Blog Break. And a Conversation on Love over at Richardus’ Londinium Pub

Enjoy a Roman everyday's scene. "The family-run kosher pastry shop Bernasconi, on Via dei Giubbonari, has only one table outside. Actually one table, period." Picture (and text) by Eleonora Baldwin, from her "Roma every day". Click to enlarge.

This blog is taking a vacation. A one month vacation.

Above you can see a Roman scene as taken by Eleonora Baldwin’s camera. Eleonora is a Roman, but her father is Irish American.

ψ

Here is a conversation occurred over at Richardus.

It is about Love.

I paste, as usual, what I deem relevant to my blog themes.

Wow, Love! [Readers will think]

Wrong. No easy stuff … but fun, none the less.

Richardus:

“Aristophanes may search for his other half, but I search for my whole self.

Thrust into a hostile world, I trudge towards my inevitable grave in utter isolation, seeking an impossible solace, never knowing who I am.

Suddenly, I peer into the eyes of another and see myself. Here is my peace, my consolation, my defence.

I claim those eyes to be always with me as I am always with myself. Perhaps I procreate, but only incidentally.

Selfless caring for another is true love. With practice it may become as universal as its source.

Lev Tolstoy in Yasnaya Polyana", 1908, the first color photo portrait in Russia

Geraldine: I hear Tolstoy in this post and I’m not surprised.

Richardus: How would you unravel Christianity from Anna Karenin, Geraldine? I haven’t read War and Peace.

Geraldine: Your post reminded me more of how Tolstoy thought. For example you said:

“Suddenly, I peer into the eyes of another and see myself. Here is my peace, my consolation, my defence.”

Tostoy was conscious that the soul is godlike and unites all of us [italic by MoR]. The same soul lives in all of us. Emerson also refers to this in “The Over Soul.” The Hindu religion refers to this with the hands in prayer and the bow to each other: The God in me recognizes the God in you. Is this not what you mean?

To answer your question, I unravel Christianity in the novel in a simple way. Even though Toystoy had a profound insight into human suffering and behaviour his writing is morally severe. There is punishment and it is binary. I believe Levin is modeled after Tolstoy.

Anna defies or flaunts the rules of her society and receives a tragic end. Levin achieves fulfillment as a committed landowner and is involved in society. One protagonist lives outside of himself (if this sounds right) the other follows her own needs. Values, sacrifice, self-possession or self-control are scrutinized to the core.

In this work love is not light. It all suggest judgment.

Note I didn’t say that the love is not right. I do not know.

Kaytis:

True love is so hard to find and to keep. You paint a lovely picture Richard, of an ideal. Beautifully expressed.

Man of Roma:

What is true love? Everybody is in search for Love, in his /her own way.

Plato, Magister

While I am studying for my Manius soap I now think of this:

1) on one hand we have sapientiae voluptas (or wisdom’s, knowledge hedonism, since real knowledge implies passion, joy, love, it implies trying to probe – with poetry? sacred books? philosophy? science? – the big mysteries of the universe: death, God etc.

But on the other hand we also have 2) corporis volutpas, ie bodily pleasure, not necessarily vile: at its best it is love for a human being; at its worst banal lust.

A man (don’t know about women, they are more mysterious to me the more I age) is imo torn between 1 and 2.

Plato's chariot in Phaedrus: the Charioteer is our Reason, 1 horse is soul's positive passionate nature; the other horse our soul's concupiscent nature.

1) is the white horse in Plato’s Phedrus chariot (Plato influenced the Jews and the Christians), and 2) is the black horse, especially as for non-spiritual love. Who is riding the two-horsed chariot? It is our Reason.

Now men, I don’t know about women, are badly torn between 1 and 2. If they are not, throw stones at me because I am.

Torn between being a monk (of wisdom, at least tentative) and a libertine? Between ‘the Being’ & Love for a person in flesh? Hard to say.

At times the Woman, for a Man, may take us to God, to the Spirit, to the Being, like Beatrice did with Dante, or Polia with Polyphilo (ie, lover of Polia, in Francesco Colonna’a palatial neoplatonical Renaissance Comedy (Poliphilo’s Strife of Love in a Dream) – the anti-Dante – since the 2 lovers finally get united in their love – thanks to Polia – before the Cosmic Venus; yes, no Madonna there, but Venus at her highest level of purity).

Dante meets Beatrice at Ponte Santa Trinità, by Henry Holiday, 1883. Click to enlarge

Now our flight in such chariot towards Platonic Good, the Ideas (or the Christian God, or the neoplatonic cosmic Venus etc.) goes up when reason and the white horse prevail. It tends to flap flap flap down to bodily vile stuff when corporis voluptas, bodily desire, is stronger.

As for myself, num 2 is very powerful. My flight is often low, non-spiritual, my quest vile, although my desire for num 1 – for Good, God and so forth – is never ending, and is bugging me all the time, and each time I flap flap flap a bit higher, I do feel better.

Ok. I am very confused (plus verbose). Asta la vista babies

Richardus:

Well, now Roma, since you seek to distinguish hormonal and spiritual love, I must re-read the Symposium to see what is said there on the subject.

