March Madness

Good evening ladies and gentlemen. How's it been? I've been silent on the writing since the new year. I feel the need to write as an outlet because I believe reading and writing is the greatest tool for communication as a medium. Sure, I talk to friends and family, but you just don't get to really say everything you want to say with friends and family. That's why I've had this blog for so many years. The blog is a good outlet not only for creativity but also to say everything I want to say. I haven't really been too busy or anything, but I do think I had some slight writer's block that lasted all of February. But I've been good. I've been reading, working, and tonight I was playing guitar and electronic keyboard, just practicing, and improvising. 

I've been on a roll since the new year 2026 reading a lot of books. So far already since January I've read 10 books: The Mammoth Hunters [by Jean M. Auel], Van Gogh The Passionate Eye [Pascal Bonafoux], Plato's Symposium, Caesar's War on Gaul, Lolita by Nabokov, Words of Wisdom, The Nibelungenlied,  Cousin Bette by Balzac, The New Grove Mozart, and Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad. I'm also currently reading The Portable Medieval Reader and A History of China. My reading has stayed mostly in the realms of fiction, non-fiction, western canon but I will sometimes still read science fiction, more modern day science fiction as well as the golden age sci fi stuff. 

All the reading has been keeping me sharp and keeping me going. The state of our country isn't good and now all of a sudden we're on day 5 in a war against Iran with our partner Israel. What does reading all these great books of the western canon tell you about the political nature of the times we're currently living in? As Hegel would put it, "We learn from history that we don't learn from history." As bad as Trump and the MAGA Republican tinfoil hat crowd are, we have seen this before and we have been here before. 

Even this war against Iran. We're shooting at them with all these airstrikes and we're hoping for a regime change with no boots on the ground as of yet, which is unheard of and has never happened before. Well, this scene looks a lot like Bush's declaration of war in Afghanistan, but at least Bush got approval from Congress to go to war. With Trump, he declared it and we were instantly in war. It's an interesting time to be alive in the United States, being someone of my age, of my education, of my economic and social class. 

You see, you could argue that Americans like me, American citizens with good education, good family structure, they're doing okay economically, they're eating well, they're exercising, they're getting entertained, they have friends and family, they read books, etc, well you might say that Trump, what Trump does, and the new war against Iran, maybe it might not affect them as much as you think. 

The reality is that the Trump regime has had a profound influence on practically every facet of American culture, politics, entertainment, and governance. I believe, personally, that ever since President Trump was elected, since even the first time, American culture has largely degenerated and gotten worse and worse. I could even see it among the largely minority employees and management at the retail grocery job I worked at for years. You could see that because they loved Trump and praised him, they wanted to become like Trump, which included becoming more hateful and full of cruelty towards others around them. For them Trump wasn't just a symbol of American conservatism, he was the example to show them that it was okay to be a racist, to be hateful, to be cruel, and show it anywhere and anytime they wanted. Yeah, it was that bad there folks. That was just a market. Imagine how people who love Trump would act in a mob [January 6], or in Congress as leaders in the White House. Houston, we have a problem.

Which brings us to the end of February 2026, a new war with Iran. This war is like the perfect foil for Trump because he was already in trouble for the killings of two US Citizens with his gestapo-esque police force ICE [Rene Good, and Alex Pretti who were called terrorists by Kristi Nome leader of Homeland Security] and in addition Trump was in trouble for his too close ties to child trafficker Jeffrey Epstein. Also, there's the fact that the economy under Trump has slowed down a lot, there's a lot less jobs, food and gas prices are very high, and companies are putting more and more money and effort into AI [stupid idea] when in reality, Americans are struggling to pay rent, eat well, and find a job that gives them enough cash to live in a house or apartment. Trump's problem as President as always, has been affordability, as Democrats would say. Trump inherited a robust economy from Biden, and now when you go to Fatburger you're paying $24 for a burger, fries, and a soda. 

It almost seems at times like what Trump does is seemingly random. Which makes you wonder what is really going on in this world, what systems are controlling what's going on behind the scenes. For example, you notice how not once has Trump pushed back against Putin despite Putin's war crimes against Ukraine. So it makes you wonder, what does Putin have on Trump? Is Trump really a pedophile rapist like the newly reported story said? If its true, then we have to seriously discuss and decide what kind of a country we are and what kind of a country we should be. Because if we allow a guy who's done that to be our President and get us into a war then we have fundamentally failed as a democratic experiment. 

It helps to be somewhat of a cynic right now. In a way, to stay informed, you pretty much have to read the news every 24-48 hours or watch the news on TV daily, just to stay up to date on basic information, but in reality, you still have to question everything, not only Trump and his administration and their actions, but also the news and media itself, as well as yourself. Henry David Thoreau has this great quote where he says all the news stories are all things that have happened in other super old news stories from other times and years. That was a stunning revelation because in some sense, yes, it's very true. 

But why is this, why is that quote true? I think a small part of being a cynic is the feeling and knowing that something is amiss, something is not right, even though you don't know what it is, something like a conspiracy, who's to say that there isn't something like that going on right now and/or has been going on since the foundation of this state. Like I said, you have to question everything, even yourself and your own beliefs, even if you have a low education level, play videogames, and are more concerned about being 'turnt at da club.' There's something undeniable about the current times we're living in that has an eerie similarity to the past, something we don't understand, or perhaps will never be granted the right to understand. Who knows what evil lurks in the hearts of men? The Shadow knows!

