Philip Christman

So apparently Marilynne Robinson has a new book out today, or something. She sure does have some obsessive fans. Do those guys need a hobby, or what?!

I’m so mad she used that title, too. It preempts my autobiography-in-progress, When I Was a Child I Read Books (In Which Superman Fought a Villainous Brain Collector from Deep Space Who Wanted the Universe’s Last Kryptonian Brain For His Collection Which, See, That Would Be Superman’s Brain, But Superman Wasn’t Havin’ Any of That Bullshit, POW!).

I’m kinda going for Michael Chabon territory.

This is a book by the German-born novelist/translator Philipp Blom, telling the story behind the great eighteenth-century Encyclopedie of Denis Diderot et. al. It is frustratingly simplistic throughout in the way that it opposes champions of Enlightenment to the forces of darkness (priests, aristocrats, etc.). It has a handful of what seemed to me like inaccuracies (in one chapter, Blom gives a description of the ontological argument for God’s existence that left me wondering whether he or I had failed to pay attention during Philosophy 101). It’s not always beautifully written.

Does that sound as though I didn’t enjoy the book? Because I did, thoroughly. It added a lot to my understanding of eighteenth-century Europe (what it will add to your understanding I could hardly guess), and it is full of the kind of important-people-gossip that makes “Downton Abbey” such a guilty pleasure for me. (Or did, till they arrested Bates. I mean, come the fuck on. I can only be obviously manipulated for so long with no payoff before it stops being fun and I totally withdraw my emotions. That’s why my first college relationships flopped.)

To start with. The reason Denis Diderot never really wrote his great philosophical masterwork (something to compare with Voltaire’s Philosophical Dictionary or Rousseau’s Discourse on Inequality) is because he got arrested early in his career. After three months in a dungeon, he signed a document promising never to attack the church or aristocracy again, on pain of life imprisonment. All his life he has this stupid contract hanging over his head. Would you produce your best work in those circumstances?

Another thing I learned: Do you remember that paranoid drama queen that you were probably friends with somewhere between age 17 and age 19, who at first was the warmest, most interesting, spontaneous, wonderful person you’ve ever met and six weeks later has written you off completely because the color of your socks proves that you’re a hypocritical sellout who’s “totally against him”? Yeah, that was pretty much Jean-Jacques Rousseau. He and Diderot were as close as brothers for years, but as Rousseau came to see society as the source of nearly all human corruption, he started seeing corrupt and hypocritical motivations behind the actions of all the players on Team Enlightenment, including Diderot. Meanwhile, he treated his mistress and his patroness like shit, tried to hook up with his patroness’s sister-in-law while living “the simple life” on his patroness’s estate (and allowing his mistress’s octogenarian mother to work herself to death keeping house for him), and scolded everyone else for being a hypocrite. It all really illustrates the truth of Arnold Toynbee’s dictum: “More than any other of the men to whom we owe our modern concept of freedom, Jean-Jacques Rousseau needed to be punched in the nuts.” OK, maybe I said that.

Blom’s book is full of these sorts of fascinating stories. I almost never look at the several pages of portraits that are invariably bound into the middle of a nonfiction book like this; I pored over them here, because I had gotten personally invested in these people and wanted to know what they looked like.

Rousseau, of course, wore a stupid hat.

Baron D’Holbach, that notorious freethinker, looks like a used-car salesman in a wig.

Here is Diderot’s close friend, Baron Friedrich Melchior von Grimm, one of the few Germans whom French people thought spoke French correctly. As a young man, he almost died for love, thereby possibly inspiring Goethe to create Werther, and definitely inspiring a lot of French women to sleep with him.

Below we see Diderot’s co-editor, Jean le Rond d’Alembert, who was pretty high-maintenance and stuck Diderot with most of the job, and finally quit after like the fifteenth time the Catholic Church tried to have them all killed. What a wuss. I absolutely love this picture; he looks exactly like that guy that played Kirk’s estranged son in Star Trek II.

Klingon bastards killed my son!