You raise also the matter of Christianity, for which love is the beginning the middle and the end.

Then we have love by love by internet, whose progenitor is love by letter-writing, yet less considered, or maybe less the product of reason.

There is a common thread which I must seek. I may be a little while.

Richardus:

You remind me, MoR, of a blond Adonis I knew at school into whose arms a succession of beauties fell, unregretting.

We mortals listened to him in awe. It was a boys’ school, so our knowledge of female anatomy was rudimentary and, shall we say, of a more academic nature. We envied the time he spent on his special study and the joy and adoration he left in his wake.

He went on to become a doctor, the better to develop his talents.

Man of Roma:

I’ll be verbose as usual.

Dear Richardus, sweet Celtic Geraldine:

I was in a boys’ school too, for the reason that, in my Liceo Classico, the headmaster, an absolute moron, decided to create, right on that darn year, one class of just girls and another of just boys (us, alas). So, our knowledge of women was also very academical. And, among us, we also had a brown-haired green-eyed Adonis. So beautiful he was, Tommaso, that he made our ‘female vacuum’ (if one can say that) even more painful: since, each time a girl approached our buddies’ group he quickly seduced her – she was powerless before Him, so she knelt down, and was lost in love – and nothing was left to us.

This occurred again and again.

Oh boy, what absolute starvation for a couple of (very formative btw) years, ie btw 15 and 17. It made us ALL very shallow for a long while as for the other gender: id est, when we met ANYTHING that faintly reminded us of the human female (in an age range btw 13 to 98), she, to us, was just flesh, flesh, flesh. Well, at that age, hormones were active. I, for example, couldn’t easily conceive a girl-friend in the sense of a real ‘friend’. Then I evolved I guess (and hope lol).

Pythagoras. Roman copy of a Greek original. Musei Capitolini, Roma. Via Wikipedia. Click for attribution

Yes, Richard, Plato is the Great Teacher of us Christians. Christ I guess did his part, but Plato is the supreme Magister of us all in the West. Forget Aristotle imo. But let us not neglect Pythagoras, Plato’s real mentor (even if dead long before Plato’s time) according to Plato himself and to many scholars, together with Socrates of course, of which little we know, and in any case Socrates was Pythagoras’ pupil also.

Now, what fascinates me [all readers here now taking a nap, I know] is the link Orpheus-Pythagoras. What a great theme!!

Which leads us into 2 sparkling directions: pre-Celtic North Europe, and India!

But that is a story I’ll try to unfold in the Manius plot.

Manius btw seems that it will be published – I was toasting yesterday with wifey – both in Italian (paper book) and in English (e-book: this version needs bigger editing, it is clear). I just have to finish it in 8 months time in a plausible and entertaining – and hopefully deep enough – way. Hard work, and contrary to my nature, whimsical & undisciplined. But in any case.

Blogger Love, you’ve mentioned.

The Love I developed for you Anglo-Saxons & similar, I guess I owe all to that,. To sweet Richard, Philippe, Mr C, Geraldine, and to ALL the American people, ALL of them etc. You people brought me -I forgot how – into discovering Ancient Britannia, fascinating to me to the extent that I now dream of it, like Giorgio in the plot (who in fact is me, obsessed by the theme).

This Love, dear dear Richard, gave me so much inspiration and happiness.

I read the elegance of you people’s words, I look at the pics you people publish (your houses, your windows so different from ours: they must allow more light, ours less) with so much Love (I now sound corny, I know). And well, yes, it is again the white and the black horse (hyperborea, the American & the British-isles type of Woman), and Reason, the Charioteer, sometimes (or often) faltering in its guide.

But this is the way we are, humans who are not only human, since perhaps there’s some extra sparkle (from somewhere where we came from and are bound to return).

As marvellous Geraldine so gently has told us – in her Irish Celtic, untouched-by-the-Romans, pure, Nordic Female’s words …

Man of Roma. Un bilancio (assessment)

MoR in Piazza Navona. Click for a larger view. Pic taken by Devinder Singh with my brand new Galaxy Tablet. Dev, an Indian blogger, was in Rome last May. He had presented a short (and great) film at Cannes. See 2 links on Piazza Navona at the foot of the post

[Per i lettori italiani.

Un nuovo blog, Pagine del Man of Roma, in cui sto mettendo brani significativi del MoR in italiano.

La soap sull'antica Britannia la sto scrivendo anche in italiano]

ψ

Thus said, cercando di non fare i tronfioni e di essere obiettivi (English translation in progress) il 9 settembre 2007 cominciai un blog in inglese perché:

1) era difficile

2) dopo 16 anni di IT volevo riprendere gli studi umanistici

3) la lingua di Shakespeare, meravigliosa, speravo aprisse a una varietà di interlocutori eccitante

4) volevo praticare la dialettica, mito della mia generazione ma di valore universale

5) volevo focalizzare il lavoro sulla romanness, verificando eventuali nessi, di qualsiasi tipo, tra i romani dell’antichità e i romani – italiani (e oltre) – di oggi (la romanitas si dispiegò infatti su un impero vasto).

