Currently Reading: Nonrequired Reading by Wislawa Szymborska 📚

I’m old-fashioned and think that reading books is the most glorious pastime that humankind has yet devised. Homo Ludens dances, sings, produces meaningful gestures, strikes poses, dresses up, revels, and performs elaborate rituals. I don’t wish to diminish the significance of these distractions—without them human life would pass in unimaginable monotony and, possibly, dispersion and defeat. But these are group activities, above which drifts a more or less perceptible whiff of collective gymnastics. Homo Ludens with a book is free. At least as free as he’s capable of being. He himself makes up the rules of the game, which are subject only to his own curiosity. He’s permitted to read intelligent books, from which he will benefit, as well as stupid ones, from which he may also learn something. He can stop before finishing one book, if he wishes, while starting another at the end and working his way back to the beginning. He may laugh in the wrong places or stop short at words that he’ll keep for a lifetime. And, finally, he’s free – and no other hobby can promise this – to eavesdrop on Montaigne’s arguments or take a quick dip in the Mesozoic.

(Post by Patrick Kurp)

Currently Reading: Jakob von Gunten by Robert Walser 📚

More by Nicolás Gómez Dávila:

No esperemos que la civilización renazca, mientras el hombre no vuelva a sentirse humillado de consagrarse a tareas económicas.

Uno a uno, talvez los hombres sean nuestros prójimos, pero amontonados seguramente no lo son.

Aun cuando la desigualdad no fuera imborrable, deberíamos preferirla a la igualdad por amor a la policromía.

La democracia sólo tolera dos partidos: el vocero de las ideas estúpidas, el protector de las codicias sórdidas.

Generalizar extiende nuestro poder y empobrece nuestro espíritu.

Los tres enemigos del hombre son: el demonio, el estado y la técnica.

La difusión de la cultura tuvo por efecto capacitar al tonto a parlotear de lo que ignora.

Al que anda a caza de una explicación cabal del mundo aconsejémosle que la invente. Para que corra menos riesgo de creer en ella.

Los especialistas no pueden comunicarse mutuamente las particularidades que verdaderamente saben, sino las generalidades que erróneamente creen saber.

Donde es posible decir lo que se quiere, nadie se da el trabajo de decir solamente lo que importa.

El historiador debe atenerse a lo probable, sin cerrarse a lo imposible.

Los conservadores actuales no son más que liberales maltratados por la democracia.

Los medios actuales de comunicación le permiten al ciudadano moderno enterarse de todo sin entender nada.

Two Articles on Nicolás Gómez Dávila: Nicolás Gómez Dávila: The Nietzsche From the Andes (2019), Nicolás Gómez Dávila and the Authentic Reactionary(2022).

When Charles Lamb was little more than a toddler, his sister, Mary, took him for a walk in the graveyard. The precocious little boy read the laudatory epitaphs on the tombstones, commemorating the deceased as “virtuous,” “charitable,” “beloved,” and so on. As they came away, he asked, “Mary, where are all the naughty people buried?” (The Little, Brown Book of Anecdotes, ed. Clifton Fadiman)

Every book worth reading at all should immediately be read twice, partly because we understand things better in their context the second time and only really understand the beginning when we know the end, and partly because we bring a different spirit and mood to every passage the second time around, which makes for a different impression and is as if we view an object in another light. (Schopenhauer, Parerga and Paralipomena)

How is “real book” defined? Quite simply: it is a book one wants to reread. It can stand rereading because it is very full – of ideas and feelings, of scenes and persons real or imagined, of strange accidents and situations and judgments of behavior: it is a world in itself, like and unlike the world already in our head. For this reason, this fullness, it may well be “hard to get into.” But it somehow compels one to keep turning the page, and at the end the wish to reread is clear and strong: one senses that the work contains more than met the eye the first time around. (Jacques Barzun, Begin Here: The Forgotten Conditions of Teaching and Learning)

In the république des instituteurs, Emile-Auguste Chartier was sovereign. He signed himself “Alain.” His was, unquestionably, a commanding presence in European moral and intellectual history. His influence permeated French education and significant elements in French politics from 1906, the year of Dreyfus’s rehabilitation, to the late 1940s. Alain’s prose possesses unsurpassed economy and clarity. His stoic integrity held generations of pupils and disciples spellbound. Comparison with Socrates became routine. Alain was “the sage in the city,” the Maître des maîtres. In addition to philosophical and political writings, in addition to essays on the arts and on poetry, such as his elucidation of Valéry’s La Jeune Parque, Alain published autobiographical reflections. L’Histoire de mes pensées of 1936 is a jewel. As are his meditations on war in Mars.