Eliot's Renaissance Tempest: Romola's Moral Crucible

 

First, it may be surprising that, George Eliot, famous writer of 19th century English novels wrote one novel about the Renaissance period. Romola is George Eliot's fourth novel, a significant departure from all her other novels. Romola is set in Florence in the 15th century of Niccolo Machiavelli, [he's a minor character in the book], during Christian religious leader Savonarola's rise. 

George Eliot took meticulous notes on the Renaissance period for this novel and dives in deep to explore the themes of humanism and psychological human struggles. This is most likely Eliot's most intellectual novel, whereas her more popular books like Middlemarch and Mill On the Floss focus more on the intimate social realism of rural England in the 19th century, the core of all her writing and style. However, for the curious western canon reader, this book is not only important, but is a must read.

Second, Eliot uses the world of 15th century Renaissance Italy as more than a backdrop, it is a protagonist, the city itself comes alive almost like a character. This is one of Eliot's strongest stylistic writing skills. The political machinations of the city have it come alive like a person. The Medici's versus republicans, artististic ferment, impassioned religious leaders [Savonarola], and the passion of learning, ambition, and decline. The setting is important for the characters because it helps to explore the themes of humanism, faith, individualism, and communal duty. 

Third, Romola's journey from naive helper-scholar to her blind father to adept Holy Madonna is not only inspiring, it is downright transformative. Romola is one of Eliot's most well thought out characters, like Tito, her husband. Her duties were initially to help her blind-scholar father, her god-father, and her husband Tito, who she marries, but along the way she finds herself in struggle and contradiction. As every powerful character in Eliot's novels, she has to make tough decisions in order to find meaning in her life. She might be the most powerful and transformative character in Eliot's writings. 

Fourth, Tito Melema. Tito is a remarkable villain and, one of the best villains in Eliot's work. He's good looking, tall, dark, personable, intellectual, ambitious, but he's also backstabbing [marrying a peasant girl behind Romola's back and having two kids with her], he's so ambitious to the point of getting too involved in the internal politics of Italy [thus garnering him enemies], he backstabs his father who adopted him as a child, and because of that, his father ends up getting his revenge. Tito's Father's revenge is ultimately satisfying although not quite as action packed as one would think it would be. Most writers will never be able to write a better villain. If Romola represents Life and Holy Goodness, then Tito is Death and Intellect. 

Moving on, Savonarola plays a big role in the stage because of his strong religious fervor and influence. He's reacting against corruption of politics and the church, offering a powerful vision of moral renewal in Florence, Italy. You could say that because of Eliot's ideas on religion, she always has strong ideas of religious characters, ideas, and influence. You can say that she never has anything bad to say about religion. The role on religion on Romola is immense, to the point where in the end she finds a village suffering from the plague, and she ends up helping and saving a lot of them, thus becoming a Holy Madonna. 

Finally, putting it all together. Eliot's dense, allusive, descriptive, intellectual writing style in a psychologically penetrating prose style is what makes this book an amazing read. She's able to successfully and accurately use historical notes and detail without losing the narrative flow or psychological state of the characters. Her characteristic philosophical concerns are explored through this unique renaissance prism. The novel is considered Eliot's least popular novel and it was received with mixed reviews, but reading it in 2025 feels as fresh as a daisy, and I believe its a must read for the western canon list. 

In conclusion, like many historical novels of the western canon, this novel has epic scope. When the fires of belief and lightning of new ideas clash across Renaissance Florence, testing one woman's soul as kingdoms fall and fanatics rise, George Eliot's Romola forges a story so powerful it echoes through centuries, standing forever as a towering testament to how we hold onto what's true when the whole world shakes. The novel begs to ask the question, "How do we find meaning in our lives?" You could say that is what every George Eliot novel is really about.

Adam Bede, by George Eliot

 

He's in love with her, she's in love with him, he's mad at him for being in love with her, and she doesn't realize he loves her. Set in rural England in 1799, the hardworking well-respected carpenter Adam Bede falls in love with the dairymaid Hetty Sorrel, as the upper-class Arthur Donnithorne also falls in love with Hetty, and pursues a relationship with her in a classic tragedy of seduction and betrayal that ends with a happy ending for some but not for all.

First, this novel focuses on psychological realism. Eliot's free writing style allows us to inhabit each and every character, from Dinah, the preacher, to Hetty the dairymaid, to the old folks, the Church goers, the upper-class Donnithorne, to Seth, Adam's brother, and their parents. You get to live within the world of these rural English people. They may not be rich or have much, but they have values like church going, family, eating good home-cooked meals with the family, and hardwork. The other side of this realism is the inner mind of Hetty later with this novel, when she is charged with the crime of letting her baby die and eventually ends up being hanged.

Second, this novel has moral complexity. Hetty isn't exactly a crazed lunatic killer when she lets her baby die of exposure in the woods. She's a tragic character that didn't know where to turn. Arthur isn't exactly innocent when he finds out Hetty is pregnant and he ends the relationship and goes abroad to Ireland, only to come back to find that Hetty let the baby die after she ran away from marriage with Adam. Dinah the preacher seems to be the only true god-blessed person in the book, as she's a preacher and ends up marrying Adam at the very end. So there is some happiness.

Third, this novel has a lot of pastoral imagery of a rural England of old. From Adam working at his carpentry workshop business and working a farm, to Hetty doing chores around the house, to the Church dinner celebrating Adam Bede's success, even the scenery and backgrounds where the characters live in and interact in, is almost like additional characters in and of themselves. 

