tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-48203555359144408492024-02-20T11:17:16.878-05:00GerontionHere I am, an old man in a dry month...Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00244241468676700799noreply@blogger.comBlogger460125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-47056971457392031552019-07-05T12:17:00.000-04:002019-07-05T12:18:02.308-04:00MovedAs is readily obvious from a look at the most recent posts, this blog is no longer active.<br />
<br />
But, fear not, Dear Reader. The blog has a new location:<br />
<br />
<a href="https://jamesehartley.com/">https://jamesehartley.com</a><br />
<br />
See you there.Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-18885392829559912672017-07-05T17:20:00.001-04:002017-07-05T17:20:54.388-04:00My Headstone<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">“Í don’t know what one puts on a
stone when it’s murder…Can’t very well say ‘entered into rest’ or anything like
that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One will have to choose a text—something
appropriate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>R.I.P.? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No, that’s only for Catholics.”</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">“O Lord, thou has seen my wrongs.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Judge thou my case,” murmured Mr. Entwhistle.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">I have never really thought about what I want on my
headstone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is this the sort of thing I should
be pondering?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Janet would insist that
this is precisely the sort of thing I should <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">not</i> be pondering.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Indeed, if
I ever start a conversation with Janet with, “I was thinking about this today…”
she could instantly reply that whatever comes next is surely not worthy of any
attention, let alone the attention I gave it during the day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nevertheless, I persist in pondering such things.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In this case, I am not pondering what I would
want on my headstone but whether I should be thinking about what I want on my
headstone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Truth be told, I have never really
even thought about whether I want a headstone in the first place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, let’s just pretend that question has
been answered in the affirmative.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">On the one hand, I think I probably shouldn’t care what is
on my headstone because, not to mince words, I’ll never actually see or read
said headstone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>On the other hand, said
headstone will be the only permanent record of the fact that I have whiled away
a few years in this Vale of Tears, and surely I should care about my Permanent
Record. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Moreover, if I don’t think about
this question now, then I am leaving it to my heirs to make this permanent decision
at a time when they are (presumably (hopefully?)) in grief.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Surely, I <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>shouldn’t impose that burden on them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then again, is it really a burden on them
since there is no chance that I will ever express disapproval of whatever
choice they have made? And come to think of it, should I or the people who survive
me decide on the content of my headstone?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>After all, they are the ones who will read it, they are the ones who
will use it as a Stone of Remembrance, so shouldn't they decide on the content?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Until now, I must admit, I have given this
matter shockingly little thought.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And I
still don’t know the answer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I don’t really
care about my headstone, but now I am wondering if I should care.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">The quotation above is from (in case it isn’t obvious—maybe it
is a famous quotation and you already know where it is from.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Oh dear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>What if that quotation is as famous as “to be or not to be,” and I am the
only one on the planet who had never heard it before?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I guess I could check the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Oxford Dictionary of Quotations</i> to see if
it is in there, but I am now afraid to do so in case it is in there and I was supposed
to know it was in there.)—the quotation is from Agatha Christie’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">After the Funeral</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
quotation has absolutely nothing to do with the rest of the plot, by the
way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It just strikes me as strange bit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had no idea, for example, that RIP was <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Catholic</i>; then again, maybe it isn’t—I am
not sure a character in an Agatha Christie book is necessarily a reliable
source of information.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even still, I
never would have made the R.I.P.-Catholic association.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">I’ve read a lot of Agatha Christie before now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, until writing this blog post about a
random quotation from the book, I have never really associated Agatha Christie
with actual life and death.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Her books
are so obviously fiction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What does an Agatha Christie novel not seem
more realistic than some sort of fantasy novel with sorcery and monsters?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It must be something to do with the constraints
of the Whodunit genre.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To work, a
Christie novel must have a confined feel; the murderer can’t show up out of the
blue as someone we haven’t met earlier in the novel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, there must always be a limited number of people
involved in the story.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And, then not
only the murderer, but also assorted others must have some motive for actually
murdering the deceased.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And on top of that,
at least some of the non-murderers must have an unrelated secret which gives
them an excuse for doing suspicious things.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And, when I compare all that to real life, I realize I have never been
in a situation in my life with such tightly defined intrigue and back-story.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I suspect if I was ever in a remote country home
with 8 other people and someone was murdered and the murder must have been done
by one of the remaining 7 people, it would take all of about 30 seconds to
figure out who the murderer must be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Maybe all this is obvious to everyone, but I have never once
thought about any of this before. Which may explain why I never thought about
my headstone either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>With all the Agatha
Christie I have read, why have I never imagined being the victim of a murder or
an even suspect in a murder case?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead,
I read Christie and think of it as a nice little intellectual puzzle—one that
you can’t really solve, but it sure feels like you could solve.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is what makes them fun.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If this was real, it wouldn’t be quite so
much fun would it?</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">To return to my headstone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>How about this?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’d like the Raiders
shield with the guy with the eyepatch and the crossed swords behind him on my
headstone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s like a skull and cross-bones,
so it sort of fits in a<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>graveyard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that way when people see my headstone
they will be reminded that something about which I dearly care survives
me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Raiders will be here for a long time,
too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, even after everyone I know is gone,
people can still think fondly about the Raiders..<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So how about:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.0in; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Your Humble
Narrator</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.0in; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">11/24/66 – [insert
date]</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.0in; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Requiescat In Pace</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.0in; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Survived by the
Raiders</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 1.0in; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">[Insert Raiders
logo]</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Is that a good headstone?</span><br />
</div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-16299777398893068542017-07-03T17:15:00.001-04:002017-07-03T17:15:17.301-04:00Mr Rosewater<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">After deciding that the world is one meaningless thing after
another, what then?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Wait, the Hypothetical
Reader asks, when did We decide that?)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>(Well, Your Humble Narrator replies, the Hypothetical Reader May Not
have Decided that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What makes you, Hypothetical
Reader, think that You are the One Doing the Thinking and Deciding Around these
here parts?)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(But, I digress.)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Then again, isn’t the whole point of using parentheses
to demonstrate that this is a digression?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I think one uses parentheses for parenteral asides, right?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, I guess saying “I digress” in parentheses
is redundant)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(By this point, there are
no Hypothetical Readers left, so We may now progress with the Main Event).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To remind ourselves of where We were: After deciding
that the world is one meaningless act after another, what then?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Kurt Vonnegut (see, it wasn't about you, Hypothetical
Reader) demonstrated the absolute absurdity of everything in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cat’s Cradle</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, his next novel presented a challenge—does
he simply double down on the meaninglessness of everything or is there some way
out of this trap?</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">As I have noted in this space before, thanks to the Library
of America, I am finally understanding Vonnegut.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Again, as noted before, I had read lots of
Vonnegut in the past, I had enjoyed the novels when I read them, but a week
after reading a novel, I had no memory of the content of the book.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, reading them in order, it is all making
so much more sense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Library of America
is a National Treasure.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">So, in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cat’s Cradle</i>,
Vonnegut argues that the world is pointless and meaningless.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His next novel was <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I had read this novel before, and I only remembered one thing from it—a particular
scene from the novel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can imagine my
surprise when I realized that the one thing I remembered about this novel wasn't
actually in this novel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It must be from another
Vonnegut novel—presumably I’ll get to that remembered scene at some point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, to correct the record—I had read this
novel before, and I didn’t remember a single thing from it.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Coming after <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cat’s Cradle,
</i>though, the novel makes a lot more sense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Vonnegut’s universe is still meaningless.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, a meaningless universe creates a new problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are still people living in that meaningless
universe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What do you do about all the people
living meaningless lives in a meaningless universe but who do not know the universe
is meaningless and so don’t know they are just supposed to laugh at how meaningless
everything is?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The temptation is just to
ignore them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After all, if you are faced
with a meaningless universe, why not just enjoy yourself?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And if you have wealth and live in a meaningless
universe, then why not just hang out with all the Beautiful people, and you and
the other wealthy beautiful people can enjoy a beautiful life in a meaningless
universe?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Should you worry about all those
other people?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why bother?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They are all sort of…repulsive and low-class,
anyway…right?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Eliot Rosewater, the Mr. Rosewater of the title of the book,
has more inherited wealth than he can spend.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And he makes a discovery.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">“I look at these people, these
Americans,” Eliot went on, “and I realize that they can’t even care about
themselves any more—because they have no <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">use</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The factory, the farms, the mines across the
river—they’re almost completely automatic now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And America doesn’t even need these people for war—not any more, Sylvia—I’m
going to be an artist.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">“An artist?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">“I’m going to love these discarded
Americans, even though they’re useless and unattractive.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is going to be my work of art.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">That was published in…1965.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Imagine a large swath of Americans who have become largely irrelevant.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As the Vonnegut surrogate in the novel explains:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">“In time almost all men and women
will become worthless as producers of goods, food, services, and more machines,
as sources of practical ideas in the areas of economics, engineering, and probably
medicine too….Americans have long been taught to hate all people who will not
or cannot work, to hate even themselves for that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We can thank the vanished frontier for that
piece of common-sense cruelty.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The time
is coming, if it isn’t here now, when it will no longer be common sense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It will simply be cruel.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">So, imagine a society divided with the Good, Beautiful People
on the one side and Pointless, Pedestrian, Boring, Low-class people on the
other side.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Imagine a person from the
Good, Beautiful side of the tracks decided to love the latter set of people—and
love them not from afar, but actually move into the neighborhood and help them out
whenever they had a need, a real immediate need, like needing someone to talk
with at 3 AM or someone to help out on the volunteer fire department.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you knew someone who did that, who walked
away from an Ivy League Education to move to a small town in the middle of nowhere,
just to live there and be with <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">those</i> people,
what would you call someone like that?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Insane,
perhaps?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And therein is the plot of this
Vonnegut novel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is Eliot Rosewater
insane?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">It is an eerie book to read in 2017, by the way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This idea of a whole set of Americans who are
angry because they feel useless and ignored and don’t like feeling useless and
ignored, well…what would happen if they actually existed and then 50 years
later they still actually existed and they were still angry that they felt
useless and ignored?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not a rhetorical question,
obviously.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">So, Vonnegut is providing an interesting answer to his
problem from <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cat’s Cradle</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is all well and good to say that we live
in a pointless world, where there are no higher goals or causes which can give
our lives meaning; in fact if you are one of the wealthy, beautiful people, the
type of people who have nice college educations and buy books by Kurt Vonnegut,
then it is even fun to think about a world like that and imagine we live in a world
like that, and even live as if we live a world like that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, if you are one of those people out there
living in a small town like Rosewater, Indiana, well, you might not be enjoying
your life as much as those people reading <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cat’s
Cradle</i> and laughing at the pointlessness of it all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And, maybe, just maybe, those people reading <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Cat’s Cradle</i> should think about what it
must be like for those other people and do something crazy like, love
them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not love them from afar in some
abstract, “I love humanity” way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, love
them enough to set aside all their privileges and become like one of them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A radical idea that. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Imagine the Social Justice Warrior who instead
of joining a non-profit in Downtown Manhattan or a nice College Town and Working
to solve the world’s problems from a nice one-bedroom apartment near cute vegetarian
restaurants, imagine that person just deciding to move to Rosewater, Indiana or
the equivalent town in Nowhere America and get a job at Wal-Mart and just live
with people and love them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That would be
a radical act.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Of course this is all just silly talk.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What kind of person would voluntarily set aside
all the trappings of a very nice life and endure such humbling as to actually
live with, among, and like the lowly, unworthy beings?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Empty yourself and become a servant?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yeah, that would be insane.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-9215396140153283352017-06-29T16:10:00.001-04:002017-06-29T16:10:29.419-04:00A Traveller from an Antique Land<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dahlia is bounded by the Ruby Wall, 27 feet high and 9 feet
think, bright red when the rays of the sun beat upon it.<span> </span>It is a three day journey to cross through Dahlia
on foot, more if you bring a camel.<span> </span>As
you traverse the city, you find many structures which are a roof, held up by
four posts and no walls.<span> </span>There are structures
with four walls and no roof.<span> </span>There are
roofs with just one wall, sometimes having a door or windows set within the
wall, sometimes not.<span> </span>There are roofs
with two walls.<span> </span>If you spend many hours
searching, you might find a roof with three walls down one of the twisted
walkways, though I have never seen such a structure..<span> </span>The roofs are always a bright blue, sometimes
with streaks of white.<span> </span>These structures
serves as dwellings or shops or government offices.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">But in the middle of the city sits a structure with a roof
and four walls.<span> </span>It has a doorway set in
the middle of <span> </span>the Northern wall and a
window of painted glass set above the door.<span>
</span>This is the only structure in the whole of the city with a roof and four
walls and it sits directly in the center of the great city.<span> </span>The walls are 17.25 feet high and the roof is
flat.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">If a person crosses through the doorway of the structure in
the center of the City, Dahlians say the traveler has gone Outside. <span> </span>In every other place, a person is said to be
Inside.<span> </span>The structure in the center of
the City is well known; one only has to say “Let us meet Outside,” to know that
one should leave the city by going through the doorway in the structure in the middle
of the city.<span> </span>Once Outside, people go Inside
by passing back through the doorway.<span>
</span>There are no other places in all of Dahlia that are Outside.<span> </span>The rest of the City is Inside.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Now that you, Dear Reader have read about Dahlia, do you
wish to visit it?<span> </span>The idea of Dahlia was
born when I was reading <i>Invisible Cities</i>
by Italo Calvino.<span> </span>A student gave me the book
(thanks, Lia!), and I can easily imagine her reading it and liking it.<span> </span>The book is dozens of descriptions of cities which
do not exist, with a framing story of Marco Polo describing the cities to Kublai
Khan.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The City descriptions are prose poems, lyrical and
evocative.<span> </span>There is possibly a structure
to the book, but it is hard to tell.<span> </span>It
is the sort of book that might repay endless hours of devoted study or it might
simply be what it is and no more.<span> </span>Could one
add another city to the book or take out one of the cities or would such an addition
or subtraction fundamentally destroy the order and beauty of the book?<span> </span>I have absolutely no idea.<span> </span>I suspect academic papers have been written
on the matter.<span> </span>But, this is one of those
things where academic papers may destroy what beauty the book has.<span> </span>It is a hypnotic book.<span> </span>You roam across the land, with hints that
this is all real or this is all false or some of this is real and some is
not.<span> </span>Even the framing device may be real
or not real.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This is the sort of book that prompts the question: why do
we tell stories?<span> </span>It is an ancient question,
of course.<span> </span>Before thinking about this
book, I thought that question might have an answer.<span> </span>But having just read a seemingly endless
array of stories about cities which do not exist, each one of those stories
being more evocative of a place than actually describing a place, each one of those
descriptions hinting at story upon story that could be told about the city, but
having none of those stories actually told, after reading all that, I am not at
all sure I can explain why we tell stories.<span>
</span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Take the city of Melania, which shows up on page 81.<span> </span>(Melania was chosen totally at random—all of
the following is accurate, but I am pretty sure the same paragraph could have
been written no matter which page I randomly chose.)<span> </span>A page and a half description of a city.<span> </span>It isn’t hard reading the description of the
city to imagine a whole book of short stories coming straight out of the description
on those pages.<span> </span>It would be a challenge
to write such a book, but then again, it is a challenge to write any book.<span> </span>The book of stories from Melania, though, has
the potential to be Great Art, Beautiful and Deep.<span> </span>I can see that book of stories in my mind; I would
like to read that book of stories.<span> </span>But,
Tales of Melania not only doesn’t exist, it never will exist.<span> </span>Instead, we have the page and half evoking
the idea of Melania and nothing more.<span>
</span>So, why tell about Melania?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Having read <i>Invisible
Cities</i>, I am not even sure how to read this book.<span> </span>Reading it straight through was more hypnotic
than thought-provoking.<span> </span>There is no
forward momentum, just one description after another. And even the framing
device is just one description after another.<span>
</span>Having read it, when I now pick it up, I can simply flip to a random
page, and read it and start wondering.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Does a book that just starts you wondering provide anything
to the Reader?<span> </span>I can’t tell.<span> </span>As I sit here puzzling over this book, I
cannot figure out if this is a book I should pick up on a regular basis, read
two pages, and then set down just to start imagining a city and the tales that city
could tell.<span> </span>A book that fosters
imagination.<span> </span>And therein lies my
problem.<span> </span>I do not know the intrinsic value
of imagination.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Take the description of the city at the outset of this
post.<span> </span>I started ruminating about the
book by wondering what it would be like to write a description of a city that
does not exist, and so I began.<span> </span>It
morphed with an idea I puzzled about for a few hours months ago about whether Outside
and Inside could be flipped or not.<span> </span>Is
it possible that by being in my office, I am outside, and everywhere else is
inside?<span> </span>I tried to talk with my family
about this matter which seriously troubled me, but nobody else seemed to think
the matter was troubling.<span> </span>So, that idea worked
its way into the story of the city above.<span>
</span>In that city, they think this way.<span>
</span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">But, as a city that fits within <i>Invisible Cities</i>, I am pretty sure it is a failure.<span> </span>A city of one idea, and probably not a very
interesting idea at that.<span> </span>None of the Invisible
Cities seem so small.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">My failure to craft a city worthy of this book does not surprise
me in the least, by the way. I do not think I could ever write a respectable
short story, novel or even a poem.<span> </span>I
have always thought my creativity does not lie in that direction.<span> </span>And now I wonder if perhaps my imagination
does also not lie in that direction.<span> </span>Why
is it that I am troubled by the idea of a book that simply sparks imagination?<span> </span>Why do I want Imagination to have some end
beyond itself?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rakape74oNY"><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Obvious Song Choice</span></span></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">(Incidentally, I actually like this cover version better
than the original (which I always thought was far to saccharine))</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-15926405295753199862017-06-28T17:02:00.000-04:002017-06-28T17:02:08.547-04:00The Seeing Eye<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I have long had a troubled relationship with C.S.