Piazza Navona, Rome, former Circus of Emperor Domitian located to the north of the Campus Martius. Via Wikipedia. Click for a larger view

Come è andata?

Io credo bene. In modo non sistematico:

214 scritti (non tantissimi forse nell’arco di quasi 4 anni ma molti sono saggi ben sudati), 5.281 commenti (tanti, molti dei quali più lunghi del post che li aveva stimolati). Praticamente, tra articoli e commenti, “un librone di diverse migliaia di pagine” in cui gli interventi (al 99% in inglese) sono spesso più elevati degli scritti stessi. Ci sono anche i miei commenti e, wel well, i miei lettori sanno che sono un bel chiacchierone (chatter-box).

Estrema varietà degli interlocutori. Eccitante dicevo. In ordine alfabetico:

America, Australia, Austria, Brasile, Canada, China, Francia, Germania, Gran Bretagna, India, Irlanda, Italia, Messico, Nuova Zelanda e Svezia.

Bust of Roman Emperor Domitian who reigned from 81 to 96 CE. Roma, Musei Capitolini

Viaggio di esplorazione. Questo per me e spero per i lettori è stato il Man of Roma:

Un girovagare imparando cose belle insieme, un dialogo continuo (estenuante a volte), uno studio tosto da parte di chi scrive (fa bene, ok, ma ‘na faticaccia …).
Nel fondo ero e rimango un insegnante, fiero del mestiere che ho fatto per più di 30 anni, un dare e soprattutto un ricevere che riscalda il cuore prima della mente.

Verifica dello strumento dialettico. La tecnica dialettica – inventata forse da Socrate e Platone 2400 anni fa (ma esistono dialettiche orientali efficacissime, vedi il link subito sopra) – per come la vedo io è:

A. dialogo con noi stessi sui temi che ci appassionano

B. Dialogo con libri testi e pagine (anche web) validi (non si cresce senza dialogare con menti migliori della nostra).

Consiglio lo studio attento di scritti frammentari o zibaldoni (l’efficacia dell’esempio vivo!) poiché il pensiero in progress ci fa teste pensanti (thinking people) per naturale imitazione, piccole teste o grandi chissenefrega (who the hell cares),  l’importante è pensare con la nostra testa, diritto sancito da ogni costituzione democratica.

Domitian's Stadium, built in 86 CE conceived for Greek athletics that the Romans considered immoral (nakedness etc.). Later become 'Circus Agonalis' the population watched there agones (games, from αγών: any contest), whence 'agone', which possibly merged into 'navone' (big ship), whence Navona. Voilà, Piazza Navona! Click for credits

Personalmente ho imparato tantissimo dallo Zibaldone di Leopardi, dai saggi di Montaigne e soprattutto dai Quaderni del carcere di Antonio Gramsci, autore oggi riscoperto a livello globale (dalla destra e dalla sinistra americana, in India, in Inghilterra ecc.) non per il suo essere marxista (il marxismo è morto, pace all’anima sua) ma per il suo essere pensatore geniale, utilissimo.

Presto vorrei meglio approcciare gli essais (1rst & 2nd series) & lectures di Ralph Waldo Emerson, forse il più grande intellettuale americano che, for some weird reason, è a me molto affine.

[Anche la poesia, attenzione, di ogni genere e popolo, è strumento -cognitivo e artistico- micidiale]

C. Dialogo con gente in carne ed ossa, dovunque è possibile (amici, caffè, strada). I blog? Per loro natura dilatano il dialogo e naturalmente con l’uso di una lingua franca il livello di tale dilatazione è potenzialmente altissimo.

Piazza Navona, air view. Click for credits

Infine, ‘romanità’ ieri e oggi. E qui concludo perché credo che l’audience del blog (not too far from half a million hits, specie considerando argomenti non proprio semplici direi) sia dovuta proprio a questo:

al meraviglioso mondo di Roma raccontato da un ‘uomo medio’ in tutte le salse possibili. Da uno cioè nato e vissuto quaggiù, ie a witness from right there.

ψ

Ringrazio con affetto tutti quelli che mi hanno seguito e che ho seguito nei loro blog.

THIS IS NOT A FAREWELL, IT’S A NEW BEGINNING! [had to add this since a few readers were worried: see comments below].

That the journey continue! I do love you ALL (and you know it damn!)

Yours.

Man of Roma

Nota. Per piazza Navona vedi queste notizie storico-archeologiche in italiano e in inglese.

ψ

Post correlati (bilanci, audience e temi, man mano che il blog cresceva):

[Related posts (assessment, audience & themes as the blog progressed in time]

Are We Going Anywhere?

This Blog’s First Birthday

Post sul Metodo (see the English original of this, well, wild post)

100 Posts. I’ll Celebrate My Own Way. 1

100 Posts. I’ll Celebrate My Own Way. 2

Merry Saturnalia! And a Roman New Blog

Locking Horns with a Young Roman

Themes from Man of Roma: a site map

Il mio maestro

Le mie idee [English original] cominciarono a fermentare 35 anni fa, quando mi imbattei nella persona che nel presente blog chiamo Magister, ovvero il mio caro maestro.

