Eagle Minds: Selected Correspondence of Istvan Anhalt and George Rochberg (1961-2005)

2001

| 387 232 12 september 2001 My dear George, The date on the upper right should have been marked as 11+1/9/2001 for the obvious reason that after 11/9/2001 each day will appear as 11+x/9/2001. One feels that something has changed yesterday that one will not be able to erase from one’s consciousness. This being said, what is there to add to what you and I, with countless others, feel and ponder on? I, at least, will need time to place the awful tragedy of yesterday in some kind of a ‘frame’ the nature of which (if at all!) I cannot guess at and it will take time, much time, for me to feel my way out of this awful, and threatening fog. And then the future … the consequences, the risks, the acts that are bound to follow … Awful, awful, tragic, sad, menacing, etc. witches’ brew this … [ … ] Istvan 233 23 september 2001 Dear old friend, Isty, It’s impossible to remember my state of mind. I thought all week to call you, even earlier today, but realized I lacked the energy for a phone conversation—my head is full of the horror of what has befallen us— and the Western world—at one blow, and by fiendishly clever—far cleverer than any of us could ever dream of being (“us” meaning everyone in our gov[ernmen]ts, intellectuals, artists, writers, composers, et al.)— 2001 Islamic minds that twist and turn in the shapes of the calligraphy of Arabic —by contrast the squareness of ancient Hebrew denotes opposite characteristics (no need to spell it out—& no desire). I keep thinking of the Crusades & the “Saracens,” the “Moors” of Ferdinand/Isabella’s Spain, of Shakespeare’s “Othello,” of the Ottoman Empire that reached to the very outskirts of Vienna in Haydn, Mozart & Beethoven’s time (remember “Turkish Music”—cymbals, bass drum, marches—coffee and croissants ?), of the deadly hatred of the old Muslims for the “infidel” Christians—not to mention Jews from whom they “borrowed” the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac & Jacob (who became Israel), the slow, patient coiling of their plan to strike, not just at anything, but at the symbols at the heart of what stands for America to most Americans and most of the world: the financial, capitalistic nerve center of lower Manhattan and the Pentagon, nerve center of our military “might” as some would call it. The human loss which means so much to us means absolutely zero to the crafty twisted mind of bin Laden & his gang of death-dealers. The end of the first stanza of Yeats’s “Second Coming” is the very prophecy of the fogbound sated-with-false-dreams & illusions of a fast-asleep-w[ith]eyes -wide-shut West best represented by America—possibly less so by England & the continental Europeans—though they’ve been caught napping & off guard too many times themselves—and the fierce hating Moslems in Arabic & non-Arabic lands of the “worst full of passionate intensity” while “the best lack all conviction.” I keep thinking of Beethoven and his “Nicht dieses töne” followed by his “hymn to the Brotherhood of Man.” Was he also full of nonsensical illusions? Truth is, I feel sick at heart and in spirit. Because despite the horror of the shock and the blow, most people here don’t comprehend the vastness of the divide and the conflict . And young ones, friends, think that Islam’s “intentions” as based on the Koran (a fogbound circuitous piece of mumbo jumbo only surpassed by the Mormon Bible) are “morally” good, peaceful, practicing kindness etc. etc. Since when does a doctrine millions swear by have anything to do with how they act? Never prevented the Hebrews from destroying everyone in sight whom they considered dangerous and could overpower; nor Christians to this very day in Ireland; on and on it goes, the “ideal” belief so-called & the rotten truth coupled with the inability of people with brains to discern the great divide. My young friend, Barry Bobrick (whose last book was on the creation of the English Bible—a very telling story in its own way)1 said the other day: “I’m afraid they will outsmart us.” I think he’s right. And unser Bush said: “This will be a long campaign ”—fulfilling a sense that I’ve lived with since early maturity: I was Part V: Envoi (2001–2005) 388 | born in the last months of...