness he felt.
It may not have been coincidence that his most powerful movie roles (e.g., Good Will Hunting, Dead Poets Society, What Dreams May Come, The Fisher King) often involved tender portrayals of wounded souls seeking liberation from the world's cruelty and heartache. But in the real world the equilibrium he sought through his work and relationships proved in the end unsustainable. The world let him down. The medical profession let him down. Contending with an unresolved pain that came from somewhere deep within, the life force could no longer be nourished. And, finally, tragically, time and energy began to run out for this tender-hearted man.
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