I finished a couple of books today. One was The Great Code by Northrup Frye.  This book seemed uneven to me. It began with some interesting ideas that caught my attention. But there were sections where he seemed to be almost rambling which was so odd after succinct sections.

He came up with  very clever organization principle. He began a chapter on Language then one each on Myth, Metaphor, and Typology. Then the next four chapters reversed this order of subjects and moved from chapters on Typology to a final one on Language. I was tantalized  when he revealed this was going to happen early in the book. What a lovely circular spiral. Than I was disappointed that there wasn’t a bit more coherence to the over arching discussion that impelled this clever organizing principle.

I was also expecting more insights on literature and/or Bible. I found that I knew both areas that he chose to emphasize. I don’t think it helps that I am so entranced with the scholarship of Robert Alter and the Norton Edition of the English Bible. They are writing decades after Frye and I find them much more convincing and helpful.

This  sense of deflation was somewhat allayed when he pulled some cool stuff out of his hat in the final section on Language.

A few pages from the end, Frye remarks that “The Bible includes an immense variety of material, and the unifying forces that hold it together cannot be the rigid forces of doctrinal consistency or logic which would soon collapse under cultural stress, but the more flexible ones of imaginative unity, which is founded on metaphor.”

It may surprise you that he sees the Bible as held together with some kind of unity of purpose, but he makes some clear observations that support this well.

When the Old and New Testament are lumped together as a specifically Christian expression, the Bible begins with Creation and ends with Apocalypse. Frye sees a sort of rhyming of structure in the Old and New Testament. One convincing aspect of this is that the Gospel of John seems to restart Creation by it’s beginning: “In the beginning was the word and the word was with God.”

Alter’s three volumes of the Hebrew Bible follow a specific known understanding and terminology: the five books of the Law, the Prophets (which includes history), and the Writings which include the poetry of Psalms and Job as well as the Apocalyptic writing of Daniel and other books.

He uses Hebrew terms for these as subtitles: Torah (law), Nevi’im (prophets), and Ketuvim (writings).

Frye sees a pretty convincing (at least to me) parallel: Gospels – law, Acts – histories, Epistles – prophets, Revelations – writings.

That’s cool.

Here are a couple of sections toward the end of Frye that I thought were lovely.

“One of the commonest experiences in reading is the sense of further discoveries to be made within the same structure of words. The feeling is approximately ‘there is more to be got out of this,’ or we may say, of something we particularly admire, that every time we read it we get something new out of it. This ‘something new’ is not necessarily something we have overlooked before, but may come rather from a new context in our experience.”

This happens to me all the time and not just with reading words. As I play my way through music I love by Bach, Beethoven, Mozart, Debussy, Hindemith, and others, I often feel that I am experiencing it differently because of my own new context of better understanding.

Resisting Milton’s (and others’) notion that “No passage of Scripture is to be interpreted in more than one sense,” Frye draws on an idea of Dante’s that understanding a text is moving through a series of “more senses than one.” Frye says that this is a “series of phases or stages of comprehension: is a  “feature of all deeply serious writing.”

He takes Dante one step further:

“What is implied is a single process growing in subtlety and comprehensiveness, not different senses, but different intensities or wider contexts of a continuous sense, unfolding like a plant out of a seed.”

I quite like that.

On a completely different note, I was just looking on Facebook for a certain link and discovered a very moving and flattering thank you note from a musician who was a kid at Our Lady of the Lake and was inspired by me to be a musician. We never officially met. He now teaches music in Nashville, Tennessee. It’s funny because I knew this guy was a young musician and watched him from afar play with people I knew when he was  in high school but got the idea he didn’t think much of my own work. In fact, if I have my facts right, I probably intimidated him into staying at a distance. Wow. It would have been fun to have him for a colleague.

Supreme Court, in 5-4 Decision, Rejects Church’s Challenge

It makes me crazy how partisan the Supreme Court is right now. This is an insane challenge mounted by a church and would have been ratified had Supreme Court Justice Roberts not sided with the sane ones. It feels like Roberts is at least aware of the appearance of partisanship.

