The search for Truth?

There is something invigoratingly refreshing (as well as totally humiliating!) about discovering that your use of one of your favourite quotations has been inaccurate.

            I cannot pretend to have read Francis Bacon’s Essays, Civil and Moral in full.  Indeed apart from the opening sentence of Essay I, Of Truth I don’t think that I have read any more of them, unless I have unconsciously read them as isolated quotations.

            To test the point I have just made I have traipsed upstairs to get a couple of my dictionaries of quotations: Encarta Book of Quotations (2000) London, Bloomsbury and Chambers Dictionary of Quotations (1996) Edinburgh, Chambers.  If you read through the selected quotations drawn from the Essays (1625) you realise just how much and how far Bacon’s thoughts have penetrated our everyday lives.  Sometimes the wording is somewhat different in their modern form, but his witty, perceptive and profound understanding has found its way into common wisdom.

            My own favourite of his thoughts, here written correctly with the verbs in their original form rather than my own choice is something which has troubled and stimulated me in equal proportions:

         What is truth? said jesting Pilate, and would not stay for an answer.

The question (which you note Pilate ironically states rather than asks, he neither wants nor expects an answer) is perennially relevant and we too often follow ‘jesting Pilate’ and live in our refusal to face the demands of what Bacon goes on to describe as the “difficulty and labor which men take in finding out of truth” and the lure of the preference for its opposite is because, “a mixture of a lie doth ever add pleasure” it shuns the “naked and open day-light” of truth because “that doeth not show the masks and mummeries and triumphs of the world, half so stately and daintily as candle-lights.”

Although Bacon’s prose is perhaps too dense for a modern reader, it is worth persevering with because it puts you in contact with a liberal understanding of the human condition.  

I have made myself a promise to read more of the Essays because I see a connection with the prose of someone like Sir Thomas Browne, 

a writer I have always enjoyed reading – and another person whose writings may not be universally well known, but whose thoughts have made their way into our intellectual expression.  

You have to like a writer who can think up, for title of whose second (?) most famous work, Hydriotaphia or Urn Burial, and it has pictures!  

Both Bacon and also Browne are easily, and productively, searchable on the Internet 

If you have not read them before, you might well be surprised to find out how familiar their thought is to you.

Obviously, the quotation from Bacon has been going through my mind as I look at the situations in Spain, Britain and the USA.  

Truth seems to have become an even more slippery concept in modern political life than usual.  Brexit was conducted with “candle-lights” so dim that Truth appeared to be living in some other debate; truth, honesty, integrity and all other positive virtues are signally lacking from the bunch of chancers who have taken the government in Spain, and Trump has found new depths of duplicity and prejudice that actually manage to throw a glimmer of probity on the mismanagement of Britain and Spain!

I have ever found consolation in Literature.  Thank goodness I have a goodly selection of reading glasses to make my contemplation of so many politicians “poor shrunken things, full of melancholy and disposition, and unpleasing to themselves” as something that can be accommodated within the liberal confines of pages of value!

Music and other concerns!

To say that the Liceu's production of Benvenuto Cellini was 'busy' is an understatement along the lines of saying that PP in Spain is 'dishonest'. With stilt-walkers, drum beaters, giant swinging skulls, an enormous golden head, back projection, front projection, acrobats, flag wavers, moving sets, fire, dramatic lighting and a camp pope, there is enough going on to keep even the most reluctant opera goer amused.

Whether it all works, of course is something else.

This production is designed and directed by Terry Gilliam, with co-direction and choreography by Leah Hausman, and Aaron Marsden also credited with design, so a certain amount of scenic Surrealism is to be expected. It may have been the lacklustre audience that the production I saw had, but the participants seemed to be working too hard for too little response. The circus troupe parading through the auditorium with a coloured paper ticker-tape shower was perhaps giving too much too soon and added to that much of the 'acting' was hammy in the extreme.

And that is one of the problems with the piece: what exactly is it? The opera exists in various versions and experts have said that it is difficult to know exactly what Berlioz had in mind for it. Originally it was conceived as an opéra comique with spoken dialogue and musical numbers, but this was not the opera that was performed in 1838 when the piece had become a through-sung performance. The opera was then cut and revised so that there are now at least three 'versions' of the show to choose when contemplating a (rare) performance.

Perhaps this lack of clarity is reflected in the sense of discomfort that I had in watching parts of the opera. There are elements of pure farce (in the best Brian Rix - there's a name from the past! - tradition) with lovers hiding when the father of the object of their attention comes home; there is the 'tables' approach to the action which could be funny; individual characters are presented as absurdly pompous or as outrageously camp, the latter most blatantly in the character of Pope Clement VII (well sung by Eric Halfvarson) who arrived on stage processing through a pair of massive swing doors, atop a wheeled set of stairs and encased in a sort of armour of over-the-top ecclesiastical garments which opened to allow him to descend the stairs in a mincing fashion to join the action. His appearance was like a cross between the ancient emperor from Turandot and Bella Lugosi, except, of course, I cannot remember either of those wearing an ostentatious gold cross and false glittering metallic finger stalls! And there's a murder, a real death in all this visual melange.