Lewis.<span> </span>I first met him as a young lad
when I won a copy of <i>The Lion, the Witch,
and the Wardrobe</i> in some Bible Trivia contest.<span> </span>I really liked the Chronicles of Narnia; I
read the whole series multiple times when growing up.<span> </span>I started his space trilogy as soon as I heard
about it, but I only made it a few chapters into volume 1 before realizing it
was really boring compared to the tales of Narnia.<span> </span>(Later reading confirmed that my childish
impression was correct.)<span> </span><span> </span>Over time, I heard more and more about him; he
is one of those authors evangelical Christians are supposed to like.<span> </span>So, I kept reading him and kept finding him
mildly disappointing.<span> </span>Interesting ideas,
but never anything like a slam-dunk book. <span> </span>Eventually, I came to appreciate him a bit.<span> </span>I really like <i>The Abolition of Man</i>; not a perfect book, but a book well worth reading
(and, it would seem, assigning in a class).<span>
</span>But, even still, I have this vague sense that while Lewis is good and
all, I really should like him more than I do.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So, when I was offered the chance to go to a colloquium on
Lewis, I didn’t hesitate.<span> </span>It’s a Liberty
Fund colloquium, which means you get a set of reading, and show up for two and
a half days of conversation with 15 other invited participants.<span> </span>No presentations, no papers, just talking
about the reading.<span> </span>Liberty Fund colloquia
are without a doubt the best conferences in the world.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The colloquium is in September, so a few weeks back I got a
box with the reading material.<span> </span>The reading
turned out to be <i>The Abolition of Man </i>(good
news—I like that book!) and a dozen other essays.<span> </span>The dozen essays are scattered among 5
books. So, here I was at the start of summer with five books of Lewis essays
and I figured I might as well just read them all.<span> </span>Seems like a decent project to add to my
summer list.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The first volume I read: <i>The
Seeing Eye</i>.<span> </span>This is a posthumous
collection of otherwise not collected essays.<span>
</span>And, as always with such things, it is hard to review.<span> </span>If you step back and ask, “What unifies these
essays?,” the honest answer is “Well, Lewis never put them in a collection of
essays he made during his lifetime.”<span> </span>Not
much of a hook there.<span> </span>So, who buys a
book like this?<span> </span>Presumably people who
just can’t enough of Lewis.<span> </span>Should you
read it?<span> </span>Yep—if you have read everything
else he wrote and just can’t get enough of Lewis.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Don't get me wrong, it isn’t a bad book at all.<span> </span>There are some interesting essays in here;
indeed, I didn’t detest any of the essays.<span>
</span>Lewis writes well—he is an easy person to read, which is presumably a
part of his appeal.<span> </span>It is conversational
writing, and not simply because many of his essays were originally talks he
gave.<span> </span>It is one of those depressing
facts of life that far too many people giving talks cannot manage a conversational
style even when giving a talk.<span> </span>So, I
found the book easy and thoughtful reading.<span>
</span>Perfect for while having that second and third cup of coffee in the
morning.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">But, and here is the problem with the book, the best of this
book is already embedded in <i>The Abolition
of Man</i>.<span> </span>Indeed, part of the book
could have been labeled, “First drafts of material which will later be included
in another book.”<span> </span>There are other essays
which read like precursors to Lewis’ book on the Psalms.<span> </span>So, if you have read the other Lewis books
and come to this one, do you learn anything new?<span> </span>Sort of.<span>
</span>It is interesting to see familiar material presented in a<span> </span>new way.<span>
</span>Every now and then there is an interesting turn of phrase that stands
out.<span> </span>(“Some people make allowances for
local and temporary conditions in the speeches of Our Lord on a scale which really
implies that God chose the time and place of the Incarnation very injudiciously.”<span> </span>“It may even be the duty of some Christians
to be culture-sellers.”) <span> </span>But, I can’t
imagine recommending this collection of essays to someone over the more completed
books which were finished off later on in his life.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Now the good thing about reading a book like this is not really
the book itself, but the idle speculation to which a book like this leads
you.<span> </span>Halfway through that third cup of
coffee, you finish an essay, stare out the window and start mulling.<span> </span>What exactly is Progress? you ask
yourself.<span> </span>Lewis is hard on the Apostles
of Progress, the charlatans who talk about Societal Evolution as if evolution always
improves matters.<span> </span>But set aside Lewis’
target for a second, and wonder: suppose we wanted society to progress.<span> </span>What change would constitute progress?<span> </span>The first instinct is to say that progress
would be fixing things I don’t like about the society.<span> </span>But, that is a rather amusing answer.<span> </span>Does Society <i>progress </i>when it becomes more to <i>my</i> liking?<span> </span>Now that is
rather egocentric of me.<span> </span>I am confusing
“I like these things” with “A Society progresses when it has more of the things
I like and it regresses when it has fewer of the things I like.”<span> </span>When did <i>I</i>
become the standard for <i>progress</i>?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So, if we become a little less egocentric and say society progresses
when it has more of the things people like me like, then it doesn't sound quite
so silly, but it still sounds weird.<span> </span>So,
we modify it to say society progresses when it has more of the things Enlightened
People like, which is a circular argument saying the same thing.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So, to get progress, we have to have something more abstract.<span> </span>Society progresses when it has more Liberty
or Equality or Fraternity?<span> </span>Take the second
one.<span> </span>As society becomes more equal, it
makes progress on being more equal.<span> </span>Tautologically
true.<span> </span>But “society progresses when it becomes
more equal” just begs the question.<span> </span>Why
is more equality progress?<span> </span>What enthroned
equality as the progressive endpoint?<span> </span>Or
Liberty?<span> </span>Or Fraternity?<span> </span>And again, we are back to the idea that society
progresses when people like me like the society more.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">In the absence of something outside myself establishing the goal,
I am not sure what Progress means.<span> </span>Does
theism get around the problem?<span> </span>Does
Society progress when God likes it more?<span>
</span>That gets us into all sorts of theological problems.<span> </span>Is God’s goal for this society to improve
until it hits an eschatological end?<span>
</span>Does Society progress when it gets more like Heaven and regress when it
gets less like Heaven?<span> </span>If the world ends
in fire and condemnation, which the New Testament seems to suggest it does, is
it progress to get closer or further away from condemnation?<span> </span>There seem to be a slide here from the idea
of progress as found in <i>Pilgrim’s Progress</i>
and the idea of a society progressing by…what?<span>
</span>What are the rules to measure the progress of a society?<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The very term “progress” implies a goal which society is either
moving toward or not.<span> </span>Without a stated
goal, it is a meaningless term.<span> </span>Calling someone
“progressive” sure sounds like a compliment, but surely it matters to what end
they are progressing.<span> </span>When you frame it that
way, you realize that every act of progress toward one goal is simultaneously
an act of regress from the opposite goal.<span>
</span>There is no such thing as progress in the abstract.<span> </span>We spend too much time talking about progress
and not enough time establishing what the goal is to which the progress is occurring.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">And that is where I get stuck.<span> </span>As soon as you try to articulate the goal
toward which a society is progressing when people talk about ”societal progress”
it gets rather messy.<span> </span>I suspect if the
goals were stated more clearly, it would be less attractive to talk about
progress.<span> </span>I suspect that the very idea
of “progress” is just a mask for some very muddled thinking.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I’ve been puzzling over this for a while now, which is of
course the sign of a good book. At best, Lewis only hints at any of this—I have
no idea if he would even recognize these ruminations as related to the essays he
wrote.<span> </span>I am still back at my original
problem though—is Lewis worth reading or not?<span>
</span>I rarely find that Lewis gives me a satisfying argument for anything,
but he is easy to read and make me think.<span>
</span>I suspect he would be happy with that characterization.<span> </span>Framed this way, I too find it a positive
thing to say about an author.<span> </span>But, while
Lewis makes me think, I always find him far too yielding of a conversation
partner; when I push back against Lewis, he just yields the terrain.<span> </span>Maybe I just prefer stronger-willed
conversation partners.<span> </span>I don’t know.<span> </span>But, I do have four more books of essays this
summer to sort out my Lewis Problem.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-27998387813670358362017-06-27T16:13:00.001-04:002017-06-27T16:13:17.749-04:00What Should I Read Next?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">“I cannot live without books.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thomas Jefferson wrote that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is unclear how he tested that
hypothesis.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have a little plaque-like
thing (a plaqueoid? plaquoid?) in my office, given to me as a gift from my
mother, which has that quotation on it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I am not sure how I feel about it (the plaque-like thing).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In one way, it reminds me that I like books.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, at the same time, it reminds me that Jefferson
read a lot of books, and so maybe I should read more books, because compared to
the amount I think he read, I don’t read very much at all.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Then again (self-justification for bad behavior alert),
Jefferson didn’t have the internet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In
the alternate universe in which the internet does not exist, how many more books
do I read per year?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is undoubtedly
not a trivial sum.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And if you think of the
other alternative universe in which not only does the internet not exist, but neither
does television, I suspect my current reading habits are embarrassingly slight.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">I want to think I would like to live in that world in which I
read more than I do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, then again, if
I really wanted to live in that world, I could just not use any computing devices
or video devices and thereby live in a facsimile of that world.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I don’t do so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Insert axiom of revealed preference.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">All of these thoughts (and, truthfully, angst) were prompted
when I reread <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Books and the Founding
Fathers</i> by George Nash.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a slim
book (60 pages).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I read it when it came
out, and (full disclosure) I talked with George about it when he was giving the
lecture which comprises the bulk of the book, so I knew the contents even
before I read it the first time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, I
reread it because of a conversation I had a few weeks back about putting together
a reading list of the books the Founding Fathers would have read and been
thinking about when composing the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution.
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I knew the answer was in this slim
volume with the title connecting Books and Founding Fathers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When I reread it, I was depressed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You can’t put together a reading list of what
the Founding Fathers read.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They read…everything.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They were incredibly well read.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I spent the whole book thinking that I should
really read more than I do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I haven’t read
the complete works of Cicero.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve never
even started Blackstone’s Commentaries.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And I am truly ashamed to acknowledge (so ashamed I almost didn’t even
write this sentence) (Really, I was going to not write this sentence I am so ashamed)…I
have never read…this is hard to admit in print (I am not joking)…I have never
read Montesquieu’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Spirit of Laws</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(There I said it.) (Maybe admitting that in
public will get me to actually read it sometime soon.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(First step: Admit you have a problem.)) <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I haven’t read it because, well, I haven’t convinced
myself I will find it inspiring.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, it
inspired Jefferson and Madison and Adams and Hamilton <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and that whole crew and so shouldn’t it inspire
me too?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course it should. It probably
will. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I haven’t read the complete works
of any the Founding Fathers, either. Just sticking to the realm of political philosophy,
it is truly overwhelming to make a list of all the books I haven’t read.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, the Founding Fathers read those
books.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, why shouldn’t I? </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">And that is just political philosophy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is far too overwhelming to conduct the
same experiment on other branches of knowledge.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Indeed, it causes me acute pain to realize I don’t think there is any
branch of knowledge that I can honestly say I could not quickly make a list of
a dozen books I have not read that it really pains me to admit I haven’t read.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(And, yes, that even includes Economics.) </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">I’d like to be Well Read.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But, how much reading does one need to do in the Modern Age to be Truly
Well Read?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mean it is pretty obvious to
me that I have read more than many people I meet, but is that the right comparison?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Reading something like <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Books and the Founding Fathers</i> makes me think I have probably read
a lot less than Thomas Jefferson had read.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And I am not even sure where Jefferson fits in the Well Read
category.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Samuel Johnson probably read
even more than Jefferson.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thomas Aquinas?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dante?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Now those guys are well read.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Me?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not even in that league.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">(And, lest anyone be prompted to tell me I am Well Read in some
misguided charitable attempt to make me feel better about myself, I will preemptively
say, “Don’t be Silly.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This I know: I have
read enough to know that I am not Well Read.)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">I run into a related problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To be Well Read, how wide does one’s reading
need to be?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Can one be considered Well
Read if one has never read a novel or a work of political philosophy or a book
on the natural sciences?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Surely having
read the complete works of Aristotle and nothing else does not constitute Well
Read.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, how does it work?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I have read some but not all of Aristotle,
can I still be Well Read?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How much does
one have to know about Chinese history to be Well Read?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How many comic books does one have to read to
be Well Read?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And if the answer to that
last question is zero, are there other categories that do not count for becoming
Well Read?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Does one Jane Austen novel
count for more than the Complete Works of Alan Moore in the quest to become Well
Read?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">I am legitimately troubled by this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Suppose I made it my personal quest that in the
next 10 years I will go from my present state to the state of being Well
Read.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What do I need to spend the next
10 years reading?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is it even possible to
get there?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The possibility that the answer
to that last question is “No” is quite depressing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, let’s drop it from consideration.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(If you pretend a possibility is impossible,
then it is, by definition impossible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Right?) <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I want to be Well
Read, how should I choose my books?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Was it
OK that I reread <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Books and the Founding Fathers</i>
or should I have spent the time reading books written by the Founding Fathers?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Was the time I spent over the weekend reading
an Agatha Christie novel an aid in advancing toward my goal or did it not advance
me toward the status of being Well Read?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Curiously, this blog makes me feel better about my
reading.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While writing meaningless reflections
of no interest to anyone about books seems to bear little resemblance to
becoming Well Read, I find that pausing after a book to actively ponder it is
enormously useful.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To go from passively pondering
a book to actively asking “What was it about this book that was most striking?”
makes the book come alive in a whole new way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It took a long hiatus from doing this to make me realize that something was
lost when I stopped doing it—I read a lot of books in that time, and some of
them were memorable to be sure, but there are whole books I realize that I read
but nothing about them jumps to mind.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To
be Well Read surely means more than just having turned the pages of a book, it
surely means to be able to recall how said book changed your thoughts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And therein lies the utility of this here
blog.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And, yes, simply typing this up
and not broadcasting it to the world could theoretically serve the same purpose,
but the act of thinking that someone, somewhere might read it, induces a degree
of deliberateness to the reflections.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>None
of which explains why you, Dear Hypothetical Reader, would bother to read these
ruminations.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">On a related note, does listening to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t7zk4as9kzA">songs about books</a> help
make you Well Read?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-25551235666022856422017-06-26T16:33:00.001-04:002017-06-26T16:33:15.465-04:00Skipper Worse<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Raise your hand if you have ever heard of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Skipper Worse</i> by Alexander Lange
Kielland.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Anyone?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Anyone?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">This novel was included in Charles Eliot’s series, Harvard Classics.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That series was intended to show that you
could get the basic liberal education in a library which fit on a five foot
shelf.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, imagine the challenge—you have
a mere five feet of bookshelf space and you want to put in all the
classics.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So, Homer, Dante, Shakespeare,
Milton, Plato, Aristotle. And so on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Oh,
and Kielland’s <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Skipper Worse</i>.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">A curious choice to put it mildly.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had never heard of this book until a friend
of mine, Chris Fauske, published a translation of the book. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Chris kept telling me the book was really
good, so I finally bought I and it lingered on my bookshelf forever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I felt guilty whenever I ran into him again that
I hadn’t yet read it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I finally
did.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Chris was right; it is good.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is what got me puzzling—why hadn’t I
ever heard of Kielland or this novel in any other context?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And you can imagine my shock when I found it
listed as one of the books in Charles Eliot’s (yes, Charles Eliot, President of
Harvard, proponent of Great Books!) Harvard Classics. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hard to get a bigger stamp of Great Book than
that.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">But, then it gets really odd:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Skipper
Worse</i> does not have its own page in Wikipedia.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now we have a Great Book without a Wikipedia
page!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I suspect this is a set of one.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">And then, I discover that Harold Bloom didn’t list Kielland’s
novel in the appendix of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Western Canon</i>,
which pretty much lists every work of high fiction ever written.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">So, what do Charles Eliot and Chris Fauske know that the rest
of the universe doesn’t?</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Kielland is Norwegian and is part of the generation of
writers that helped create Norway as a distinct country and people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Publishing this work in 1882, he is doing for
Norway much what Dickens was doing for England or Tolstoy was doing for Russia—trying
to capture society as a whole in a novel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Using this novel as the reference point (I have no other independent knowledge
of Norway in the late 19<sup>th</sup> century (yeah, clearly I have a critical failing
in my education—how did 1880s Norway get skipped in every class I ever
took???)), Norway was caught in a real cultural crossroads as an older maritime
culture met a burgeoning commercial class met an intensely devout religious
class.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Poor Skipper Worse.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Can I note how hard it was to get over the
fact that “Worse” is just his last name and not the English word “worse”?)<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Skipper Worse likes to sail boats.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At the start of the novel he has just completed
the first-ever Norway to Rio voyage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Almost,
but not quite as important a voyage as Diaz rounding <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the Cape of Good Hope, to be sure.) <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Skipper’s ship is named <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The Hope of the Family</i> (insert “Symbolism
Alert”). By the end of the first chapter, you know this is going to be one of those
nice novels where a maritime hero settles back into the life of his beloved
homeland.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Except it isn’t.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While he was away, Norway changed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Skipper Worse’s old life no longer exists,
and he is suddenly faced with a problem.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>What world should he join?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There
is the grand new commercial world where Skipper Worse can become a shipping magnate
running a large-scale commercial enterprise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There is the intense new religious community where Skipper Worse can thwart
the devil and all his works through a life of simplicity and intense devotion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And there is his tavern and his old friends
where he can merrily get drunk and tell tall tales, but that doesn’t really work
in with either of those other two worlds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Oh, and there is a girl.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A young
girl, much younger that the Skipper.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe
Worse can regain his lost youth with this younger bride; all the more important
because Worse’s son is, well, not a good fellow (nothing to look forward to
there).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Throw is some interesting characters
from the commercial and religious worlds, and you have an intriguing portrait
of Norway at a slice in time when Norway has to decide what it means to be Norway.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">For the scope of the novel, it is surprisingly short; just
164 pages in the Fauske translation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yet
despite being under 200 pages, I feel like I know this town, these people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it breaks my heart to see them so
divided, so poised on the cusp of great societal upheaval, so unprepared for
what the future will bring.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These are people
who are simply not prepared for the 20<sup>th</sup> century.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Another curious note, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Skipper
Worse</i> is a prequel to Kielland’s earlier novel <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Garman & Worse</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, for
as much as I enjoyed <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Skipper Worse</i>, I
am not eager to read the sequel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is
partly because I have such a quaint little picture of this town that I am not
sure I want to know what happens next.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But, even more importantly, because Kielland is not exactly a household
names, when you look him up on Amazon, all you find are a bunch of free Kindle versions
of the books—which means translations which have now hit the public domain—which
(generally) means, total hack-job translations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In fact, you have to search by ISBN (978-0-89304-111-3) to get the Fauske
translation of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Skipper Worse</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe if Chris ever translates the sequel, I’ll
read it then.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>[In the meantime, if you
need a gift for a person who likes Great Books, get the Fauske translation of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Skipper Worse</i>—they are unlikely to have
read it and they will enjoy it. (End commercial interlude.)]</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">On prequels: what is the first literary prequel ever
published?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To qualify: an author needs
to have written both the original and the prequel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Retelling old myths doesn’t count—it has to
be an original story followed by another original story that precedes the one
already published.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have not exhaustively
thought about this, and I may be missing something really obvious, but it is just
possible that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Skipper Worse</i> is the
first one that would qualify.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’d be happy
to hear that this is wrong, by the way—I suddenly am quite interested in this
matter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Don’t ask why I am interested.