I found a new bookshop in my home town.  I was talking to my brother and he mentioned shopping at his locally owned bookshop, Serendipity Books, via bookshop.org.  He is friends with the proprietor and actually turned her on to bookshop.org. She said that it was very convenient for her as a bookstore owner to sell through this website. She doesn’t have to do anything like mess with shipping and she receives 30%  of any book ordered there under her bookshop name.

So I went to the site and allowed it to figure out my location. Bang. It recommended a bookstore here in Holland I didn’t know existed. As far as I can figure, it opened late last year. I wish I had known about it before Covid, because they carry used books as well as new.

Dam. But anyway I can support this store by ordering through Bookshop.org. Both this store and the store near my brother have responded to the Covid 19 quarantine by offering appointments to buyers. I’m not sure how Bluestocking works but Serendipty allows buyers to book a 30 minute interval where they can come and shop. Mark said he hadn’t done that because he was afraid he would only chat up the store owner and not look at books since they are already friends and colleagues (she’s in his writers group).

I just looked through the list that Bluestocking offers through Bookshop.org and it’s not very long. I’d love to order something through them but I didn’t see anything yet. I’ll have to keep figuring this stuff out but I’m very glad to find out about this bookstore and the website bookstore.org.

I was chatting with my brother because I had called him up to thank him for drop shipping me Art Young’s Inferno. Art Young was a socialist cartoonist in the thirties. He is enjoying a revival and part of that is the republication of this book. Mark has had his eye on it since last year and mentioned to me that he would have given me a copy of it for Christmas but it hadn’t been published yet.

Woo hoo!

My Wednesday staff meeting got pushed to this afternoon. This worked out well for me because I was unmotivated to do church stuff yesterday and skipped it. The delayed meeting gave me time to write a music note for this Sunday and put info into the bulletin doc.

For exercising this morning I found a neat little introduction to Eric Auerbach’s Mimesis (link). I have read a couple of chapters in this book and am looking forward to getting back to it after I finish Frye’s The Great Code.

In the video, Conrad Van Dyke quoted from p. 59 and I ran and got my copy of the book to make a note on the passage. I bet you can see why:

“If it is true that man is capable of everything horrible, it is also true that the horrible always engenders counterforces and that in most epochs of atrocious occurrences the great vital forces of the human soul reveal themselves: love and sacrifice, heroism in the service of conviction, and the ceaseless search for possibilities of a purer existence.”

I thought this was a positive thought for the terrible times we seem to be living in under our leadership in America right now.

It also inspired me to read the next chapter in Mimesis (The Arrest of Peter Valvomeres) instead of skipping ahead to chapters on Dante, Montaigne, Virginia Woolf and others.

This thin little book came in the mail today. I bought one that wasn’t in such great shape because it was more affordable (60 bucks instead 200 bucks).

It’s one of those books that the reader had to slit pages in order to read. I guess the person who had it before me didn’t read the preface since I had to fetch a sharp knife and open it in order to read it. According to the preface, Eliot read the Temple Classic edition of Dante that I own.

I am spoiled.

So today I am feeling lazy even though I made bread yesterday and have washed a zillion dishes in the last few months.

After exercising and the usual morning routine of making coffee and cleaning up a bit, I have been beginning my day sitting outside reading The Great Code by Northrup Frye the last few days.

(Hey, it looks like Frye has his own Canadian postage stamp.)

As I read further in this book it has become much less difficult than it began. At the beginning I thought some of his ideas were very clarifying, but as the book progresses i find that he’s not teaching me much either about the Bible or literature.

On the other hand, I have found reading in my handy dandy new Bible translations has been much more educational. I was taught a lot of Bible stories as a kid. Then I learned  a lot from studying history and liturgy and what not. But I still can find surprises and I like that.

But before long, sitting outside is too hot. We have turned on our air conditioner during the day. What a luxury!