And the fact that I haven't mentioned the music yet speaks volumes for this production.

It is not music that I know, apart that is form the snatch of melody from the fiesta which later was used by Berlioz as the basis for the Roman Carnival Overture. So I came fresh to this opera and was open to be impressed.

The title role was taken by John Osborn, who sang it competently, but not in a way to take me with him through the production. I felt that he was straining in the upper register – but then, what tenor would not given the music written for him by Berlioz – and I found his acting a little wooden.

Teresa (the love interest) was played by Kathryn Lewek and she was more than a match for challenge of the role, though she was sometimes drowned by the excellent orchestra, the Orquestra Simfònica del Gran Teatre del Liceu conducted by Josep Pons, a fault I am prepared to forgive because of the magnificent performance the orchestra gave.

For me the stand-out performance was given by Annalisa Stroppa as Ascanio a replacement for Lidia Vinyes-Curtis who was scheduled to sing the role in the performance I saw. This is a 'breeches' role and it is always a delight to see what characteristics are adopted by the singer to emphasise the masculinity of the character: Stroppa was a delight to watch as, legs akimbo, chest out, hands on hips she made the man! Her singing was exceptional and she was always a commanding presence on stage.

I was surprised not to see on the cast list credits to the troupe of jugglers, acrobats and dancers who added so much to the feel of this piece. The sinisterly androgynous Master of Ceremonies with his painted skin and cracking whip added a touch (perhaps more than a touch) of depravity to an opera that always seemed on the cusp of descending into total mayhem and incoherence.

Did I enjoy this opera? On balance, yes I did. Not only is it an opera that I can now tick that I have seen and heard, but its Piranesi influenced scenery and sheer vitality will stay with me for a long time.

And, of course, the sound, the sheer sound of the chorus (Cor del Gran Teatre del Liceu) which in many ways was the true star of the production.

The first of the OU essays is slowly getting written. I have decided that today will (WILL) see a draft of the first of the three pieces that I have to write – anything less will make the timetable for completion impossible. Though, there again, I always hear David's, “Don't worry Stephen, it will get done!” echoing in my head. And I suppose that's true, but I am aiming to do more than simply get the essays done.

I am enjoying this course on the Renaissance much more than I did the Modern Art course just completed. I suppose that artists or 'artists' had not yet got into their pseudo-intellectual stride and so much of what the practitioners wrote was more practically orientated than wallowing in theory. And it is a bloody sight easier to read and understand!

I take it as a good sign that the opera was about Benvenuto Cellini who was, after all, himself a Renaissance man, or at least goldsmith (or godsmith as I first typed it! Given what he managed to create, perhaps the typo is not too far from the truth!) and I am going to take his easy way with evidence as my inspiration for the sort of writing that I am going to produce for my essays. Cellini's 'Autobiography' which I read when I was in college in the Penguin Classics (black & serious) edition was an absolute delight to read. It was recommended by the English and the history departments- though, to be fair I think that it was regarded as 'informed literature' by both!

I have a great deal to do to find out details of the art works that I am supposed to be writing about, and I will give you some of the questions that I need answers to: Who commissioned each work of art? Was there a contract? Does that contract exist? Who designed the font? Who decided on the artists? Where exactly was the font positioned? Who the hell is the sculptor, of whom I have never heard? Were the statues supposed to be where they now are? What is the cross of St John made of – surely not marble? What is the significance of the bird (eagle?) on the base of the half column behind the three statues? Were the blind windows (and is that what they are called) intended to be the background for the statues? And so on. In a way I am delighted that I am in a position to have to answer, or bluff my way through, these questions. And I am paying (heftily) to do so!

I have discovered that one other person (as well as an appalled Toni) listened to my infamous but-he-doesn't-speak-the-language radio interview – Ramon, the owner of the take-away (how little that description tells you about the foodie delights that he provides) who merely said that he was listening to the radio and heard a voice which he told himself could only be me!

This is not the first time that this has happened. A very early broadcast (!) of mine was for WNO when I had to enthuse about an opera that I had neither seen nor heard. This was broadcast live on a Sunday evening when no-one was listening. But, come Monday morning, I was greeted by one of my pupils who asked if I had been on the radio the previous day! In a similar way one friend recalled driving in North Wales along narrow and difficult roads while listening to the radio and almost swerving to oblivion as my dulcet tones emanated from the loudspeaker! It is nice to have an effect or affect – or possibly both depending on how you read the sentence!