Aveva piovuto tutto il giorno. Roma ha uno strano odore quando piove. Ero andato casualmente nel centro culturale nel quale Magister era solito tenere conferenze, nei pressi del Tevere, il fiume sacro di Roma.

Già molto vecchio, capelli e barba bianchi, i suoi occhi erano attenti, penetranti. Nei ruggenti anni ’70 l’Italia era tutto un dibattito. Sto ascoltando The Dark Side of the Moon per cercare di ricreare l’atmosfera di quei giorni lontani.

Roma. Tevere sotto la pioggia. Courtesy of 'eternallycool.net'

Il maestro parlava a voce bassa per lo più e il silenzio degli ascoltatori era assoluto, a volte persino imbarazzante. Quando gli capitava di arrabbiarsi la voce si faceva potente, gli occhi scintillanti.

Non lo dimenticherò mai. Ero un brutto anatroccolo prima di conoscerlo. Non che egli abbia fatto di me un cigno (l’idea fa un po’ ridere) ma certo da lui ho ricevuto tanto, la nozione tra le altre cose della mente e della volontà come potenti strumenti di libertà.

Chissà se sono stato un buon allievo. Lasciai casa in cerca di fortuna. La sfortuna è dei giovani che non incontrano maestri.

Non rivelerò la sua identità. Non che a lui importi, ormai non c’è più e i suoi resti stanno da qualche parte nella città eterna da lui così intensamente amata. Lo adoravo. E non fui il solo a piangere sulle sue ceneri. Ho dei motivi per non rivelarvi chi in realtà fosse, e vorrei qui solo ripetere che a lui devo veramente tanto, non ultimo quest’amore, curiosità o desiderio per la conoscenza – non so bene come dirlo -, questa sorta di “edonismo culturale” (“conoscitivo” per gli anglosassoni) che tende ad auto-organizzarsi e che malgrado l’età continua a crescere invece di abbandonare il mio spirito.

Tra le altre cose devo al Maestro il metodo dialettico utilizzato del presente blog nonché l’idea che la scrittura sia la migliore palestra per imparare a pensare con chiarezza, razionalmente.

Scrittura & pensiero

Pensare, scrivere, chiarificare:
lo sforzo del disporre i tuoi pensieri
in modo chiaro, ordinato e comprensibile.

Così tanti anni or sono
il mio Maestro consigliava
per la buona educazione della mente.

Maestro amato,
filosofo, scrittore, pedagogo …

[l'originale in inglese è migliore:

Writing, thinking, clarifying,
striving to sort out thoughts
in ways so “clear and ordinate”
and comprehensible.

This, many years ago, Magister counselled
for the good education of the mind.
Beloved Magister,
writer, philosopher, educator...

Il mio insignificante tributo a Magister]

Contemporary ‘Romans’? World’s Folks May Tread On US, We’ll Stay

November 11, 1940. With Operation “Judgment” in WW2 half of the Italian fleet at Taranto was sunk by a raid of British torpedo planes from a carrier. The image shows the Italian Conte di Cavour, a great ship, sunk. Click for credits and further infos

This post is about the Italian peculiar case of ‘survival through cynicism’ (Italians & WWII.)

The next post will be about ‘survival through quality’ in times of economic globalization. A bit of a survival kit for any folk.

ψ

The following playful exchanges occurred at a London’s café where Richardus, the café owner, was present together with Chaerie (California,) Paul Costopoulos (Quebec) and others we’ll omit since not part of the theme selected.

Richardus (Britannia): “A breathless bolt, a high-pitched arrow of sound pierces the night and cleaves my skull.”

Man of Roma (Roma): “At times we don’t sleep well do we. Very similar we are, Britannia.”

Britannia: “We are. But also we have to keep watch for wild animals and itinerant males.”

Roma: “We have. That is why I bought a real Roman gladius. By the way, a new chapter of the ‘last Roman soldier in Britannia’ soap has just appeared”

Paul Costopoulos (his blog): “The primal scream can be such a relief… it does disturb, fleetingly, our bed companion.”

Cheri (her blog): “Have you tried opening your window at night to let the night sounds into the room?
Those in the spirit world might come in, deep in the dark of sleepless night, and rest with you.”

Britannia: “I shall listen for the sounds of the Klamath River.”

Roma: “I am eager to read about your spirits’ world Cherie… We all are at a phase in our life where we need that…. I envy your possibility of communicating with Mother Nature. Here we live only the life of the city people (see image below) surrounded by the works of man more than ‘the spirits’ world’. [or maybe ...]”

Via dei Serpenti, with the Colosseum at the end. Photo by MoR. Given to the people!

Then something happened. Cheri said she would visit me in Roma. Richard pulled out a Norman helmet. The silly male in me hence made me say:

Roma: “Richardus, what’s that helmet about? I have my gladius don’t forget.”

Roma: “And I know our apple of discord c’est Chaerie.