I have no idea why I get interested in anything.)</span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">On Wikipedia: the lack of a Wikipedia entry on this book is
more than just puzzling.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It also makes
me wonder if I should take up a project about which I feel twinges of guilt all
the time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Should I be spending time each
week improving Wikipedia?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I love Wikipedia—I
use it all the time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, I often note
small errors or omissions or things that it would be good to include.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I certainly know enough random, but kinda interesting
things.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I could do this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, I never have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Why not?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Surely working on a free, global encyclopedia is not a bad use of a
half-hour a week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yet, I have been
tortured with the idea that I should do this for years, and never once done
so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have no idea why not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, I can say—creating at least a rudimentary
Wikipedia page of Skipper Worse is certainly worth doing.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">And a final note:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
have no idea what <a href="https://tv.nrk.no/serie/fjernsynsteatret/fdrp34000198/02-03-1968">this even is</a>, but it is pretty funny to discover this doing a
Google search.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s too short to be the
whole novel, but it may be episode 1.</span></div>
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Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-89699795883208911752017-06-23T15:13:00.001-04:002017-06-23T15:13:36.162-04:00Analogue God<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">“For who hath despised the day of small things?” God says
that (Zechariah 4:10)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">The God of Small
Things</i>, Arundhati Roy</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Is this a coincidence?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hard to believe that it is, but
Roy’s novel of India and Zechariah’s prophecies in Ancient Israel don’t seem to
have any obvious similarities.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Indeed,
consider the context of that line for Zechariah:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Moreover the word of the Lord came
unto me, saying,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The hands of Zerubbabel have laid
the foundation of this house; his hands shall also finish it; and thou shalt
know that the Lord of hosts hath sent me unto you.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">For who hath despised the day of
small things? for they shall rejoice, and shall see the plummet in the hand of
Zerubbabel with those seven; they are the eyes of the Lord, which run to and
fro through the whole earth.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">(That is the King James Version by the way (though you probably
instantly knew that)—I don’t normally read the KJV, but I like the way the question
in the middle there is phrased.)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Roy’s God of Small Things is introduced in a dream described
thus: “If he touched her he couldn’t talk to her, if her loved her he couldn’t leave,
if he spoke he couldn’t listen, if he fought he couldn’t win.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yeah, I don’t know that that means either,
and it isn’t clear the novel explains it.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;">Maybe there is no connection between Roy and Zechariah, but
it seems weird that there isn’t.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">All of which is a long way of saying that Roy’s novel is extremely
good, but not because it provides an exegesis on the book of Zechariah.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Though it is rather hard to believe Roy wasn't
referencing Zechariah, so maybe I am missing something….I need to stop
pondering this…really, I need to just stop…)</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Small things (to start afresh).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Is there a moment in your life around which
the whole of your life pivots?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A moment
to which everything you did before inexorably led and everything after necessarily
follows?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A moment that every small thing
in your life was either a cause of or an effect of that single moment?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is the thesis of Roy’s novel, and she
does a marvelous job exploring it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This really
is a book worth reading—indeed, it is one of those books I am surprised I had
not read before now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But thanks to a
former student who was shocked I hadn’t read it and thus bought me a copy to remedy
this failing, I have now read it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(Thanks,
Maniza!) </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The novel unfolds with the before and after circling around
and around that central moment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We only
find that central moment in the last chapter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And there is a very clever bit of plotting in the construction of the
novel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The nature of the central event
is tipped off early, so there isn’t a big shock at the end if you are paying
attention.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, and this is the really impressive
part, the event that I assumed would be the pivot point, the event I assumed would
be the final chapter, was contained in the penultimate chapter.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The real central point, also not a surprise
event, is only surprising because it comes at the very end—it is the moment to which
the whole novel leads and follows.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And
as soon as you see it, as soon as you realize that this event and not the one
you thought it was is the real moment around which the whole novel circles, you
say “of course.” <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is a marvelous feeling—here
you are enjoying one book, watching it all unravel to get to the middle and then
you discover that the middle you that you were uncovering isn’t the middle after
all, that an event that you thought was just a precursor to the middle was in
fact the middle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All of life of all
these characters all hinged on that one moment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>All of the decisions reaching back generations led to that moment and all
the things that happened afterwards happened because of that one exact moment.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">So, great story, well written.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, is it right?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Does your life have such a<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>pivot point?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And disturbingly(?), the pivot point may not actually be an event in which
you participated or even witnessed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Roy’s
argument is that the pivot point may not even happen to you and may not even
happened until after you are dead and yet your whole life was just leading to
that pivot point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">It is the idea of this pivot point in life that is intriguing
me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In Christian theology, all of human history
has a pivot point at the Crucifixion of Christ.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But, what about your life or my life?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The reason this is so hard to decipher is that even if it exists, how would
I know?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What if my pivot point comes at
the age of 57 or 74?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What if it happened
when I was 12?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In either case, would I know?
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Indeed (terrifying thought, this) what
if writing these reflections on Roy’s novel are the unique pivot point of my
whole life—that this moment is unique because it is the sole moment in my life
in which everything I have done up until now led to this exact moment and everything
afterwards happens because of this moment?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Here I have comfortably lived my life assuming that my life
had a trajectory, that one thing followed another in a perfectly predestined
fashion, but the inexorable nature of life never raised the possibility of a
crucial moment in that life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Every
moment is crucial.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is Eliot’s argument
in Burnt Norton, by the way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I guess I
have lived my life assuming this is the case: </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Time present and time past</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Are both perhaps present in time
future,</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">And time future contained in time
past.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">If all time is eternally present</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">All time is unredeemable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">What might have been is an
abstraction</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Remaining a perpetual possibility</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Only in a world of speculation.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">What might have been and what has
been</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Point to one end, which is always
present.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Footfalls echo in the memory</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Down the passage which we did not
take</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Towards the door we never opened</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">Into the rose-garden.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">And in that reading, there is no unique pivot point<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All time is unredeemable.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">So, why does Roy’s hypothesis haunt me is much?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In the universe of Eliot (and me), every
moment is sacred and inviolable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But if
every moment is sacred, then no moment is special.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In Roy’s novel, there is that one moment that
is different.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And what troubles me is
this:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>if there was a moment that was
special, shouldn’t I acknowledge it as such?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Obviously.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But, what if there
were two special moments?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Well, then
both should be thought of a sacred and special. Three moments?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The same.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Four?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Five?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And adding up, what if every moment is
sacred?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What if ever single moment is a
fixed point, eternally present and unredeemable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then should I be in awe at every moment in my
life, holding onto the thing that makes this moment the moment of my life that everything
has led to and everything will come from?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If I agree with Eliot (and I do) that every moment is The Moment, then why
don’t I treat every moment as The Moment?</span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" /></span>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;">The test:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I just discovered
there is a band named “The God of Small Things.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They aren’t really good, but they aren’t really
awful either.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A perfectly innocuous band
(I know, I just listened to their entire repertoire on Spotify while writing this
blog post (it isn’t a big repertoire) and not once did the music cause me to
think This is really good or This is really horrid.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Here is a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PmOBh4dHvlo">music video</a> they have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Should you watch it?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All time is unredeemable.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The whole rest of your life depends on whether
you click that link or not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Choose
wisely.</span></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-3264878490885258872017-06-21T16:36:00.004-04:002017-06-21T16:36:59.105-04:00Eating Pancakes<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Let’s start by getting this out of the way: <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>, by Dostoevsky
(you knew that, right?) is a Great Book (you also knew that).<span> </span>Not only is it Great, it is perhaps the
Greatest Novel Ever Written.<span> </span>I think its
only competitors for that status are <i>Pride
and Prejudice</i> and <i>Middlemarch</i>. <span> </span>This is the fourth (or possibly fifth?) time I
have read this novel, and it is still brilliant from beginning to end,
gripping, thoughtful, and amazingly fun to read.<span> </span>Everything you could possibly want in a
novel.<span> </span>If you have never read it, do
so.<span> </span>You won’t regret it.<span> </span>(Get the Pevear and Volokhonsky translation
(unless you can read Russian, in which case get the original).)</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Odd trivia note: While I was reading this novel, Clara saw
it and told me she watched the movie in her AP English class.<span> </span>Well, just the first part of the movie.<span> </span>I was unsure which surprised me more: a)
there is a movie of this book, or b) her teacher had them watch a movie of the Greatest
Novel Ever Written, but didn’t assign the novel, and then only showed them part
of the movie (sometimes, I despair).<span> </span>But
the movie?<span> </span>Alexei is played by…are you
ready for a shock?...William Shatner!<span>
</span>Captain Kirk as Alexei!<span> </span>My mind
literally freezes up every time I think about that.<span> </span>How is it possible to cast Shatner in this
role?<span> </span>Part of me wants to see the movie
to see how this is possible; part of me is afraid to see the movie because I
know it is not possible.<span> </span>Clara said the movie
was good, but then again, she doesn’t have the greatest taste in cinematic
productions, so I am not sure she is credible.<span>
</span>(Don’t think too lowly of Clara, though—she is amazing and wonderful…but
17 years old...so critical taste failings kinda go with the age.)</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So, what does one write about the Greatest Novel Ever
Written?<span> </span>The problem here is not a paucity
of things to say, but a surfeit of topics.<span>
</span>Pick a page and start your mind wandering—it will go interesting places.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So, let’s take the very end:</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span>
</span>“Well, and now let’s end our speeches and go to his memorial
dinner.<span> </span>Don’t be disturbed that we will
be eating pancakes. It’s an ancient, eternal thing, and there is good in that,
too,” laughed Alyosha. "Well, let’s go! And we go like this now, hand in
hand.”</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span>
</span><span> </span>“And eternally so, all our lives
hand in hand! Hurrah for Karamazov!” Kolya cried once more ecstatically, and
once more all the boys joined in his exclamation.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Eating pancakes.<span> </span>At
the end of a novel exploring the deepest philosophical matters which have
occupied the mind of man, the eternal, ancient questions, they head off to eat
pancakes at a memorial dinner.<span>
</span>Pancakes.<span> </span>Simple, basic pancakes.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I was thinking about those pancakes this morning when I read
an essay by C.S. Lewis: "Christianity and Literature” (reprinted in <i>The Seeing Eye</i>).<span> </span>The essay itself is a bit of a mess—Lewis is
trying to figure out how Christianity and Literature connect, and his answers
are tentative and terribly unsatisfying—but he made the following observation toward
the end which startled me with its relationship to those pancakes I had been
pondering.<span> </span>“The Christian will take
literature a little less seriously than the cultured Pagan: he will feel less
uneasy with a purely hedonistic standard for at least many kinds of works.”<span> </span>Lewis’ reasoning leading to this conclusion
is a bit wobbly. (“The unbeliever is always apt to make a kind of religion of
his aesthetic experience” while the Christian knows his aesthetic experiences
are not as important as the salvation of mankind, so things like literature are
smaller and thus easier to simply enjoy. Like I said, wobbly.)<span> </span>But, set Lewis’ reasoning aside and just
think about the premise: how <i>seriously</i>
should we take literature?</span></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">An aside before getting back to Dostoevsky.<span> </span>I teach courses using Great Books at Mount Holyoke
whenever I can figure out a way to sneak one into the curriculum.<span> </span>To say these courses are not popular with my colleagues
in the Humanities would be an understatement.<span>
</span>Their (my colleagues) principal complaint: here is an economist (insert
tone of disgust) talking about…Literature or History or Philosophy.<span> </span>What could I possibly know about...Literature.<span> </span>Surely I don’t know enough Theory (said in hushed
reverent tones) to be competent in discussing Literature.<span> </span>To which complaints, I invariably laugh and point
out that Shakespeare was Great long before Derrida showed up to tell us how to
take apart Shakespeare and find a nothing but a mirror for the obsession of the
day of the 21<sup>st</sup> century academic.<span>
</span>Surely, we can all just read Shakespeare and, you know, enjoy him.<span> </span>Surely enjoyment is part of the point of
Great Books.<span> </span>My colleagues in the Humanities
find me utterly incomprehensible when I say things like this.<span> </span>Lewis again: “It thus may come about that
Christian views on literature will strike the world as shallow and flippant.”<span> </span>I don’t know about the “Christian” part in
that sentence, but there is no doubt that “shallow and flippant” is exactly how
my colleagues in the Humanities see my views on teaching Great Books.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The serendipitous shock I had on reading Lewis’ essay: this
was exactly why I thought that pancake passage is so fascinating.<span> </span>Fyodor!<span>
</span>You just wrote The Greatest Novel Ever and you end by having your hero
wander off to have pancakes with some kids??<span>
</span>After all the talk of Life and God and Meaning, you end your novel with
pancakes?<span> </span>Which is, of course, exactly how
I read Great Books—they are Great, Amazing, Worth Reading, Deep, Profound, Insightful,
Etc., Etc., Etc.—but after setting them down, I go on with my life.<span> </span>I don’t read Great Books Seriously; I read
them for pleasure, including the pleasure of thinking thoughts I have never
before thought and ruminating on unanswerable questions and learning new
things.<span> </span>And all that Learning is Important,
Very Important. not because it is Serious, but because it is Joyful.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">That is exactly what I try to teach whenever I am teaching a
course or giving a lecture (or, come to think of it, writing a blog post): this
book is Awesome because reading it will bring you Joy.<span> </span>It is a message far too few teachers seem to understand.<span> </span>I cannot think of anything more dreary that taking
a positively amazing novel like <i>The Brothers
Karamazov</i> and dissecting it according to the Dictates of Theory.<span> </span>Give me the genuine human reaction to a book every
time, give me the sense of rapturous joy or utter disgust with the argument,
the parts that make you weep or cry, the shocks and twists, the parts that caused
you to stop and just stare into space for half an hour—tell me about these
things.<span> </span>And as we talk about those things
we will learn something worth learning.<span>
</span>And then we will go eat pancakes and enjoy a pleasant conversation over
a meal.<span> </span>An ancient and eternal practice there.<span> </span>To remember the dead, the past, and simultaneously
take joy in the present.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Hurrah for Karamazov!<span>
</span>If this book has ever been taught and the students did not scream that
at the end, then the teacher should be immediately removed from the classroom
as a positive danger to mankind. <span> </span>Hurrah
for Karamazov! Read <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>
and eat pancakes.<span> </span>That is about as good
a recipe for the Good Life, the Life Worth Living, as I can imagine.<span> </span>Hurrah for Karamazov!</span></span></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-17742237296079483532017-06-20T17:05:00.003-04:002017-06-20T17:05:57.433-04:00To Be Continued<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">What does it mean to be complete?<span> </span>Take a novel, say <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i>.<span> </span>If
you read all 776 pages, you have read the complete book.<span> </span>If you only read Part I, you have not.<span> </span>I don’t think anything in those last two sentences
is controversial.<span> </span>(And, yes, Dear
Reader, I know it was exactly to be able to read such pointless assertions of
obvious facts that compelled you to come to this here place and start reading
(after all, why else are you reading this? (and, don’t pretend you aren’t reading
this (unless you don’t exist, in which case feel free to pretend to exist and not
be reading this)).)<span> </span>But, now (surprise plot
twist alert), imagine that someone took Part I of <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i> and published it as stand-alone book with title:
<i>The Brothers Karamazov: A Nice Little Sensualist
Family in an Inappropriate Gathering: Book 1</i>.<span> </span>Is it now a complete book?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">And before you hasten to answer that, remember (as you
surely do remember) that the narrator of <i>The
Brothers Karamazov</i> says right up front that the novel in question is really
just a prelude to the real story the narrator intends to write (but alas was
never written).<span> </span>So, is <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i> itself a complete
novel or just part 1 of an unfinished novel?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">But, this isn’t really about <i>The Brothers Karamazov.<span> </span></i>(Though
that volume is in the pile of recently read books awaiting review, but, honestly,
it is hard to figure out how to review a novel of that scope, so it may take a while
before it is moved from the pile in which it now sits back to its rightful
place on the bookshelf (<i>Crime and
Punishment</i> is really missing its neighbor, but it serves that book right
(yeah, I don’t know why either, but it just seems like <i>Crime and Punishment</i> can do with a bit more loss and yearning)).)</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The book that actually prompted these reflections is Jason
Lutes’ <i>Berlin: City of Stone: Book One</i>.<span> </span>Here is my problem:<span> </span>how exactly do I think about this book?<span> </span>It looks like a complete book (not exactly a difficult
thing to pull off I just realized—if you want make something to look like a
book, there aren’t a whole lot of steps).<span>
</span>But, the full story was serialized—think Charles Dickens with a higher
picture to word ratio than that in Dickens’ serials (yes, <i>Berlin: City of Stone: Book One</i> is a comic book, or should that be
a collection of comic books?<span> </span>The mind
reels)—and the serialization is still not yet completed.<span> </span>So, this book is the first third of an as of
now uncollected larger story.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Not surprisingly, reading this book leaves one (read; Your
Humble Narrator pretending his feelings are universal) feeling incomplete.<span> </span>Lots of characters are introduced, some
develop a bit, there are some story lines developing, something dramatic
happens at the end to one of the characters, and then…book over.<span> </span>If this was the real end of the book, I would
have one impression of the story I just read.<span>
</span>But, knowing the book didn’t actually end, it just looks like it did because
it was printed as a stand-alone book, has me wondering if I should think of the
stories as they are, or is this really just like reading the first third of a
Dickens novel and then stopping?</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This is a lot like television.<span> </span>In the old days (for the young ‘ins) TV shows
used to happen once a week, and if you missed an episode, it would air again
the following summer.<span> </span>For TV shows with
stand-alone story lines, this worked OK.<span>
</span>But, imagine a TV show with a continuing story line (they did exist)—now
if you missed an episode, you were in trouble.<span>
</span>In the days before VCRs (yeah, way back then), you couldn’t even record the
show to watch later.<span> </span>So, if you got
invited for a night out on the evening when a serialized show was on, you had a
pretty stark choice.<span> </span>As can be imagined,
serialized TV shows were rare.<span> </span>Serialized
shows are now a nickel a gross.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Fundamentally a serialized TV series and a serialized comic
book are akin.<span> </span>In both cases, there is a
time lapse between one installment and the next.<span> </span>And here is my problem—I am not a fan of
unfinished installment series—I rarely watch a show before the complete run is over.
