the sleep of reason

For a long time, I misunderstood Goya's The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters. Goya wanted to express that when Reason is absent, the forces of irrationality, ignorance and folly take over, with dire results. A typical Enlightenment point of view. Or maybe, as the Wikipedia page says, the etching is a Romantic embrace of unbridled imagination and emotion, wherever it leads. Either way, both the Enlightenment and Romantic interpretations agree that it is the abeyance of Reason's restraining powers what brings about the horrors —or the creative efflorescences.

But for me, Goya's engraving suggested something very different: that when Reason dreams, when it frees itself from the constraints of reality and the obtuse and paralyzing absurdity of the world, when it attempts to completely fulfill itself according to its own principles... that's what ends up creating the monsters. Is not the owl a symbol of knowledge, after all? For me the sleep of Reason didn't represent an abdication, but a momentary glimpse into its own apotheosis —which turns out to be a nightmare.

I suppose mine was a very Post-enlightenment, post twentieth-century interpretation. I think it is in line with Poincaré's assertion that "logic sometimes breeds monsters", although he was talking about deeply counterintuitive and seemingly aberrant mathematical results:

Logic sometimes breeds monsters. For half a century there has been springing up a host of weird functions, which seem to strive to have as little resemblance as possible to honest functions that are of some use. No more continuity, or else continuity but no derivatives, etc... Formerly, when a new function was invented, it was in view of some practical end. Today they are invented on purpose to show our ancestors’ reasonings at fault, and we shall never get anything more out of them.

"shop talk"

Most reviews of Jack Vance's autobiography "This Is Me, Jack Vance" point out that he avoids talking about his own writing for the most part. Apparently, he dislikes such "shop talk", as he calls it.

Well, he wasn't as reticent near the beginning of his writing career, as this snippet taken from The Illustrated Vance shows (click to enlarge):

The story being discussed is "Phallid's Fate".

an eye-popping fact

Jacksonborough was formerly the county site, situated on Beaver Dam creek, 10 miles from Savannah river, 55 from Augusta, and 70 from Savannah. It is now almost a deserted village. The place had formerly a very bad character. It was reported, that in the mornings after drunken frolics and fights, you could see the children picking up eyeballs in tea-saucers!

That quote, which reads like an hyperbole from one of R. A. Lafferty's tall tales, actually comes from from George White's "Statistics of the state of Georgia" (1849). I encountered it while searching for information on Lorenzo Dow, who is passingly mentioned in Harold Frederic's novel The Damnation of Theron Ware.

All the People

Anthony Trotz went first to the politician, Mike Delado.

"How many people do you know, Mr. Delado?"

"Why the question?"

"I am wondering just what amount of detail the mind can hold."

"To a degree I know many. Ten thousand well, thirty thousand by name, probably a hundred thousand by face and to shake hands with."

"And what is the limit?"

This is the beginning of R. A. Lafferty's story "All the People". It doesn't have much of a plot; it occupies itself with describing how weird would be for a person to know all the people in the world. In a way, the story anticipates the concept of Dunbar's number.

I wonder what kind of social processes take place when a small business expands, the number of its staff growing beyond Dunbar's number. It must be a critical phase, something like the social equivalent of breaking the sound barrier: the shock can be dangerous if the structure isn't sturdy enough.

some history books (2)

This time about France:

• France, mediaeval and modern, a history [1918]
• Medieval France : a companion to French studies [1922]

Also, let's not forget John Merriman's course France Since 1871 at Open Yale.

The City & The City

I haven't read any China Miéville yet, since the usual comments about his work suggested a tiresome inflation of weirdness for weirdness' sake. But Paul DiFilippo's review of "The City & The City" makes it sound like an interesting book:

Besźel is overlaid in enigmatic, never-fully-explicated fashion by a sister-state, Ul Qoma, which possesses a distinctly different cultural and political setup. At some point millennia ago, the two states were one. But then came the inexplicable Cleavage, a climacteric both physical and mental. Ever since, the citizens of each "overlapping magisterium" (to contort Stephen Jay Gould's famous phrase about the separation of science and religion) are prohibited from interacting on a daily basis, even in the slightest fashion. From earliest youth, individuals in Besźel are taught to "unsee" any parallel structures and events and people in Ul Qoma. The citizens of Ul Qoma do likewise. Any accidental or deliberate interaction between the two realms is deemed "breach," and is punished severely by the near-omnipotent agency of that same name.