Finally, here’s Chevalier Louis Jaucourt. More than any other person, he is responsible for the success of the Encyclopedie. A Hugueunot (French Calvinist), he wrote nearly 18,000 entries, paid for much of the research out of his own deep pockets, and covered all the really boring topics. He was a saint. Nobody liked him.

Bartholomeus Anglicus has a section on geography that just begs to be excerpted in full. It is amazing. Here’s what he says about England:

OF ANGLIA,

England is the most island of [the] Ocean, and is beclipped [beclipped: love this word!] all about by the sea, and departed from the roundness of the world, and hight sometimes Albion: and had that name of white rocks, which were seen on the sea cliffs. And by continuance of time, lords and noble men of Troy, after that Troy was destroyed, went from thence, and were accompanied with a great navy, and fortuned to the cliffs of the foresaid island, and that by revelation of their feigned goddess Pallas, as it is said, and the Trojans fought with giants long time that dwelled therein, and overcame the giants, both with craft and with strength, and conquered the island, and called the land Britain, by the name of Brute that was prince of that host: and so the island hight Britain, as it were an island conquered of Brute that time, with arms and with might.  Of this Brute’s offspring came most mighty kings. And who that hath liking to know their deeds, let him read the story of Brute. [I'd love to! It sounds tough as fuck! I can only assume, by the way, that we're talking about this guy, and that this is his book.]

[This all leads into some of the best fake-etymology action I've seen since the opening chapter of Frederick Buechner's novel Godric, where the ass-kissing assistant monk interprets the title character's name as God ric, "God reigns," and Godric responds that it actually means "Go" and "drick," "drick" being "a foul Welsh word not fit for monkish ears." Pious assistant: "Great is your humilitas, father!" Godric: "Not so great as is my drick." Moving on!:]

And long time after, the Saxons won the island with many and divers hard battles and strong, and their offspring had possession after them of the island, and the Britons were slain or exiled, and the Saxons departed the island among them, and gave every province a name, by the property of its own name and nation, and therefore they cleped the island Anglia, by the name of Engelia the queen, the worthiest duke of Saxony’s daughter, that had the island in possession after many battles. Isidore saith, that this land hight Anglia, and hath that name of Angulus, a corner, as it were land set in the end, or a corner of the world. But saint Gregory, seeing English children to sell at Rome, when they were not christened, and hearing that they were called English: according with the name of the country, he answered and said: Truly they be English, for they shine in face right as angels: it is need to send them message, with word of salvation. For as Beda saith, the noble kind of the land shone in their faces. 

It goes on like that for another half-page or so: England is full of cool natural resources, and also, it is full of people who are tougher than Gerard Butler’s dried-out toenail clippings. Don’t mess with Anglia.

A little later on, we get the nice and frowny faces of Orientalism. Here is Frowny:

OF Ethiopia

Ethiopia, blue men’s land, had first that name of colour,  of men.  For the sun is nigh, and roasteth and toasteth them.  And so the colour of men showeth the strength of the star, for there is continual heat.  For all that is under the south pole about the west is full of mountains, and about the middle full of gravel, and in the east side most desert and wilderness: and stretcheth from the west of Atlas toward the east unto the ends of Egypt, and is closed in the south with ocean, and in the north with the river Nile.  In this land be many nations with divers faces wonderly and horribly shapen: Also therein be many wild beasts and serpents, and also Rhinoceros, and the beast that hight Cameleon, a beast with many colours. Also there be cockatrices and great dragons, and precious stones be taken out of their brains, Jacinth, and Chrysophrase, Topaz, and many other precious stones be found in those parts, and cinnamon is there gathered.  There be two Ethiopias, one is in the east, and the other is in Mauritania in the west, and that is more near Spain. And then is Numidia, and the province of Carthage. Then is Getula, and at last against the course of the sun in the south is the land that hight Ethiopia adusta, burnt; and fables tell, that there beyond be the Antipodes, men that have their feet against our feet. The men of Ethiopia have their name of a black river, and that river is of the same kind as Nilus, for they breed reeds and bullrushes, and rise and wax in one time: In the wilderness there be many men wonderly shapen. Some oft curse the sun bitterly in his rising and downgoing, and they behold the sun and curse him always: for his heat grieveth them full sore. And other as Trogodites dig them dens and caves, and dwell in them instead of houses : and they eat serpents, and all that may be got; their noise is more fearful in sounding than the voice of other.  Others there be which like beasts live without wedding, and dwell with women without law, and such be called Garamantes.  Others go naked, and be not occupied with travail, and they be called Graphasantes.  There be other that be called Bennii, and it is said, they have no heads, but they have eyes fixed in their breasts. And there be Satyrs, and they have only shape of men, and have no manners of mankind. Also in Ethiopia be many other wonders, there be Etbiops, saith Plinius, among whom all four footed beasts be brought forth without ears, and also elephants. Also there be some that have a hound for their king, and divine by his moving, and do as they will. And other have three or four eyes in their foreheads as it is said, not that it is so in kind, but that it is feigned, for they use principally looking and sight of arrows. Also some of them hunt lions and panthers, and live by their flesh, and their king hath only one eye in his forehead. Other men of Ethiopia live only by honeysuckles dried in smoke, and in the sun, and these live not past forty years. 

Yes, the Ethiopians are so scary that they curse the sun. Also: blue people. India, on the other hand, is where Anglicus and his sources project all their idealism, rather than all their fears, and we wind up with a picture that’s equally crazy in the opposite direction:

OF INDIA,

And as it is said some of the Indians till the earth, and some use chivalry, and some use merchandise and lead out chaffer; some rule and govern the community at best; and some be about the kings, and some be Justices and doomsmen, some give them principally to religions and to learning of wit and of wisdom. And as among all countries and lands India is the greatest and most rich: so among all lands India is most wonderful. For as Pliny saith, India aboundeth in wonders. In India be many huge beasts bred, and more greater hounds than in other lands. Also there be so high trees that men may not shoot to the top with an arrow, as it is said. And that maketh the plenty and fatness of the earth and temperateness of weather, of air, and of water. Fig trees spread there so broad, that many great companies of knights may sit at meat under the shadow of one tree. Also there be so great reeds and so long that every piece between two knots beareth sometime three men over the water.  Also there be men of great stature, passing five cubits in height, and they never spit, nor have never headache nor toothache, nor sore eyes, nor they be not grieved with passing heat of the sun, but rather made more hard and sad therewith. Also their philosophers that they call Gymnosophists stand in most hot gravel from the morning till evening, and behold the sun without blemishing of their eyes. Also there, in some mountains be men with soles of the feet turned backwards, and the foot also with viij toes on one foot. Also there be some with hounds’ heads, and be clothed in skins of wild beasts, and they bark as hounds, and speak none other wise; and they live by hunting and fowling: and they be armed with their nails and teeth, and be full many, about six score thousand as he saith. Also among some nations of India be women that bear never child but once, and the children wax whitehaired anon as they be born. There be satyrs and other men wondrously shapen. Also in the end of East India, about the rising of Ganges, be men without mouths, and they be clothed in moss and in rough hairy things, which they gather off trees, and live commonly by odour and smell at the nostrils. And they nother eat nother drink, but only smell odour of flowers and of wood apples, and live so, and they die anon in evil odour and smell. And other there be that live full long, and age never, but die as it were in middle age.  Also some be hoar in youth, and black in age.  Pliny rehearseth these wonders, and many other mo.

And if anyone questions whether the English have the right to rule certain … neighboring territories, well, let’s hear about those Irish and Scotch.