<span> </span>I rarely read a continuing series of
novels until they are all published.<span> </span>I like
completeness.<span> </span>So, when I turn to <i>Berlin: City of Stone: Book One</i>, I want
to think of it as complete, but I know better and I don’t quite know what to
make of it.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">But, there is an added measure of angst here (yeah, I know
that you, Dear Reader, think my angst on this point has already been a little absurd
and over-the-top—this is the sort of thing all three of my children would mock
me for expressing (fortunately, none of them read this blog)).<span> </span>I have now read <i>Berlin: City of Stone: Book One</i>.<span>
</span>Book Two (Same title, different subtitle, different number) is published.<span> </span>That would continue the story a bit further.<span> </span>But, the final installment is not yet written
and so not yet collected.<span> </span>Someday it presumably
will be finished and published.<span> </span>At that
point, will I go back and read the whole series?<span> </span>If they were all published now, I would just
read the whole thing—I like finishing things.<span>
</span>But, how am I supposed to know if the whole thing is worth reading a few
years hence?<span> </span>I have this sense of incompleteness,
but since I cannot complete the series now, is it comforting that I can complete
it later?<span> </span>Should I just move on with a sense
of completeness thinking that I have finished the book or rabidly check The Amazon
<span> </span>awaiting the publication of the final installment
and then read the whole thing straight through?<span>
</span>I don’t know.<span> </span><i>Berlin: City of Stone: Book One</i> wasn't so
good that I know the whole story will be amazing and awesome, but there was enough
promise that it is possible that the whole story will be amazing and awesome, but
there was also enough in the first book that the whole story could just get cliché
and boring.<span> </span>This is the problem: I don’t
know if I should feel like I have completed this book because I read the book
right here in front of me or feel like I have just started a longer book and
not completed it.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">All of which is the reason I have spent this whole time agonizing
about the completeness of the book and no time discussing the plot, characters,
artwork, anything about the book.<span> </span>I would
never write up reflections on the first third of a book.<span> </span>That would just be weird.<span> </span><span> </span></span></span></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-69707655371505442302017-06-19T16:54:00.002-04:002017-06-19T16:54:56.643-04:00A Love Song to Kentucky (and Nepal)<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">On my recent sojourn to Kentucky, I read a book about
Nepal.<span> </span>And therein lies a tale.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Kentucky is the home of the McConnell Center (yes, <i>that</i> McConnell)<span> </span>which runs, among a very many other worthy activities,
conferences for school teachers on important matters like the role of Liberty
in Western Civilization. <span> </span>This year’s
week-long conference was in, <i>mirabile
dictu</i>, Kentucky—this is more anomalous than you, Dear Reader, might expect—it
is the fourth time I have done something with the McConnell Center, but the first
time I have done something with them in Kentucky.<span> </span>I spent the week at Natural Bridge State Park,
which I am happy to report is a wonderful place if you are looking for a scenic
mountain retreat with limited phone service and a Wi-Fi at the park’s lodge
that works so slowly you’ll just decide to skip using it.<span> </span>(Think: Dial-up days (remember that sound the
modem made when it connected?).) </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The school teachers with whom I spent the week were amazing
(no surprise there—they are great).<span> </span>But,
this time I had the additional joy of spending the time with them on their home
turf instead of somewhere in Tourist Land.<span>
</span>I am happy to report that Kentucky Charm is a real thing.<span> </span>I learned a few things too:</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">1. Kentuckians really, really don’t like the fact that y’all
look down on them.<span> </span>They are a Proud
People.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">2. If you aren’t from Kentucky, then no matter how long you
have lived there, you aren’t from Kentucky.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">3. If you set your moonshine on fire and it burns blue, it’s
fine.<span> </span>If it burns green, you are going
to have your knees lock up and maybe die.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I was only told that last item after drinking moonshine, by
the way.<span> </span>(I am happy to report it was
blue.)</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Speaking of moonshine, the Official Signature Drink of the
tavern at Natural Bridge State Park is The Purple Lady, a cocktail with a
moonshine base.<span> </span>Nobody had ever heard of
a moonshine cocktail before.<span> </span>It isn’t real
moonshine, though—some licensed thing in a jar with a label doesn't count as “moonshine”
in the eyes of Kentuckians.<span> </span>I think the
rule is that if it legal to sell it, it isn’t real moonshine.<span> </span>(The aforementioned blue burning liquid was
real moonshine in case you were wondering (which you probably weren’t).)<span> </span>I, and I alone, ordered The Purple Lady.<span> </span>I achieved Instant Legend status not only for
ordering it, but actually drinking it.<span>
</span>It was a kitchen sink cocktail—I cannot imagine who thought that combination
of around 8 ingredients had any hope of being palatable.<span> </span>It sounded disgusting from the description
and it tasted even worse.<span> </span>But I, a loyal
sort, could not abandon my Purple Lady—I aspire to be a gentleman, after all—and
so I consumed the drink made in her honor.<span>
</span></span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The name of the tavern at the park is Trails End.<span> </span>As one of the other participant’s noticed, it
is Trails End, not Trail’s End.<span> </span>A curious
case of nomenclature—not sure what it means.<span>
</span>But, since the Purple Lady is ghost which frequents the park and the
tavern announces not that a trail ends there, but that trails end, I realized a
startling possibility too late to do anything about it—does drinking the signature
drink named after a ghost in a Tavern named Trails End mean that one will
shortly be joining said ghost?<span> </span>To the
best of my knowledge, I am still among the living (if I am not, this is a
rather curious afterlife).</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">These ruminations on Kentucky bring us to the book abut Nepal
promised at the outset.<span> </span>The book was <i>Palpasa Café</i>, by Narayan Wagle.<span> </span>Unless you are from Nepal, you probably have
never heard of it. <span> </span>I received it as a
gift from a student (who was, presumably obviously, from Nepal).<span> </span>The heart of the book had the protagonist wandering
around rural Nepal during the height of the Maoist insurgency.<span> </span>That part of the book was quite interesting in
creating a sense of place.<span> </span>One could
feel the heartbreak of rural villagers caught in the middle of a battle between
the army and the rebels, neither of which seemed to care all that much about
the villagers in the middle.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">(The book itself is a critical failure—the first part has much
cringe-inducing dialogue between the protagonist and a woman he meets—I mean,
in the scale of cringe-inducing dialogue, this was about as bad as it gets, it
just kept going and going—and the plot itself was contrived and hinged on an endless
series of impossible coincidences.<span>
</span>Indeed, even the whole “Let’s start wandering around rural Nepal” made
absolutely no sense.<span> </span>But, the plot was
clearly a mere add-on to justify a dissertation on how the war in Nepal was
affecting the people of Nepal.<span> </span>And that
part was not only good, but made me glad I read the book.)</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This was a book rooted in place.<span> </span>It felt like something that could only have
been written in Nepal.<span> </span>The author, the narrator,
the protagonist, the love interest, and the villagers all belong not just i<i>n</i> Nepal, but <i>to</i> Nepal.<span> </span>And right there is
the connection to Kentucky.<span> </span>At previous
McConnell Center events, I have met Kentucky school teachers.<span> </span>But meeting them in Kentucky was different…they
just <i>belonged</i> there.<span> </span>They belong not just <i>in</i> Kentucky, but <i>to</i>
Kentucky.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">An example: Kentuckians are obsessed with counties.<span> </span>Obsessed.<span>
</span>The first thing they ask each other is what county they are from.<span> </span>This has an amusing (well, amusing to me—nobody
there understood my amusement) feature.<span>
</span>If you ask Kentuckians where they live in the state, they tell you the
name of the county.<span> </span>If you ask where
that county is, they invariably tell you the name of a neighboring county.<span> </span>When you still look blank, they just keep
naming nearby counties.<span> </span>When you finally
say, “Is that in the west or east or north or south of Kentucky?” they get this
really weird look before giving some sort a vague answer.<span> </span>That way of establishing location apparently makes
no sense to Kentuckians.<span> </span>There are, by
the way, 120 counties in Kentucky.<span> </span>So,
not even Kentuckians know all the counties in Kentucky.<span> </span>But when they talk to each other, they go
through the same list of surrounding counties to establish location.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Kentuckians are also obsessed with the fact that the rest of
the country looks down on them.<span> </span>Now to a
Californian like me, Kentuckians are just part of that broad mass of Easterners
(you know, everyone east of Salt Lake City), so I started asking if they thought
of themselves like people from other states.<span>
</span>They looked at me in horror when I asked if there was a difference between
Kentucky and Alabama.<span> </span>Or Mississippi.<span> </span>They assured me they were nothing like <i>those</i> states.<span> </span>Nothing like Louisiana either (Cajun
country).<span> </span>Tennessee? <span> </span>Too many cities.<span> </span>The coastal states—might as well be
Northerners. <span> </span>West Virginia—well, that
one didn’t generate instant horror at the comparison, but it was pretty obvious
they don’t ever actually think about West Virginia.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">On evening toward the end of the week, while we were sitting
around drinking (bourbon and beer that night—not moonshine), I was listening to
the Kentuckians complaining once again that the rest of the country thinks so
lowly of them.<span> </span>I asked why they cared so
much about what others thought.<span> </span>It is obvious
that Kentucky is a beautiful state and Kentuckians are amazing people.<span> </span>So, when others put them down, why don’t they
just say “whatever”?<span> </span>Then it hit me,
that was a very “Californian” thing to ask.<span>
</span>When I realized this, I got that condescending “You clearly aren’t a Kentuckian”
look and we all just moved on from my faux pas.<span>
</span>Kentuckians are, as noted above, a Very Proud People.<span> </span>Honor means much to a Proud People.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So, all this has me wondering.<span> </span>I am a Californian.<span> </span>Do I belong <i>to </i>California in the same way that Wagle’s Nepalis belong <i>to</i> Nepal and the Kentucky school
teachers belong <i>to</i> Kentucky.<span> </span>Somehow, I don't think so.<span> </span>California just seems so…transitory…in comparison.<span> </span>Io wondered what it would mean to <i>be</i> Nepali or Kentuckian and realized I will
never know.<span> </span>I also realized while
writing this, that no matter what I say, I could never write a true love song
to Kentucky that Kentuckians would recognize as a love song to Kentucky.<span> </span>So, I hope they know how much I admire and
respect them.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So, I just <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z2uPKDXS8BA">listen to this</a>—an artist I heard about last week—and
think, “not my type of music, but now I know people to whom this speaks to their
souls.”</span></span></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-49590270975250959602015-07-07T11:47:00.001-04:002015-07-07T13:14:35.495-04:00The Ishiguro Test<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Quiz time. It’s
multiple choice, so don’t get too worried—unless you are one of those people
who habitually panics about multiple choice tests, in which case, since you
have a preternatural obsession and are going to worry no matter what I suggest,
go ahead and worry.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">What is the title of the novel whose plot is summarized in the
following paragraph?</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The narrator in Kazuo Ishiguro’s novel is an emotionally reserved
adult reflecting on the past. The reflections
have a high literary flair, which is presumably because Ishiguro can write so
well, but which is not quite in keeping with how we would expect the narrator to
write. The emotionally reserved part is
fine, but one wonders how the narrator learned to write so incredibly
well.. That is a minor problem however—indeed,
the book has such high literary merit it is easy to overlook. The novel starts at a moment when the narrator
has cause to reflect on the past and then immediately starts jumping back into
autobiographical mode, with enough breaks in the autobiography to remind you of
when the narrator is writing. As the
story unfolds, there are a number of small surprises and one Big Surprise. But, in every case, there was such extensive
foreshadowing that the surprises never actually surprise. By the time the Reveals happen, the
overriding response is, “Well of course that is what was going on.” This is clever writing, by the way—it would
not be easy to write a book in which the surprises just gradually emerge in a
manner that the reader is never surprised by the surprise. Despite the fact that the narrator continues
to live past the point in which the novel ends, there is a sense of completeness
here. The arc of the narrator’s Life has
ended despite the fact that the narrator will continue to live for a time,
probably relatively short, past the end of the novel. All in all, the novel is extremely good, in
part because Ishiguro writes so incredibly well, but also because the story has
some intrinsic interest, taking on a matter of contemporary relevance.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Here is the quiz. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The novel described above is:</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">a) <i>Remains of the Day</i></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">b) <i>Never Let Me Go</i></span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I’ll pause while you decide.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Time’s up. It was a
trick question. The summary above fits both
novels. This leads to a strange
phenomenon—on the surface, these two novels are completely different. In one, we have an English butler as a narrator. In the other we have a 31 year old woman who
used to live in a boarding school. Yet,
underneath the structure, underneath the Big Surprise (which will be discussed
shortly—it is impossible to discuss these books and keep the surprise hidden—so
if you are averse to knowing what happens in these books, you’ll want to stop
reading now—then again, neither surprise is really all that surprising by the
time you get to it), underneath the storylines, the novels have the same structure
written in the same way by a person with exactly the same sense of emotional
reserve.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I read <i>The Remains of
the Day</i> a year or so ago. I thought
it was amazing. Vastly better than <i>Never Let Me Go</i>. What I have no way of knowing is whether if I
had read these novels in the other order, I would have liked <i>Never Let Me Go </i> more.
(For example, decades ago when I read Ludlum a lot, I liked <i>The <span style="font-family: inherit;">Aqu<span style="font-family: inherit;">itaine Pro<span style="font-family: inherit;">gression</span></span></span></i> the best—it was the first
one I read, and I suspect I liked it the best because once you have read one
Ludlum novel, you have read them all.) That
being said, I suspect the tale of the English butler is a superior novel. There is vastly more subtlety to the whole
thing. It is an extended reflection on the
idea of decorum and loyalty in an world in which such things are breaking
down. Is it wrong to maintain standards
when one discovers the English Lord whom you serve is a Nazi?</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>Never Let Me Go</i>
got high praise all around. It certainly
deserves praise, but I did not think it was anywhere near as gripping as <i>The Remains of the Day</i>. The problem: once you realize that the narrator
is a clone, being raised for the sole purpose of being a medical donor to those
in need of donations (the science of the donations is never made clear), then
the rest of the novel just feels like it is running out the course. <i>The Remains
of the Day</i> stayed intriguing until the end.
But, I found myself, just waiting for <i>Never Let Me Go</i> to get around to announcing what was already known and
then wrapping up. Perhaps my problem was
that I found the narrator personally more interesting in one novel than in the other. </span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">But, I have this nagging idea that Ishiguro was also simply going
through the motions in crafting this novel.
He had an idea—let’s discuss cloning in a way which will get people thinking
about it, really thinking about it (more about this anon). Then, needing a way to tell that story, he
thought he might as well rehash the structure of his greatest novel. If so, then he was partly successful, but <i>Never Let Me Go</i> needed a bit more work
to bring it to full success.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The cloning idea does merit thought. Imagine science does develop the ability to clone
humans. Do the clones have a soul? Are they people with Natural Rights? Or, since they have been created, are they
best considered no different than the biological agents used to make vaccines? It would seem rather important to settle this
matter before we start cloning humans, but of course, we won’t. Someday we will be faced with exactly the
sort of question which lies at the heart of Ishiguro’s novel. I expect this is the reason for much of the praise
of this novel—people who have never thought about this issue would find themselves
suddenly pondering a deep moral question in a novel they picked up having no
idea that is what it contained.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">On the surface, Ishiguro’s novel is an argument for the humanity
of the clones. Yet…I have another
nagging succession. Is the novel more
nuanced than the first reading would suggest?
The clones…well, as I think about
them, they aren’t entirely convincing as people. Maybe this is just the emotional reserve of
the narrator, but maybe the emotional reserve is a clue to that something on which
I cannot place my finger that makes me suspect that on a rereading, maybe the
clones won’t seem so human after all. Therein
lies the real question about the Greatness of Ishiguro’s book. If the matter of whether the clones are fully
human, complete with souls, is ambiguous in this novel, then it might just be a
Great Book. If the novel does not support
debate on this question, however, it will be a period piece, worth your time if
you enjoy nicely crafted sentences. Then
again, if you just want that, I’d suggest reading <i>the Remains of the Day</i> instead—that one has serious Great Book
potential.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The song is obvious Judy Bridgewater’s <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4UX6tzE7P44"><i>Never Let Me Go</i></a>: it is the song from which the book gets its title. But, here is the funny part. Judy Bridgewater doesn’t exist. The album from which the song comes in the
novel doesn’t exist. Ishiguro made up the
song when writing the novel. But, I just
included a link to a YouTube video with a version of a song which does not
exist being sung by a person who does not exist. Gotta love the modern age.</span></span></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-2508312846454701322015-07-06T16:41:00.001-04:002015-07-06T16:41:10.419-04:00Cat's Cradle<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">A history of human stupidity.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I am not about to write such a thing, but the idea is
amusing.<span> </span>Sadly, the book would be too
long to read in a lifetime—and that is assuming you were just reading the abridged
version.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">But, we have the next best thing: Vonnegut, <i>Cat’s Cradle</i>.<span> </span>It’s nominally fiction, but fiction of the
sort that says something truer than non-fiction. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">This is Vonnegut’s fourth novel.<span> </span>As I have noted in this space before, thanks
to the Library of America publishing all of Vonnegut, I embarked on reading him
in order and it all makes so much more sense now.<span> </span>I had read this novel before, and when I finished
it, I had no idea what I just read and thus I promptly forgot the whole
thing.<span> </span>But now, after reading <i>Sirens of Titan</i> and <i>Mother Night</i>, the novel was perfectly sensible.<span> </span>What is curious about this fact:<span> </span><i>Cat’s
Cradle</i> is in no way a sequel to the previous two books other than being the
intellectual sequel—Vonnegut could only have written this book after writing
the previous two.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Insofar as there is a thesis in this book it is this:<span> </span>History is just one stupid human act after
another and in the end we all die and it was perfectly meaningless.<span> </span>Yet,<span>
</span>this is no cause for despair.<span> </span>Because,
when you look at it, when you really look closely at it, when you press your eyeball
right up against history and stare as intensely as you can at it, then you see
that all this human stupidity is really quite funny.<span> </span>You just have to stop taking everything so seriously.<span> </span>You have to stop striving for some Big Think overarching
narrative story that makes sense of the whole thing in terms of Grand Causes or
Grand Cosmic Ends.<span> </span>Just chop up reality into
really tiny parts (this book is 183 pages long and has 127 chapters—you do the
math) and look at each part on its own and realize that each part, which follows
from what went before and leads to what comes after, each part individually is
just another senseless act of stupidity in a long string of actions of senseless
stupidity all leading to yet more acts of senseless stupidity.<span> </span>In the end, we all die.<span> </span>But, don’t get all worked up about that
either—even our death is just one more small little bit of human stupidity following
inexorably from what came before.<span> </span>So
laugh.<span> </span>Really, just laugh.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">This is a brilliant book.<span>
</span>Wrong, of course—there is a Grand Overarching Cosmic Narrative—but wrong
in a useful way.<span> </span>For example—take this
moment.<span> </span>(Whether that means the moment
the following is being written or the moment the following is being read is
irrelevant, but it will be more amusing to consider the latter).<span> </span>I want to, and truth be told, you Dear Reader
also want to, imagine that this moment is larger than it is, that there is some
Great Purpose to this moment, that this moment cannot be stripped out of
eternity and held up like a 1.44 page chapter as an entity unto itself and
laughed at. <span> </span>I (and you) want to believe that
there is some larger meaning to all this, that I am not simply adding to the chronicle
of human stupidity by writing this and that you are not adding an even greater stupidity
by actually reading this.<span> </span>(Who’s the
more foolish: the fool or the fool who follows him? (If you don’t know the
soruce of that, I weep for you.)) <span> </span>We,
you and I, Dear Reader, want to weave this moment into something <i>meaningful</i>.<span> </span>Yet, is it?<span>
</span>Can I honestly say that by writing these rambling semi-coherent
reflections I am adding to human <i>wisdom</i>?<span> </span>I am rehashing a book which I said up front
was a book I read before and promptly forgot because it seemed so purposeless
and now I am calling it brilliant because I found some purpose in a purposeless
book and you are reading my second-hand reflections on the book hoping to
discover…what?<span> </span>What, Dear Reader, did
you really hope to attain in the few moments you read this blog post?<span> </span>Did you honestly expect to become more wise,
to lessen the amount of human stupidity in history by charging forth after
reading this to revolutionize the world?<span>
</span>Did you really believe that by reading this blog post you would make the
world would a better place?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I just opened <i>Cat’s
Cradle</i> at random.<span> </span>Chapter 98.<span> </span>We read in that chapter: </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">“I agree with one Bokonist
idea.<span> </span>I agree that all religions,
including Bokononism, are nothing but lies.”</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Is that Bokonist Idea the truth or a lie?<span> </span>That of course is the Joke.<span> </span>As the Cretan said, “All Cretans are liars.”<span> </span>The apostle Paul (or should that be Saint Paul?)