And now writing. A simple draft before bedtime will suffice.

Time to breathe again?

The fatalistic philosophy of David from The School on the Hill has proved its worth yet again.  Like a modern day Candide, his supremely irritating assertion that, in spite of all the factors hindering completion of any action in academic life, “It will get done!” has been shown to be true once more.  And, although the even more irritating and fiddly work of referencing is not complete,  a useable draft of my essay exists.  This writing has almost gone to the wire but, dare I say it, I have two days in hand and the thing (for thing it is) is largely complete.

            It will be a relief to get this essay out of the way, to allow concentration on the end of module assignment.  Quite what happens to Book 4 of our course which is now ahead of us with no essay or examination to force concentration, I do not know. But that is for the future and I am not looking forward with any discriminating clarity until the essay is winging its electronic way to my tutor and her fully justified condemnation!

Toni is working with what I can only describe as compressed smugness.  He is enjoying the thrill of horrified anticipation about the depth and width of the work that he will have to complete in the new courses that he has just started, but that is because he is no believer in the fear-fuelled production process that I espouse.  He looks back to his time in school as largely wasted and therefore the makeshift and lackadaisical approach that he had then is anathema to him now.  He works with oodles of time in hand and ensures that all his assignments are finished well within the limits allowed.  I do not think that he could exist in the digressive world that I inhabit!

            I am supposed to be writing an abstract of my ‘research’ so that its inclusion in some form or other might be considered for an exhibition on Guevara in Leeds University!  I am not sure that people outside the course A318 in the Open University have any real idea of what I am doing or what I am proposing to do and at what level – but I am enjoying the frisson of thinking that my work may extend out of the narrow tutor/student environment and gain further readers.  
          Yet again, as with my autumn book, all I have to do is write the thing so that there is some there to share!

Toni is using his blog (at: http://catalunyaplacetoeat.blogspot.com.es/ ) as part of his course as he is able to try out the various technological techniques to which he has been introduced.  
          The number of restaurants that he has commented on has now reached double figures and I rather enjoy the fact that our eating out has now been given a sort of authority and vindication by the inclusion of each of our meals as raw material (though rather delicious and usually cooked!) for their critical inclusion in his blog - with photos!

            I think the best part of the blog is the illustration of the food, and for the photographs I have resurrected my old Canon G9 – probably the favourite of all my cameras.  This is a flexible and compact piece of kit, feels good in the hand and does not have the bulky ostentation of a bridge camera or full SLR.  I am inclined to take it with me to London for the photographing of the Guevaras when I finally get to see them in Chelsea.

            It will be interesting to see how Toni’s blog develops, especially when the Ruta de Tapa is in full swing as each offering will have an entry of its own and Toni has indicated that we could do one-a-day then the number of entries will be considerably boosted.  
          The only unfortunate thing is that these tapas are only produced for the limited period of the Ruta and therefore will be of only historical interest as people will not be able to sample them after the Ruta closes.  
          But I think that they will be interesting to look back on and, if Toni continues the blog for the next few years then he could show how restaurants respond to the Ruta by adding the new tapa to the old and linking this to the general meal entry.  
          Already we have revisited one restaurant and we have added photos of the ‘new’ meals so that the range of food available in at least one place has been demonstrated.

            Eventually this blog will be a fascinating pictorial record of the food that we have eaten over a period and also a way of keeping track of how restaurants keep up their standards.

            
          In my blog, the one that you are reading now, I am still mystified by the fact that one particular entry has had and continues to have a large and regular readership.  
          I have re-read this entry myself and I would like to think that it is because of the witty and insightful writing that it has such a continued popularity – but I don’t see it myself.  
          The ways of the blogosphere are weird and wonderful and I suppose that one just has to accept rather than analyse.

            My poetry blog (at: http://smrnewpoems.blogspot.com.es/ ) is altogether more rarefied and the readership is, shall we say, more select.  I would welcome ways in which to extend the readership, but I don’t know how.  I can hear Toni’s injunction to “Go on YouTube!” as the answer to all of life’s questions.            I don’t know why philosophy is still taught in universities because now all you have to do is “Go on YouTube”.  What is reality?  Why does pain exist?  Is there a God?  What?  All the answers to these and more questions are waiting to be experienced in a three minute barely articulate video made by some spotty teenager in Wisconsin.  It is such comfort to know that Knowing with a capital K is just a few clicks away!

Now for my swim, and then the fiddly bits of the essay – together, of course with my flamboyantly academic yet paradoxically popularist bibliography, all carefully double-spaced.  
          If nothing else, and sometimes my essays are exactly that, they look professional and polished.  Pity about the content – though there is sometimes an elegance of expression which almost makes up for the paucity of apposite perception!  Almost!

And let’s face it, sometimes that is enough.