Solinus speaketh of Ireland, and saith the inhabitants thereof be fierce, and lead an unhuman life.  The people there use to harbour no guests, they be warriors, and drink men’s blood that they slay, and wash first their faces therewith: right and unright they take for one. . . . Men of Ireland be singularly clothed and unseemly arrayed and scarcely fed, they be cruel of heart, fierce of cheer, angry of speech, and sharp. Damn. OK, what about the Scots? The men are light of heart, fierce, and courageous on their enemies. They love nigh as well death as thraldom, and they account it for sloth to die in bed, and a great worship and virtue to die in a field fighting against enemies.  The men be of scarce living, and many suffer hunger long time, and eat selde tofore the sun going down, and use flesh, milk meats, fish, and fruits more than Britons: and use to eat the less bread, and though the men be seemly enough of figure and of shape, and fair of face generally by kind, yet their own Scottish clothing disfigures them full much.  And Scots be said in their own tongue of bodies painted, as it were cut and slit. For in old time they were marked with divers figures and shapes on their flesh and skin, made with iron pricks.  And by cause of medlying with Englishmen, many of them have changed the old manners of Scots into better manners for the more part, but the wild Scots and Irish account great worship to follow their forefathers in clothing, in tongue, and in living, and in other manner doing. Pity the poor colonizer.

Doesn’t “subtle body” sound like a really out-there sort of dance music from Detroit? But actually, according to my favorite medieval encyclopedist, it’s this:

A spirit is a subtle body, by the strength of heat gendered, and in man’s body giving life by the veins of the body, and by the veins and pulses giveth to beasts, breath, life, and pulses, and working, wilful moving, and wit by means of sinews and muscles in bodies that have souls. Physicians say that this spirit is gendered in this manner wise. Whiles by heat working in the blood, in the liver is caused strong boiling and seething, and thereof cometh a smoke, the which is pured, and made subtle of the veins of the liver.  And turneth into a subtle spiritual substance and airly kind, and that is called the natural spirit. For kindly by the might thereof it maketh the blood subtle. And by lightness thereof it moveth the blood and sendeth it about into all the limbs. And this same spirit turneth to heartward by certain veins. And there by moving and smiting together of the parts of the heart, the spirit is more pured, and turned into a more subtle kind. And then it is called of physicians the vital spirit: because that from the heart, by the wosen, and veins, and small ways, it spreadeth itself into all the limbs of the body, and increaseth the virtues spiritual, and ruleth and keepeth the works thereof.  For out of a den of the left side of the heart cometh an artery vein, and in his moving is departed into two branches: the one thereof goeth downward, and spreadeth in many boughs, and sprays, by means of which the vital spirit is brought to give the life to all the nether limbs of the body.  The other bough goeth upward, and is again departed in three branches. The right bough thereof goeth to the right arm, and the left bough to the left arm equally, and spreadeth in divers sprays. And so the vital spirit is spread into all the body and worketh in the artery veins the pulses of life. The middle bough extendeth itself to the brain, and other higher parts, and giveth life, and spreadeth the vital spirit in all the parts about. The same spirit piercing and passing forth to the dens of the brain, is there more directed and made subtle, and is changed into the animal spirit, which is more subtle than the other. And so this animal spirit is gendered in the foremost den of the brain, and is somewhat spread into the limbs of feeling.

I’ll probably keep posting bits from the Proprietibus Rerum for the next few days.

I’ve noticed over the past weeks that people keep getting led to my blog by searching “Phil Christman artist.” If you are one of those people, the fellow you’re after is here. Though he is, to the best of my knowledge, no relation of mine, he shares a first and last name with me, with my dad, and with no other human beings I have ever heard of. He lives in North Carolina, as I do, and paints what look to be very nice landscapes. I suspect there’s a Paul Auster novel to be written about all this.