Elle vaut la peine de se battre. Mais soyez prudent. Les Italiens ne sont pas des lâches (cowards), ils sont indifférents, which is another thing entirely.

And Chaerie, elle vaut absolument la paine de ne pas être indifférents id est, she deserves absolute non indifference.

Hey, where’s my darn gauntlet? *He falls while looking for it and breaks his left leg*

Chaerie. Apple of discord?

Cheri: “Good jokes, Roma. I get it…Remember, I have been having lunch with a lusty Italian for years. Ahhh….I miss Joe so much.

Roma: “Joe a lusty Italian? Ah ah ah ah. Now I get it. You were so intelligent, beautiful, hyperborean, and he was Sicilian and all. Not surprising. Not surprising at all. I cannot blame him. May his soul rest in peace Cherie.”

Britannia:

Roma: Richardus, that lento played by the Quartetto Italiano, is that supposed to mean a requiem to my hopes regarding Cheri because you’ll kill me with your sword?

Wrong move man. I’ll explain why.

Battle of the Mediterranean. Reloaded

The beautiful Italian Royal Navy (Regia Marina) was defeated by the British Royal navy in the Mediterranean. Ok, the famous WW2 ‘battle of the Mediterranean’ – we lacked radar, proper fleet air arm (and fuel). OK. OK.

BUT, only a few years after that defeat two Mediterranean persons, my sister and my bro-in-law, got married.

Look into their eyes Britannicus Mensch. Do they look defeated?

They don’t.

How the hell is that, are they morally superior?

They aren’t.

It’s …

It’s just they don’t give a damn Richardus. Italians don’t give a damn.

[I call Italians 'Romans' in the title: nothing is more appropriate I believe ...]

Methinks a foolish chant is taking shape (may readers pardon me) …

Like a warm-fleshed woman
lying languidly on the Mediterranean,
Italy is there, motionless, statue-like.
The world folks may pass on her body …

(Oh yes! she says)

… from the German barbarians,
from Hitler TBBM
(The Big Big Maniac)
to the Allied Forces.

(Oh yeah yeah! she moans)

Partenope (1905) by Arnarlo de Lisio (1869-1949), an Italian painter from Molise

But, in her sluttish nature,
she will not pass, Britannicus.
She will stay, and survive.
And will continue to be beautiful
rising up eternally from her ashes.

“Why this folk is like that”
Mario TBM (the big moron) will ask.

MoR: “Oh Mario, I’m so surprised,
you should know better. ”

In any case they’re like that since they are:

THEDONTGIVEADAMNERS

[by now the English customers, shaking their heads in disapproval, turn to their drinks]

And an old post,
That Pride Which Actually is Blindness,
explains why we are all like Joe,
why we are all Sicilians (which is good).

While this one why we’re all
like Mario too a bit (less good )

[*Mario the deceiver rejoicing in silence (but biting his nails)*]

ψ

Britannia: “That lento, requiem or not, is gentle fulfilment for all, dear Giovanni. Let us relish it.”

Roma: “Of course, dear Richard, of course. Gentle fulfilment. Thank you for these two words.

A la prochaine, veramente, amico caro …”

The Day Paganism Yielded To Christianity. Has India Anything To Do With It?

Constantine I, the first Christian Roman emperor (272 – 337 AD). Musei capitolini, Roma [Click for credits, GNU Free Docum License, Ver 1.2

I’m preparing 2 posts I hope will help readers to easily learn some ancient Greek and Latin but I need a few more days.

The whole thing is in fact tough and I’m a bit breathless.

Not because of the poems – they are ready (and will be in progress in any case.) It is the cultural context around them that has exhausted – and troubled me – a bit.

I’ll try to explain.

Ψ

Andreas Kluth’s Hannibal blog – a place extraordinaire I stumbled upon months ago – had once presented a fascinating metaphor possibly created by a certain Professor Phillip Cary.

“You can think – Andreas wrote – of “Western culture” as a human body:

[nums by MoR instead of stars].

1. The left leg is ancient Athens and Rome, Socrates and Aristotle;
2. the right leg is Jerusalem and the Bible, Moses and Jesus;
3. the crotch is the end of the Roman empire when the two “legs” met ;
4. the torso is the Middle Ages, when the two traditions became one [Dante, MoR];

[etc etc up to the rest of the body that can be pondered over at the Hannibal blog, *here* and *there*; MoR]

Ψ

Ok. The left leg (1) – the Classical – has been THE main topic of this blog so far.

The research around my Greek and Latin classes though caused the other leg (2) – the Judeo-Christian – to more or less pound on my head.

Ouch what a blow my dear readers!  – and later I might tell you why.

Constantine's dream of a sign from the Christian God

Mario: A blow? Why TH do you care? Just go ahead with the left leg, you always were a leftist ah ah ah!

MoR: You moron, MY problem is the ancient languages classes Mario! Now it turns that, while the classical texts are hard (leg 1), the Judeo-Christian ones (leg 2) are often that easy – Old and New Testament alike – that even a baby can read them, for reasons fascinating not the place here to discuss.