Yet the very name of Alain is virtually unknown in the Anglo-American world. Hardly any of his writings have been translated. Why should this be? I have no good answer. There is, no doubt, a problem of context. Alain’s Propos, the succinct but often highly wrought memoranda of which he published some five thousand in the daily or weekly press from 1906 to 1936 – there is a hiatus between 1914 and 1921 – touch on “universals”; but they do so with incisive reference to the immediate, to the political, social, ideological, or artistic occasion of the day. Alain’s brevities assume shared knowledge. For any outsider, for French readers after the second world war and the young today, the informing circumstance has faded. Alain’s texts, moreover, were resonant with his teaching voice. With the distancing, with the disappearance of the man, the life-giving force may have drained from the page. Nevertheless, so much wisdom and warmth of feeling endures. Again: why the blank in British and American awareness? (Lessons of the Masters, George Steiner)

Heine died in poverty, deserted by his friends. The sole person to attend his deathbed in his squalid Parisian garret was the composer Berlioz. “I always thought you were an original, Berlioz,” observed the dying man. (The Little, Brown Book of Anecdotes, ed. Clifton Fadiman)

During the winter of 1894–95 Hamsun visited Paris for the first time. On his return home someone asked him, “At the beginning, didn’t you have trouble with your French?”

“No,” he replied, “but the French did.” (The Little, Brown Book of Anecdotes, ed. Clifton Fadiman)

My long pupilship with Jacques Barzun began when I was a sophomore at Columbia College and he was an instructor teaching a course entitled “The Historical Background of English Literature.” We students were asked to read a long series of excerpts from notable authors, together with Trevelyan’s History of England, but the class discussions took an unexpected turn. At the first meeting, as I remember it, Mr. Barzun introduced Byron’s irregular sonnet beginning “She walks in beauty like the night” to illustrate the method of relating a literary work to the historical setting in which it was produced. The class flung itself upon this example with avidity and, with the instructor’s encouragement, found so much to consider in the piece that its eighteen lines and their historical background remained our topic for most of the term. The lesson I still retain from that course is that the close, patient and unhurried reading of a single text is more profitable than the hasty reading of many. (Theodore Caplow, in Dora B. Weiner and William R. Keylor, eds., From Parnassus: Essays in Honor of Jacques Barzun)

Pour mon goût, voyager c’est faire à la fois un mètre ou deux, s’arrêter et regarder de nouveau un nouvel aspect des mêmes choses. Souvent, aller s’asseoir un peu à droite ou à gauche, cela change tout, et bien mieux que si je fais cent kilomètres. (Propos Sur le Bonheur, Alain)

Carneades used to say that the sons of princes learned nothing rightly but how to manage horses, since in every other exercise everyone gives way to them and lets them win; but a horse, who is neither a flatterer nor a courtier, will throw the son of a king just as he would the son of a porter. (Essays, Montaigne, tr. Donald Frame)

Qui voudrait jouer aux cartes sans risquer jamais de perdre? Voici un vieux roi qui joue avec des courtisans; quand il perd, il se met en colère, et les courtisans le savent bien; depuis que les courtisans ont bien appris à jouer, le roi ne perd jamais. Aussi voyez comme il repousse les cartes. Il se lève, il monte à cheval; il part pour la chasse; mais c’est une chasse de roi, le gibier lui vient dans les jambes; les chevreuils aussi sont courtisans. (22 Janvier 1908, Propos Sur le Bonheur, Alain)

Some months after the end of his term as president, Eisenhower was asked if leaving the White House had affected his golf game. “Yes,” he replied, “a lot more people beat me now.” (The Little, Brown Book of Anecdotes, ed. Clifton Fadiman)

During the Peloponnesian War an eclipse occurred when Pericles was about to set out to sea. As the pilot was too terrified to perform his duties, Pericles stepped forward and covered the man’s head with his cloak. “does this frighten you?” he asked. “No,” said the pilot. “Then what difference is there between the two events,” inquired Pericles, “except that the sun is covered by a larger object than my cloak?” (The Little, Brown Book of Anecdotes, ed. Clifton Fadiman)