In addition, this novel includes a lot of Church and Methodist preaching, a lot of it by a character named Dinah. There are many preaching chapters in the novel. Oftentimes, this can slow down the narrative of the novel and prolong the novel. You'll find that Dinah's preaching often overrides the novel itself. This display of religious preaching fervor takes over much of the novel. However, this could be because that's the world in which these characters inhabit, and because that was the world of England in 1799, ultimately making the novel much stronger in its realism.

Ultimately, though, we find that in the end this is a very rewarding experience. We find that Adam's love interest in Hetty was genuine, but that doesn't mean that other men couldn't have been interested in her and courted her. Arthur's remorse after the death of the baby and Hetty's death is lifelong, and Hetty's tragedy is a reminder to society that poor women have no safety net; if they do something wrong and have no money or help like to say, raise a baby, they might have no choice but to give the baby up or worse, a sad reminder that poor women are often the most neglected members of society within any time period throughout history. 

Lastly, although written in 1859, Adam Bede reads like a modern literary novel, albeit even with all the Methodist preaching. I would also recommend reading Eliot's The Mill On The Floss, for a more biographical take also in a rural England setting. And of course, you should've already read Middlemarch, if you've read any of George Eliot's works. 

Otra Covid Wave, Ad Infinitum

Hello ladies and gentlemen of the internet. Welcome to covid 2022 July edition. 

We're going on year three with this thing. It's a real drag. They're reinstating an LA mask mandate soon. I've only taken off some three months since covid began and surprisingly, I never caught covid myself from anybody. Talk about lucky! That being said, I wear my mask at work regularly and in crowded places just in case. However, I am double vaccinated. But I digress. 

The work gig is going strong. The work is heavy and consistent as well as the hours and pay. Decent, but it's never enough to really pull you out of the class of poverty to the middle class.

Covid at work is still a thing but much less so nowadays. However, the case rates are going up again, so we are seeing small increases here and there. One of my pet peeves is the loud yelling customers that don't wear masks that really spray it all over the place. Yuck! 

I mostly cashier and customer service. It ain't much but it's honest work. 

In terms of my free time, I'm doing all kinds of things. I've learned a good amount of Spanish and bits of other languages like French, Portuguese, Italian, and even Chinese. I'm reading a lot of books, mostly classics of the western canon. Tonight, I was just reading Vasari's Lives, the chapter on Leonardo Da Vinci. I'm playing a lot of guitar. I'm seeing friends here and there. Owning enemy players as the team healer. Working at least forty hours a week. 

As this next covid wave storms upon the shore, remember to plant your anchor and keep your grounding. There's a storm brewing within the land and a lot of people are being washed away. You have to have a steady grounding in whatever it is that you do, believe, feel, and think, ya dig? For me, the answer has been to stay inspired, whatever it takes works, anytime, all the time. 

In the beginning of the pandemic I was doing meditation about an hour each day because I was working less hours and had more relaxation time. Well, now I'm finally using that training to good use and using that TM to stay calm and relaxed even in my most stressful moments of my work day. Yowza, yowza! 

A new big thing for me has been to enjoy nature much more often. Whenever I go for walks now, I never put in earbuds. Just enjoy the scenery, the plants, the Sun, and the blue skies. I am a night elf druid. Nature thanks you. 

Also, for those who are interested I've kept a record of life since covid first began, you can read my plague journal, as I call it, here, http://ofigueroamusic.blogspot.com/p/blog-page.html.

See you later in time and space. 

Spring Break 2022!

Hello, good readers of the ofigueroamusicblog. It's been a pretty long time since I've updated, so here I am, ready to share more information on what it's like working at the job still under covid conditions and more. 

First, the working conditions have improved since I've last posted. There was going to be a possible strike but the company ended up giving in to most but not all of the demands from the union. We've also since added more staff to the front end. And inspiringly, I got promoted to cashier position after many years of toiling in the vineyards. 

However, this doesn't mean that the working conditions are optimal. We're still working under covid conditions, there are still a few covid cases every now and then, and most of the customers aren't wearing masks while they get extremely close to our bodies and faces. Covid has been extremely brutal for workers in the retail industry. In addition, now that the weather has become a lot hotter, the masks have become really hot again, but again, I can't take it off, unless I want to risk the wrath of possible covid exposures. 

I've mostly been chilling by myself and occasionally with a few friends. It's funny because, two years later, still under covid, I find myself only really going out to dinners with family and friends. It's my favorite social occasion. I've since left a lot of my many much more casual friends/acquaintances, to focus more on doing my own thing, which involves a lot of reading, guitar, and studying languages, mostly Spanish. 

I started the morning by reading Machiavelli's Mandrake, a comedy play about a young man who tricks an old scholar fool into letting him fuck his beautiful young wife. Talk about uncomfortable reading. In a way you could say c'est la vie but if it was your wife or your girlfriend what would you do? What if you never find out like our old scholar dude? It's certainly a funny story. Maybe the ends do justify the means, because in the end the wife wants to do it again with the young man, and even befriends him and gives him a room at her and her husband's estate. Talk about the ends justifying the means. 

I also found time to read Seneca's Agamemnon tragedy and start reading The Dawn of Everything, A New History of Humanity, a deep thinker for ya, anthropology and sociology.

Lastly, I even found time to jam with my friend Jason who plays the alto saxophone. You can find our most recent live recording here.

Although work has been the norm throughout and around all this activity, I'll be able to rest easy knowing that I'll be getting the better contract raises, and although I'll get less hours as a result of getting paid more, in that process I'll actually get the same and/or more money for less hours of work. Not too shabby! I found 100 rupees! 

Although I haven't gone anywhere in a few years and things have stayed relatively the same I feel like I'm on a grand spring break adventure for the moment. 

