"Once you hear something, you can never return to the time before you heard it."
- Jonathan Safran Foer, Everything is Illuminated
If there was a way to erase our memory of a specific artistic experience, how often would we use it?
This isn't just to rip off the premise of Eternal Sunshine, and, in fact, let's consider it only for positive experiences: Would you take a pill that let you forget everything you knew about The Beatles, just so you could listen to all of their songs again for what would seem like the first time? Would I purge my memory of The Wire to treat myself once more to the surprise and tension that can only accompany a maiden viewing?
In some cases, perhaps to see a great movie for the first time (Eternal Sunshine for example) or to see a movie with surprising turns (like Shawshank) I would be apt to intentionally forget; but in others, like for The Beatles catalog, I doubt I would want to start all over, since I place value in all the subtle parts that took me many listens to notice--but the lure would be strong.
Would we be afraid of not even liking what we think we love? Are there things we think we like, but a fresh start would reveal that our previous affection was only due to circumstance? We like movies more or less depending upon who we see it with. We like bands more or less if our friends like them.
Or, even more simply, when we saw or read or listened to something for the real first time, maybe we're just different people now than we were then. Our favorite movie in high school--that still provides sweeping waves of nostalgia now--without that fond, extended memory, perhaps isn't anything we'd be interested in at all.
Get workin' on it, science.
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