The premise of two separate populations living in the same city without interacting, or even seeing each other, is reminiscent of Jack Vance's story "Ulan Dhor", from The Dying Earth.

(later) "Ulan Dhor" also resonates with some aspects of Jeff VanderMeer's "City of Saints and Madmen", as he himself has mentioned.

Geography and History

I'm trying to find a good book about the influence of Geography on History. Not at the macro level (in the style of Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs and Steel") but rather at a smaller level explaining the success of failure of particular polities.

Meanwhile, I try to notice instances of geographical reasoning on regular history books. Like the following passage, which explains the relative paucity of republics on the plains of Lombardy during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance:

Although this danger [Ezzelino] had been got rid of, no town in the northern plains of Italy, except Venice, was able to establish a durable republic. The poet tells us that liberty has two voices, one of the sea, and the other of the mountains. Freedom dwells upon the heights, and not upon the plains. The plains of Lombardy were peculiarly suited to the evolutions of cavalry, and cavalry was especially the arm of the nobles, as infantry was of the citizens in the towns. Hence the great towns Milan, Verona, and Padua, were no sooner free from one master than they fell under the dominion of another. This encroachment was also assisted by the fact that the towns were obliged to allow themselves to be defended by some nobles of their choice against the attack of a robber chieftain who might swoop down upon them from the mountains. They were obliged to oppose cavalry of their own to the cavalry of their enemies. We find the power of more than one of these houses raised upon the ruins of the authority of Ezzelino.

—Guelphs & Ghibellines : a short history of mediaeval Italy from 1250-1409.

The same book mentions how Pisa's lack of natural defenses was a decisive factor in the eclipse of the city by Genoa:

The weakness of Pisa consisted in the plain which lay behind it. That was occupied by a number of hostile towns Lucca, Florence, Arezzo always ready to take advantage of a moment of misfortune. Genoa, on the other hand, her victorious rival, was backed by the ridge of the impassable Apennines. The cornice or narrow ledge of coast road between Genoa and Spezzia, offered points of vantage for many a little town, which owed allegiance to her proud mistress, but to no one else. The busy ports were well suited for shipbuilding ; the sea supplied the wealth and sustenance which the hills denied. Every village sent forth its contingent of hardy sailors, no unworthy fellow-countrymen of Columbus. For these reasons the contest between the two cities was unequal, and the issue could not be doubtful.

The importance of an easily defensible position for the prosperity of Genoa and Venice is touched in Nick Szabo's essay History and the Security of Property.

I also found the following bit about Corsica interesting:

The position of Corsica was peculiar. That island is divided into two parts by a very high range of mountains, whose summits rival the loftiest peaks of the Apennines. At a time when all communication was effected by sea, the two sides of the island knew very little about each other. They stood, as it were, back to back, one half owning allegiance to Ajaccio, the other to Bastia ; the western half dependent on Genoa, the eastern to Pisa.

Another book notices Siena's unpropitious location:

If beauty of situation determined the importance of a city, Siena would have been second to none in Italy. But, unfortunately, the unrivalled site imposed a number of permanent material drawbacks. One alone of these, the lack of water, constituted no less than a calamity; for at their sources among the hills the Elsa and the Ombrone are mere brooks, not only unsuited to navigation but incapable even of yielding a liberal supply of drinking water for man and beast. Was it conceivable that Siena should ever overcome this fundamental disability? Was it at all likely that a town suffering from scarcity of water and deprived of what in early times was always the safest means of communication with the surrounding territory, a generous water-course, should ever become a great directive agent of civilization? No, its action would necessarily be limited, its world would be hardly more than the dependent district which the citizen, gazing from the ramparts, saw lying at his feet. The story of Siena, set high and dry among the hills, could never be the tale of a world centre, such as Venice, or Milan, or Florence, bestriding each, like a colossus, one of the great and convenient highways of the Italian peninsula.

—Siena: The History Of A Mediaeval Commune.

