Learning Italo Calvino's Literary Oeuvre

Il Duce. Mussolini in Mailand, May 1930. Photo [CC-BY-SA 3.0] via Wikimedia.

Into the War by Italo Calvino

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

Calvino wrote these three short autobiographical stories despite his criticism of autobiographies. The works were written in Italian in 1954, and only translated into English in 2011. 

The stories tell the tale of Calvino's youth in Mussolini's Italy at the beginning of the Second World War. Calvino was too young to serve when war broke out, and by the time he was of age to serve, he avoided the Fascist draft and become a partisan. 

A few things stand out for me. Life in the early period of the war seems to have been quite mundane, especially for a teenager. The usual goings-on of teenage life seem to fit, relatively unchanged, into the backdrop of war. Even a trip to the newly conquered French town of Menton provides mostly a backdrop for what a teenage boy might do. 

At the same time, a subtext of the Fascist movement is ever-present, and subtle hints at the Fascist's glorying in their conquering as if re-imagining a Roman past appear in the actions and words of the adults who direct the boys in their guard and sentry duties. 

In his translator's introduction, Martin McLaughlin mentions Calvino's relationship with his father, and how the father concludes the three short stories by walking off with his dog to do his normal duties as if nothing else was going on. While the likes of Mortimer Adler have suggested not reading introductions before embarking on a new book, I find it increasingly useful when I am in the early stages of reading an author's works. 

This is only my fourth Calvino work, and I am yet to grasp the nature of his oeuvre. I found the same when first reading Hemingway, but after learning more about his life and other non-literary background readings, I came to better appreciate his work as I read it. 

I found the introduction useful with Calvino and I was able to follow the subtle hints to the backstory of his father that I may have otherwise missed. The translation seems to work well, and if anything is lost in translation I can only imagine how brilliant Calvino's work must be in the original (if I could read Italian, that is). 

Already, I am surprised by the diversity of Calvino's work, especially when compared with Hemingway, where almost all of his work (except perhaps Garden of Eden, although it is somewhat the antithesis) is a variation on a theme. I am intrigued by Calvino. 

Whether it is reading someone other than an Anglophone I am not sure, but I have the same experience of reading Walter Benjamin or even Harold Bloom. This makes me think that Calvino's literary work is brilliant. And that's it.

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The Republic: Religion rules, recipes for today's kitchens, and ¿Qué?

The Allegory of the Cave, Book VII. By Corpalma, 2011 [CC BY-SA 3.0] via Wikimedia.

The Republic by Plato

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Three things struck me about The Republic. The first is the incorporation of theology into philosophy. For all the goings on about religion in recent times and the apparent "victory" of science, Plato's philosophy begins and ends with Heraclitus' God. Almost none of the philosophy makes sense without the soul or a higher purpose for humans, and an intelligent deity that has ordered it all to be so.

Second, The Republic is a handbook for politics. Hardly an idea has escaped tyrants or politicians. Parts of the work are basically a program for political action. Of course, the examples provided from ancient times are not necessarily the equivalent of the polis today, but there is certainly an element of prediction that cannot be ignored. 

And third, the art of translation has a significant influence on the readability of classic texts, and this translation by Desmond Lee is fascinating. Lee includes extensive notes throughout the text. Many of the notes relate to the various translations by others, and Lee often admits when he is not sure of his translation. 

After reading Benjamin Jowett's translation of Meno, I was disappointed with how annoying Socrates appeared in the dialogue. Nonetheless, the dialogue in The Republic is so contrived as to make me wonder why bother having the interjections from the audience (who always agree with Socrates even when the logic is obscure?). 

Of course, dialogue is a literary and political device, but the differences between the various translations are significant, as they are with Homer's epic poetry. My marginalia is too extensive to write up in this space, but I have kept notes on pedagogy, the reliance on God to make sense of the philosophy, numerous other readings to complete, and Plato's various ideas that make this work timeless. 

One quote relating to teaching struck a chord (p. 300):

The teacher fears and panders to his pupils, who in turn despise their teachers and attendants.

As did the many references to democracy leading to tyranny brought about by a popular champion. Once again, I find that a complete reading reveals so much of my education that did not make a direct link to the original source. 

The allegory of the cave appears in almost any undergraduate degree in politics, but in such a cut-down version as to make the entire idea in relation to the allegory of the Sun and the Line and the division of knowledge into its levels of "truth" disappear. It makes we wonder how much has been lost by perpetually drawing on secondary sources in education. 

Again, translation fascinates me and I regret not having learnt more than one language when I was young, so I can only trust that Lee's translation does the original work justice (no pun intended). If I had known the impact a complete reading of this work would have on me, I would have attempted it much earlier. 

Having said that, without having read Homer, Hesiod, Heraclitus, and the Stoics, I think much of The Republic would have gone straight over my head. I have since commenced reading The Laws while I am in sync with Platos' dialectical dramatisation.

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Sir Walter Ralegh: Poet, soldier, explorer

"Raleigh's First Pipe in England" - an illustration included in Frederick William Fairholt's "Tobacco, its history and associations". [Public Domain] via Wikimedia.

Poems by Walter Raleigh

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I must admit I had no idea Sir Walter Ralegh (alternatively spelt Raleigh) was a poet. This volume is interesting as it outlines the purpose of such poetry as a form of "appropriate" court communication that would otherwise be unacceptable in ordinary speech.

The book includes some of the poetic responses to Ralegh's work, especially from Queen Elizabeth and Ralegh's arch-rival, Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex. These two engaged in literary as well as political struggles. From what I have read about Ralegh, he was a key figure in the English Renaissance, and many members of the aristocracy dabbled in poetry. 

This book includes some of Ralegh's translations of classical Greek and Roman works into rhyming poetry, no doubt reflecting his education at Oxford (which was never completed). The ABAB rhyme scheme was quite common in many of the works, but several of the poems include ABBA and ABABCC rhyme schemes in the stanzas. 

I was surprised that such rigid rhyme schemes were used and the book develops a sort of rhythm that only appears to be interrupted in the section where poems "attributed" to Ralegh seem to miss a few beats. 

Two poems by Sir Henry Wotton, "The Character of a Happy Life" (p. 109) and "Upon the Sudden Restraint of the Earl of Somerset, then Falling from Favour" (p. 111) are worthy of quoting (respectively):

How happy is he born and taught, That serveth not another's will... This man is freed from servile bands, Of hope to rise or fear to fall, Lord of himself, though not of lands, And, having nothing, yet hath all.

And:

Virtue is the roughest way, But proves at night a bed of down.

I sense some Stoic training in these lines. Wotton was a member of the House of Commons and an English diplomat before becoming provost of Eton College. 

From this small snippet of history, there is little wonder that Shakespeare emerged during this period, often regarded as the height of the English Renaissance. 

It was interesting to see Ralegh's use of smoke (from tobacco) and smoking pipes in his poems. Surprising, too, that Shakespeare died two years before Ralegh, supposedly from drinking, whereas Ralegh was beheaded. 

One of the many smoking stories about Ralegh suggests that he was nonchalantly smoking his pipe in the window of his cell in the Tower of London as he watched Essex being executed. 

I have generally avoided this period in history as I am yet to do a cover to cover reading of Thomas Hobbes Leviathan, and I am dreading a reading of the tome of Shakespeare's complete collection that is sitting there waiting for me when I can read without distraction. 

Yet all roads in English literature are leading to this period in history, and it was a pleasant surprise to learn something new about someone I had only ever known in the history books as a soldier and a maritime explorer.

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