Shortly before Austria went fascist, in 1938, Schuschnigg is reported to have said that 25 per cent of the population were for him, 25 per cent for Hitler, and that the rest would go the way the cat jumped. This principle deserves the name of Schuschnigg’s Constant. The only doubt is whether he did not grossly exaggerate the number of those having opinions. (Jacques Barzun, Of Human Freedom)

After Einstein had gone into exile, a hundred Nazi professors published a book condemning his theory of relativity. Einstein was unconcerned. “If I were wrong,” he said, “one professor would have been enough.” (The Little, Brown Book of Anecdotes, ed. Clifton Fadiman)

A Thessalian brought an exceptionally beautiful horse, named Bucephalus, to the Macedonian court, offering to sell it to King Philip. However, when the royal grooms tried to test its paces it proved wild and unmanageable. The young Alexander asked his father for permission to try his skill. Philip reluctantly agreed, saying that if the prince failed to ride Bucephalus he was to pay his father a forfeit equal to its price. Alexander walked quickly to the horse’s head and turned it to face into the sun, for he had noticed that the horse’s own shadow was upsetting it. He calmed it, then mounted it, and Bucephalus obediently showed off his paces.

The court, which had feared for the prince’s safety, broke into loud applause. Philip was overjoyed. He kissed his son, saying, “Seek another kingdom that may be worthy of your abilities, for Macedonia is too small for you.” (The Little, Brown Book of Anecdotes, ed. Clifton Fadiman)

Lorsqu’un petit enfant crie et ne veut pas être consolé, la nourrice fait souvent les plus ingénieuses suppositions concernant ce jeune caractère et ce qui lui plaît et déplaît; appelant même l’hérédité au secours, elle reconnaît déjà le père dans le fils; ces essais de psychologie se prolongent jusqu’à ce que la nourrice ait découvert l’épingle, cause réelle de tout.

Lorsque Bucéphale, cheval illustre, fut présenté au jeune écuyer ne pouvait se maintenir sur cet animal redoutable. Sur quoi un homme vulgaire aurait dit: «Voilà un cheval méchant.» Alexandre cependant cherchait l’épingle, et la trouva bientôt, remarquant que Bucéphale avait terriblement peur de sa propre ombre; et comme la peur faisait sauter l’ombre aussi, cela n’avait point de fin. Mais il tourna le nez de Bucéphale vers le soleil, et, le maintenant dans cette direction, il put le rassurer et le fatiguer. Ainsi l’élève d’Aristote savait déjà que nous n’avons aucune puissance sur les passions tant que nous n’en connaissons pas les vraies causes. (8 Décembre 1922, Propos Sur le Bonheur, Alain)

Censuring Stalin at a public meeting, Khrushchev was interrupted by a voice from the audience. “You were one of Stalin’s colleagues,” shouted the heckler. “Why didn’t you stop him?”

“Who said that?” roared Khrushchev. There was an agonizing silence in the room. Nobody dared to move a muscle. Then, in a quiet voice, Khrushchev said, “Now you know why.” (The Little, Brown Book of Anecdotes, ed. Clifton Fadiman)

During William Morris’s last visit to Paris, he spent much of his time in the restaurant of the Eiffel Tower, either eating or writing. When a friend observed that he must be very impressed by the tower to spend so much time there, Morris snorted, “Impressed! I remain here because it’s the only place in Paris where I can avoid seeing the damn thing.” (The Little, Brown Book of Anecdotes, ed. Clifton Fadiman)

New at IWP Books: Jeremiah (1917) by Stefan Zweig.

Horace’s Diffugere Nives by Camões, 1595 (& 182 English Translations):

Fogem as neves frias

dos altos montes, quando reverdecem

as árvores sombrias;

as verdes ervas crescem,

e o prado ameno de mil cores tecem.

Zéfiro brando espira;

suas setas Amor afia agora;

Progne triste suspira

e Filomela chora;

o Céu da fresca terra se enamora.

Vai Vênus Citereia

com os coros das Ninas rodeada;

a linda Panopeia,

despida e delicada,

com as duas irmãs acompanhada.

Enquanto as oficinas

dos Cíclopes Vulcano está queimando,

vão colhendo boninas

as Ninfas e cantando,

a terra co ligeiro pé tocando.

Desce do duro monte

Diana, já cansada d’espessura,

buscando a clara fonte

onde, por sorte dura,

perdeu Actéon a natural figura.

Assim se vai passando

a verde Primavera e seco Estio;

trás ele vem chegando

depois o Inverno frio,

que também passará por certo fio.