Lack of water, and of easy access to the sea, whas a hindrance for Siena's economic development. Later in the same book:

Never have men since cities have a history struggled so hard against a decree of nature, or so persistently hoped against hope, pinning their faith in the last resort to a miracle. With admirable patience the burghers brought water from afar by means of cunning, subterranean conduits which still exist, arousing the admiration of modern engineers. Nevertheless the supply obtained was insufficient. When that picturesque upland region, where Siena has her seat, failed to reveal, even to close scrutiny, any further spring capable of being tapped for city uses, the townsmen encouraged one another to believe in a hidden river underneath their feet. They even knew its name, the Diana; borings were invited at public expense, and sensitive ears in the still hours of the night plainly heard the rush of its waters. Readers of the Divine Poet have laughed merrily over his contemptuous fling at the gente vana who hugged such illusions to their breast, but for the lover of this people the curious aberration has the deep pathos inseparable from the spectacle of hopes heroically pursued in the face of the unchangeable decrees of nature.

a homely landscape

This land is a little land; too much shut up within the narrow seas, as it seems, to have much space for swelling into hugeness: there are no great wastes overwhelming in their dreariness, no great solitudes of forests, no terrible untrodden mountain-walls: all is measured, mingled, varied, gliding easily one thing into another: little rivers, little plains, swelling, speedily-changing uplands, all beset with handsome orderly trees; little hills, little mountains, netted over with the walls of sheep-walks: all is little; yet not foolish and blank, but serious rather, and abundant of meaning for such as choose to seek it: it is neither prison nor palace, but a decent home.

—William Morris

some history books

A few history books from the Internet Archive which I have read or intend to read. Of course, the scolarship may be obsolete but, keeping that in mind, they may be good reads nonetheless.

• Jacob Burckhardt: The Civilization Of The Renaissance In Italy. Includes a good amount of pictures.
• James Bryce: The Holy Roman Empire (1902). I have found surprisingly few histories of the Holy Roman Empire as such, maybe I haven't searched well.
• John Bagnell Bury: History of the later Roman Empire (1923). And here's part II.
• Oscar Browning: Guelphs & Ghibellines: A Short History of Mediaeval Italy (1893).
• Ferdinand Schevill: Siena The History Of A Mediaeval Commune (1909).
• Edmund Garratt Gardner: Saint Catherine of Siena, a study in the religion, literature, and history of the fourteenth century in Italy (1907). A modern work of scolarship like The saintly politics of Catherine of Siena regards this book as "still useful", and indeed it is an interesting read. The chapters alternate between closely following the life of the saint and explaining the wider historical context. The book's only defect is that it skimps on the more scabrous and entertaining details of Catherine's life, like her claim of having a magical invisible ring made out of Christ's Holy Prepuce, or her pus-drinking episode.
• Duncan B. Macdonald: Development Of Muslim Theology Jurisprudence And Constitutional Theory (1903).

God's mathematics

Set theory can be viewed as a form of exact theology.

—Rudy Rucker.

[speaking about Set Theory] God's mathematics, which we should leave for God to do.

—Errett Bishop.

Some books on Set Theory: Thomas Jech's Set Theory and The Axiom of Choice, Akihiro Kanamori's The Higher Infinite, Michael Potter's Set Theory and Its Philosophy.

Currently trying to digest a book on Real Analysis, while painstakingly following the down-to-the-last-detail proofs available at Metamath.

A nail through the head

In Jack Vance's novel "Emphyrio", evil alien invaders execute the eponymous hero—who wanted to contact them in order to talk peace—by driving a nail through his head. For an author so disdainful of religion as Vance, the scene is remarkably Passion-like (as with the Passion, the death of Emphyrio is theatrically reenacted within the world of the novel).

The Old Testament features an example of death by nail through the head. Yael received Sisera into her house with feigned hopitality after the latter's armies were routed, only to push a tent peg through his temples when he laid asleep.

I'm not very partial to Yael's form of heroism. Its sneakiness precludes bravery, while still not requiring any particular cunning. You only need a modicum of hand-eye coodination, really. And slaughtering your guest in his sleep is unbecoming. At least Judith had to take the effort of infiltrating Holofernes' camp and seducing him.

Another example of these low-effort heroines is the portuguese Brites de Almeida, a baker who discovered in her furnace spanish soldiers seeking refuge from their defeat at Albujarrota, and dispatched them in a manner which almost suggested itself, given the circunstances. You have to admit that lighting a furnace and waiting for the screams to subside hardly constitutes the apex of heroic achievement.

Maybe I'm being parochial, but I much prefer local heroine María Pita, who helped defend A Coruña against the forces of Sir Francis Drake.

(later) Either I misremembered or there are several versions of Brites' legend. Internet says that she didn't bake the poor chaps, but instead silenced them forever by applying a number of vigorous shovel strikes. That's better I guess, but still not as meritorious a deed as besting a son of Albion in the throes of a honest-to-God battle like María Pita did.

reading while walking (3)

From Steven R. Fischer's A History of Reading:

The physical act of reading was anything but easy in the Middle Ages. This discouraged many.

