RAMANATOM'S TEN SUGGESTIONS FOR BETTER INVESTING

I read an article today about the disappointing behavior of Warren Buffet, who owns lots and lots of shares of Coca Cola stock and whose son is on the board of that corporation.  He voted to abstain from a corporate proposal to ridiculously increase already ridiculous salaries of Coke executives. This was of course a very bad decision, but I wish the article had gone a little deeper.  Not only are the executives of Coke receiving morally indefensible salaries; they are working for a morally indefensible company.  (I am not going to list here all the harm Coke's  empty calories are doing to the well being of young and old alike all around the world; if you doubt that this is true, ask a doctor or a nutritionist.)

I am shocked by Buffet's apparent hypocrisy on both counts.  Whom are we to trust now regarding investing?  Cheer up, said my inner guru, I will now reveal to you my Ten Suggestions for Better Investing, which, if followed, will lead you to much happiness.

RAMANATOM'S TEN SUGGESTIONS FOR BETTER INVESTING

1. Invest in Your Career

For want of space, I will write it only three times: Do what you love doing, do what you love doing, do what you love doing!  Keep on writing it on your inner screen, until that wondrous concatenation of nerves a.ka. you is convinced.  I am not denying the importance of money, but if that's your primary interest, you're going to be unhappy and those around you are going to be unhappy.  And remember the old nostrum: primum non nocere--First of all do no harm.  If you love doing something that not only does no harm, but improves the life of those wondrous concatenations of nerves around you a.k.a fellow human beings, you are well on your way to happiness.

2.  Invest in Relationships: Family

Do your very best to love or at least respect all members of your family.  If you choose to get married, which is a noble thing to do, choose your spouse with your heart and with your mind.  If you have children, which is also a noble thing to do, be a great example--Help to direct them where their best inclinations lead, and not where your inclinations need.  If you don't have children, keep in touch with siblings who do.  A good aunt, a good uncle--what a lucky child who has at least one of these!

All right, you have a sister from hell.  It might even be worse than that.  Ramanatom gives you his permission to keep your distance until you make yourself strong enough not to let their problems affect you.  Once you at least have some awareness of who you really are, making you much more impenetrable to the barbs thrown in your direction, go back to step one: do your very vest to love or at least respect them all.

Remember two wonderful sayings: tout savoir, c'est tout pardonner (To know everything is to forgive everything) and There but for the grace of God go I. (Ramanatom also gives you permission, if so inclined, to interpret the last proverb in a more impersonal way.)

3. Invest in Relationships: Friends

Human beings evolved in groups.  If you are almost always  isolated, you are living in an unnatural, unhealthy state.  Your chances of being unhappy and of having health problems are greatly increased.  Feeling isolated does not have a salubrious affect on, say, blood pressure, etc.!  Good nutrition and exercise are undeniably important, but the case can be made that friendship is even more important.  It's important to stress this, since most advice for good health is about things like pills and peanuts, and neglect what's most  important for well-being: relationships.  I remember a study long ago about Japanese who emigrated to the United States.  Those who traded their healthier diet for American junk food, yet maintained their Japanese emphasis on relationships did better and lived longer.than those who ate Japanese food yet had become more socially isolated--Even when those in the longer-lived group smoked cigarettes and those in the second group didn't!  Don't get me wrong--smoking is very very bad for your health, but isolation is  apparently worse.

If you don't have many friends, do your best to get some; in the meantime I will give you some very good news.  The person you have contact with doesn't have to be a bosom buddy in order for you to receive an emotional, healthy lift.  This has been studied!

Even talking to strangers counts.  Research has shown that saying a few kind words to a stranger on the subway increases the happiness, at least temporarily of both parties. If you are snubbed, don't allow vanity to discourage you.  Keep at it for others' sake as well as for yours!

I was in a very poor area of the Dominican Republic in January 2014--Everyone says hello there with a hug--it really felt good!  Everyone knew each other in the town--if you got lost, ask, say, "Where is Pedro's house?" and someone will take you there; the families were large and the relationships rich.   I was struck by the fact that I was able to have many conversations with healthy--and very poor--people who were  well into their 90s.  I saw several people who were very old and didn't want to be fussed over yet were fussed over nevertheless.  No nursing homes--it is customary for the elderly to remain  in a family home shared with people of all ages until they die.  What do you think is the reason for this longevity? (Believe me, it wasn't the food.)

