[NetBehaviour] six weeks left
Alan Sondheim
sondheim at gmail.com
Wed Aug 4 00:17:41 CEST 2021
A great poem! And probably one of the strangest I've read!
One question, you move between/through Leonardo and Dante - what other
people, periods, intensities, have you written within/without? It's
fascinating work -
Best, Alan -
On Tue, Aug 3, 2021 at 6:11 PM Max Herman via NetBehaviour <
netbehaviour at lists.netbehaviour.org> wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> It's about six weeks until the 700th anniversary of Dante's passing.
> There may be some more activity around this time; I've looked for some
> around here in Minneapolis but haven't found any.
>
> There is an article by Barbara Newman in the new London Review of Books,
> titled "Seven Centuries Too Late," that reviews five books on Dante from
> 2020. The article starts with a concise history of Dante's life and works,
> and contains some assertions with which I cannot fully agree. Yet these
> need no further detail as of course I'm likely mistaken.
>
> The question occurs to me, what is the range of possibility for positive
> developments on the planet regarding Dante between now and the
> anniversary?
>
> Six weeks is just a drop in the bucket compared to 700 years, so by math
> one could say only 0.0164 percent of whatever positive developments have
> already occurred in the previous 36,400 weeks can occur in the next six.
> But the math isn't necessarily proportional here, and there's no reason the
> percentage couldn't be 1, 10, 50, 200, or 1000 percent. It could also be
> zero or minus 1000, or minus 10,000, in theory.
>
> Concurrent events also constrain how positive such hypothetical events
> might be. Due to the climate and Covid crises, and all other difficulties,
> there may be a very small window for positive developments of any sort in
> the next six weeks. One could say it's inevitable that conditions will be
> worse than the status quo in six weeks no matter what, due to climate and
> Covid. However, they might not necessarily impact conditions regarding
> Dante.
>
> One could certainly say that human interpretation of Dante is too
> sensitive, since he addressed politically difficult issues, and therefore
> must be kept mainly unchanged. By this logic, any change greater than
> 0.0164 percent would be, by definition, bad or negative. If so, how
> positive might a change of 0.0164 percent or less be? However, it is
> possible that the degree of changelessness the planet's safety requires
> regarding Dante could be subject to change over time and therefore also in
> the next six weeks. It is possible, but to what extent can it be known?
> Are only wild guesses possible? Perhaps it is most logical to say that the
> percentage of change should be lowered in proportion to the risk of too
> much change, vis-a-vis Dante, but could still be pretty high like even 1 or
> 10 percent due to the occasion. After all you can usually change back
> pretty quickly too if needed, or often can.
>
> +++++
>
> When too many topics proliferate for standard interpretations one can get
> new results that are "interesting" as they say in AI, but one can also just
> get "mud" as they say in painting. Just trying to make sense of and parse
> one painting -- the *Mona Lisa* -- I tried to bring in words, namely
> *Esperienza*, from Leonardo's handwritten journals. These journals led
> of course to Dante, because they place the relationship between words and
> images (or painting and poetry) at the very center of nature, culture, art,
> and science. Anniversaries like Leonardo's in 2019 and Dante's in 2021 can
> sometimes offer constellations, or novel permutations, but half the time
> or more they offer the opposite.
>
> Johannes' mention of *Purgatorio *27 seemed relevant to Dante and change,
> as did Graziano's information on Dante's language project (to make a
> network vernacular of sorts), the *vitae activa* and *contemplativa* as
> parameters for information experiments, astronomical language metaphors in
> Tolstoy/McLuhan/Joyce/Eliot, plus Nail on postmodern theory and rivers in
> drought or flood seemed a reasonably simple arc. Yet one can easily make
> too many assumptions and every piece that sort of fits could go in a
> completely different direction or a completely different puzzle. I don't
> know what vectors and bundles are, only extremely vaguely, so if Alan's
> images of the heron and the star pertain I couldn't necessarily say how
> except perhaps to mention Doré's images of Dante.
>
> What about place? Free association aside one can look at Finsbury Park, a
> green space in a city by a river, beset by Covid and uncertainty like
> perhaps all cities by all rivers. It opened the year *War and Peace* was
> published, in part to help alleviate Dickensian conditions of the urban
> working poor. How many more incomprehensible conflicts will its plane tree
> see? The range of possible occurrences within its grounds is infinite, in
> one sense, yet bounded in another.
>
> Though by the laws of physics it can't be ruled out, it's not clear to me
> how any permutations at all of Dante or Leonardo could help the park or
> with the park's help change or keep the same anything in European or global
> history for the better. How could it be clear even if it were possible?