I still read poetry daily. This morning I looked up a couple of the many Wallace Stevens poems that Northrup Frye incidentally quotes in his book. I’m still trying to connect with Stevens who was a bit favorite of Harold Bloom.

Here’s links to the poems I like in the May issue of Poetry Magazine.

Daedel  by A.E. Stallings

The Acceptance by Raymond Antrobus

I dreamed about my dead father last night. We were on a bus and he only had socks on. Weirdly I thought we should get off and go buy him some warmer socks. Why not shoes, I wonder?

Fuck / Time by Inua Ellams

This poem is the story of what happens when Yo Yo Ma tries to record the song of a shaman in Botswana

Sestina written as though Genesis by Kayleb Rae Candrilli

I especially like how this poem begins. In the magazine this is a fold out page to allow for the very long lines.

I have long preferred live recordings to studio ones though there are some of those that I prize and quite like as well. In this time of Covid 19 I keep seeing many people offering music and other stuff online. I have begun to ponder the value of a live stream. It seems to me that watching a live stream or connecting with someone on Google hangouts is very different from watching prepared recordings even those which are recent.

I wonder if any of this relates to what Daniel Siegel is working on especially with his Wheel of Awareness. If our minds exist between us as much as in our bodies, what does this have to do with live music and live streams?  My suspicion is that Siegel is onto something very concrete and physical that has not been clearly understood.

I have used Siegel’s ideas to help my own understanding (and acceptance) of the idea of prayer at this time in my life. As one goes around the Wheel of Awareness, one reaches out to connect from the center of who you are to others. This expansion of point of view seems to have an odd calming effect at the very least. And as I pointed out to my therapist, it gives me something to do while I’m with a bunch of people praying.

Even if I can’t be with those I love at this time, perform live music, or lead a congregation in sung prayer and ritual,  it seems that much of the authenticity of these experiences can be recovered in groups of people thinking about each other at the same time, whether listening or performing or speaking.

I have been doing live performances online for my church’s Sunday services for a while and this is part of what I’m wondering about. Many church choirs and musicians are making recordings of groups via Zoom and other apps to share with interested people and communities online. They are even doing this right here in some Holland churches.

I think this strikes at the center of the difference between live recordings and what I sometimes think of as sonic sculptures (at its best) or recordings.

I was thinking about listening to recordings of my father’s voice. I’m glad I have some of those but I don’t feel that I am in his presence. But when I stream a musical performance live, something is changed in my little living room.  I wonder if what has changed is my own awareness of just what is happening when I do this. This is exacerbated if I plan to improvise as I have for the last two Sundays.

Liturgical theologians sometimes talk about the mystical connections when one prays. One is connected to everyone in the world who is praying, everyone in the past, and in the future. So time and space are transcended.

I wonder how this relates to new interpersonal understandings of mind.

Eileen’s suffering continues. It’s difficult to watch. But she did think that this video I found was funny.

I seem to be taking a bit of hiatus from Dante. I have been spending a lot of time with Northrup Frye’s The Great Code. I am finding it absorbing but complicated. I am a bit surprised that instead of talking about how the Bible has affected literature and history, Frye instead analyzes just exactly what the Bible is and how it works when considered as a whole.

One of the fun things for me has been that it calls on my Greek in order to understand stuff. Frye’s vocabulary and manner of thinking are challenging in a bit of an old-fashioned scholarly way. I have been spoiled by contemporary scholars who are conscious of clarifying their ideas in terms that are easiest to understand. Frye doesn’t do that. He assumes clarity of thought and a wide understanding of Western thought including Plato, Joyce, Aristotle, and others.

I like that. But it takes some concentration. I’m about a third of the way through the book. I’m approaching it more like a class than a book. Before I begin reading, I refer to my notes and try to familiarize myself with important concepts on which Frye is building.

I can see your eyes gazing over so let me revert to some fun things from the book.

In Chapter 1 entitled Language 1, Frye writes.

“Adverytising and propaganda are designed deliberately to create an illusion, hence they constitute for us a kind of anti-language, especially in the speeches of so-called charismatic leaders that set up a form of mass hypnosis.”