If you're looking for a reading adventure look no further than the beginning of my covid plague journal where I write about the beginning of the pandemic and the working conditions at the gig. There are many posts in the plague journal now after these two covid years. Read all about it here.

Let there be peace and love in the universe as well as within your life. 

Aristoi

Wow, what a terrific space opera god adventure story!

The way I described this book to people was this: this is a space opera about gods that become humanized. I mentioned Homer and his humanizing of his Olympians. So there's a long cherished tradition here going back throughout time, the western canon, of pathos, from Plato. What does it mean to be human? A god? What is good and evil? Who gets to justify right and wrong? These are some of the existential philosophical questions this book brings to mind in a general sense, disguised in the form of a 90s space opera. 

In addition to that, the momentum of the book never really stops, not even at the very bitter end. The story itself isn't remarkable, its rather predictable, and we've seen this same science fiction space opera tropes used time and time again within the golden age of science fiction and even the cyberpunk and new wave, it's rather space opera cliché. 

However, it is the way he tells the story that is truly a thrill. The style is simple but downright effective. It was never dull and every moment is a good one. I'm somewhat of a science fiction connoisseur but I missed this one all these years and I know I've missed much more. I would even say it's a required science fiction reading in the genre of space opera. It would be extremely difficult for a new science fiction writer in 2021 to write a space opera this good. It might even be downright impossible unless it was coming from overseas [not the US], maybe China.

The Decameron

What can I say about Boccaccio's Decameron? Well, for starters, its the best dirtiest book in the western canon. A group of noble young women and three men decide to travel and tell tales for ten nights, amongst the ten of them, telling ten tales, thus equaling 100 tales. There's some significance to the number ten as relating to the Greeks, which is where the Decameron name comes from.  It provides a document of life at the time. Written in the vernacular of the Florentine language, it is considered a masterpiece of classical early Italian prose.

Not every story here is a ten out of ten. In fact, every night perhaps three out of the ten tales that they tell aren't that great. But those other seven in fact have everything you would want in a story, book, or novel; adventure, picaresque, nobles, kings, queens, lords, peasants, farmers, thieves, murderers, a threesome even.

There's sex, lots and lots of sex. But the sex isn't described in a saucy or offensive way, rather it's more interesting albeit still provocative such as "the resurrection of the flesh," "they made the nightingale sing many times," phrases such as that. 

One of my favorite stories was the one where a young girl goes through a series of unfortunate events and finds herself getting fucked by nine different men over a short period of time. At the end of her misery she marries a King, who believes she is a virgin, and she fakes how good the sex is making it seem as if she really is a virgin. It was comical yet still realistic, showcasing something within the human condition. 

What is so fascinating about this book is that the stories are mostly about everyday people; nobles, lords, and peasants, there are lots of common ordinary peasants in the Decameron, and it seems that Bocaccio has a lot to say about them, the way the live, their wants and desires, which always somehow come back to lots and lots of sex. 

Most of the stories have an ABCD format. Something begins, then three things happen, and then the story is over. Some of the stories are only a page or two long, others are more complex. Although the stories are pretty simple, there's always something unexpected here and there to bring the stories to a climax. Usually in the form of actions and/or dialogue. 

Women take on a very important role here although they end up being the butt of a lot of the jokes. However, there are many stories where the wife commits adultery, right under the husband's nose and gets away with it, the wife being the better for it in the end even in terms of the morality of some of these stories. Consequently, you could see why in terms of morality, this book was condemned by the church and religious peoples. 

Boccaccio uses actions and dialogue to move the stories along. One of the finer details to note is that the language the people use is the common tongue and language of the people of the times, making the Decameron something noteworthy as a historical literary work in addition to being the best dirtiest book in the western canon. 

Again, some of the stories don't really go anywhere or are just for giggles, and that's okay. This book is a must read for readers of the western canon, medieval literature, and Italian literature. I was so inspired by Italy with Boccaccio that I've started reading Purgatorio of Dante's Divine Comedy. Before now, I've only read the Inferno. 

A must read for the western canon crowd or those interested in historical literature from the 13th century. 

Bertrand Russell The Problems of Philosophy

Great introduction to philosophy. It's not really the problems of philosophy that are important, rather the ideas where they come from, the terms, the definitions, the meanings, the different ways to explain, refute, and rationalization, in short, how to think about well, anything, and everything. 

If you've read a lot of philosophy, chances are you will know everything in this book, or at least be familiar with the ideas and concepts presented, but it's a good fresh reminder and Bertrand's final chapters here are especially refreshing for a retail philosopher in aisle 9 like myself. 

One of my favorite parts of the book was the chapter where Russell explains Hegelian dialectic in 15 pages. It's poignant, and the fact that I'm familiar with Hegel firsthand, I found Russell's interpretation quite appreciated and inciteful. 

Remember that his friend, Ludwig Wittgenstein said there are no problems with philosophy, only a problem with language. One is standing with the pillars of western philosophy and the other is smashing it to pieces in a way.

Dubliners

Dubliners by James Joyce is one of the best collections of short stories. Maybe the best ever of all time. Yes, it's that good. 

This is a collection of short stories based on people, their lives, relationships, and the history of their times in which they're living in, Victorian era. It's based in Dublin, Ireland, which is full of alcoholics, Catholics, Protestants, Priests, school children, working people, and rich people of the Victorian style era in which this is written. 

What makes James Joyce's stories here so great and so effective is that he writes a simple style that is easy to read and understand. Not only that, but his stories go somewhere emotionally, something that is very much lacking in modern entertainment like video games, television, and movies where things simply just happen in a linear escapade. 