> (A meditation class on Leonardo and resilience might fly, or go over like a
> lead balloon. 🙂 ) I do still try to see more *chiaro *at local parks
> here this summer -- of which there are also about six weeks left -- and a
> few afield, but the only permutation with any purchase beyond random may be
> as it perhaps should even more local than local.
>
> Very best regards,
>
> Max
>
> PS -- I wrote the below Sunday and Monday, for the *Purgatorio *27
> chapter, amateur and derivative doggerel but it was fun to write.
>
> +++++
>
>
> On Canto 27
>
>
>
> 1 Sage Dante’s passing nearly *sept siècles * past
>
> 2 I read an article by Barbara Newman.
>
> 3 The clock of *Purgatorio* ticks its last
>
>
>
> 4 To show us what transforms can change the human,
>
> 5 Comparing antique stimuli-response
>
> 6 Gold yolk’s emergence into clear albumen
>
>
>
> 7 To fabric that our human beauty wants
>
> 8 And thereby may make image for itself.
>
> 9 Once seen and spoken, such an image haunts
>
>
>
> 10 All memory and time, as White Guelph
>
> 11 Did the Black, the Ghibelline
>
> 12 Of both a coral ship-destroying shelf.
>
>
>
> 13 In twenty-seven, three times nine, is seen
>
> 14 By Dante fire most fatal to behold
>
> 15 Since public pyre should grace his Florentine
>
>
>
> 16 Return, a curse that kept his footing cold
>
> 17 On roads of poverty and gifted roof.
>
> 18 Yet past that wall of fire his shepherd told --
>
>
>
> 19 Virgilio that is, to Dante’s hoof
>
> 20 Aeneid author holding verse’s hook --
>
> 21 His Beatrice’s eyes remained aloof.
>
>
> 22 The laureled *Poeta* even shares a look
>
> 23 A “seem to see,” *parea* and the like,
>
> 24 To burn all hesitance from Dante’s book!
>
>
>
> 25 Thus spurred he walks on through, because to hike
>
> 26 Reversing couldn’t be and went nowhere
>
> 27 To nothingness in fact, his soul to strike
>
>
>
> 28 From both his body and our world so fair
>
> 29 Far worse than fire could, murmured what the hell,
>
> 30 Burned hot, stepped forth, to hear the new song blare.
>
>
>
> 31 Endorphins sweet and dopamine that dell --
>
> 32 Well really a narrow canyon, rocky stairs,
>
> 33 Steep walls that hid the sky almost -- a spell
>
>
>
> 34 Of hard-earned rest infused, dispelling cares
>
> 35 Like last and ashy sparks of fading flame.
>
> 36 He calls himself a goat and slumber shares
>
>
>
> 37 With few but brighter stars above like fame.
>
> 38 What happened there is that his brain was burned,
>
> 39 “His” meaning Dante in the poem’s frame,
>
>
>
> 40 To rid it of vestigial data learned
>
> 41 Like doubts and fears, defeats that weighed him down,
>
> 42 All pettiness, misapprehension, turned
>
>
>
> 43 To crumbling papery leaves or scaly brown
>
> 44 Skin cells that lost their use and atomized
>
> 45 As in the old and Jovian eagle’s crown
>
>
>
> 46 Of burning eyes and sight restored comprised.
>
> 47 He slept in other words right tired so dream
>
> 48 Is what we all can sense he realized.
>
>
>
> 49 Some dreams are weird, plain nonsense, not a gleam
>
> 50 Of relevance to them. Yet half awake
>
> 51 They sometimes mix an image fresh and seem
>
>
>
> 52 With parallel a question's thirst to slake.
>
> 53 How else would Dante read his burning up
>
> 54 Of old debris than as a way to stake
>
>
>
> 55 His own imago of himself a cup
>
> 56 Of wine from grapes he sought and grew to drain?
>
> 57 The taken breath must outward ever sup
>
>
>
> 58 On emptiness within as sweet refrain.
>
> 59 How though? Like dancing, duplicate repeat
>
> 60 Would be as a *ricordo* but inane
>
>
>
> 61 Because the spot is new and dancer fleet
>
> 62 And each new turning is its very own;
>
> 63 A slightly different glance each reel must meet
>
>
>
> 64 And every spring new flower from what was sown.
>
> 65 The brain must mix. It knows no other way.
>
> 66 And so to see the eyes his thoughts were flown
>
>
>
> 67 To match a something third, a story say,
>
> 68 That would the not yet real event allow
>
> 69 A form that would not in an instant stray.
