Parables of Sun Light: Observations on Psychology, the Arts, and the Rest

1977

1977 3 January What better example of the beauty of great scientific conceptions than the "mobile" described in Kepler's second law of planetary motion! A line drawn from the sun to the place of the planet on its elliptical path traverses equal areas of the ellipse in equal times. One must savor the lively harmony of the ratio that makes the planet slow down in the exact measure of its increasing distance from the center of its rotation and speed up as it comes closer. The mechanical spin is animated by the rhythmical variation of speed and distance, and the variation is held in balance by the strictly contrapuntal relation between the two parameters. The elegant simplicity of the ellipse is dynamized by the eccentricity of its motion. No wonder Kepler heard the harmony of the spheres. No bodily metabolism could cope with supplies presented in so disorderly a fashion as those challenging our intellect. On one evening I read a monograph on the visual aspects of quantum physics, a review of a new translation of the Genji monogatari, and a description of Freud's apartment in Vienna. I like to believe that in less tattered ages people thought about one thing at a time. 215 7 January Four short words from the poems of Eugenio Montale remain with me firmly as a call signal: "E fu per sempre . . ." They signify the transformation of passing events into the state of lasting being, when the moth— wearing the frightening death's-head on its back— struggles among the papers, blinded by the lamplight. "E fu per sempre con le cose che chiudono in un giro sicuro come il giorno . . ." Even more touching is the beginning of the short poem "Lindau": La rondine vi porta fili di erba, non vuole che la vita passi. Ma tra gli argini, a notte, 1'acqua morta logora i sassi.* The erosion of the stone reflects the existing anxiety about the passing of things. Not by coincidence am I now concerned with architecture, the most lasting of tangible thoughts. 10 January Lying awake last night, I undertook to translate the Montale poem into German: Dorthin die Schwalbe tragt Ihre Halmchen, sie will Nicht dass das Leben ende. Doch nachts an den Dammen zersagt Das tote Wasser still Die steinernen Wande. * "And it was forever among the things that close in a firm orbit like the day . . . " "The swallow carries bits of herbage; it does not want life to cease. But under the quays at night the dead water grinds the rocks." 216 PARABLES OF SUN LIGHT "Ladies and Gentlemen" is reverse discrimination. Why should the women come first? But in a sequential medium there can be no coexistence. 14 January When Bergson speaks of numbers as "des elements provisoirement indivisibles," he reminds me that the law of differentiation I have formulated for the development of visual form should be applied to concepts in general. Concepts will remain as abstract as the situation permits. Or, differentiation takes place—or ought to take place— only to the extent to which the situation requires it. The atom remains indivisible as long as there is no need to subdivide it. 6 February At the time of the energy crisis, President Carter advised all government offices to keep the heat at 65°. Since this proved infeasible in many of the buildings, which continued to be overheated in the usual manner, some of the bureaucrats, to comply with the president's directive, turned on the air conditioners. This generated the prescribed temperature by doubling the expenditure of energy as a means of attempting to reduce it. 15 February In Japan, where they are still civilized enough to respect objects, they celebrate on the eighth of February each year the Hari-kuyo, a Buddhist requiem for the needles broken during the year by the seamsters. 16 February Those ancient male chauvinists were unwilling to say that Adam was made from a rib of Eve, although that would have been closer to the natural order. 217 1977 21 February When I listen to the greatest music—and Beethoven's String Quartet in C-sharp Minor, opus 131, is perhaps the greatest piece of music ever written—I cannot help suspecting that I have been admitted by mistake, since I have no right to attend something so much beyond my capacity. It is as though a careless priest had let me take...