said that.<span> </span>Now Paul was writing to Titus
when he said that and Titus was ministering to the people of Crete and Paul
used that joke to remind Titus about the sort of people he was serving.<span> </span>Paul wasn't kidding—as he said, “that statement
is true.”<span> </span>Paul has a sense of humor
too.<span> </span>So, opening up <i>Cat’s Cradle</i> at random, truly at random, I suddenly found Vonnegut
and Paul sharing a joke and then I wrote about it, and you Dear Reader, read
about it, and what did we all, you, me, Vonnegut, and Paul, just accomplish?<span> </span>This paragraph is 2000 years in the making,
and we just advanced humanity…how?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">So, while I believe in the Grand Cosmic Narrative, while I believe
there is a teleological point to human existence, it is hard to escape the
Vonnegutian Perspective.<span> </span>Moment by moment,
history sure does seem like just one stupid thing after another.<span> </span>Momet by moment, those acts of stupidity are
pretty funny.<span> </span>I am very amused that you
are actually still reading this, Dear Reader.<span>
</span>At what point did you miss the cue that there is nothing here worth
reading?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Page 47.<span> </span>I just
picked that page number at random.<span> </span>(Was
it truly random?<span> </span>Why 47?<span> </span>I have no idea.)<span> </span>I am about to turn to page 47 and will
transcribe a sentence from that page.<span> </span>I
note this to give you fair warning.<span> </span>Do
you really believe there is any possibility that something on page 47 of this
book will generate an observation which is worth your time, Dear Reader?<span> </span>Think of this as the Rorschach test
moment.<span> </span>If your answer to that was “Yes,”
then what, Dear Reader, gives you any hope that a sentence on a random page from
a random book on a random blog written by Your Humble Narrator will have meaning?
<span> </span>And, if your answer was “No,” then why
are you still reading (that isn’t a rhetorical question)?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">From page 47: OK.<span> </span>I’ll
admit it, this is really quite eerie.<span>
</span>The first thing on page 47 is the end of chapter 32:</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">But all I could say as a Christian
then was, “Life is sure funny sometimes.”</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-left: 0.5in;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">“And sometimes it isn’t,” said
Marvin Breed.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Here is the part I find seriously troubling.<span> </span>I really did just pick the number 47 at random,
wrote the preceding paragraph and then turned to page 47 and there it was.<span> </span>I did not rewrite the preceding paragraph in
any way after turning to page 47.<span> </span>I, of
course, have absolutely no way to convince you, Dear Reader, that this was, in
fact what happened.<span> </span>Indeed, I suspect you
think this whole thing is rigged.<span> </span>Honestly,
if I was reading this blog post I would think this whole thing was some lame
attempt to make a point. <span> </span>I can’t think
of anything the author could write that would convince me otherwise.<span> </span>But, as the writer of this blog post, I know something
you, the Reader, don’t know.<span> </span>It really
did just happen <span> </span>It wasn't made up.<span> </span>I am troubled.<span> </span>This is just too strange for my tastes.<span> </span>I mean I get that God has a sense of humor
too, but to orchestrate things so that I would turn to that page at the end of
this blog post and find those two sentences right at the top of the page…well,
that is just a bit too much Grand Cosmic Narrative for my tastes.<span> </span>I am seriously troubled.<span> </span>(Really, no joke here.)</span></span></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-14650377116782087312015-06-26T17:24:00.002-04:002015-06-26T17:24:43.555-04:00Get Your Motor Runnin'<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Some books defy summary.<span>
</span>So, I won’t even try.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Robert Pirsig, <i>Zen and
the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance</i></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">The structure of this book is either a) the message itself
or b) a way of masking the lack of a message.<span>
</span>Pirsig has a Philosophy—a big think, redo everything about the world,
Philosophy.<span> </span>He sketches it out in this
book.<span> </span>If this book was just that
Philosophy, you’d think it was the wild ramblings of that crazy grad student
whom you hate to see at a cocktail party because you know he will just start going
off on his theory and he will never shut up and in the end his theory makes no
sense but he is so convinced it not only makes sense but it will revolutionize
the world if only you could understand this big idea he has which isn’t really
definable because, you see, rationality is a trap and he sees how we can get
around that trap by going beyond or above or around (it’s never really clear)
rationality to see the true thing which is One and which generates everything
from Rationality itself to Humanity to how to repair a motorcycle and let me
just show you how some obscure details in motorcycle repair are really examples
of this Oneness of all our ideas…and by this point you are frantically looking
around the room hoping someone will come over and interrupt this guy and save
you from this conversation, but everyone else in the room is avoiding eye
contact with you because they see the guy talking to you and nobody else wants
to get trapped in this conversation.<span> </span>If
the book had been just this, nobody would have read it.<span> </span>It would have been the manuscript of a guy
you knew was going to end up in an insane asylum.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Robert Pirsig ended up in an insane asylum.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">He came out.<span> </span>Schizophrenic.<span> </span>So, the other, normal Pirsig wrote a book
about his motorcycle trip across America.<span>
</span>He had his son with him.<span> </span>The
drove and stopped and drove again and stopped again and drove again.<span> </span>Nothing of any interest whatsoever happened
on this trip.<span> </span>If that had been the book,
nobody would have read it.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">But, somehow combine those two things: guy takes trip on motorcycle
and starts describing the theories of that old, pre-insane asylum guy and
suddenly you have a 1970s bestseller.<span>
</span>The structure is clever in a way.<span>
</span>Pirsig can talk about his theories, but if you think there are giant
holes all over the place, that is just because he is, you know, sketching out
his fragmentary memories of what his other self thought before his other self
went insane.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Oh, but Pirsig is a clever one—after he has lulled you into
all this, it turns out that his other self wasn't insane at all, it is his new
conventional self that is insane for thinking that life should be boring and
conventional and so Pirsig rides off into sunset in the last chapter laughing
maniacally now that his old self, which was <i>not</i>
insane, triumphs in his schizophrenic battle.<span>
</span>And we feel free and liberated and forget that that the philosophical
theory had all those strange holes because, you know, it’s a happy ending and I
feel so good about myself right now.<span> </span>Or
something like that.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Now you don’t want to read the book.<span> </span>But, you know what? Despite the fact that
this book is utterly absurd and pretentious and annoying in a million ways, I
enjoyed reading it.<span> </span>Why?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">“The trouble is that essays always have to sound like God
talking for eternity, and that isn’t the way it ever is.<span> </span>People should see that it’s never anything
other than just one person talking from one place in time and space and circumstance.<span> </span>It’s never been anything else, ever, but you
can’t get that across in an essay.”</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Therein lies the clever part of this book: this is just Pirsig
ruminating about his life and philosophy while riding on his motorcycle.<span> </span>You don’t have to treat all that Philosophy
stuff in the book as some sort of mandate from God; it’s just a guy on his motorcycle
remembering his life and what he used to think about and the circumstances in
which he thought about it.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">That’s the part that made the book an enjoyable read.<span> </span>It was less what Pirsig was saying and more
triggering all sorts of thoughts about things from my own life and what I think
and why I think what I think.<span> </span>Pirsig’s
book was, in other words, like a really long blog entry in which the events of
his life trigger thoughts about other events in his life which trigger thoughts
about what he thinks about Life, the Universe, and Everything.<span> </span>Pirsig uses motorcycle maintenance as a Launchpad.<span> </span>I use books.<span>
</span>Pirsig thinks like a westernized Zen Buddhist, 1970s style.<span> </span>I think like an American Evangelical Protestant.<span> </span>So, I could rename this blog: “Evangelicalism
and the Art of Reading” and it would be pretty much the same thing.<span> </span>Except I never went insane and ended up in an
insane asylum getting electric shock treatment.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Where does this this all lead?<span> </span>Pirsig taught English composition classes in college
for a while and one of the things he tried to do was get his students thinking
about deep, big things like “What is Quality?”<span>
</span>Pirsig would have been an annoying teacher.<span> </span>Which is exactly what I am at times.<span> </span>Annoying.<span>
</span>You don’t have to take my word for it, though.<span> </span>(Note to my current and former students who
are about to write me and tell me I am not as bad a teacher as I am pretending
to be here—yeah, I know.<span> </span>Bear with me a
minute.)<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">In my economics classes, I assign supplemental books.<span> </span>I assign them to try to convince students
that the world is bigger and more interesting than a textbook and a lecture,
that there is this whole world of knowledge and a joy of learning things out
there.<span> </span>I tell them to just read the book
and enjoy it and that I will throw a few questions on the test about the book
and if they read the book they will know the answers to the questions, but
really, just read and enjoy the books.<span>
</span>Some students do this and they love it.<span>
</span>Other students just skip the reading.<span>
</span>Then there are that few who get really angry about it.<span> </span>Last semester, one of those angry students
wrote on the course evaluation:<span> </span>“Why do
I need to read only for knowledge?”<span> </span>That
comment has both deeply amused me and deeply intrigued me since I read it.<span> </span>At one level it is funny.<span> </span>You come to college and get upset that you might
need to, you know, read a book in order to get something called knowledge?<span> </span>But, then again, on the other hand, I
understand the complaint: students have been conditioned to think that college
isn’t about knowledge; it is about getting good grades to get a good job.<span> </span>So, if the purpose of a professor is to hand
out the material which will be on the test used to determine the grade and thus
the job prospects, then why should a student be expected to read for something
as irrelevant as knowledge?<span> </span>Why, after
all, do I, the Professor, impose my view that gaining knowledge, and more importantly
gaining the desire to acquire knowledge, is a more important goal than grade
maximization?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Similarly in my Great Books classes, I spend a lot of time
letting conversations wander all over and constantly arguing against whatever
was just said.<span> </span>Some students find
themselves caught up into whole new thought patterns by this exercise and love
every minute of it.<span> </span>Some students hate
it.<span> </span>Last semester, again on the course evaluation,
one student wrote: “I do not like the way he conveys his ideas that makes him
sound like a stubborn 3 year old.”<span>
</span>Again, I was both amused and intrigued.<span>
</span>I know exactly what she means.<span> </span>I
spend a lot of time in a Great Books classes asking “why?” over and over and
over and over.<span> </span>Why is the outrageous
thing I said wrong?<span> </span>Why is what you just
said right?<span> </span>So, if the student who wrote
that evaluation were to have said that in class, I would have instantly asked
“Why is that bad?”<span> </span>And no matter what
she said, I would have then asked “Why is what you just said right?”<span> </span>And she would have said I was acting like a
stubborn 3 year old.<span> </span>Socrates also acted
like a stubborn 3 year old.<span> </span>He was really
annoying when you get right down to it.<span> </span>They
killed him for it.<span> </span>Fortunately, I just
get a course evaluation saying she didn’t like the class.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">So, why do I think all this pondering about Big Questions is
so interesting?<span> </span>Why do I want to share
my belief that thinking about Big Questions is endlessly fascinating?<span> </span>How best to convey that belief?<span> </span>Well, how about using mundane details from my
life—like a couple of comments on teaching evaluations—as a means for thinking
about the purpose of education?<span>
</span>Interestingly, if I knew a class full of students would all complain
about being expected to read for knowledge, I would just assign more books to
be read for knowledge.<span> </span>If I knew a class
would complain that I argued like a stubborn 3 year old, I would increase the
frequency of times I asked “Why?”<span>
</span>Apparently I am a contrarian.<span> </span>Is
that part of my nature or part of my philosophy of learning?<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">A shocking addendum: In an afterward written 10 years later,
Pirsig notes that the manuscript for his book was rejected 121 times before
someone finally agreed to publish it.<span> </span>That fascinates me.<span> </span>What kind of person
sends a manuscript to a publisher after 121 previous publishers have rejected
it?<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span>By the way, if you don;t want to read 531 pages of Pirsig, you can just watch the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=142&v=rMbATaj7Il8">movie</a>. </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-80589241247289122862015-06-24T15:36:00.002-04:002015-06-24T15:36:42.664-04:00Whaddya Want?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">In the (rather lengthy) reading packet for my recent sojourn
into the Realms of Intellectual Inquiry with Kentucky School Teachers were excerpts
from John Kenneth Galbraith’s (he of three names—so as not be confused with
John Galbraith, you know, the one without the Kenneth) book, <i>The Affluent Society</i>.<span> </span>Here is the funny thing about Galbraith.<span> </span>To non-economists of a certain age (read:
old), Galbraith was one of the leading lights of economics, the guy who
popularized Keynes, the guy who understood economics and could explain it to the
masses.<span> </span>But, within the economic guild,
Galbraith barely exists—sure his name floats around in the waters here and there,
but I never met an economist who actually took him <i>seriously</i>.<span> </span>Occasionally, I would
see a reference to Galbraith's claim that the function of advertising was to
manufacture desires; said reference was usually provided as a launching point to
show that advertising does nothing of the kind.<span>
</span>So, Galbraith was the non-economist’s economist and the economist’s non-economist.<span> </span>I was never tempted to read him.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">But, I was suddenly faced with a remarkable coincidence: 1)
as mentioned above (in case the Reader has forgotten) there was Galbraith in
that there reading packet (did I mention the reading packet was lengthy?) and
2) the Library of America (Arbiter of Taste) just published a volume of Galbraith.<span> </span>Clearly the Universe was whispering in my
ear, “Time to Read Galbraith.”<span> </span>Who am I
to argue with the Whisperings of the Universe?</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">In one way, Galbraith was exactly what I assumed he was—a rather
sloppy and lousy economist.<span> </span>My goodness,
there it is, that Saskatchewan of economics: an actual sighting of someone arguing
post-Friedman that inflation is caused by wage demands, not that silly money stuff
about which you may have heard. <span> </span>But, it
turns out that Galbraith’s rather dated economics is a minor part of the argument
as a whole; indeed, strip out the sloppy macroeconomic model, and <i>The Affluent Society</i> would be a vastly
better book.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">One way to read <i>The Affluent
Society</i> is that it is merely <i>Walden,
Part 2</i>.<span> </span>By the mid-20<sup>th</sup>
century, it was obvious: America was a very affluent society.<span> </span>Indeed, the level of wealth in mid-20<sup>th</sup>
century America was staggeringly high by historical standards.<span> </span>And, we are even more affluent now than we
were when Galbraith was writing.<span> </span>As we
have gained all this new wealth, we have all this new stuff.<span> </span>Getting wealth and stuff makes us happier,
right?<span> </span>So, surely we must all be in some
sort of perpetual ecstasy these days.<span>
</span>But, we aren’t.<span> </span>Why? <span> </span>“Among the many models of the good society, no
one has urged the squirrel wheel.”<span> </span>Yes,
we want more wealth and better stuff, but there is always even newer and even
better stuff on the horizon, so we are left with a perpetual feeling that we aren’t
quite at the Stuff Frontier.<span> </span>This breeds
dissatisfaction.<span> </span>Sure, I have an iPhone
6, but that iWatch sure seems even more Awesome.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">At this point in the argument, Galbraith starts running into
problems.<span> </span>He doesn’t like the fact that
we always want more.<span> </span>He thinks we should
be content with the basic necessities of life.<span>
</span>But along comes The Corporation (insert shudder) which through Advertising
(insert screams of terror) manufactures in us false desires for the things which
they are producing.<span> </span>Left to ourselves,
we would have a different set of desires.<span>
</span>And, what, pray tell<span> </span>would that
look like? <span> </span>How exactly are our desires
being corrupted?<span> </span>“Houses; automobiles;
the uncomplicated forms of alcohol, food and sexual enjoyment; sports; and movies
require little prior preparation of the subject for the highest enjoyment.<span> </span>A mass appeal is thus successful, and hence
it is on these things that we find concentrated the main weight of modern want
creation.”<span> </span>Hmmm.<span> </span>Something seems amiss in that there list of manufactured
enjoyments.<span> </span>Ah, yes, he clears it up in the
next sentence: “By contrast, more esoteric desires—music and fine arts,
literary and scientific interests, and to some extent even travel—can normally be
synthesized, if at all, only on the basis of a good deal of prior education.”<span> </span>If only we were all as enlightened as John Kenneth
Galbraith to like the proper things, the things requiring a fine (preferably
Ivy League) education, you know things like fine art and <i>sophisticated </i>forms of alcohol<i>
</i><span> </span>and <i>sophisticated</i> food, and, yes, even <i>sophisticated</i> sexual enjoyment (oh, JKG, how it would have been
nice for you to have explained <i>that</i>
one), if only we all had these educated tastes, then those corporations
(shudder) and their advertising (terror) would not be so effective.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">And, suddenly, the game is up.<span> </span>Clearly that Advertising doesn’t seem to be working
on dear old J Kenneth Galbraith.<span> </span>He sees
right through it and enjoys his sophisticated pleasures.<span> </span>That is because his desires are <i>natural</i> and not <i>manufactured</i>.<span> </span>He likes cognac
and Mozart because it is natural to like Cognac and Mozart—all you need is a
fine education; you, unenlightened Reader, like Beer and Football because corporations
convinced you to like them.<span> </span>And I, Your
Humble Narrator, like cognac, beer, Mozart and football because…hmmm.<span> </span>I am stuck there.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">One way of look at it: <i>all</i>
our desires are manufactured.<span> </span>Nobody is
born liking Mozart or Drake.<span> </span>Some people
develop good taste and like the former; some don’t and like the latter.<span> </span>Why?<span>
</span>Taste formation is a complicated thing.<span>
</span>But, it is not clear that our desires are any more manufactured in an
age of television advertising than they were in the Dark Ages.<span> </span>People liked decorative clothing long before corporations
came along to tell them they should like them.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Another way to look at it: we have necessities: food and
shelter.<span> </span>But, once you have shelter from
the rain, it is wrong to want insulation to keep you warm in winter?<span> </span>Is it wrong to want air conditioning to keep
you cool in the summer?<span> </span>Is it wrong to
want a man cave so you can put in a large screen TV and an epic audio system so
you can watch football in a state of total immersion?<span> </span>Nobody wanted those things before they were invented.<span> </span>But, it sure is nice now that they are
invented, even though I only have two of the three.<span> </span>Is it bad that in idle moments I think I would
be really nice to have the third?</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Galbraith would surely say it is wrong, but that is because his
preference set is quite different than mine.<span>
</span>You see, dear old JK Galbraith has a sophisticated set of preferences
based on <i>objective</i> reality.<span> </span>I am not exaggerating.<span> </span>JKG knows that because of all those false
wants, we spend too much on private goods (you know, things you buy for
yourself) and not enough on public goods (you know, things the government buys
for you).<span> </span>You aren’t allowed to disagree
with JKG on that point, by the way: “This disparity between our flow of private
and public goods and services is no matter of subjective judgement.”<span> </span>If you think we aren’t underfunding public
goods, you are a flat-earther.<span> </span>It is <i>objectively</i> true.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Now that line of argument would be intriguing if John Kenneth
Galbraith could actually stick to his argument.<span>
</span>But, he can’t.<span> </span>You see: only <i>some</i> public goods are underfunded.<span> </span>Military expenditures are overfunded.<span> </span>Uh…<span>
</span>So, public goods that Galbraith wants more of are underfunded and public
goods Galbraith wants less of are overfunded.<span>