One of the stories that hit me hard was the one where two friends are talking. One is a bigshot that made it in Europe, traveled everywhere, has a great career, wife, and kid. The other didn't make anything of himself and never left their hometown. We get the idea that the other didn't appreciate his friend because he declined his friends' offer to see his wife and kid, thinking that his friend thinks he's better than him because he's so successful in life. But at the end of the story we find that the successful one with the wife and kid is actually miserable and doesn't like his life. Things like that are impressive in writing, that sort of contrast.  

There's a meta magical realism in James Joyce's writing that is unmatched even by other writers of the same period like say for example, Jane Austen. It's realism but there's always a little something extra, a twist here and there that makes the short stories pop and shine with luster unmatched by other writers of his time period, of even the entire western canon. I haven't completely tapped into and understood this writing style completely, but I will understand more when I read more of his works, the next one being Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man. 

Lastly, a review can't be written without mentioning The Dead, the story at the end. Here we have a party where a wife and husband attend. The husband is ready to have sex with the wife in their hotel room, but he sees she's crying about something so it doesn't happen. It turned out that she was thinking about a boy she loved when she was younger, who was a great singer. Music is very important in Joyce's world. In Ireland. In Europe in general during this period. The husband realizes that his relationship with his wife is actually nothing in comparison with the boy who died loving her. The snow falls outside the window. It doesn't really get more meta than that. 

James Joyce is one of the greatest writers of the western canon. I plan on reading much more of his works: Portrait of an Artist as a Young Man, Ulysses, and Finnegan's Wake. 

Hegel's Phenomenology of Spirit

Spirit is Artist. Hegel describes daesein and spirit. Difficult but not if you've already read Kant, Wittgenstein, and Heidegger. The world is what it is, this being the case, Hegel is a true philosopher of dialectic. This is one of the most interesting philosophical works.

Thoughts on Tolstoy's War and Peace, Parts V-X

 

Okay, so if you have made it this far on my series on War and Peace, thanks for reading. Make sure you check out the last post here. So if you saw that post you noticed that although the book has many characters in it, I focused mostly on Pierre and Prince Andrey. 

Pierre goes on a hunt for spiritual enlightenment by joining the Freemasons. Andrey recovers from a near fatal wound from an army battle, only to come home and have his wife die from childbirth, the child Nikolai survives but Andrey feels bad that he didn't treat his wife better. 

Pierre's wife, who Pierre had a falling out with because he believed she was cheating on him, begs Pierre to take her back, and Pierre, urged by the Freemasons' laws of forgiveness, decides to take her back. 

Natasha, the Countess of the Rostov family, is engaged with Prince Andrey. However, she meets a new man, named Anatole who seamlessly gets her to fall in love with him, and him with her. Faced with new feelings of loving a different man other than Prince Andrey, she inevitably breaks off the marriage with Andrey, which was scheduled to go on. This entire section devoted to Natasha, her falling in, and consequently out of love is such a heartbreaking part of this book. Because when you see that she could have been happy if not for wanting more, wanting what she couldn't have, you see how capricious love really can be sometimes. What is also interesting is that Pierre realizes he's in love with Natasha. And Prince Andrey coldly accepts Natasha's break off of the engagement, but he doesn't wish to ever see her again. 

Meanwhile, the whole of Russia is fighting Napoleon's army. Napoleon is characterized by Tolstoy as a charismatic man, even a good man, although he has his moments of arrogance. At times he sounds like a guy who loves the sound of his own voice. But at other times, he's sympathetic, caring, charismatic, powerful, well spoken, the very best of the best qualities that leaders and generals all share. Napoleon is a man who has many virtues according to this description in the book. 

Alright, so all these things are happening right after the next. But it is also at the end of this section [or near it at least], where the rest of War and Peace becomes a reading difficulty, the strain on you from reading the book becomes much more intensified, there's a degree of heaviness that bears upon the soul. Because of that this is probably one of the most difficult, most intense books I have ever read, maybe will ever read, who knows. 

Because you see that Tolstoy puts every emotion: joy, surprise, fear, disgust, anger, contempt, and sadness, and all the variations on and between them. This is what is meant by the fact that the second part of War and Peace [this part and onward to the end] becomes less a literary novel and more a grand philosophical design. "Tolstoy wrote in a letter to Afanasy Fet that what he has written in War and Peace is also said by Schopenhauer in The World as Will and Representation. However, Tolstoy approaches it from the other side." [wiki]

"Tolstoy said War and Peace is "not a novel, even less is it a poem, and still less a historical chronicle." Large sections, especially the later chapters, are philosophical discussions rather than narrative. Tolstoy also said that the best Russian literature does not conform to standards and hence hesitated to call War and Peace a novel. Instead, he regarded Anna Karenina as his first true novel." [wiki]

So when Tolstoy puts these aristocrat characters in these very personal, intense situations, and then he goes into every detail of their lives in a grand philosophical way, you get to experience philosophy in a much more literal literary form. It's been simplified of course so that we can experience it more from our hearts rather than just from our heads. This is important to note because I think this is what is meant by the fact that Tolstoy says the same thing as Schopenhauer in his The World as Will and Representation, but "from the other side," the other side could perhaps be the heart rather than the head [or brain]. I've also seen this particular comparison in Fritz Lang's Metropolis [the mediator between, the heart and the brain]. 

The book has become immensely more difficult but I plan to be done with the novel perhaps by early next week, perhaps earlier. At this point its not about how long it takes to read 1200 pages, rather it is about all the thinking that takes place when one reads something like this. You'll be thinking a lot. Nonstop, in fact, it seems. 