>
>
>
> 70 This third was chosen loosely, much as how
>
> 71 We pick a word somewhat by chance when one
>
> 72 We thought of first does not quite speed the plow.
>
>
>
> 73 A ripple on a stream, a glimpse of sun
>
> 74 Through leaves on water or avian on the wing
>
> 75 Percussing lightly in a pattern begun
>
>
>
> 76 Elsewhere just enough is just the thing
>
> 77 To balance in a *pertratatto* knot
>
> 78 The dancers’ feet to what the voices sing.
>
>
>
> 79 Alike, yet not alike, the mind will spot
>
> 80 A match, yet not a match, with subtle touch.
>
> 81 The fire with which he had to burn yet hot
>
>
>
> 82 With charcoal black and soot his mind as such
>
> 83 Still smoky, yet in hope of seeing seen
>
> 84 The image of two *vitae* would do much
>
>
>
> 85 To move him past scorched waste to verdant green.
>
> 86 Yet how to move from spent exhausted blank
>
> 87 To what he never was is to careen
>
>
>
> 88 From one shore to another without rank
>
> 89 Or ship intact. A way he saw:
>
> 90 To gather flowers on a riverbank.
>
>
>
> 91 *Convivio* makes simple, clear, the law
>
> 92 That languages do what they want. They change
>
> 93 And dance according to the times in raw
>
>
>
> 94 Profusion. Improvised and sleek they range.
>
> 95 If speakers fish, at sea they find their speech.
>
> 96 Each passing moment words will rearrange.
>
>
>
> 97 What better form than poetry’s spring could reach
>
> 98 This fact of flowing improvisation?
>
> 99 Musicians kept the time, that book did teach.
>
>
>
> 100 A swaying river grass in currents’ run
>
> 101 Is how the Poet’s changing mountain jaunt
>
> 102 At Book Two’s base auspiciously begun
>
>
>
> 103 Is shaped to us, and so as not to daunt
>
> 104 Our frail and battered crisis-riven heart
>
> 105 The river-grass grows instant back, as wont
>
>
>
> 106 For everything from which life cannot part.
>
> 107 This holds as much for images as words,
>
> 108 For themes and narratives and place as art.
>
>
>
> 109 So Lia’s way of living undergirds
>
> 110 The brighter, starker truth our fear now past
>
> 111 We long to see as air uplifts all birds.
>
>
>
> 112 An information experiment can last
>
> 113 As long as can be imagined. A time crystal,
>
> 114 Announced last Thursday, arguably could cast
>
>
>
> 115 A shadow of a theme, to distill
>
> 116 Echoes found in a computer’s quanta.
>
> 117 The simple case of folk songs that persist will
>
>
>
> 118 Show the same. A thing can be like A,
>
> 119 And like not-A, contra Aristotle,
>
> 120 As every science knows it should display.
>
>
>
> 121 Life flows like rivers and forests, and to bottle
>
> 122 It up for observation and control
>
> 123 Is simply vain, a duckling’s baby waddle,
>
>
>
> 124 Not flight from inferno, fiery death of the whole,
>
> 125 The all, from which no living thing survives.
>
> 126 Something more sturdy cares, call it a soul.
>
>
>
> 127 To crown us each with one Vergil contrives
>
> 128 His final lines of play benign to do
>
> 129 Then logic and reason fade. Beatrice drives
>
>
>
> 130 The vision thence with certainties but few.
>
> 131 This error-checking self-awareness gained
>
> 132 Constructive peaceful art and science grew.
>
>
>
> 133 Or did they? Maybe we’re still caught, restrained
>
> 134 By something we get really, really wrong
>
> 135 With nature and cities’ ruin by deluge pained.
>
>
>
> 136 We see in twenty-seven simple song
>
> 137 Consistent, sung and heard, the only bridge
>
> 138 From *Purgatorio* sufficiently strong
>
>
>
> 139 To *Paradiso*, of sciences' presence the image,
>
> 140 Experience of the spheres by nature’s art
>
> 141 Informed, coeval sight's renewing vintage.
>
>
>
> 142 “The purification is real,” for Newman’s part;
>
> 143 “The earthly paradise within reach” we start.
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> Notes:
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convivio
>
> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Guelphs_and_Ghibellines
>
>
> https://www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v43/n14/barbara-newman/seven-centuries-too-late
>
>
>
> https://www.academia.edu/1050327/_Par_che_sia_mio_destino_The_Prophetic_Dream_in_Leonardo_and_in_Dante
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
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> NetBehaviour at lists.netbehaviour.org
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>
--
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