</span>And Galbraith knows this because…well, because, he, unlike the rest of
us who disagree with objective truth, sees through the attempt to manufacture
false desires.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">What genuinely puzzles me about Galbraith is how he is so certain
that his own desires haven’t been manufactured.<span>
</span>How does he know he isn’t the deluded one and the people he thinks are
deluded aren’t seeing clearly?<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">In the end, <i>The
Affluent Society</i> is a flawed book.<span>
</span>But flawed in a way that makes it eminently worth reading.<span> </span>It makes you think.<span> </span>That is high praise.<span> </span>Higher praise: I was faced with the choice on
where to keep Galbraith’s book.<span> </span>Does it belong
in the economics section or the non-economics, nonfiction section of my
library?<span> </span>He now lives in the latter—this
is very high praise.<span> </span>Before reading him,
I assumed he would be filed under economics and relegated to being a bad economics
book.<span> </span>But, the parts that are good in
this book, the non-economics parts, are so worthy of respect, that he got filed
outside of economics.<span> </span>I am not sure he would
see that as praise, but it is.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">And, for those of you who don’t want to read the whole book,
here is a <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEjkftp7J7I">musical version </a>of the main argument.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><span> </span><span> </span></span></span></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-27626236461654796722015-06-22T15:29:00.000-04:002015-06-22T15:29:10.736-04:00Serving Tea to Friends<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Part 1 of the experiment has ended.<span> </span>Waves of relief.<span> </span>Part 2 is much shorter.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Oh, Henry James.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Clearly, I am stalling.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">To begin with a misdirection:<span> </span>I just returned from spending a pleasant week
in Atlanta with 14 amazing Kentucky school teachers in a conference organized
by the McConnell Center and Liberty Fund. This is the third year I have done
this—and once again, I left the week inspired by these teachers, having had
many wonderful conversations about Great Books and Other Matters (while
conceding they have talent, I still say Heart is not a good band (and, Toad the
Wet Sprocket?<span> </span>Surely, you were jesting…)
(one of the best things about a blog is that you always get the last word in
bar fights)).<span> </span>The McConnell Center is doing
great work, truly great work.<span> </span>If you
have access to large sums of money to distribute to charitable causes, look no
further,</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">A week-long conference with travel to and fro merits a Plane
Book, which as the ever attentive reader will recall is a book one thinks one should
probably read but will never actually get around to reading unless trapped in a
metal cylinder hurtling through the air.<span>
</span>Add time in a hotel room, exhausted from endless social interaction, and
you have many hours to work through said tome.<span>
</span>Plane Books are everywhere; the trick is picking which one.<span> </span>Which brings me to the experiment.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I really don’t like Henry James.<span> </span>He is a bore.<span>
</span>I have read several things by James over the year, and other than a brief
flicker somewhere about three-fourths of the way through my third reading of <i>Washington Square</i>, I have never once
thought, “maybe, just maybe, there is something worth reading here.”<span> </span>Yet Henry James keeps coming up in discussions
about Great Books.<span> </span>I don’t understand it.<span> </span>So, I decided on an experiment.<span> </span>There are two English profs here at Mount Holyoke
whom I have heard say kind words about Henry the Bore.<span> </span>So, I e-mailed both of them back toward the end
of the semester with a request.<span> </span>I will
give Henry James another chance this summer.<span>
</span>Send me the title of the one book you think I should read.<span> </span>The fate of James’ immortal reputation hangs
in the balance.<span> </span>He has somehow climbed into
Purgatory; will he be cast back own into the inferno?</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I figured I could fit in two books by Henry James this summer
and still enjoy my summer.<span> </span>I got my two
suggestions.<span> </span>I have now read the first
one.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><i>The Portrait of a Lady</i>.<span> </span>Had some promise since T S Eliot has a poem
of that name.<span> </span>Then again, the novel is 600
pages.<span> </span><span> </span>“Under certain circumstances there are few
hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as
afternoon tea.”<span> </span>It begins.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">In one way, the experiment was a success.<span> </span>I have a new theory on Henry James and I have
a second book in which I can test my theory.<span>
</span>The theory:<span> </span>A Henry James novel
is like an exquisitely crafted object, something made so perfectly that you can
look at the object and admire the craftsmanship because the craftsmanship is so
perfectly visible and obvious no matter where you look at the object.<span> </span>But, the object itself, though perfectly, and
I mean <i>perfectly</i>, crafted, is not
Beautiful.<span> </span>At all.<span> </span>There is nothing in the object which would attract
a second glance unless one likes to look at craftsmanship for the sake of
craftsmanship.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I realized this late in the novel.<span> </span>It is perfectly put together, perfectly written.<span> </span>Every character is perfectly described.<span> </span>The plot twists are perfectly foreshadowed
and revealed.<span> </span>The characters act perfectly
in accordance with their perfectly crafted natures.<span> </span>There are a perfect number of main characters
and secondary characters.<span> </span>The novel has
a perfect ending, which is only ambiguous if you haven’t been paying enough attention
to the perfectly crafted characters, but if you realize that all these
clockwork characters will continue to function like perfect timepieces, then
you know exactly what comes next.<span> </span>And in
the midst of all that perfection, the story is terribly dull.<span> </span>The characters have no blood in them.<span> </span>There is never a moment when the novel grabs
you by the lapel and forces you to care.<span>
</span>It is a perfectly detached novel.<span>
</span>It is there, it is perfect, and yet it is lifeless.<span> </span>Henry James failed to discover the secret of
Dr Frankenstein. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">If the foregoing is correct, then I understand why James is
held in such high repute despite not being worth reading.<span> </span>It is the Specialist problem.<span> </span>If you are a professor of English literature
and when you read novels, you treat them like items in a laboratory, then Henry
James gives you great specimens to study.<span>
</span>But, step outside the laboratory, read the books because you want them
to show you something about Life beyond how to craft the perfect sentence, there
there is nothing to see.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I’ll test the theory soon.<span>
</span>Fortunately, the second book is vastly shorter.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">What I don’t know is whether confirmation of the hypothesis
will lead to Henry James being banished to perpetual exile or not.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">In the meantime, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v_LC0HAu8Us">another 70s band</a> who is on a Kentucky
school teacher’s Top 5 list.<span> </span>This band
is much better than the ones mentioned above.<span>
</span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-76796714370711223582015-05-20T14:50:00.003-04:002015-05-20T14:50:48.330-04:00Doppelganger<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">It had such promise.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dostoevsky’s <i>The
Double</i> is a mess.<span> </span>One of the strange
problems of reading the writers of Great Books is that you usually start with the
Great Books, and then move onto the rest of the corpus.<span> </span>It shouldn’t be a surprise that once you move
to the B-list, it isn't as good as the A-list.<span>
</span>Yet, it is always a disappointment nonetheless.<span> </span>Dostoevsky’s four Great long novels are as
good as it gets.<span> </span>Indeed, <i>The Brothers Karamazov</i> is a legitimate contender
for greatest novel of all time.<span> </span><i>Crime and Punishment</i>, <i>The Idiot</i> and <i>Demons</i>? <span> </span>All long and all
worth rereading.<span> </span><i>Notes from Underground</i> is fascinating.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><i>The Double</i>?<span> </span>Ugh.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The most coherent summary is that this is the tale of a bureaucrat
who becomes schizophrenic.<span> </span>On this reading,
the double is just some sort of projection of his other self.<span> </span><i>Fight
Club</i> does this sort of thing much better (well, at least the movie—I haven’t
read the book), though in that story the Double is not an identical twin of the
person doing the projecting. <span> </span>But, in
this case (Dostoevsky, not Pitt/Norton), it isn’t clear that the schizophrenia
story works all the way through.<span> </span>I’d have
to go back through the book to see if it all fits. That’s not going to happen. <span> </span>It probably doesn’t work.<span> </span>The book is just messy.<span> </span>I think I said that already.<span> </span>If it isn't a story about schizophrenia, then
it is the tale of a guy who is a bit insane who also has a double and there is
no way to tell where the insanity stops and the real double exists.<span> </span>That would be an even messier, and utterly
pointless, story.<span> </span><span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So, parting from the story entirely: suppose you found out
you had a double, a person who looked so exactly like you that nobody could tell
the difference, and that person moved into town.<span> </span>(By the way, I have a double.<span> </span>Some friends of mine found him.<span> </span>(Thanks, Aimee.)<span> </span>You can see <a href="http://www.encyclopedia-titanica.org/benjamin-guggenheim-photographed-marceau-new-york.html">my double here</a>.<span> </span>Eerie.<span>
</span>Fortunately, my Double died on the Titanic.<span> </span>Hmmm.<span> </span>Maybe
“Fortunately” is the wrong word.<span> </span>It sure
sounds wrong.<span> </span>Should that be “Tragically”?)<span> </span>Imagine further your double takes a job at the
same place you work.<span> </span>Would you then go
insane?<span> </span>Or would you figure out how to
cope with the fact that you never knew if people knew they were talking to you
or had talked to you the past?<span> </span>And if
your double was evil, how much would your life be destroyed?<span> </span>OK, this is really a pointless thing to
ponder.<span> </span>Some questions just aren’t worth
asking.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Oddly, however, you can learn a thing or two asking
pointless questions which don’t need to be asked.<span> </span>(Good life lesson, that.)<span> </span>After finishing that last paragraph and
before starting this one, I was interrupted with some bureaucratic
annoyances.<span> </span>My place of work is full of idiotic
bureaucracy of late.<span> </span>Faced with the question
of how to respond, I realized there are two separate selves living within my head.<span> </span>There is the patient, kind, thoughtful
me.<span> </span>That me would have ignored the
nonsense.<span> </span>There is also the impish agent
provocateur who enjoys annoying people who deserve to be annoyed.<span> </span>That me would respond to the nonsense in a
way designed to engender even further nonsense and have a merry time pointing
out the incoherence of it all.<span> </span>The
latter me won.<span> </span>So, it turns out I do, in
fact, have a double who does, in fact, look just like me, and does in fact,
work at the same place as I do.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">And, that immediately makes me realize that Paul also talks
about one’s Double in Romans (chapter 7, verses 15-24).<span> </span>I have that Double inside me too.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">All of which wraps back to <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=__aCeI8aaVg&index=9&list=PL5092D3F5BDD4BABB">this song</a>.<span> </span></span></span></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-63160747785592926102015-05-19T16:18:00.001-04:002015-05-19T16:18:16.417-04:00The Escapist<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Dearly beloved<br />
We are gathered here today<br />
To get through this thing called life</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">File that opening under: Inexplicable.<span> </span>I never liked the artist or the album and I
never saw the movie.<span> </span>Yet, when I sat down
to write about the book soon to be mentioned, I opened Spotify, wondered what I
should put on while I typed, and that was the first album that popped into
mind.<span> </span>Makes no sense.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">And oddly, while I was typing that last paragraph, I realized
there is a connection.<span> </span>When I finished the
last book I had assigned for Spring semester (<i>Bad Paper</i>, by Halpern (maybe I’ll get around to reviewing it here—but
in case I don’t: The book is not worth your time)), I needed my first book of
the summer.<span> </span>The first book of the summer
is invariably a short, fun read.<span>
</span>Wodehouse, Christie, something like that.<span> </span>Yet, when I looked up at my bookshelves to
pick out that first book of the summer, I suddenly found myself holding a 641
page Pulitzer Prize winning novel by an author I had never read.<span> </span>Not the usual Start Of Summer fare.<span> </span>I have no idea why I decided to read it
then.<span> </span>Kind of like the album to which I
am currently listening, and which is, all in all, not shaping up to be an album
I will enjoy.<span> </span>I have never listened to
this album before.<span> </span>I have heard the hits
off it many (many, many, many) times (endless radio play when it came out.<span> </span>(Endless.)).<span>
</span>But, after a lousy opening song and second song, song 3, “The Beautiful
Ones,” is truly awful.<span> </span>I can’t decide if
I am looking forward to this song ending and hearing the next one or not.<span> </span>What if it is worse?<span> </span>[Your Humble Narrator is taking a perverse pleasure
in the fact that you, Dear Reader, are hoping that sooner or later the album to
which this refers will be mentioned because it wasn’t worth your time to Google
the lyrics at the outset of this blog post to find out what album it is.]<span> </span>[Your Humble Narrator is also not unaware
that the book mentioned above has also not yet been named.] <span> </span>[Your Humble Narrator is additionally not
unaware that there is no Actual Reader who is providing the perverse pleasure
to which the previous two parenthetical asides refer.]</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The book:<span> </span>Michael
Chabon, <i>The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier
and Clay</i>.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">As mentioned before, this book won the Pulitzer.<span> </span>This is not normally a recommendation.<span> </span>But, in this case, the award is fully merited.<span> </span>I really enjoyed reading this book.<span> </span>In the realm of modern fiction, it’s a star.<span> </span>(Part of me is wondering how Mallory never
recommend this book to me.<span> </span>It is exactly
the type of book she would a) read and b) instantly recommend to me.)</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">It is a slice of life novel: New York in the ‘30s and ‘40s.<span> </span>(1930s and 1940s, that is.<span> </span>When will saying the ‘30s not instantly be assumed
to mean the Great Depression?<span> </span>In 2030?
Or earlier? <span> </span>2029?<span> </span>2026?)<span>
</span>Two cousins.<span> </span>One a Jewish
refugee; one a New York native.<span> </span>They
become comic book writers.<span> </span>The time
period is, as comic book aficionados know, the Golden Age of Comics.<span> </span>Superman, Batman and the Escapist are all
created.<span> </span>Haven’t heard of the
Escapist?<span> </span>He is fictional—created by
Kavalier and Clay.<span> </span>[Your Humble Narrator
is not unaware of the irony of calling the Escapist a fictional comic book hero
to distinguish him from Superman and Batman.]<span>
</span>[In a marketing stunt which was as inevitable as it was undoubtedly a disaster,
there are now actual comic books starring the Escapist.<span> </span>I would be shocked if said comic books were
not Beyond Awful.]</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">If you love comic books and high literature, then you should
instantly put <i>The Amazing Adventures of
Kavalier and Clay</i> on your reading list.<span>
</span>It is that good.<span> </span>If you don’t like
comic books, but do like literature, then this book is still highly recommended.<span> </span>It is a great story, and the comic book elements
do not get in the way.<span> </span>After all, in any
slice of life novel, the protagonists have to have <i>some</i> job.<span> </span>You may not care
at all about Dentistry, but you don't avoid <i>McTeague</i>
because it is about a Dentist, do you?<span>
</span>If you don’t like comic books or literature…hmmm, why are you reading
this blog?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Escape is, not surprisingly given the title of the fictional
comic book hero, the overarching theme of the book.<span> </span>The characters in this book are constantly seeking
to escape.<span> </span>They want to escape from their
pasts and their presents and their futures.<span>
</span>They want to escape from their own identities and their surroundings.<span> </span>Why?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">It’s not the desire of the characters in the book to escape
that intrigues me.<span> </span>That is all pretty explainable
from the novel itself.<span> </span>(I pity the poor
souls who will have to read and write papers on this book for a college English
class.)<span> </span>Why do non-fictional people (like
you, Dear Reader) want to Escape?<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I received a letter yesterday from a good friend of mine,
noting among other things “The adults I know are never fulfilled.”<span> </span>And, it occurs to me now that I am writing
about this book that her observation and this book have a lot in common.<span> </span>People are not fulfilled, they sense that
there must be something better, and they want to Escape into that better
thing.<span> </span>But, nobody quite knows what that
better thing is.<span> </span>How do you escape when
it is not clear to what you are escaping?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">At this point, I would dearly like to provide the obvious religious
answer that fulfillment is found in Christ.<span>
</span>But, I am haunted by that sentence: “The adults I know are never
fulfilled”—well, that applies to most Christians I know too.<span> </span><span> </span>That is,
of course a bit of a dodge—theologically I know that fulfillment is only found
in Christ, that short of Divine Fulfillment, we are all left eternally desiring
something more.<span> </span>So, there is a religious
answer.<span> </span>But, does the theological answer
mean that fulfillment is possible or not?<span>
</span>If we are inherently aliens here, if we are strangers in a strange land,
then is it wrong to be fulfilled?<span> </span>If our
souls are longing for the City of God, is it a sin to feel fulfilled in the City
of Man?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">But, that religious answer merely begs the question.<span> </span>Why do people so desperately want to escape?<span> </span>How have we been hardwired to lack a sense of
fulfillment?<span> </span>Why is being perfectly content
so remarkably rare?<span> </span>Why is it rare even
among those whose religious convictions assure them that they have the capability
of feeling fulfilled within themselves?<span>
</span>And, the even more pressing question, the question this novel raises but
to which it fails to provide even a remotely satisfying answer: can we escape
that deeply felt sense of not really belonging where we are, that there is some
better place we should be inhabiting?<span> </span>Can
we escape not ourselves and our surroundings, but the feeling itself that we
need to escape?<span> </span>Short of finding
fulfillment, is escape even possible?</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I do know this: now that I am done writing this blog post, I
am going to stop listening to <i>Purple Rain</i>
by Prince.<span> </span>And I will be shocked if I
ever play it again.<span> </span>I guess that is an
Escape.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">(For those of you who want to feel a similar liberation, you
should rent <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKVDdm-bpKY&oref=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DSKVDdm-bpKY&has_verified=1">this movie</a> and then I suspect you will be very glad when you stop
watching it.) (I would have linked to the song, but apparently Price doesn't like his music available on the internet. Seriously--search for Prince videos on YouTube. Pretty funny.)</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-34296872142793611202015-05-18T15:09:00.003-04:002015-05-18T15:59:38.870-04:00An Open Letter to my Friends<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Yesterday was graduation. As always, it was a strange mix of emotions—joy
at seeing my students graduate and sadness that they are leaving. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Last night I read a couple of stories by Wodehouse (“Extricating
Young Gussie” and “Jeeves Makes an Omelette”) and a story by Gaiman (<i>Odd and the Frost Giants</i>). Finding things to read the evening of
graduation is tough. It is hard not to
let my mind wander. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I realized this morning why those two authors were the ones
I ended up reading last night. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I spend a lot of time talking with students during the
school year. Rarely do we just talk
about the material in a class—there is a whole universe of interesting topics
and, as a result, conversations in my office or over lunch wander far and
wide. I always call the people with whom
I talk “students,” but truth be told, that isn’t always the right word. Some of the people in my classes are just
students—they are in a class and maybe they come by to talk about how why a
line on a graph shifts the way it does and then they leave, but never anything more
than that. Most of the ones who come by
to talk end up staying for a bit. I
never kick anyone out of my office—we talk until whomever I am talking with
decides to leave. (I never answer the
phone either when I am talking with someone—some students find this disconcerting. As I tell them, “Why would I assume the person
calling is more important that you are?”)