Speaking from the ancient time of 1982, Frye accurately describes public rhetoric in the USA in the time of Trump, don’t you think? The chapter is entitled “Language 1” because Frye has designed an argument that moves forward from Language to Myth I  (chap 1) to Metaphor I (chap 3) to Typology I (chap 4) then reverses to Typology II (chap 5), Metaphor II (chap 6), Myth II (chap 7)  to Language II (the final chapter 8).

Regarding this structure Frye says that his argument fell into a “double mirror” pattern that “describes as existing in the Christian Bible itself,  pointing out that the Christian Bible begins with the creation of time and ends with the end of time.

I like this kind of shit.  There’s more but I’ll take pity on those of you who have read this far.

NYTimes: How Democrats Win in Montana (and They Do Win)

NYTimes: Trump Is Playing the China Card. Who Believes Him?

Michigan Judge Pens Partisan Rant Against Gretchen Whitmore – Slate

Court sides with Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer after GOP lawmakers challenge her coronavirus restrictions – Fox News

So. Theses two stories popped up on my news aggregator as being recent and being about the same story. They are not about the same story. And weirdly the Slate story is more biased than the Fox story. It’s my bias, but it’s still obviously slanted. The weird thing about the Judge in the Slate story is that he voted to uphold the Governor’s vaping ban but attached a 13 page rant to the decision lambasting her.

As my physical ability to make music well diminishes my reading, thinking, and learning  are showing signs of cool convergence.

This is exemplified by the book I began reading today, The Great Code: The Bible and Literature by Northrup Frye.

Frye has been on my radar for a while and this is not the only book by him I own. it IS the only one I can find right now which is just as well since it addresses so many things I am thinking and learning about.

First of he took his title from William Blake who said that “The Old and New Testament are the Great Code of Art.”

Frye has also written a book on Blake. Frye ties together Blake, Dante, Shakespeare, T. S. Eliot, William Carlos Williams, James Joyce, and Vico, all current interests of mine. And, of course, I am interested  in what he has to say about the Bible as literature although he points out that he deliberately subtitled the book: The Bible AND Literature not AS.

I’m thinking of plowing through this book. Frye was a teacher and he says that the book he has written is much like courses he taught and I like that a lot.

I’m also plowing quickly through Philip Pullman’s The Book of Dust II The Secret Commonwealth.

It’s been a while since I had trouble putting down any book, but both Pullman and Frye have my undivided attention.

took my cat to the vet today. One of his eyes did not look good this morning. Eileen contacted the vet and set up an appointment for me to take him in. The vet thinks the retina/lens has detached and floated up into the front of the eye. Edison (the cat) does not seem to be in any discomfort as a result. He probably can’t see out of it, but that may not be new. The vet recommended doing nothing. Options could include costly eye surgery which would take an unwarranted toll on my old cat. He (the vet) an remove the eye if that becomes necessary. As it is, I’m glad I took him in.

I finished reading two translations of Purgatorio by Dante yesterday.

On to Paradisio.

These illustrations of  Commedia are by Leonard Baskin.

Speaking of Hell, Eileen has made an appointment with our GP. It will be online and she has asked me to sit in on it.  She is suffering and I hope this doctor can offer some ideas on how to alleviate the pain.

I am taking today off from thinking about church stuff. Tomorrow I will nail down the prelude and postlude for next Sunday and write a music note. I have an idea about what to do both next Sunday and the following Sunday which will be Pentecost.

I guess I don’t have much to write about today. This morning I got a bit behind in my morning ritual. I was  moving slowly. I cleaned the kitchen, exercised, stretched, changed the cat litter, moved a huge box that contains the rest of the bed we ordered so that I could open the back door, and straightened the kitchen. Eileen beat me. I usually have not only done all this kind of stuff but also cleaned up, brushed my teeth, and put on clean clothes.

I am enjoying Hamlet. I like this stage direction: “Hamlet enters reading a book.”