I love Bartholomeus Anglicus’s description of glass:

Glass, as Avicen[na] saith, is among stones as a fool among men, for it taketh all manner of colour and painting. Glass was first found beside Ptolomeida in the cliff beside the river that is called Vellus, that springeth out of the foot of Mount Carmel, at which shipmen arrived.  For upon the gravel of that river shipmen made fire of clods medlied with bright gravel, and thereof ran streams of new liquor, that was the beginning of glass.  It is so pliant that it taketh anon divers and contrary shapes by blast of the glazier, and is sometimes beaten, and some-times graven as silver.  And no matter is more apt to make mirrors than is glass, or to receive painting; and if it be broken it may not be amended without melting again. But long time past, there was one that made glass pliant, which might be amended and wrought with an hammer, and brought a vial made of such glass tofore Tiberius the Emperor, and threw it down on the ground, and it was not broken but bent and folded. And he made it right and amended it with an hammer.  Then the emperor commanded to smite off his head anon, lest that his craft were known.  For then gold should be no better than fen, and all other metal should be of little worth, for certain if glass vessels were not brittle, they should be accounted of more value than vessels of gold. 

Glass is among stones as is a fool among men: it takes everything. I love it.

The creativity in ancient science is easier to appreciate than that of modern science, because it’s all there usually is to appreciate: the truth value of these descriptions isn’t so high. But science remains a creative endeavor. I was reminded of this last night as I read a fascinating interview with the SF writer Kim Stanley Robinson, whom I’ve not read and would probably love, judging from this excerpt:

For me, art in our time is strongest when it is aware of science, includes science, is inspired by science, or is about science. On the linguistic level, the new words coined by scientists to describe their new discoveries form a giant growing lexicon that means English is simply bursting with new possibilities, resembling the Elizabethan age in that respect. Then conceptually, science is creating new stories to tell, by deluging us with new information and potentialities. In this deluge we need art to do its usual job of sorting things out, by giving things their human dimension and by exploring how they might feel and what they might mean. So to me the arts and the sciences are completely intertwined. Maybe that’s always been true, but now more than ever.

And I was reminded of it all again this morning, as I read in Scientific American about dendritic cells. In mice, they seem to help the immune system fight off atherosclerosis. The guy who named them did so because, under a microscope, they look like trees: dendrites in Greek means “of or pertaining to trees.” There’s poetry all over the place, if you look for it.

Reading excerpts from a medieval encyclopedia this week. Bartholomeus Anglicus, tell us what a rainbow is, please?

The Rainbow is impression gendered in an hollow cloud and dewy, disposed to rain in endless many gutters, as it were shining in a mirror, and is shapen as a bow, and sheweth divers colours, and is gendered by the beams of the sun or of the moon. And seldom gendered by beams of the moon, no more but twice in fifty years, as Aristotle saith. In the rainbow by cause of its clearness be seen divers kinds and shapes that be contrary. Therefore the bow seemeth coloured, for, as Bede saith, it taketh colour of the four elements. For therein, as it were in any mirror, shineth figures and shapes and kinds of elements. For of fire he taketh red colour in the overmost part, and of earth green in the nethermost, and of the air a manner of brown colour, and of water somedeal blue in the middle. And first is red colour, that cometh out light beam, that touches the outer part or the roundness of the cloud: then is a middle colour somedeal blue as the quality asketh, that hath mastery in the vapour, that is in the middle of the cloud. Then the nethermost seemeth a green colour in the nether part of a cloud ; there the vapour is more earthly. And these colours are more principal than others.

Discredited science always has a second life as poetry. I love the word “somedeal” (meaning, I take it, “somewhat”), those four-times-in-a-century moonbows, the ingeniously wrong explanation of the rainbow’s four colors (which are not, actually, a rainbow’s four colors) as reflections of the four elements, the repeated use of mirror metaphors. (Hypothesis, probably either false or lamely unfasifiable: mirror-metaphors are to the middle ages as theatre-metaphors are to the Renaissance and Enlightenment.)

I also really dig how he explains the timelag between the sight of lightning and the sound of thunder:

And with the thunder cometh lightning, but lightning is sooner seen, for it is dear and bright; and thunder cometh later to our ears, for the wit of sight is more subtle than the wit of hearing.  As a man seeth sooner the stroke of a man that heweth a tree, than he heareth the noise of the stroke. 

Well, no, it’s that sound is slower than light. But I like this version better: “the wit of sight is more subtle than the wit of hearing.” Take that, hearing!