I enjoy talking with my students.
There it is again. That word “students.” </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Calling these people “students” reduces them to a single
dimension. They are so much more. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">A more accurate word: Friends. I spend a lot of time in my office talking
with my friends. The friendship that can
form between a professor and a student is one of the most fascinating and
fulfilling friendships I can imagine.
Stripped of all the social obligations that come with other types of friendships,
this type of friendship exists purely in the realm of conversation—wide-ranging,
deeply personal, important conversations.
When my friends want to talk, they stop by or e-mail and we talk. When they have other things to do, they need never
fear that I will feel neglected or left out.
And when they stop by or write again, the conversation continues exactly
as if we were just talking yesterday.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I have a number of friends who graduated in the past and
with whom I still regularly or irregularly talk. Graduation does not end this friendship. So, what is this loss I feel at graduation? Not a hard question. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">While many of my students are my friends, they are not all
the same. I suppose that is like other
sorts of friendships. Many, well most,
of my students are ones with whom I spent some time here or there having some conversations;
I like them; I always enjoy talking with them.
They are my friends. In the
future, they will occasionally send me an e-mail updating me on their lives, and
I will read those e-mails with great joy.
I really like it when my former students write me. (Though, I always feel bad trying to answer them
when they ask me what is new in my life.
Nothing. My life never really changes.) But, I never know at graduation which ones I
will hear from again and which ones will vanish. Some of the students who just graduated I
will never see or hear from again. I
will miss them; not in some crippling sense of saying life can’t go on, but in that
sense of I spent time talking with her and I always enjoyed talking with her
and I wonder how she is doing.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Of all the blog posts I have ever written here, <a href="http://jimhartley.blogspot.com/2011/12/love-of-scrooge.html">“The Love of Scrooge”</a> is without a doubt the one I think about the most often. I love many of my students. They are truly my
friends, and I love them. I know them in
a way unlike the way anyone else knows them and I care about them immensely. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Then there is that other set of students, the ones I deeply
love. Every year there are a few
students whom I can honestly say I love as much as anyone outside my immediate family.
I am always glad, very glad, when I know that they know this. When these students graduate, there is
undoubtedly a loss. I will hear from
them again—these students almost always write, some more often than others, but
the frequency of e-mails and the time between e-mails makes absolutely no
difference with these friends. They will
come back for reunions and we will find some time for a conversation. I will continue to love these friends of mine
for as long as we are both around. But, graduation
inevitably marks a change. I will
necessarily see them less often. And that
is sad. It is a strange world when your
best friends are constantly moving away.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Here is the thing I find most curious about these friends of
mine. Some of them I have known for
their entire time at Mount Holyoke. Some
of them I have met only in their last semester.
The depth of my friendship is uncorrelated with length of time I have known
them. Some of the students for whom I
have the deepest love, the bond which will certainly persist no matter what, I
have met in their last semester of college.
Some of them I had in a class in their first semester of college. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">My students occasionally tell me how much I have given to
them. I don’t think many of them understand that they also have given much to
me. That magical moment between the ages
of 18 and 22 when a person is just beginning to craft an adult self, when the
world is all open and new and exciting, when ideas seem like the most important
thing in the world because they are, in fact, the most important things in the world,
that time before opinions have hardened and life has become routine, that moment,
that magical moment, my students share with me.
My students, my friends, have made my life richer and fuller than it
ever could have been. I perpetually
dwell in a world of discovering Beauty and Truth with friends for whom discovering
Beauty and Truth is more important than anything else. That is what my friends give me. By bringing me in and letting me share in the
wonders of their lives, I experience great joy.
The friendships I have with my students is very much a mutual
friendship. I am not sure why it is so
hard from them to understand that.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Why did I read Wodehouse and Gaiman last night? Like I said above, I only realized this morning
why those two authors would be the ones I would read after the very draining
weekend of Commencement. They are both
utterly predictable authors. They are
the literary equivalent of friends, writers whose work never ceases to bring
that same easy joy of a conversation with someone with whom you “just connect.” That phrase, “just connect” is from a very lovely
letter I received from one of my dearest friends who just graduated
yesterday. And it is a perfect description. Gaiman is like that clever friend with whom
you just like to spend time because he always makes you smile. He is an easy friend, not a deep friend, but
one you know will never present anything particularly challenging or particularly
dull. Wodehouse is the better sort of friend. The friend with whom you never need any pretense,
the one you can just slip into and know will bring you to a more enlightened
place through the mechanism of a lovely, wide-ranging, impossibly deep and
fulfilling, amusing and vitally important (all those things rolled into one) conversation. Both authors are perfect for graduation night
because both allow for that subconscious ruminating about the joy and the
sadness of graduation itself.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">To my friends: both those who just graduated and those who graduated
in the past: I love you. Thanks for all
the joy you have brought me and will bring me in the future just by being You.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-53129363899747925652015-02-06T20:26:00.002-05:002015-02-06T20:26:47.733-05:00Friends of Yore<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<![endif]--><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">A revelation:<span> </span>Some
days, I am just not in the mood to write about John Adams. I came into work
today and knew that at some point during the course of the day, in between
students dropping by to chat about Life or Coursework, I’d write about the John
Adams biography I recently read for my tutorial.<span> </span>Yet, here I am staring at the John Adams
book, and noticing that, really, I won’t do it justice right now.<span> </span>I lack the seriousness of intent and intensity
of concentration to ruminate upon John Adams.<span>
</span>So, he is being pushed aside, and looking at the pile of books awaiting
review, it is not contest what sort of review fits my current mood.<span> </span>Writing is much like reading.<span> </span>Some days I am in the mood for weighty
substantial fare; others for light-hearted fare.<span> </span>Not terribly surprising, I know, and yet, I
have this conversation with students all the time (earlier today in fact)—it is
OK to not always be in the mood to enjoy reading Plato—sometimes, Homer is just
more fun—and sometimes Herge beats out both of them.<span> </span>And so today is the Comic Book Roundup.</span></span>
<br />
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">1. <i>DC Universe vs
Masters of the Universe</i></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span> </span>A Christmas
Gift.<span> </span>A curious read.<span> </span>As a straight story it was good enough to be
enjoyable.<span> </span>Some fun bits.<span> </span>The whole clash of two different lineups was
clever in a way.<span> </span>I think I would have
enjoyed it even more if I had ever seen an episode of He-Man and the Masters of
the Universe.<span> </span>I never watched that
cartoon; it was after my time.<span> </span>So, this
was the first time I met anyone in that universe—I knew about He-man and
Skeletor—well, I knew their names and what they looked like, I knew nothing
about their personalities other than He-Man: Good; Skeletor: Bad.<span> </span>So, this book was like uncovering a whole new
universe which was interesting, but not so interesting I would rush out to read
more about the Masters of the Universe.<span> </span>In
the end—if you have a copy of this on your shelf, it is worth reading.<span> </span>If you don’t own a copy, not worth rushing
out to buy a copy.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span> </span>An odd addendum.<span> </span>As noted above, in case your memory is so
short you can’t remember what you read in the last paragraph, I have never seen
the cartoon about He-Man nor ever read a comic book about him.<span> </span>But, when I was in college I had a He-Man
Action Figure on my desk.<span> </span>Why?<span> </span>I cannot recall.<span> </span>I have no memory of where I got said Action Figure—a
Christmas gift from my brother, maybe—and I have no idea why having received said
Action Figure, I thought it would be a great addition to the desk in my dorm
room, but there he was, brandishing his sword.<span>
</span>I wonder what happened to him.<span> </span>I
wonder if he is in the attic.<span> </span>Oddly, I
sort of miss my He-Man Action Figure right now.<span>
</span>We went through a lot together, me and He-Man.<span> </span>He is like my fake friend I never really
cared about and didn’t miss at all whenever he left my life, but now, after reading
a comic book about the guy who was the model for my fake friend, I get to
wondering where my fake friend ever went.<span>
</span>Maybe I will look for him this weekend and if I find him I can put him
on my nightstand and say goodnight to him.<span>
</span>Oh, never mind.<span> </span>I just realized
that Janet would see He-Man and say in a very disdainful voice, “Where did you
dig that up?”<span> </span>Janet never liked my
He-Man Action Figure.<span> </span>Oh my.<span> </span>It just occurred to me.<span> </span>Did Janet get rid of my He-Man Action
Figure?<span> </span>Was she jealous of him and destroyed
him when I wasn't looking?<span> </span>Is my wife a
closet murderer of Action Figures?<span> </span>Now I
will stare at her all night wondering about the Darkness which might just lie
in her past.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">2. <i>Fantastic Four:
Original Sin</i><span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span> </span>Some comic
books are so good they transcend the genre and one can recommend them to anyone
as books worth reading.<span> </span>This isn’t one
of those.<span> </span>Some comic books are fun to
read and can be recommended to anyone who likes comic books.<span> </span>This isn’t one of those.<span> </span>Some comic books are decent enough that if
you had a copy and an idle evening, it isn’t a bad way to spend your time.<span> </span>This isn’t one of those.<span> </span>Some comic books are so awful you just hope
that nobody ever sees them because they would be a prime example of the stereotype
that comic books are fit only for people with extraordinarily feeble intellects
and absolutely no idea that there are books out there written for 2 year olds
with more literary merit.<span> </span>This is one of
those.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span> </span>I thought
about relating the plot, but trust me, you don’t want to know.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">3. Herge, <i>Flight 714 to
Sydney</i></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Coming off the disaster of <i>Fantastic Four: Original Sin</i> I needed something I was certain would
not depress me.<span> </span>Enter Tintin.<span> </span>I’ve read all the Tintin books, so I knew
exactly what I was getting.<span> </span>This one is
Tintin at his best—but, then there are numerous titles which are Tintin at his
best.<span> </span>It has everything you want—Tintin
is daring and bold and courageous; Haddock and Calculus and Snowy are funny;
evil villains have a dastardly plan.<span> </span>I
was so cheerful after reading it.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">4. Trudeau, <i>But This
War Had Such Promise</i></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I never know: is a collection of comic strips a comic book?<span> </span>Really, this question has long puzzled
me.<span> </span>I cannot decide. On the one hand,
Comic Strip and Comic Book do have the same word in the description. <span> </span>Some Comic strips have story lines which
persist over the space of many days.<span>
</span>But, Comic strips have a formula that are absent in the Comic Book Proper.<span> </span>These are the sorts of philosophical
questions which keep me up at night.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span> </span>I have liked
Doonesbury since I was in high school.<span> </span>I
know conservatives like me are supposed to hate Doonesbury, but I think it is fun,
and I like the characters.<span> </span>At a library
book sale in October, imagine my pleasant surprise to see a nearly complete set
of all the pre-reboot Doonesbury collections ever published.<span> </span>At 50 cents each, I bought them all.<span> </span>I have been enjoying rereading them—I read
most of these decades ago.<span> </span>In this
one<span> </span>B.D., whom I always liked (well,
until recently—Trudeau has really destroyed his characters of late—but I guess
that is what happens when you write a comic strip for 50 years) heads off to
Vietnam.<span> </span>And he meets Phred. <span> </span>And Zonker and Mark are up to their usual shenanigans.<span> </span>Bernie—whatever happened to Bernie?—is in his
lab.<span> </span>The Reverend Scot Sloan makes his
appearance.<span> </span>And, of course there is poor
Mike himself, bumbling through life.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span> </span>Truth be
told, even in college I liked Doonesbury more than I liked He-Man.<span> </span>But, I didn’t have a Duke Action Figure.<span> </span>(Much to my surprise, I just found out such a
thing exists.<span> </span>$225 on Ebay.<span> </span>A bit out of my price range.<span> </span>I would have paid $2.25).<span> </span>In the run of books I am reading, Duke hasn’t
shown up yet—he was always my favorite.<span> </span></span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-9978836381451869342015-02-05T21:38:00.003-05:002015-02-07T20:33:35.015-05:00In Search of a Shrubbery<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<![endif]--><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I gather there are people who enjoy reading travel
guides. Not browsing in them, mind. Reading straight through them. They pick up a copy of the <i>Lonely Planet Guide to Latvia</i> and they
start at page 1 and read straight through.
They read about the prevalence of ATMs, the average temperature, how
much the taxi drivers will try to rob you, and whether the hotel on Fifth Street
is clean or not. If that sounds like fun
to you, then I have a book recommendation for you.</span></span>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">How do I know there must be people who enjoy reading travel
guides? Because otherwise, Bill Bryson’s
<i>Notes From a Small Island</i> would not
exist.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"> Bill Bryson decides
to travel around England and write about his trip. If you like the sound of that, you can read
the whole book right here:</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">“On (insert day of week) I arrived in (insert Town
Name). I was surprised to find the town
to be so (quaint/unimpressive [pick one]).
I checked into a hotel which was (charming/dilapidated) and then set off
to see the (insert famous landmark in town).
On the way I ran into a (young/middle-aged/retired) person who told me a
(historical/quirky) story. The (landmark
mentioned above) was (interesting/boring).
(Insert humorous story or anecdote.)
Realizing I was hungry, I went to the local (restaurant/pub) and had a
drink and a (delicious/indifferent) meal.
I tottered off to bed and the next morning I left by (bus/train). The landscape was (scenic/bleak). “ </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Repeat. </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Repeat.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Repeat.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">And so on.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">I learned one thing from reading this book. I really, really don’t care about English cities. At all.
I thought I might care about English cities after reading <i>Alice in Sunderland</i>. (Not a typo—<i>Alice in Sunderland</i> is a different book than <i>Alice in Wonderland</i>. The
latter is more famous (but you knew that).
It is also better. Indeed, <i>Alice in Wonderland </i> is the best book mentioned in this blog
post. So, if you ever have to choose
between the <i>Lonely Planet Guide to The Great
Lakes</i> and <i>Alice in Wonderland</i> for
a pleasant evening’s read, it is not a contest.
This sort of public service announcement is what keeps bringing Readers
back to this blog. But I digress.) At times Bryson’s book reminded me of <i>Alice in Sunderland</i>. I suspect I am the first person to make that comparison. But, while I can imagine reading the Alice
book again (any of the three Alice books to which that could refer), I cannot
imagine reading Bryson’s book again.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">That is not to say that Bryson’s book is without interest. He is funny.
At times, he is quite funny. A book
of “The best jokes and stories in Bryson’s book” would be a pleasant little thing
for an evening of leisurely reading.