Also I don’t remember what a ditz Polonius is. Shakespeare even has him lose his train of thought at one point:

“And then sir, does he this—he does—What was I about to say? By the mass, I was about to say something. Where did I leave.”

Act II, i. 55-58

I can relate.

Green or red light: China virus app is ticket to everywhere

My son-in-law, Jeremy Daum, is quoted in this link. Unfortunately, he wasn’t happy with how they interpreted the information he gave them. Here’s what he said:

I can’t make this any more legible. You’ll have to use your device to enlarge it if you want to read it.

A groundbreaking classicist is irreverently acting out The Odyssey

I know this stuff isn’t everyone’s cup of tea, but I do admire this scholar.

Earthly Powers by Anthony Burgess

I’m nearing the end of Purgatorio by Dante. I am simultaneously reading two versions of the Commedia.  This is my second time through the entire work. The translators are Dorothy L. Sayers on the one hand and Marcus Sanders and Sandow Birk on the other. I think of it as Lord Peter Wimsey versus the surfer dudes (this is one thing that Sanders and Birk have in common. Sandow Birk is an artist who has done illustrations and installations using Dante’s piece.

I am finding that I can understand the work more theologically this time. This is largely Sayers take on it. But at the same time I understand it, I am developing a distaste for the historic Christianizing of the Hebrew Scriptures. This is because of Robert Alter’s brilliant work.

Today I have my first online session with my therapist. I have a couple things to talk to him about. But, I think I am at a new normal and would like to go back to seeing him once every two weeks.

One thing I am working on is understanding my own feelings about losing full use of my hands musically. As I have said here, I can still play and practice. My guitar chops are coming along as well as my keyboard chops. But I noticed that this was bothering me more than I anticipated it doing.

I am plowing ahead in Homer in English. I haven’t read Emily Wilson’s translation all the way through yet. I have only used her in conjunction with translating the the first couple Books. I have changed from studying Homer back to studying Ancient Greek in general. This seems to be working for me.

Right now I’m waiting for my bread to rise so that I can put it in the oven.

It’s still kind of rainy here in Holland.

I have called the Holland Sentinel for four days in a row to report a missing paper. I am trying to get on their subscription list in order to support local reporting. I can pretty much access their stuff online but last week’s On The Media was about local reporting. It convinced me to subscribe to the Holland Sentinel.

Now if I can get them to bring it to me automatically without a phone call, that would be nice.

Oddly enough, we have started receiving the Wall Street Journal. I did not subscribe to it and haven’t read any of the copies that have shown up in front of my house. If I could speak to someone at the Sentinel I would let them know about this in case it’s related. But this morning the phone robot recognized my phone number and promised a paper later today and hung up on me.

So, Dante, Homer, Shakespeare, and Blake. That’s how I’m getting through my days. Plus practicing and baking.

I’ve been trying to choose a prelude and postlude for our Weekly broadcast online that fits somehow with the readings for the day. This Sunday I couldn’t come up with anything so I scheduled a Gymnopedie (the famous one) and a Gnossiene by Erik Satie. My boss told me it was okay to not have a music note this weekend.

I was looking through my piano music by Satie. A million years ago when I was a student at Ohio Weslyan I learned one or two of his nocturnes. All of this music fits the rainy day we are having.

I continue to work on my Bach violin bourree guitar transcription. I have been trying to practice some other guitar stuff to work up my guitar chops. I think I might pair it with John Renbourn’s version of Gervaise’s Bransle Gay. I have been practicing it and am surprised that it seems the easiest it’s ever seemed to me. Still I need to practice it so I know it well.

I play both of these much slower than anything I have found on YouTube.

I finished The Book of Dust Volume One The Belle Sauvage by Philip Pullman and started the next volume, The Secret Commonwealth.

i also finished reading 1 Henry IV by Shakespeare. This is the first of the Falstaff plays and probably the best one. Orson Welles uses a lot of it in his screen adaptation about Falstaff, Chimes of Midnight.