[I know there are comics, that there are web sites plus the Latin and Greek Wikipedia- which I adore. But I always prefer the best literature for language learning: ie starting with what is matchless]

Extropian: MoR is right. Wanna get into mountain climbing? Forget the Everest and start with simple (tho captivating) hills.

MoR: Ok ok Extropian, but you 2 didn’t get the MAIN point.
I’m not only facing here the daunting task of presenting the context of the greatest spiritual revolution the West ever had – the switch from Paganism to Christianity. And btw I’m a guy who, revering the Classical as much as I do, is not exactly excited to see the DEATH of it  …

Extropian: “Num 3, the crotch?

MoR: The crotch, yes. Problem being: there’s a lot more, and a lot earlier.

Extropian: Urghhh! A LOT earlier??

Serapis, an Hellenistic-Egyptian god in Antiquity (since the III century BC)

MoR: Yyyeees! While trying to figure out the spiritual context of the poems, much to my horror (and fascination) did I realise that the (Judeo)-Christian leg was part of bigger – much more ancient  – streams originating from Egypt and from the East (both Middle and Far East.)

To be more precise – and in a reversed order: from Egypt, Thrace, Anatolia, Palestine (the Jews, naturally, crucial,) Mesopotamia, Persia AND India.

Mario: India??? Oh oh oh oh ….India AGAIN???

Extropian [*getting more attentive*]

MoR: I’ll repeat it! The Greco-Romans had already encountered A LOT EARLIER that much wider oriental humus – of which the Judeo-Christian leg was just a part – much earlier I mean than when we finally get to the darn crotch – ie the switching to Christianity and soon after that cataclysm, ie the horrible end of the Roman empire.

Extropian: [*lost in reflection, eyes gleaming*] Mmmm, how MUCH earlier …

MoR: 800-850 years earlier, more or less. I’ll check better but I’d bet on it.

Ψ

Long pause. Pauses are important. The sun begins to shine through the clouds folds over the eternal city  … We drink strong coffee.

Ψ

MoR: Which led me to reconsider the Judeo-Christian tradition as being NOT TOTALLY EXTRANEOUS to the Classical World (!) as I first had thought.

A kind of a BLOW, plus a troubling one because I got fascinated by it.

I told Lichanos over at his blog – his posts inspired me as for the Jewish heritage: “I feel the need of coming to terms with both traditions or legs – I said – AND, should I get back to Christianity, I will SUE you …” 

Ψ

The silence in my study-room is now disturbed only by Mario che smadonna piano piano … My friends love me and they are worried. I am just excited.

This was happening yesterday in an apartment in Rome.

On another area of the planet 70 million Hindus plus 40,000 Indian politicians were /are about to gather near the banks of the Ganges. The water is cold. It is flowing to the plains directly from the Himalayas. The water is also dirty.

Indian crowds over the Ganges to purify themselves. Click for credits and to enlarge

Not that the Indians will care – about the cold or the dirtiness. All they care about – the poor and the low caste, the rich and the high caste – is this sacred water purifying them from their sins and helping them with better reincarnations.

The Kumbh Mela hindu festival might though be special this year. The convergence of the 12-yearly Kumbh Mela with the longest solar eclipse of the millennium – it is believed - could guarantee an end to the reincarnation cycle.

Note. Sin. Purified by sacred water. ‘Souls’ and ‘bodies’ separated but incessantly reuniting in a reincarnation cycle of life and death.

Ah what a marvellous introduction to what we are about to narrate!

Virtual Dinners on a Roman Terrace

I am on a trip around California. Having no time for writing, I’ll propose again a few lines from my method post that express the initial inspiration of this blog.

A sort of naïve enthusiasm is to be noted. Well, nothing can be achieved without enthousiasmos, a Greek word meaning “a rapturous inspiration like that caused by a god.” Big words, I know.

Let us Have Fun, my Delectable Guests

“Let us have fun, my delectable guests. Life should be fun! Let us imagine we are in early summer when the evening sea breeze, or ponentino, is so delightful. I’m inviting you all from every civilization, country, era space location. I am inviting you ALL to this virtual Roman terrace, overlooking the eternal city’s magnificent skyline.

Rome, loose woman and she-wolf, is watching attentive. Is she smiling?

Dinner after dinner, amid flowers perfumed and aromas from dishes exquisite, in front of a breathtaking spectacle of glories and defeats, coming from a civilization of hard & refined conquerors, who always accepted those who were – and are – diverse, and their gods, and their creeds, and philosophies and manners …

… here, sweet guests of mine, let us enjoy our life a bit! Away from all the sorrows, away from all the pains, let us discuss on themes light, silly and severe. Good food will not be missing, together with good music (another guest of ours, of course) and plenty of delicious wine and, naturally, no real objection to a pot of good beer (or cervesia), once in a while.

Playing being simple, playing being easy: all it takes is good food, good music, and good good company, most of all!

PS
While I was writing, music and red vino di Montalcino were helping me to fly high.”

See you soon.