Scribes often noted in the margins of their manuscripts the physical discomfort of reading and writing in dark, cold, draughty scriptoria. As one Florencio protested in the middle of the thirteenth century: "It is a painful task. It extinguishing the light from the eyes, it bends the back, it crushes the viscera and the ribs, it brings forth pain to the kidneys, and weariness to the whole body."

I hear you, Florencio.

What are examples of literary characters who got some kind of physical disability because of their excessive reading? Don Quixote doesn't count because it was the semantic content of the books he read what did him in. I'm thinking more among the lines of Clym Yeobright from Thomas Hardy's The Return of the Native, who ended up damaging his eyesight.

Also, are there accounts of members of a preliterate culture encountering for the first time a person engaged in reading? It must have seemed a puzzling and inscrutable activity...

reading while riding

Abraham Lincoln did it, at least judging from this equestrian statue:

John Wesley was also in the habit of reading while on horseback. In a journal entry for March 21, 1770 he writes:

Nearly thirty years ago, I was thinking, "How is it that no horse ever stumbles while I am reading?" (History, poetry, and philosophy, I commonly read on horseback, having other employment at other times.)

Myself, I would read while mounted on a camel and maybe even on a donkey, but not on a horse. It seems too unstable!

It must be an odd experience to read the Houyhnhnm section of Gulliver's Travels while on horseback.

reading while walking (2)

Today I saw a gentleman strolling undaunted around the park, book in hand, reading. He didn't seem to bump into benches, statues, or other people, and appeared to avoid ditches just fine. I guess the activity is not as risky as I supposed from passages like the following:

Ibn al-Abanusi reported that al-Khatib used to read while walking. This is a common habit among hadith masters. [...] The philologist imam Tha`lab (200-291) died one day after he was hit by a running horse while walking and reading at the same time as narrated by al-`Askari in al-Hathth `ala Talab al-`Ilm (p. 77).

In the city Oviedo there's a statue of a girl who is reading while walking. It's called Esperanza Caminando:

One can also read while on a treadmill, although to my mind it lacks charm compared to reading while walking outdoors:

When I last spoke with him, by telephone to his hospital bed, Adrian's warmth and sense of humor were undiminished. I told him that Arion Press was beginning the printing of James Joyce's Ulysses, and he replied that he had read that immense novel while walking on a treadmill. That was back in the forties, he said, while he was serving out his term of alternate service as a conscientious objector and had been assigned to a medical experiment.

(source)

The Ascian language

In The Book of the New Sun, Gene Wolfe imagined a language called Ascian. Its speakers have very little grammatical leeway when producing speech. In fact, they may only choose from among a limited list of possible utterances which have been "approved" by a ruling, crushingly totalitarian camarilla. Those are the only valid utterances in the language. Some examples:

The people meeting in counsel may judge, but no one is to receive more than a hundred blows.

One is strong, another beautiful, a third a cunning artificer. Which is best? He who serves the populace.

The citizen renders to the populace what is due to the populace. What is due to the populace? Everything.

It's like Orwell's Newspeak carried to the ultimate limit. Not only particular words and concepts are prohibited, but linguistic creativity itself. Still, the novel recounts how an ascian captured in battle is able (with the help of an interpreter) to tell a story that criticizes the ruling camarilla. Gene Wolfe seems to be rebuking the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis: even in the most restricted of languages, you can find workarounds to communicate (or at least insinuate) any idea you want. On the other hand, the story may have been more the product of the interpreter than of the ascian himself...

I was reminded of the Ascian language when I read the Wikipedia page for Lexis. Apparently, we too employ formulaic language most of the time:

The major finding of this research is that language users rely to a very high extent on ready-made language “lexical chunks”, which can be easily combined to form sentences. This eliminates the need for the speaker to analyze each sentence grammatically, yet deals with a situation effectively. Typical examples include “I see what you mean” or “Could you please hand me the …” or “Recent research shows that…”

Language usage, on the other hand, is what takes place when the ready-made chunks do not fulfill the speaker’s immediate needs; in other words, a new sentence is about to be formed and must be analyzed for correctness. Grammar rules have been internalized by native speakers, allowing them to determine the viability of new sentences. Language usage might be defined as a fall-back position when all other options have been exhausted.

return of "people I tend to get mixed up"

Previous installments in the series.