Harold Bloom thought highly of Welles understanding of Falstaff.  I’ve started rereading Hamlet. Hamlet and Falstaff were Bloom’s favorite Shakespeare characters.

I’m also nearing the end of Shakespeare’s Sonnets. Emma Smith and James Shapiro don’t seem to think much of the Sonnets. I love them. I am reading A. L. Rowses edition of them.

I’m not exactly sure where he stands in the universe of Shakespeare scholarship, but I’m finding his comments helpful in understanding them.

Jill Lepore’s New Podcast Is a Murder Mystery: Who Killed Truth

I’m bored by the Serial approach, but ooooooo it’s Jill Lepore!

Opinion | Attorney General William Barr and the Rule of Law

We need to revive the independent counsel law.

Eileen and I just got back from walking down to Readers World. Eileen walks everyday due to the pain in her leg and bottom. It continues to cause her a lot of pain. I hate it that it does. She emailed her physical therapist today.

My books came in. I ordered the next volume of Pullman’s The Book of Dust and This is Shakespeare by Emma Smith. I called and asked if they had the Dark Materials trilogy by Pullman sitting on the shelf. They did so I bought a set. I think I didn’t read all of that series.

Eileen just told me that she has clocked Readers World as 1 kilometer away (via the Harry Potter Wizards Unite game that she uses.

Earlier today, I made bread.

And used music came in the mail.

I own the John Stanley book on the right, but I lost the cello and flute part. Now I have them. The third book from the left is a copy of 2 Corelli church sonatas for 2 violins and keyboard also with the parts included (woohoo!)

So you can see, I’m feeling spoiled today.

I love playing Francois Couperin on my little midi. I especially love some of his rondos which often go very low on the harpsichord, much lower than the compass of my little electric keyboard. i was thinking about this and realized that electronic keyboards often have a transposing function. Lo and behold, my little $30 keyboard has this as well and will go up to an octave either direction. So when I put it down an octave I can play those deep rich tones in the Couperin rondos.

This is one I have been playing. You don’t have to listen very long until you can hear one of those beautiful low notes.

I listened to Philosophize this #143 podcast a couple days ago. I am working my way through Mortimer J. Adler’s Aristotle for Everyone in a bid to learn to think a bit more clearly (I can hear your snicker. Stop that.).

So when the Podcast “Philosophize this” had an episode on Jurgen Habermas and his ideas about public sphere and discussion, I listened to it.

This is a photo of Jurgen Habermas (still alive as far as I can tell…. born in 1929)

I especially like the podcast description of  Habermas’s idea, communicative rationality in which he develops a four step system for having coherent discussions which lead to insights and changed minds (i.e. democracy type public discussion necessary for good society and government).

all parties in discussion agree to

1. mutual intelligibility 
2. agreement that the subject of discussion is legitimate  discuss
3. all parties arguing from sincere conviction
4. all agree upon values and norms

Two things jumped out at me. First, the idea that parties in a public discussion must believe in the point of view they are espousing (#3 above). The “sincere conviction” language is my own note taking.

I have spent a lot of my life wondering what people around me actually believe. Hell, I often wonder what I believe. It’s helpful to me to factor in the idea that reason someone might seem a bit fakey to me is that they don’t necessarily believe in what they are saying.

In addition, Habermas (or at least what I remember from the podcast discussion) critiques media in this regard. Essentially he says that if one is operating not from communicative rationality but instead from strategic rationality where one is not necessarily arguing from a conviction or belief, the ensuing discussion is much like listening to a salesperson trying to convince a buyer.

Hmmm. I haven’t probably said that clearly but it is rattling around in my head.

Second thing that jumped out at me. I wonder how the attempt to have clear thinking processes and discussions relates to the idea that we as humans (especially as individuals) often think we are reasoning objectively when, in fact, we are reasoning from an emotional stand point. We think we are using our head, when in fact we are going from the uninformed gut feeling.

This is easy to understand when I think about the evolutionary need for humans to be part of the tribe. It would be more important not to be ostracized from your tribe for being correct but disagreeing with the group consensus.