But, to take those amusing little stores and bury them in a whole bunch
of pointless travel matter is certainly a way to make the book longer but not a
way to make the book more enjoyable.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Still, that being said, I enjoyed Bryson’s book. This may be in part because it was a gift
from a former student (thanks, Mahua!) and so I was predisposed to be in a good
mood while reading it. It may also be that
the amusing anecdotes are liberally enough spread throughout the narrative to
keep it from flagging too much. But, all
that being said: I cannot figure out the market for a book like this.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Then again, I don’t like travel as much as the average
person does. Maybe the rest of humanity
reads tales of tours of English towns and fancies being there and so a book like
this is akin to a vicarious vacation and maybe people like vicarious vacations involving
lots of travel. Now that I think about it,
earlier today one of my colleagues was talking about how he would have liked to
have organized a class on a replica of an ancient sailing ship and sailed around
the Mediterranean recreating the voyage of Odysseus. (Note how I carefully avoided mentioning the
book title so that I don’t have to go back and rewrite the above section saying
that the <i>Alice in Wonderland</i> is the best
book mentioned in this post. The
not-actually-mentioned book by Homer is, truth be told, even better.) So,
obviously travelling does appeal to some people. Even if it does involved meeting Scylla.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Now that I think about it: Bill Bryson’s book would have
been a lot better if Merlin and Dragons and Knights who say Ni had shown up
every now and then.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-78262261324034557422015-01-30T13:55:00.001-05:002015-01-30T13:55:02.328-05:00The Blog With Exactly 40,320 Entries<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<![endif]--><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Most Exalted Reader, I shall relate to you Wonders Beyond
what you have heretofore considered Wonders, wonders so vast you will think
that I, Your Humble Narrator, am Surely Exaggerating, but I Swear to you, Dear
Reader, that everything which follows is as True as the Accounts of Dante to
Places Most Wonderful, of Robinson Crusoe to Places Most Remote.<span> </span>Prepare yourself, Dear Reader to Be Astounded
and Amazed.</span></span>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I have Seen a Blog which has exactly 40,320 entries.<span> </span>Perhaps the Blog is in Babylon, that Most Magnificent
City.<span> </span>Perhaps not. To reach the Blog you
Must travel Paths Most Serpentine.<span> </span>The
traveler must choose the right path despite the myriad of Forks in the path,
one path leading onward to the Blog, one path leading back to the internet you
are currently using.<span> </span>I have been to the end
of this road, I have seen the Blog with exactly 40,320 entries.<span> </span>I have returned to the internet on which these
reflections are being written.<span> </span>I do not know
how to return to the Blog with exactly 40,320 entries; my memory fails about
the path.<span> </span>But, I have seen the Wonders of
the Blog with exactly 40,320 entries.<span>
</span>And what I tell you is True.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">There is a book.<span> </span>The
book exists in this realm,<span> </span>You can buy
it in the Amazon if you so desire.<span> </span>The book
tells tales of other books, books which you cannot buy in the Amazon, books which
have been lost or are difficult to discover.<span>
</span>The Book you can buy is merely a pale reflection of the books you cannot
buy.<span> </span>But the stories in the Book which you
can buy are enough to give a picture of Books even more fabulous and
wonderful.<span> </span>In one part of the Book which
you can buy, you can read about the works of Herbert Quain.<span> </span>Herbert Quain has written a Novel Most Magnificent.<span> </span>A novel which is glorious to comprehend.<span> </span>The novel begins with a chapter.<span> </span>It is followed by three chapters, each of which
could serve as the chapter before the initial chapter.<span> </span>That is followed by nine chapters, three of which
could be a precursor to the second chapter, three of which could be a precursor
to the third chapter, and three of which could be a precursor to the fourth
chapter.<span> </span>This most magnificent novel of Herbert
Quain is thus Nine novels, all of which have the same concluding chapter which is
arrived at through one of three intermediate paths and begin at one of nine different
starting places.<span> </span>The nine novels embedded
into this larger novel are all extraordinarily different despite ending with the
same chapter.<span> </span>I would like to read this novel
by Herbert Quain, but it is not available in the Amazon.<span> </span>All I can read is the account of this novel in
the Book you can buy in the Amazon.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Book you can buy also describes a library.<span> </span>The library has many books.<span> </span>Perhaps an infinite number of books.<span> </span>It contains, it is rumored, every book which has
been written and every book which ever could have been written.<span> </span>There is in this library a catalog of all the
book is the library.<span> </span>There are also catalogs of all the books which would be contained in a different library of
all the books which have been written and which could have been written.<span> </span>There are catalogs which are incomplete.<span> </span>There are catalogs which are incorrect<span> </span>There is every catalog which could have
been composed.<span> </span>We do not know the
location where the true catalog resides.<span>
</span>But, it exists. <span> </span>Surely, it
exists.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The Book you can buy also describes six other worlds of
books, each of which is more magnificent than the books you can buy in the Amazon.<span> </span>The book you can buy has a title.<span> </span>It is <i>The
Garden of Forking Paths</i>.<span> </span>It may have
other titles in other libraries.<span> </span>It was
written by Jorge Luis Borges, who may have different names in different
books.<span> </span>I did not read a book with the title
<i>The Garden of Forking Paths</i>.<span> </span>I read a book with the title <i>Collected Fictions</i>.<span> </span>That book was compiled by Andrew Hurley.<span> </span>Andrew Hurley does not explain how he knows
that <i>The Garden of Forking Paths</i> is
fiction.<span> </span>There may be other books with the
title <i>Collected Nonfictions</i> which contain
<i>The Garden of Forking Paths</i>.<span> </span>The book I have with the title <i>Collected Nonfictions</i> does not contain <i>The Garden of Forking Paths</i>.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">But I have seen the Blog with exactly 40,320 entries.<span> </span>And Dear Reader you will be amazed at what I
have seen.<span> </span><i>The Garden of Forking Paths</i> contains eight stories.<span> </span>The stories do not seem to be related to one another;
they tell tales of different worlds and different books.<span> </span>But, oh Dear Reader, I have seen the Blog
with exactly 40,320 entries.<span> </span>And the
eight stories in <i>The Garden of Forking Paths</i>
are not unrelated.<span> </span>They contain a single
tale.<span> </span>I did not know they contained a single
tale until I saw the Blog with exactly 40,320 entries.<span> </span>But I have seen the Blog with exactly 40,320
entries and I swear to you Dear Reader, that <i>The Garden of Forking Paths</i> is not 8 unrelated stories, but one
story containing those eight parts.<span> </span>The
Blog of exactly 40,320 entries shows how the stories are connected.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Ah, Dear Reader, you misunderstand me.<span> </span>Perhaps I do not explain Myself well.<span> </span>Each Entry in the Blog with exactly 40,320 entries
explains how the eight tales in <i>The
Garden of Forking Paths</i> consists of one story.<span> </span>Each Entry in the Blog with exactly 40,320
entries relates this larger story by putting the eight tales in <i>The Garden of Forking Paths</i> in the
correct order and filling in the missing pieces between the entries.<span> </span>There are 40,320 possible ways to arrange the
eight tales in <i>The Garden of Forking
Paths.</i> The Blog with exactly 40,320 entries shows that every one of those
40,320 orderings tells a complete tale.<span> </span>Of
those entries, 40,319 of them are fiction.<span>
</span>One of them is the Truth.<span> </span>And I
have seen it Dear Reader.<span> </span>I know the
Truth is in the Blog with exactly 40,320 entries.<span> </span>But I do not know how to return to the Blog
with exactly 40,320 entries in order to study the 40,320 entries and find the One
True Entry.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I do not despair.<span> </span>Perhaps,
you Dear Reader will succeed where I have failed.<span> </span>Perhaps you Dear Reader will find the True
Entry in the Blog with exactly 40,320 entries.<span>
</span>I tell you this so that you may carry on where I have failed.<span> </span><span> </span><span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-43819509277305618722015-01-19T17:08:00.004-05:002015-01-19T17:08:48.473-05:00The White Lioness<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<![endif]--><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Sweden must be a boring place.
</span></span><br />
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Henning Mankell writes relatively good mystery/thriller type
books. (That is praise, by the way.<span> </span>As
anyone who has read much in this genre knows, the average fare is awful beyond
belief.)<span> </span><span> </span>I recently read the third Kurt Wallander mystery,
<i>The White Lioness</i>.<span> </span>Three books into the saga of Detective Wallander,
an odd pattern has emerged.<span> </span>Wallander is
a detective in a small town (city?<span> </span>Just
how big is Ystad, anyway?<span> </span>Ah,
Wikipedia!<span> </span>18,000. Hmmm, is that a small
or large town? <span> </span>Definitely not a
city.<span> </span>When does a small town grown up to
be a big town anyway?<span> </span>For humans, we
break at 18 or 21, but where is the break for towns? Is a town of 18,000 like a
human of 6, 18, 21, 30, or what?) in Sweden.<span>
</span>In the first novel, he suddenly had to solve the mystery of a brutal
murder.<span> </span>No surprise there—detective novels
need brutal murders.<span> </span>Nobody writes a
detective novel about the person whose bicycle was stolen by teenagers on a
Friday night.<span> </span>(Well, except, now that I
think about it, Encyclopedia Brown—my first favorite detective—probably solved mysteries
of missing bicycles.)<span> </span>The book (Kurt
Wallander’s book, not Encyclopedia Brown’s book (but, don’t get me wrong, I
still have a soft spot for Encyclopedia Brown (though I am not currently rushing
out to read another one of his tomes))) was good.<span> </span>So, you can imagine why Mankell wants to
bring back his detective.<span> </span>But, how many
murders can happen in a small (There. <span> </span>It
is decided. Small) town in Sweden?<span> </span>So,
the next book had this whole Latvian angle.<span>
</span>The Latvia part was weird—why would a detective from a small Swedish
town be running around Latvia?<span> </span>Now the
third novel.<span> </span>In this one, mercifully,
Kurt Wallander stays in Sweden, but the whole story is really about South
Africa.<span> </span>White supremacists decide to train
someone to kill Nelson Mandela and they hook the would-be murderer up with a
former KGB trainer and they decide to train in Sweden.<span> </span>Yeah, that makes sense.<span> </span></span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">But, I suppose to complain about a lack of realism in the mystery/thriller
genre is rather like complaining about how Krypton never really existed. <span> </span>(I hope that doesn’t cause anyone too much
shock.<span> </span>Is saying Krypton is fake like telling
children there is no Santa Claus?) <span> </span>So,
instead, I am puzzling over Sweden.<span> </span>Why would
a Swedish author who can write well feel the need to introduce a small town
detective and then have to keep adding international intrigue in order to get
more stories?<span> </span>Is it impossible to write
mysteries based in Sweden?<span> </span>Are there no
country manors with ex-brother in laws, imperious foreign salesmen and the
uncle who fought in foreign wars married to the aunt whose family used to have
wealth?</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Kurt Wallander, by the way, is a lousy detective.<span> </span>Makes all sorts of stupid mistakes.<span> </span>Just keeps plodding along.<span> </span>He will undoubtedly have a nervous breakdown in
the near future.<span> </span>I like that part about Wallander.<span> </span></span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Apparently there isn’t much to say about <i>The White Lioness</i>.<span> </span>It is what it is.<span> </span>It is the best of the first three Kurt Wallander
mysteries.<span> </span>So, things are looking up for
book number 4.<span> </span>(I have the complete run
already for a very curious reason.<span> </span>eBay got
hacked a while back.<span> </span>I think what
follows is related to the hack.<span> </span>I
clicked on my eBay app one day and got this notice that eBay would allow me to acquire
any one item worth up to $50 on eBay for free.<span>
</span>I had one day to use the offer.<span> </span>I
had been thinking about reading a Wallander mystery anyway, and I realized with
this offer if I could find someone offering the complete Wallander series, I could
get them all at once.<span> </span>Lo and behold,
there they were.<span> </span>The copies were
unread.<span> </span>Free!<span> </span>I would thank eBay, but since the offer was
not too long after eBay got hacked, I suspect it was related to the hack, so perhaps
scorn rather than thanks are appropriate.<span>
</span>This is the sort of useless information which does absolutely nothing to
improve the Reader’s Life.<span> </span>And to think,
if I had more mental energy, you could be reading a ruminations about Jorge Luis
Borges right now, who is worth pondering and will show up in this here space
sooner or later.<span> </span>But, not today.<span> </span>Today you get Kurt Wallander and eBay.<span> </span>You, dear Reader, should ask for your money
back.)</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So, how about <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hIyuzXn1Jkw">a song</a>?</span></span></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-75252113969139004312015-01-15T16:46:00.000-05:002015-01-15T16:46:22.958-05:00Age of Marvel<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<![endif]--><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I think it is safe to say we are now living in the Age of
Marvel.
</span></span><br />
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This blog post come with a quick test on whether you should stop
reading right now.<span> </span>When you read the
phrase “Age of Marvel” did you think the capital M was merely superfluous
capitalization or a proper noun?<span> </span>If the
former, you can safely stop reading now—nothing to see here.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">One of my Christmas gifts this year was a copy of <i>Guardians of the Galaxy: Prelude</i></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">It is a Marketing Stunt comic book, an advertisement for a movie
which you, the Reader, saw if you both heeded the warning in the second paragraph
and are still reading this blog post.<span> </span>It
is a trio of short stories providing the immediate background to the movie plot
lines plus a quartet of rather old comic books which were the first introduction
the assorted characters in the Guardians of the Galaxy.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I learned something from reading this.<span> </span>There was a reason I knew next to nothing about
the Guardians of the Galaxy before the movie announcement.<span> </span>And therein lies a fascinating tale leading
to the conclusion in the first sentence.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I have the 2006 edition of the Marvel Encyclopedia in my
office.<span> </span>A useful, as my father-in-law put
it when he saw it on the Christmas Day I received it many years ago, reference
book for fake stuff.<span> </span>There is an entry
for the Guardians of the Galaxy in it.<span> </span>It
is some 31<sup>st</sup> century superhero group.<span> </span>None of the people in the group are the ones
in the movie you saw.<span> </span>After reading my
new prelude comic book, I realized that the characters in that quartet of introductory
stories had no real reason to ever band together.<span> </span>So, I looked up the whole matter.<span> </span>Fascinating.<span>
</span>The Guardians of the Galaxy in my 2006 encyclopedia were dropped long
ago.<span> </span>In 2008, there was a new comic book
run featuring this new set of superheroes.<span>
</span>That comic book run lasted 25 issues, and then was dropped.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The reason nobody really knew about the Guardians of the Galaxy
before the movie was because they were never worth hearing about.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Even the characters are an odd set.<span> </span>Strangest was Rocket Raccoon.<span> </span>He first showed up in The Incredible Hulk’s
20<sup>th</sup> Anniversary issue.<span> </span>The opening
tagline: “Now somewhere in the Black Holes of Sirius Major there lived a young
boy name of…Rocket Raccoon.”<span> </span>Rocket Raccoon
on a quest to find, you guessed it, Gideon’s Bible.<span> </span>Ha ha.<span>
</span>That is the sort of lame joke Marvel specialized in during the Dark Years
(which <span> </span>included 1981).<span> </span>There is nothing in this comic book which would
make you ever want to read another comic book about Rocket Raccoon.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Groot was also odd.<span> </span>First
shows up in a quick story in Tales to Astonish as an Evil Tree Being, who is
thwarted by a nerdy scientist which allows the nerdy scientist to revel in the fact
that his gorgeous girlfriend now thinks that maybe the nerdy scientist guy is
better than the strapping young man in which she was starting to show interest.<span> </span>That is old style Marvel fare.<span> </span>But, again, there is no reason to think Groot
would ever merit your attention.<span> </span></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Indeed, neither Groot nor Rocket Raccoon merit entries in that
aforementioned 2006 Encyclopedia—<i>encyclopedia!</i>—and
for good reason.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">So, they and a few other minor characters get thrown in a
comic book called Guardians of the Galaxy which lasts a little over two years
and dies.<span> </span>End of story.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Well, except there is that mega-blockbuster movie about the characters
from a failed comic book.<span> </span>And that mega-blockbuster
movie will have sequels because it was a mega-blockbuster movie.<span> </span>Marvel is cranking out Movies about Nobodies
and they are Huge Hits.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Why do they need the movies about Nobodies?<span> </span>Oddly, Marvel has a problem.<span> </span>They sold off the rights to make Spider-Man and
Fantastic Four movies some time ago.<span>
</span>Then, they sold off the rights to X-Men to a different company.<span> </span>Marvel is left with the ability to make
movies with the leftover characters—which included, fortunately, the Avengers characters.<span> </span>They have done an amazing job.<span> </span>But, how to keep going?<span> </span>Who is left?<span>
</span>Enter Guardians of the Galaxy.</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">And they turn that into a hit.<span> </span>They also now have TV shows featuring
nobodies.<span> </span>(Never seen the TV shows—are they
any good?)<span> </span>At this point, I think Marvel
could make a blockbuster movie based on Agent Pratt, John Prester, Princess
Python, Presence, and Pretty Persuasions all teaming up to stop the Sons of the
Serpent and the Soviet Super Soldiers.<span> </span>(Picking
two pages at random from the aforementioned encyclopedia.)</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">This is the Age of Marvel.<span>
</span>And I am really glad to be living in it.<span>
</span></span></span></div>
Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4820355535914440849.post-89638788101243515922015-01-14T16:39:00.003-05:002015-01-14T16:39:42.043-05:00Be Not Afraid<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<![endif]--><span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Define “Courage.”<span> </span>Go
ahead.<span> </span>Try.<span> </span>Really.<span>
</span>What is Courage?
</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">I’d never given the matter much thought until now.<span> </span>But, over lunch today I read Plato’s <i>Laches</i>, which is an extended discussion
on the definition of Courage.<span> </span>Reading
the dialogue was easily more time spent thinking about the definition of courage
than I have spent in the entire rest of my life doing so up until now.<span> </span>Courage is just one of those things that you
know it when you see it.<span> </span>I never really
tried to define it.<span> </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Having read Plato’s Dialogue on the matter, I have even less
of an idea how to define it than I did before I ever tried to define it.<span> </span>Plato is like that.<span> </span>You don't read Plato to Learn Something.<span> </span>You read Plato to realize you Know Nothing.<span> </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Then again, that isn’t entirely right.<span> </span>I don’t really read Plato to learn how little
I know.<span> </span>I already know how little I
know.<span> </span>I, like Socrates, happily embrace
my ignorance, and I, like Socrates, love nothing more than trying to figure
things out even when there is no hope of actually figuring them out.<span> </span>I like puzzling over things.<span> </span>So, I enjoy puzzling over the definition of courage
even though I don’t actually care what the definition of Courage truly is.<span> </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Indeed, the only time I ever personally encounter the idea
of Courage is when I make critical remarks about Administrators at Mount Holyoke
or publicly make some remark that indicates that I am to the Right of Center in
politics or actually Believe my religious beliefs..<span> </span>Afterwards, someone will occasionally tell me
that I was really brave to say such things.<span>
</span>I always scoff.<span> </span>I have tenure.<span> </span>The Administrators cannot fire me no matter
what I say.<span> </span>How much courage does it
take to say things when your know there is no way to lose your job?<span> </span>Guys who hold their ground while enemies are
shooting explosives at them, guys who dash out in the midst of gunfire to drag
a fellow soldier to safety, guys who stand up to oppressors at the risk of
death, those guys have courage.<span> </span>To say
what I do is in any way comparable is a mockery of the term.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">But, to return to Plato.<span>
</span>I read and enjoy Plato not because of the answer, but because it is fun
to follow the meandering arguments leading nowhere.<span> </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">For example, this particular dialogue, in true Platonic
fashion, doesn’t start with the discussion of courage.<span> </span>It starts with trying to figure out whom one should
ask for advice on a subject.<span> </span>Is it the
person who is skillful in the accomplishment of the matter or the person who is
skillful in the means of the matter?<span> </span>Consider
leadership (a subject on which I am soon to commence teaching again): if you want
to learn about leadership, should you consult the person who has led well or
the person who has studied leadership well?<span>
</span>If it is the latter, then surely you want to know who the teachers
were.<span> </span>And do you evaluate the teachers
by whether they led well or whether they studied leadership well?<span> </span>At the end of the chain, it gets pretty obvious
that if you want to know about leadership, you should consult leaders.<span> </span>But, do leaders know how to articulate what
they know?<span> </span>There is no reason to assume they
do.<span> </span>If I want to study Courage, and I
ask the Courageous about Courage, the will probably just say, ‘Well, my buddy
was under fire and was going to die, so I went out and got him.”<span> </span>That’s courage.<span> </span>The Leader would say, “Well, there was this
problem and I got everyone together and we fixed the problem.”<span> </span>That’s leadership.<span> </span>Is there any evidence that a study of
leadership helps make leaders?<span> </span>If my class
from last year is any indication, then I feel perfectly safe in saying that
studying leadership, while fascinating to be sure, does not in any way turn someone
into a leader.<span> </span>You don’t have to take my
word for it—many of my students said the same thing.<span> </span>The same things is true about teaching, by
the way—the best teachers did not learn their craft in Education classes.<span> </span>This is really obvious if you think about
Courage—if you study Courage, will you become courageous?<span> </span>Would anyone think so?<span> </span>I doubt I am the least bit more courageous now
that I have read Plato’s dialogue on Courage.<span>
</span>Indeed, I don’t even have more knowledge about Courage now that I have
read this dialogue.<span> </span>Yet I have studied
Courage for an hour or so.<span> </span>And I am glad
I did so.</span></span></div>
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Jim Hartleyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08343921370278367428noreply@blogger.com0