MoR

Italian version

Ψ

Other related posts:

Method and Encounter with Magister
Locking Horns with a Young Roman

Sex and the city (of Rome). A conclusion

Amazing Continuities

In Notebook IV of Antonio Gramsci’s Prison Notebooks we read an appreciation of Ernst Walser’s suggestion that, in order to better understand Italian Renaissance men, one should think of contemporary Italians (to a certain extent). We believe that, inversely, the same could be said of Italian Renaissance men. To better understand them one should think of the Ancients, namely the Greeks and the Romans (to a certain extent).

Ok, but don’t we have a greater distance between contemporary Italians and the Ancients? Of course, but nonetheless there are some amazing continuities, and these only interest us. Which are these continuities?

An Army of Don Juans

Narrowing our focus on the matter discussed in Sex and the city (of Rome) 1, 2, 3 and 4, we heard this sentence in a History Channel war documentary film: “An army of Don Juans was about to land…”. The film referred to an Italian military expedition sent by Mussolini to some place in the Mediterranean.

Now, I find this funny, and I am asking myself: is this the way many people from the English speaking countries consider us? A bunch of Don Juans lol? I know it was maybe only a boutade but if this is even just partly true, what is the reason for that?

Other associations in fact arise. Why Latin folks are considered sensual by many people in the United States? And why Casanova is Italian and Don Juan is Spanish? Why all American women went crazy for Elvis Presley (well, well, even more for Rodolfo Valentino) who came from the south of the USA, an area marked by some influence of the Spanish and the French? Was it only because he was a very handsome man and his voice was great?

Now the big question: isn’t it possible that we have here those long-period permanences or survivals French historian Braudel was talking about? I mean, aren’t we dealing here with the remnants of a different, pre-Christian, way of living one’s sexuality? Isn’t this what is so seductive, though felt as sinful and almost amoral (think of Elvis the pelvis), but, for this same reason, irresistible?

It is not our intent to exhaust (or to applaud) the phenomenon of Don Juanism, which is a complicated topic (and has a few unpleasant aspects). Please understand that there is no self-indulgence by our side and that all we care about are the possible survivals of a far away past.

Let us then continue with our associative questions.

Amoral Pagans

Why the North Europeans who came down to Rome during the Renaissance were both spellbound and disgusted? Is it because they perceived the Christian religion was not taken seriously by the Romans and by the Italians of that time? Can’t it be this was due to the fact that most of these northern people had started to be really civilised only with the spread of Christianity, while we were already civilised one thousand years earlier?  (magnificently civilized pls allow me readers: Italian Renaissance didn’t come out of a desert, read a moving page here)

Can’t it be that they are the true Christians while in us paganism (and behaviours attached to it) has left some (at times very deep) traces? (an overview from the MoR’s here). Can’t this be the reason (I know I am obsessive) why here the Christian religion was mainly felt as a political thing, namely a way of governing the minds and the spirits of men, in ways not so dissimilar to the times when Rome was a ruler of folks and nations?

And why our cardinals and even numerous Popes had lovers? And why the great Polish Pope (who surely had no lovers) was more appreciated by the big politicians of the planet (who flocked to his funeral) and less by the spiritual gurus of our time? (Today the Vatican is perceived as a political – more than a spiritual – institution, I do not have many doubts about it; even in Germany the Dalai Lama is more popular – 44% – than the German Pope Benedict XVI – 42% -, a datum emerged from a poll published by Der Spiegel in July 2007.).

Why finally many British historians, when discussing until recently the Italian Renaissance, still show(ed) some kind of moral repulsion?

Let us listen to the words of Preserved Smith, a British historian of the Middle Ages, who wrote the Renaissance entry in the 1956 edition of the Britannica:

“A succession of worldly pontiffs brought the Church into flagrant discord with the principles of Christianity. Steeped in pagan learning, desirous of imitating the manners of the ancients, thinking and feeling in harmony with Ovid and Theocritus, and, at the same time rendered cynical by the corruption of papal Rome, the [Italian] educated classes lost their grasp upon morality …”

“The Christian virtues were scorned by the foremost actors and the ablest thinkers of the time … The Church saw no danger in encouraging a pseudo-pagan ideal of life, violating its own principle of existence … and outraging Christendom openly by its acts and utterances.”

Italian society – Preserved Smith continues – was hardly aware that the New Learning it had mostly contributed to create had provoked “an intellectual force of stupendous magnitude and incalculable explosive power …”. His conclusion is beautiful (though tragic for us):

“Why should not [Italian] established institutions proceed upon the customary and convenient methods of routine, while the delights of existence were augmented, manners polished, arts developed and a golden age of epicurean ease made decent by a state religion which no one cared to break with because no one was left to regard it seriously? This was the attitude of the Italians when the Renaissance, which they had initiated as a thing of beauty, began to operate as a thing of power beyond the Alps”.

And in fact Italy was soon to be overwhelmed by that same ‘power’ she had mostly contributed to create.

(Getting back to paganism, Gramsci argues in that same Notebook IV: “There is no doubt that Italian religious feelings are superficial, as there is no doubt that religion here has a character which is mainly political, of international hegemony”.)

