On Taste, Sound, and Smell: Calvino's unfinished business

Skunks rayé ou mouffette. Photo by Tomfriedel [CC BY 3.0] via Wikimedia.

Under The Jaguar Sun by Italo Calvino

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

My experience of Calvino is quite limited, but after reading his Why Read the Classics, learning more about Calvino's influence from Harold Bloom, and more recently purchasing The Cambridge Companion to the Italian Novel, I have decided to immerse myself in Calvino's work. 

In Under the Jaguar Sun, Calvino begins what was planned to be a novel on the five senses. Unfortunately, Calvino died before he was able to complete sight and touch, but the three short stories on taste, sound, and smell survive and work as stand alone pieces, or pieces on a theme. 

The first story (the title piece) covers taste and tells the story of a couple of gastro-tourists discovering the link between taste and ancient Central American human sacrifice and cannibalism. 

The second piece, "A King Listens", had me shivering with imagery so vivid as to be on the edge of surreal. 

The third piece, "The Name, the Nose", was my favourite, although I can barely work out what was meant to have happened. This is, so far, the most gritty of Calvino's work I have read. 

It reminded me of Bukowski crossed with Thomas Mann. The language seems suited to the 1980s (when it was written), but after mostly reviews of classic works and Marcovaldo, I wasn't ready for Calvino to be so grunge. 

Cynthia Ozock's review in the New York Times of 23 October 1988 suggests "The Name, the Nose" was not a success. 

But I found it interesting in the way it echoes Arthur Schnitzler's Dream Story. Or rather, having previously thought of Calvino as a late-nineteenth early-twentieth century writer, "The Name, the Nose" is more like Stanley Kubrick's Eyes Wide Shut, where you get the sense that the characters and setting are of another time, but not as in the "on steroids" Baz Luhrmann version of Romeo and Juliet. 

I am often amazed at how good short stories can fire up the imagination in such a way that the work takes some time to digest. "The Name, the Nose" has left its residue, and while it may not be regarded as one of Calvino's best, I am pleased to discover that his range is not as limited as I first thought.

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Plato finds God, modern philosophers ignore Him, ego ruins Socratic method

Discourse into the Night, from William Blades' "Pentateuch of Printing with a Chapter on Judges” (1891). [Public Domain] via Wikimedia.

Meno by Plato

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This short dialogue on the issue of virtue (arete) and whether it can be taught is apparently one of Plato's works from his second literary period, written after Book 1 but before the remaining books of The Republic. The introduction to this version is by the translator, Benjamin Jowett.

There are few references to other works in the modern academic tradition, but Jowett makes particular mention of Meno in relation to the works of Descartes, Locke, Bacon, Hume, Spinoza, and Berkeley. I found this interesting as I have been exploring deductive versus inductive methods of research in recent times. Plato tends to be deductive, in moving from general ideas and principles to specifics, whereas the inductive method draws on specific cases to lead to general principles. Karl Popper was not a fan of induction, it seems.

That Plato draws on Pythagoras and Heraclitus is obvious, but Jowett points out that there is no explicitly stated link. Most interesting was Plato's finding (through the words of Socrates, p. 75):

Then, Meno, the conclusion is that virtue comes to the virtuous by the gift of God.

That this is an early work makes sense. I frequently adopt the Socratic method in my teaching (as does much of academe even if implicitly) and a few times I have received feedback that sums it up thus:

The Socratic method sucks. I hate it.

By the end of this work, I couldn't help think that Socrates was being egotistical. Sure, he tried to shock people to realise their ignorance, but in this case, and as important as the idea is to so many philosophers, but in particular, Heraclitus, I thought the finding was quite a cop-out. All that posturing to say what Heraclitus had said more eloquently?

The big lesson for me is that the Socratic method, when practised by the un- or under-practised, could easily come off as it does in Meno. I am half-way through a cover-to-cover reading of The Republic at the moment, which seems better polished and far less obtuse. It may well be that Desmond Lee's translation is better than Jowett's. But clearly, if I am to be better at using the Socratic method, I must take into account how an amateurish use of the method may come off as egotistical with my students. I can recall the instances where this may well have been the case.

But the idea of deduction versus induction and Jowett's comments on Plato in relation to other philosophers ranging from Descartes to Spinoza are worthy of further exploration.

Additionally, Jowett states that modern philosophy no longer asks the sort of questions asked by Plato (p. 29). I think this explains why Nietzsche's madman shouts in the market place (The Gay Science, section 125, p. 90):

God is dead! ... And we have killed him!

Here Plato has Socrates tell us that virtue is a gift of God, which I can see means that to be virtuous requires one to find God. Rather than the shopkeepers telling Nietzsche's madman that they didn't know we had lost Him, and in spite of Plato's unrefined use of the dialogue (compared to his more advanced, later use), it would seem that modern philosophers are the crowd looking on and laughing at Nietzsche's madman (or, if you prefer, Huxley's self-flagellating Savage), while all the time they have forgotten their very origins. 

But best not to be egotistical and amateurish.

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Ralph Waldo Trine: Inspirational stuff, but no cure for illness

Infrared Echoes of a Black Hole Eating a Star (Illustration). Image Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech

In Tune with the Infinite: Ralph Waldo Trine's Motivational Classic - Complete Original Text by Ralph Waldo Trine

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This book reads like a series of sermons and draws on the "law of attraction".  Apparently, it inspired Napoleon Hill's book Think and Grow Rich. In its modern form, it might be compared to The Secret, but Trine was an academic and his practical influence inspired the likes of Henry Ford to greatness. 

This work is of the New Thought Movement which apparently developed from Christian Science. Members of the Christian Science church believe that illness can be cured by prayer alone and works best when not combined with medicine. Yet members of the congregation have been in trouble with the law for refusing to give their children medicine. 

None of this is covered by Trine, but he too suggests that the ailments of the body are a result of poor living and can be cured through right living. When taken to the extreme, it seems that Trine's work is less helpful in a practical sense. However, Trine's work draws on the teachings of Jesus and his scholarly background is obvious. Trine states (p. 108):

It has been my aim to base nothing on the teachings of others, though they may be the teachings of those inspired.

Yet it is obvious that he was familiar with Stoicism and the work of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Trine's work is inspiring and I took copious notes. He suggests that all religions are based on a single truth and that it does not matter what religion one follows. He covers a lot of ground, including pedagogy (p. 67):

The true teacher is one whose endeavour is to bring the one they teach to a true knowledge of himself and hence of his or her own interior powers, that they may become their own interpreter.

He discusses the creation of art, literature, and music and suggests that great works emanate from one who knows both God and oneself, echoing the ideas of the ancient Greek philosophers. Further, his work echoes Nietzsche's concept of amor fati (p. 52):

You must recognise, you must realise yourself as one with Infinite Spirit. God's will is then your will, your will is God's will, and with God all things are possible.

While I will not be taking Trine's medical advice any time soon, there is much to be gained from a reading of this work. Originally published in 1897, it is one of the earliest self-help books I have read. Although he was at one time a salesman, Trine was no charlatan - he was a philosopher and a teacher and lived to the age of 92, realising in many ways what he argues in this book. 

This work amounts to a series of sermons based on some of the greatest philosophical ideas about the inner life. Although it is not referenced (although he occasionally refers to authors and prominent individuals), this is as good an overview of the inner life as I have read. 

The big lesson I take away from this book is to have faith and to be cautious of the thought-word-action cycle so as to avoid self-fulfilling prophecies. But make sure you go to the doctor if you get sick.

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