Thoughts on Tolstoy's War and Peace, Parts I-V

 
So I'm reading War and Peace by Tolstoy for the first time. I figured I would do a writing exercise where I lay out my thoughts on what I've read so far and use it as further analysis for when I finish the book and inevitably write more about it. Because the book is some 1200 pages, I thought breaking it down into parts might be easier to read and understand, mostly for myself, but also for the readers. So without further adieu, here are my thoughts on War Peace Parts I-V, approximately from page 1 to 400, about 1/3 of the book. This will read like a reaction review.

For starters, this book is amazing. The beginning is quite complicated because Tolstoy introduces many characters at once, everybody is chatty, and many characters are introduced right after the other. What you get is that there are about 3 or 4 major characters, and everyone else are minor characters that might get more screen time later on, presumably. 

Pierre appears to be the "main", main character, a bastard son who's committed some crimes in the past, like the hilarious crime where he tied a police officer to a bear. He inherits a large some of money from the Count, his father, and is troubled by what he must do with it, as well as what he should do with his life in general. He thinks his wife is having an affair with a family friend, a gentlemen he's helped greatly in life. Pierre challenges him to a duel, and the poor man doesn't even fire at Pierre because of everything Pierre's done for him, but Pierre shoots him, satisfying his ego but destroying his soul in the process. Later, Pierre tries to pick the pieces and come to grace, by becoming a Freemason and changing his life forever, trying to become a better man; a better man to his peasants, his family, and his friends. Tolstoy goes into great detail, displaying Pierre's initiation into Freemasonry, and its quite what you would expect.

Prince Andrey seems to be another important, "main", character. He joins the army and fights against the French, fighting against Napoleon. He goes to war to prove himself and become a hero, he wants to be loved by men who will never know his name, but instead all he finds is death and suffering. He wants Pierre to apologize to his wife about the duel and the affair, for which Pierre had no evidence, but Pierre wants nothing to do with his wife and says he's done with it forever. 

Pierre and Andrey seem to me to be the two most important characters in the novel thus far. There are many other characters; children of the aristocrats [they're all rich people here except for the maids and peasants, who sometimes take on important roles], princesses, counts, generals, soldiers, the list goes on and on, but for me, I tend to focus on Pierre and Andrey because Tolstoy writes them [as well as the minor characters, fantastically] with such detailed precision, its like an x-ray onto the character. Tolstoy goes into the general character, their thoughts, their moods, their language and dialogue, but he also goes into the soul of the character; mind, body, and spirit, which brings me to my next point. 

At this point in the book one begins to realize that this is not just a book, not just a story. Sure, there are innovative plot points and the narrative flows better than most fiction today [the development of good story and narration is something I learned a lot about from Don Quixote, but Tolstoy is such a master of this art, that it leaves one awestruck], but what I'm getting at is that this book isn't just a story, or about characters, or about war and peace, rather it could perhaps be a grand philosophical opus. Tolstoy himself said that War and Peace was his take on German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer's ideas, particularly his masterpiece, The World as Will and Representation. 

Here is where the reader must know Kant, and must know that Schopenhauer's ideas take off from Kant's metaphysical system of transcendental idealism. 

Schopenhauer saw the human will as our one window to the reality behind the world as representation, i.e. the external world as we experience it through our mental faculties. According to Schopenhauer, the will is the 'inner essence' of the entire world, i.e. the Kantian thing-in-itself (Ding an sich), and exists independently of the forms of the principle of sufficient reason that govern the world as representation. Schopenhauer believed that while we may be precluded from direct knowledge of the Kantian noumenon, we may gain knowledge about it to a certain extent (unlike Kant, for whom the noumenon was completely unknowable). This is because, according to Schopenhauer, the relationship between the world as representation and the world as it is 'in itself' can be understood by investigating the relationship between our bodies (material objects, i.e. representations, existing in space and time) and our will. [wiki] 

That's very intense German metaphysics for the laymen, but the ideas represented do fit like a missing puzzle piece to this great novel. Why do you think this novel is so great? Of course Tolstoy read Schopenhauer and took some ideas of it for War and Peace.

More on this subject when I reach the halfway point. Watch this space.   

The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha

"The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha (Modern Spanish: El ingenioso hidalgo (in Part 2, caballero) Don Quijote de la Mancha, is a Spanish novel by Miguel de Cervantes. It was published in two parts, in 1605 and 1615. A founding work of Western literature, it is often labeled "the first modern novel" and many authors consider it to be the best literary work ever written." [wiki]

 The book is about an old noble named Alonso Quixano, who reads so many books of knighthood and chivalry that he goes mad out of his mind, decides he's a knight, and goes out on adventures; helping fair maidens, righting wrongs, dreaming the impossible dream. Once he reinvents himself as Don Quixote de la Mancha, he recruits a simple farmer named Sancho Panza as his squire. Although Sancho is a simple farmer, he speaks eloquently at times throughout the novel, and he's a master of endless proverbs, much to Quixote's chagrin. 

To put it simply, Don Quixote doesn't want to or simply doesn't understand or take the world for what it is [1600s Spain] and instead decides to live in a fantasy where he's a knight. The book takes place in the 1600s, in Spain, so at that point the people of his world think he's a lunatic, for knighthood and chivalry were seen as things of the past, medieval. People had already moved past that at this point, in the novel, and in the real time period in which Cervantes wrote the book. 