So it seems we are often considered amoral and not true Christians. Are we amoral? Are we not true Christians? Are we decadent, rotten? Or maybe someone is simply not fully capable of understanding us?

I will finish this draft conclusion of Sex and the city (of Rome) with this interesting passage written by a British historian, C. P. Rodocanachi (probably of Greek descent), and dedicated to what he considers a potent factor of the Greek miracle (Athens and the Greek Miracle, Routledge & Kegan Paul Ltd, London 1948). This text sheds light in our view on the Greek mind and, to a certain extent, on the Roman mind, plus on some aspects of Italian Renaissance men as well:

Life with no Pang of Conscience

Absence of conflicts of conscience: the Greeks were quit “of this inhibiting and agonizing struggle. Their morals were civic and not religious. Their sense of duty was directed exclusively to the city … They knew nothing of the Christian idea of good faith, of intentions conditioning acts in such a manner that the most law-abiding citizen may feel himself a great criminal at heart… [They] may be considered as being intrinsically amoral and this very amorality was a powerful constituent of balance of mind which they could never have attained if their conscience had been torn, as ours is, between the conflicting forces of good and evil, virtue and vice, pleasure and sin. They could enjoy beauty, taste the delights of life without a pang of conscience. So long as they were faithful to the laws and interests of the city they had no damnation to fear, either in this world or the next.”

Italian version

Related posts:

Pre-Christian Rome lives (where this movie by Fellini reveals papal Rome’s pagan nature)

Sex and the city (of Rome) 1
Sex and the city (of Rome) 2
Sex and the city (of Rome) 3
Sex and the city (of Rome) 4

“Italians are Cynical, Amoral, Religiously Superficial”
Survivals of the Roman Goddess Fortuna (comments section)

Constitutional Happiness by Australia Felix

Ψ

PS
We had to erase some insulting comments to this post. They were written by some persons from the UK. I ask for pardon if I have offended anybody, it was not my aim, really, plus I do not really know why these people felt offended. My style is sometimes aggressive but I am fond of the British people. I wouldn’t have toiled so much to learn their language decently enough. The main idea behind this post (a bit hasty and in some parts obscure, I’ll admit) is the fact (an historical fact, no doubt) that the people in the Italian peninsula were civilized long before Christianity arrived. I mean by civilization something distinguished from other cultures by its high level of social complexity and by the presence of urbanisation.

This fact, the existence of this pre-Christian civilization, may have created some cultural differences (living until today) with people who reached this fully civilized stage mostly thanks to (and together with) the spread of the Christian religion. These differences can regard for example some survivals of the Roman religion in our country – traces of paganism which many scholars do recognize and which Protestants, it is well known, always condemned – but could also regard, why not, sexual behaviours as well. Did scholars try to research on this? We do not know so far, but we do not think so. See the comments area for further information on this point.

Best Espresso in the World?

After all these books and reflection we really need a break. What about a good Italian espresso? Read this here:

“The espresso at Sant’Eustachio in Rome is so well-regarded that William Grimes of the New York Times advised those in the US seeking the perfect espresso, “…When the need for a real espresso becomes overpowering, buy a ticket to Rome, tell the taxi driver to head straight for the Sant’Eustachio cafe. The espresso will be perfect. A little expensive, but surely worth the trouble.”

This original article by William Grimes is so funny in his frustrated search for the best espresso in New York, and provides a lot of infos on a great town and on coffee. I agree. Sant’Eustachio’s espresso is actually great, and we cannot but be flattered that this NY guy appreciates it. Thank you Mr. Grimes, really. It can even be worth a flight to Rome, no kidding.

The only thing though being this: YOU ARE TOTALLY WRONG MR. GRIMES. I’M SORRY.

I mean, why don’t you US guys ask Italians first before writing such things? I know Grimes asked a few, but I mean the people of the street in here, in this country. If you’d asked them before, every Italian (or 90%) would have replied that the real best espresso in the world is not made in Roman Sant’Eustachio café (where they just perform inspired tricks, that crema etc.). The real best espresso in the world is made in Naples.

The truth is how can Romans compete with Greek cousins in food, pastries and general refinement of life? In Neapolis they have dozens, even hundreds cafés where espresso is much better than Sant’Eustachio’s, even in the poorest suburbs where camorra rules.

So, apart from the real pizza (which in Rome is not bad but hasn’t got the original Neapolitan taste) and apart from a choice of pastries whose quality is definitely unknown in Rome (sfogliatelle, babà, pastiera etc.) where is then the best of the best espressos?

It is served in Il Caffè del Professore, 46 piazza Trieste e Trento, in the heart of Naples. There they make their own blend or miscela of a superior quality so they can serve you the best of the best of the best. No tricks. Only real sublime coffee from a superior sublime miscela. Then of course they also do tricks and variations on the theme. How? In ways and varieties that can make the guys at Sant’Eustachio get pale from depression.

More on our Greek Cousins, the Neapolitans, who can provide a lot of surprises, not only coffee or food. It will be our duty to relate some of this in other posts.