And here's the current batch:

• Germaine de Staël, George Sand and George Elliot.
• Joachim of Fiore and Cola di Rienzi.

powder is for cheaters

Happy the blest ages that knew not the dread fury of those devilish engines of artillery, whose inventor I am persuaded is in hell receiving the reward of his diabolical invention, by which he made it easy for a base and cowardly arm to take the life of a gallant gentleman; and that, when he knows not how or whence, in the height of the ardour and enthusiasm that fire and animate brave hearts, there should come some random bullet, discharged perhaps by one who fled in terror at the flash when he fired off his accursed machine, which in an instant puts an end to the projects and cuts off the life of one who deserved to live for ages to come. And thus when I reflect on this, I am almost tempted to say that in my heart I repent of having adopted this profession of knight-errant in so detestable an age as we live in now; for though no peril can make me fear, still it gives me some uneasiness to think that powder and lead may rob me of the opportunity of making myself famous and renowned throughout the known earth by the might of my arm and the edge of my sword.

—Miguel de Cervantes: Don Quixote.

the early introduction of firearms did its part in making war a democratic pursuit, not only because the strongest castles were unable to withstand a bombardment, but because the skill of the engineer, of the gunfounder, and of the artillerist—men belonging to another class than the nobility—was now of the first importance in a campaign. It was felt, with regret, that the value of the individual, which had been the soul of the small and admirably organized bands of mercenaries, would suffer from these novel means of destruction, which did their work at a distance; and there were Condottieri who opposed to the utmost the introduction at least of the musket, which had lately been invented in Germany. We read that Paolo Vitelli, while recognizing and himself adopting the cannon, put out the eyes and cut off the hands of the captured 'schioppettieri' (arquebusiers) because he held it unworthy that a gallant, and it might be noble, knight should be wounded and laid low by a common, despised foot soldier.

—Jacob Burckhardt: The Civilization of the Renaissance in Italy.

(later)

Would to heaven that this accursed engine [the arquebus] had never been invented, I had not then received those wounds which I now languish under, neither had so many valiant men been slain for the most part by the most pitiful fellows and the greatest cowards...

—Blaise de Montluc.

reading while walking

Even if you subscribe to all the usual pieties about the benefits of reading, you have to admit that the physical act of reading, when considered by itself, is stultifying. There you are, sedentary and immobile, your attention fixated into a hinged accretion of quadrangular paper layers, straining your eyes while your muscles turn into mush. If you indulge in the habit for too long, you end up resembling one of H. G. Wells' martians: a pale, big-headed monstrosity with atrophied limbs.

It would be much better to read while performing some physical activity that plunged you back into the world, like walking... a nice blend of mental and physical exertion, a compromise between engaging the text and engaging your actual surroundings. It would involve some dangers, though, like not being able to concentrate enough on the book, or concentrating too much and wandering in front of a moving truck.

But, why not just turn to audiobooks instead, one might ask. Well, audiobooks are great, but listening to them is not exactly reading. If you want random access, or simply to find and re-read some previous passage, they are cumbersome. Plus, when wandering through noisy environments you would have to either cram up the volume—damaging your ears—or isolate yourself from external sounds—which, of course, is another way of not engaging with the world.

I, for one, have convinced myself! I will presently take a walk around the port of A Coruña, a pocket French grammar in hand. If I do not post again, assume I fell off the pier while rehearsing the irregular verbs.

placing into the abyss

R. A. Lafferty, commenting on a portrait of Stilicho (which I haven't been able to track down):

[the painting] It's in several of the old history books, and apparently dates from a century or more after the life of Stilicho. [...] He holds in one hand what appears to be a cucumber; but is probably a small fasces—the buldle of rods, the symbol of authority. In his other hand he holds a scepter with an eagle in the laterna part. On top of the scepter is a replica of himself in the same position, holding the same scepter, on which again is an expressive smudge which would be a still smaller replica of himself holding a still smaller scepter. The box within the box within the box trick is very old.

—R. A. Lafferty: The Fall of Rome.

The french have a wonderful name for this type of recursion in art, heraldry and literature: mise en abyme ("placing into the abyss"). Has Lafferty ever used this technique in his own work? Well... he does like to quote imaginary authorities, and to have the characters tell stories to each other (like in the "Liar's Paradise" episode of "The Devil is Dead"). Some of these may be commentary on the frame story, but I would have to reread them to be sure.

take a walk then write a letter

Two interesting bibliographies:

• Travel and Landscape.
• Secondary Studies of Epistolary Literature.