I think the answer might be related to a quote Ezra Klein puts in his book, Why are We So Partison?. 

“It is not possible to be rational all by yourself; rationality is inherently a collective project.” Klein is quoting Joseph Heath’s book, Enlightenment 2.0: Restoring Sanity to our Politics.

Anyway, i aspire to clear thinking.

A quick blog post today in order to give myself time to do some reading and practicing before martini time.

I have returned to my Greek text studies. I have worked my way through a bit of Homer’s Odyssey. I am finding that working on the Greek of Homer is not the same as reading and thinking about Homer. i have returned to reading him in translation. I am having fun working through different sections and different translations (Pope, Fagles, and others).

I was satisfied to resume my Greek study where I left off in my text. One thing I have changed is that I’m approaching it the way I have been approaching Homer in Greek. I am working my way through the readings, slowly. I am identifying the grammatical functions of most every word. This leads me back to the Grammar of the chapter.  I have found that I’m rubbish at memorizing charts of grammar information. Easier to use it and check it. This is satisfying.

My copy of Shakespeare and the Bible by Steven Marx came in the mail today. It arrived all the way from a German bookseller. I think I mentioned receiving Naseeb Shaheen’s hefty Biblical References in Shakespeare’s Plays. Between the two of them I think I’m set to learn more about this topic which interests me greatly.

Finally, I received a nice note from my boss telling me how much she liked my Music Note I wrote for this upcoming Sunday. I end with it. Check after it for a link to recent article.

Music note for Easter 5A

In today’s gospel, when Thomas says, “Lord, we do not know where you are going. How shall we know the way?” Jesus replies, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” George Herbert’s classic hymn, “Come my Way, my Truth, my Life” (Hymnal 182 #487) echoes Jesus’s assurance. With characteristic craft and clarity, Herbert builds on the three images:

Come my Way, my Truth, my life:
such a way as gives us breath;
such a truth as ends all strife;
such a life as killeth death. 

The Hymnal 1982 Companion says that “Like springs compressed into a box, paradoxes are packed into ordered lines that belie their complexity.” The “way” instead of tiring of challenging us, gives “breath” and  refreshes us.  The “truth” is not some forbidding doctrinal concept but unexpectedly brings peace, an end to “all strife.” And in an Easter moment, life “killeth death” through Christ’s resurrection which draws us all into eternal life. 

The tune name, THE CALL, was Herbert’s original title for his poem. It was originally set to music not as a hymn but as part of Ralph Vaughan Williams’ Five Mystical Songs for baritone, chorus, and orchestra (1911). All five movements use Herbert’s poetry. Vaughan Williams’ melody for The Call combines the simplicity and noble beauty of the original poem. 

‘This is a Time for Survival’ – POLITICO

Absence by Mark Jenkins

My brother’s latest online piece.

This morning I read portions of the 11th book of the Odyssey as translated by Pope. It occurred to me to have another look at the first of Ezra Pound’s Cantos. I remember that it is mostly a translation of the beginning of the 11th book. I had the odd experience of reading the first Canto by Pound and basically understanding most everything in it. His second Canto is partially based on one of Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Sheesh. After another discipline foray into Latin I guess I’ll be more ready for that one. I should live so long.

I have been trying to learn my guitar transcription of Bach’s bourree in A minor for unaccompanied violin.  I have decided to delay scheduling it for another week. This gives me more time to get it solidly under my fingers. My guitar skills are behind my keyboard skills. My guitar playing has been mostly of the Paul Simon variety: interesting but not as involved as playing the guitar classically. I have always loved the sound of the guitar, classical or otherwise. But returning to it after a lengthy hiatus I find that while I remember most of my skills, they weren’t exactly classical so it’s quite a stretch to attempt a medium difficult piece such as the one I’m learning.

I played guitar for the postlude on yesterday’s church broadcast. It was a much easier piece than the Bach and I still had some moments (sins of omission instead of commission…. I left out some notes that weren’t probably missed by many).