Ir-se-á embranquecendo

com a frígida neve o seco monte;

e Júpiter, chovendo,

turbará a clara fonte;

temerá o marinheiro a Orionte.

Porque, enfim, tudo passa;

não sabe o tempo ter firmeza em nada;

e nossa vida escassa

foge tão apressada

que, quando se começa, é acabada.

Que foram dos Troianos

Hector temido, Eneias piadoso?

Consumiram-te os anos,

Ó Cresso tão famoso,

sem te valer teu ouro precioso.

Todo o contentamento

crias que estava no tesouro ufano?

Ó falso pensamento

que, à custa de teu dano,

do douto Sólon creste o desengano!

O bem que aqui se alcança

não dura, por possante, nem por forte;

que a bem-aventurança

durável de outra sorte

se há-de alcançar, na vida, para a morte.

Porque, enfim, nada basta

contra o terrível fim da noite eterna;

nem pode a deusa casta

tornar à luz supernal?

Hipólito, da escura noite averna.

Nem Teseu esforçado,

com manha nem com força rigorosa,

livrar pode o ousado

Piritoo da espantosa

prisão leteia, escura e tenebrosa.

From 2007, Arthur Krystal on Jacques Barzun:

Next month, Barzun, the eminent historian and cultural critic, will turn one hundred. His idea of celebrating his centenary is to put the finishing touches on his thirty-eighth book (not counting translations). Among his areas of expertise are French and German literature, music, education, ghost stories, detective fiction, language, and etymology. Barzun has examined Poe as proofreader, Abraham Lincoln as stylist, Diderot as satirist, and Liszt as reader; he has burnished the reputations of Thomas Beddoes, James Agate, and John Jay Chapman; and he has written so many reviews and essays that his official biographer is loath to put a number on them. There’s nothing hasty or haphazard about these evaluations. Barzun’s breadth of erudition has been a byword among friends and colleagues for six decades. Yet, in spite of his degrees and awards (he was made a Chevalier de l’Ordre National de la Légion d’Honneur and has received the Presidential Medal of Freedom), Barzun regards himself in many respects as an “amateur” (the Latin root, amator, means “lover”), someone who takes genuine pleasure in what he learns about. More than any other historian of the past four generations, Barzun has stood for the seemingly contradictory ideas of scholarly rigor and unaffected enthusiasm.

“Before 1914 the critics and scholars of Central Europe were particularly free of national bias. They wrote about past and present art with such zeal and sympathy as to diffuse an atmosphere akin to that of the cosmopolitan 18C. It contributed to the mood of joy in creation and appreciation that made later comers look back on those years as a belle époque. Artists traveled freely – no passports or visas – many to Paris, where they might stay for a time, because the excitement there was the hottest; and, when back in Berlin, Vienna, Prague, or St. Petersburg, they merged their newfound inspirations with local influences and independent innovations. [The book to read is The World of Yesterday by Stefan Zweig.]” (Jacques Barzun, From Dawn to Decadence)

From Nietzsche’s Human, All Too Human (tr. Hollingdale):

More respect for those who know! – Given the present competitive nature of selling, the public is necessarily the judge of the product of work: but the public has no particular specialist knowledge and judges according to the appearance of quality. As a consequence, the art of producing an appearance (and perhaps that of developing taste) is bound to be enhanced, and the quality of the product to decline, under the domi­nance of the competitive market. Consequently, if we are to continue to be reasonable we shall at some time have to put an end to this competitive market and replace it with a different principle. Only the skilled producer of the product ought to be the judge of the product, and the public ought to rely on their faith in him and his integrity. Therefore, no anonymous work! At the very least a knowledgeable expert in the product would have to be at hand as guarantor and place his name upon it if the name of its originator was unavailable or without significance. The cheapness of a product is another way of deceiving the layman, inasmuch as it is only durability that can determine whether or not a thing is cheap; but that is hard to assess, and for the layman impossible. – From all of which it follows that what is attractive to the eye and costs little now commands the market – and that can, of course, only be the product of the machine. For its part, again, the machine – that is to say, the means of great rapidity and facility of production – also favours the most saleable type of product; otherwise there is no great gain to be made from it; it would be too little used and too often silent. But what is most saleable is, as aforesaid, decided by the public: it will be the most deceptive product, that is to say that which appears to be of good quality and also appears to be cheap. Thus in this domain of work too our watchword must be: “More respect for those who know!”