"The book was a bestseller and had a strong impact on the literary community, influencing works like Alexandre Dumas' The Three Musketeers (1844) and Mark Twain's Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (1884). The 19th-century German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer cited Don Quixote as one of the four greatest novels ever written." [wiki]

I consider Don Quixote as the all time best example of the first modern novel. It bridges the gap between medieval classical literature and modern literature. Why is this the case? Well, for starters, the old medieval literature that comes before this period puts God above all else. As above, so below. The ancient literature might not be about the Christian God, rather it revolves around other deities, like the Greek or Roman gods, or others. Literature back then was meant solely for the glorification of God or gods, sometimes employing heroes to carry out their bidding.

Here comes Don Quixote in 1605. Although it isn't the "first" example of what I would consider modern literature, it's surely the best and does it the best. This differs from ancient and medieval literature because its one of the first and best examples of the transition from ancient/medieval literature to modern literature. Why? Because you can clearly see that the transition from glorification to God goes to being about the individual, becoming less religious, but still examining central themes that every novel has; looking at virtue, the mind, the body, and the soul. Just as important is the fact that this is the first example in literature where we have a linear story-line, stellar story telling, narrative development, and a beginning, middle, and end. Mostly all other works of fiction prior wasn't like this although you can find little snippets and elements throughout various time periods and other countries' works of fiction. For these reasons, Don Quixote is in my opinion, one of the best books of all time, maybe the best novel ever written. 

Don Quixote is considered both a comedy and a tragedy. For its time it was considered comic. You can say its central idea is that individual can be right while society is wrong. It was considered social commentary, satire, if you will. 

What does it mean? This is a hard question to tackle, because the work is open to many different interpretations. For myself, I saw the work like a comedy or satire movie. I watched a man bewitched with his silly knight-errantry. I laughed throughout most of his silly adventures but there was always certain moments when I would stop laughing and think this is quite sad, this gentlemen being so far out of wack that he doesn't even know when he's being taken advantage of. The beauty of the work is that even if you find it tragic, or even if you find it too funny, you're never laughing or crying too long, because Cervantes throws so much at you; more plot development, more characters, more actions, more dialogue, more of everything, more is more. Because of this you don't [or at least I didn't] get bogged down by my emotions. 

The one truly emotional part, for me at least, was at the halfway mark through the book, where Don Quixote gets into too much trouble, gets really hurt, almost dies, and goes back to his house to get rest and heal from his wounds. This is where he might denounce knighthood and end it all forever, and just relax at home. When he gets home, his niece and his maid are worried sick for him, and are so afraid he might die from his wounds, that they are tearing their hair out and cursing knighthood and chivalry. That was when I realized how powerful this book truly is and was.

What the book means to me is quite simple. Even if you are mad, your reality is only substantiated by society so much. In a way, you are your reality. I think, therefore I am. Don Quixote thinks he's a knight-errant, so he is a knight-errant. It's very simple but very deep in a philosophical way and individualistic way. 

Lastly, it must be mentioned that this novel made me see the development and history of the novel in good form. The progression of beginning, middle, and end, development of story, narration, dialogue, action, plot, climax, are all great elements within the novel. Although I was aware of all of these important literary devices, it was only while reading Don Quixote that I came to understand, see, and analyze these devices in other works of literature, news articles, and even in spoken dialogue between friends and family. There's a form and there's substance, you can see it when it's there, and you can see it when it's missing. This was such a big revelation to me as a reader and a people's person, who gets so much out of spoken dialogue with friends, family, acquaintances, and customers. 

There's a way to tell a story and Cervantes was a master of doing so. I'll definitely check it out again at some point and take a look at some other translations. I switched between reading the late 1800s Ormsby translation and the modern Edith Grossman translation. I like the older translation better for a more literal older style and I liked Edith Grossman's translation for its simplicity. This is one of the best novels, you must read this if you like books, especially classics of the western canon. Even if you can't read all 800 pages, just being familiar with the work will make an impression upon you.  

"Bewitched with his silly knight-errantry."

It's the holiday season

Howdy, yall? Thought I'd write a short post late tonight. I haven't been writing much. Not because there's nothing to write about. I've been sick this whole week straight. I'm actually still sick but am in recovery mode from a serious cold. It started as faint flu-like symptoms earlier in the week and lasted the entire week until today...Sunday. 

Sunday Funday, as they say. I'm going in for a late 1am shift again. But this time I won't be sick. So I'll be more up to it. Have a better attitude and all that jazz. Although I haven't been writing as often I've been busier than ever. 

I've been playing a lot of guitar for one thing. Practicing Sequenza by Luciano Berio as well as my improvising skills. I took a break from the jazz duo jam session this week because I was sick but we will resume this upcoming week. 

For another thing, I finished a book in a single day today on my day off from work. I finished reading Ursula K. LeGuin's second novel, Planet in Exile, the second book in her Hainish trilogy cycle. Her first three novels. I'll probably write a post about all three books when I'm finished. Also, I recently finished reading Susan Sontag's second collection of essays entitled Styles of Radical Will. What a transformative informative read that was. 

I haven't even started on any holiday shopping but I'll get it done on my days off later this week. It's truly the holiday season. This time of year always reminds me of Paul McCartney doing that Christmas song, "Simply having, a wonderful Christmas time." Great tune, Paul. 

The job has been really tough this week with the flu/cold. I really wanted to call out four times in a row but sometimes you gotta tough it out and go with the flow. Especially when you need that holiday pay for Christmas gifts.  