I bought Akiko Busch’s How to Disappear: Notes on Invisibility in a Time of Transparency a while back. I’m about forty pages into it.

She makes an interesting case for the usefulness of invisibility. I like it. This morning I ran across this passage:

Invisibility is about “pleasure, knowledge, the growth of the psyche, discovery, privacy, discretion, silence, autonomy, keeping one’s own counsel, being quiet in a raucous world, and being still in a world that is moving too quickly.”

My experience of aging is one of gradually becoming invisible to many around me. I have expressed some dissatisfaction with that in these online entries. But Busch has helped me see it as also a plus.

It has bothered me when people I care about or am interested by have relegated me to the inconsequential category in their lives. I usually guess as to why they have made this choice and it’s not pretty. But I think Busch would probably point out that this way of looking at it is upside down.

I love my books and my music (and my family).

I also learned a new phrase today: jardin secret.

In French, this is literally secret garden however it is an idiom which means more: Busch talks about this way: Jardin secret “is a kind of psychic cloister, anything from a small personal ritual to a state of mind, some private thing, idea, or activity that people keep to and for themselves. It might a particular view through a window; a haven or retreat; an early morning walk; a spot on the river near a bridge; a table in the cafe; a piece of music; or a private collection of feathers, stones, books, or fans. The idea of privacy is intrinsic to the jardin secret.”

“A piece of music” … “a private collection of books”…. hmmm. That’s me alright.

In my house, we refer to my weekly online church stuff as “the broadcast.” Since I am doing live music for it the house has to be as quiet as possible. So far this has worked pretty well. I played banjo and guitar this morning and it seem to go well. Today is Pete Seeger’s birthday. According to Garrison Keillor’s Writers Almanac, Seeger’s parents were professional classical musicians and he rejected that heritage and wanted to be a painter. Then he heard the banjo and fell in love with the sound. I must say I can understand that because I have a fondness for the sound myself and so do the people at my church..

I have been thinking a lot about the precedents for Dante’s Commedia. In Book XI of Homer’s Odyssey, Odysseys visits Hell and speaks with some dead people he knew included Achilles. In Virgil’s Aeneid (Book VI), Aeneas does likewise. Dante did not read Homer but he did know Virgil’s works.

“Dante, Homer, and Virgil in Raphael’s Parnassus, 1510-11”

Kent State and the War That Never Ended | The New Yorker

2 Killed in Jackson, 4 Killed in Kent, 6 Killed in Augusta in 1970, The anniversary is upon us and Jill Lepore intelligently expands and fills in the notions about the difference between only seeing the white anti-war demonstrators and missing the real picture. She is my kind of historian. Excellent read.

Presence of guns escalates protests across country

These two links are related, eh?

You might assume that the title of this post, “Still Alive,” refers to the Covid 19 pandemic, but it doesn’t.

I have been thinking about how lucky I am to still be alive.

Eileen had some good luck this week with her pain clinic appointment. They were surprised that she was still suffering so much. They reassessed their diagnosis. As I understand it, there is some arthritic inflammation in her spinal cord that is causing the nerve to be pinched. After a lengthy discussion they ended up giving her six shots which provided some instant relief.

Of course, she is still sore and having some pain, but it has ebbed significantly.

My hands are getting worse. I noticed yesterday  that my left hand just barely can stretch an octave due to my Dupuytren’s (du-pwe-TRANZ) contracture.  I can still compensate and continue to play keyboard, guitar, and banjo. I spent some time with Scarlatti at the piano and the upcoming guitar pieces I have scheduled. This did not lessen my sadness, but at least proved that I can still put myself in the presence of beauty.

I was surprised that this depressed me as much as it did.

I have had a matter of fact reaction to this diagnosis. I assumed that my many other interests would balance off the loss of the ability to play well. Those other interests are what I am spending a lot of my days doing recently.  I have been reading and studying Dante. Philip Larkin and William  Blake seems to be just what the Trump mania/pandemic needs. Or at least what I need.

As I said, I am still alive and that is lucky.