I've been listening to a lot of straight-ahead jazz. That's been my spirit music for the longest now. I've given the 60s rock and roll a break. Too much Mothers of Invention and The Beatles. There's only so much Sgt. Pepper, Freak Out, Revolver, and We're Only In It For The Money I can take.

I've ordered a bunch of great books that I plan on reading soon. The list includes Sontag Under the Sign of Saturn, Dante Divine Comedy, Kant Critique of Pure Reason, Kushner Telex from Cuba, Goethe Faust, and more. I want to read more science fiction as well. Perhaps more LeGuin, say, The Dispossessed, or the Lathe of Heaven, heck, why not both? 

As a result of all this reading, my computer time has dwindled down to maybe an hour a day or just not at all. I don't even really play computer games anymore. There's just not enough time in the day if I want to read, play guitar, and go to work. 

That's the end of this one. Happy holidays!

The Canterbury Tales

The Canterbury Tales is a collection of 24 stories running over 17,000 lines written in Middle English by Geoffrey Chaucer between 1387 and 1400. Chaucer was appointed Controller of Customs and Justice of Peace, and in 1389, Clerk of the King's work. It was during this time that Chaucer wrote the Canterbury Tales. He was a court poet that wrote for nobility.

Although Chaucer wrote other works it is Canterbury Tales that is considered his magnum opus. He uses the stories within stories to satirize, and paint a critical and ironical picture of English society of the times. The fact that all the characters in the story are all from a cornucopia of social classes was something fairly new to English literature. Even poorer, more lowly classes could still call out a more noble, character, like a knight, and stop them mid-story, to criticize and tell their own story instead. Because of all the characters here are on a pilgrimage, they are all concerned with everything spiritual. The work itself is considered incomplete especially considering that all the characters didn't get to tell their stories. The work is generally opened to a lot of different interpretations. 

Canterbury Tales is a sort of stories within stories. We have some 30 pilgrims at a tavern. They are all on pilgrimage to St. Thomas Beckett's Shrine. We have our host proclaiming, "Tell your best stories. The one who tells the best story shall have a feast here when we get back and I shall pay for it." Needless to say, everybody from the knight to the parson tells a story. Some are short, some long, some serious, some jokey, some holy, some about love, some about chivalry, some epic like the knight's tale. What's interesting is that other characters interrupt and/or stop some stories by calling them out and criticizing them [regardless of social class or wealth], sometimes thereby starting their own tale.   

I enjoyed the knight's tale the most. It opens the book and gets the reader acquainted with the style of the book. Two cousins, Palamon and Arcite, both knights are in prison and they chance upon a beautiful woman, Emily from their cell windows. They both claim her but they both can't have her. They end up having this epic duel with 100 warriors on both sides. Palamon is wounded by a chance sword thrust from one of Arcite's men, leaving Arcite the victor, but then Arcite is mortally wounded by his horse throwing him off and falling on him, leaving Palamon to marry Emily. The story is epic and intended to be. The next story is an antithesis to this knight's tale of courtly love and chivalry. In the next story, the miller's story, it is about regular people in love and is more lowbrow.

As stories go, none of them are especially terrific or satisfying in my opinion. In fact, I didn't start to thoroughly enjoy the book until at least 150/484 pages. Why? Because I was expecting the stories to be more thrilling. What I found out was that as I read farther on, the stories didn't become particularly more interesting, rather, my thoughts on them changed. I began to find seemingly unimportant yet realistic stories for the medieval time, to be fun. How, why? I'm not even quite sure. Like I said I didn't get into the book until nearly 150 pages in. In fact, I found the constant rhyming going on nonstop to be quite jarring to get used to, especially considering the format is poetic but of an especially non-epic quality. Homer is forgiven for constant rhyme but I wasn't so sure about Chaucer. Consider the fact that most of these archaic works of literature that I've read have been epic, think Aeneid, Odysee, Iliad, Beowulf, Gilgamesh, Divine Comedy, so when you come to Canterbury Tales from all that you just say to yourself, "where's the action?" That was what made Canterbury Tales so hard to get into for me. Eventually, the text speaks for itself and you see how great and important it really is. For me, it took a while to sink in.

It is believed Chaucer got a good deal of his ideas from other literary works. But no other works of literature featured pilgrims telling tales together. In that sense, he's a true visionary. Harold Bloom says the text is mostly original but the idea of the host, a "master of ceremonies" was derived from Dante and Virgil in the Divine Comedy. The Decameron by Giovanni Boccaccio is most similar to the Canterbury Tales than any other work. It features a cast of characters telling stories as they flee from the Black Death. It is believed that Chaucer might have known him.

The tales themselves usually center around a single theme, mostly religious. However, the themes here aren't necessarily all religious or set. They're dependent upon the characters themselves and they don't speak in any sort of hierarchy. The passage of the time, or any traveling what so ever, or even locations along the way, is never mentioned. Rather the stories themselves are all that is spoken of. 

The version I read was a modern English translation, translated by Nevill Coghill. His translation is very smooth, breezy even in the most difficult of circumstances. Considering this is almost a 500-page book, the modern translation reads almost like modern-day. Of course, it really doesn't. What I mean is that it's very smooth as opposed to old medieval English. The words used sometimes can still be complicated and I did still have to look words up online at times. Another thing that must be said about Canterbury Tales is that a lot of the lines rhyme and they are definitely in poetic verse. Sometimes the rhyming gets overwhelming. That's typical for a lot of the 14th-century prose. But overall, for my first Canterbury Tales experience, the Penguin Classics modern translation was very good. I'll try reading it again in the future, but a different translation. I would recommend this book to anyone: students, writers, readers who like the western canon especially. A "do not miss" book.