4. Invest in Relationships: Community

A wise friend once told me that you must first shine your light on your family.  But it must go beyond that: it must extend to your friends.  Your inner photons should not stop there: let them extend into the community, into the world.  Otherwise all you have is a sun in a box!

Recently I heard someone on TV condemn religion, all religion.  One of his guests protested. She was a  well educated, practicing Jew. She wasn't interested in dogma and stressed the deep sense of community that the practice of her faith provided.  She was absolutely right!

While participating in religious services, (while refusing, at least on the inside, to give up rationality,) can be of great help, you don't have to attend a church, synagogue, temple or mosque--What you need do is to regularly get together with others to help make ours a better world.  Contributing money to a good cause is always good, but contributing money and time is much better and much more salutary.

5. Invest in Yourself: Physical

One of Ramanatom's favorite Latin proverbs is mens sana in corpore sana--the ideal of a sound mind in a sound body.  Both this and the next suggestion have this as their specific subject, although all ten suggestions, if followed, will contribute to this ideal.  No need to elaborate here, you know what you have to do; if you need specifics you can find them easily.  Eat nutritional foods in moderation!  Drink alcohol in moderation!  Exercise a lot, but without obsession!  You've heard these before--now follow them.  Just a few words on each--Nutrition: Eat a variety of vegetables and nuts; make your own salads--an excellent choice for a meal--and watch out for high calorie dressings.  Cut way down on sugar and sweets and vow to never drink a soft drink again.  Smoking?  You know what the answer to that is. Avoid alcoholic beverages if you have a tendency toward alcoholism.  Ramanatom advises you to drink a glass-if you're a woman--and perhaps two if you're a man, of red wine with your evening meal daily--a very pleasant way to get healthy, especially if combined with conversation! Regarding physical activiity: once you check with your doctor, work out a plan of, ideally, an hour's worth of physical activity each day.  Taking a walk for an hour counts!  Join a gym and you will have the added advantage of socializing with others.  Don't take the elevator, walk!  Ramanatom is saddened by observing so many people waiting in their cars for a parking space close to their destination, while there are many parking spaces a block or so away--Deliberately park at a distance from your destination and walk!  These are only a few suggestions--think of your own!

6. Invest in Yourself: Mental

Regarding the mens sana part of the proverb, one of the best things you can do is to become a lifetime learner.  Take courses online or at a community college.  Limit entertainment!  Shut off the TV! (Or better: limit it to only a few hours per week.)  Ramanatam believes that TV, even when good--and there are many excellent programs available--is bad, since it becomes addictive and is burdened with commercials.  Ramanatom is saddened when he hears educated people say such things as, "Milton, I read him in college"--thirty years ago!  Read!  Make a list of classics and read and reread them.  Join a book club!  Do something that combines Suggestions 4 and 5--Ballroom dancing or basketball, for instance, which have especially good health effects and combine them with  suggestions from this list of ten.  Learn a foreign language!  Get out that guitar and sing!  It is not right that active participation in music is much too often delegated to professionals.  I recall with amusement the story of a kindly scientist who worked among poor Africans in Lesotho.  The people were mistrustful at first, but the man's good deeds eventually won them over.  To celebrate, they invited him for a ceremony in which everyone dances and sings--marvelously, in that particular African language "to dance and to sing" always went together, and for which there was a single word.  The man panicked and declined.  "I can't dance.  I can't sing."  The Africans were amazed.  In their world, every human being dances and sings; it is viewed as an essential part of humanity.  Learn from them!

7. Invest in Yourself and Your Family: Save!

What is usually  overemphasized is here given somewhat short shrift--one suspects that from the title the main subject would be money, but it isn't.  However, attention to material wealth is important, and, if one's wealth is used wisely, it can have very positive results for the saver, her family, and for the world.  Doing this is much simpler than financial advisers would make one believe--provided that what should be done is done.  In fact, a financial adviser is not even necessary.  Read a good book such as Daniel R. Solin's "The Smartest Investment Book You'll Ever Need"--and put the recommendations of the book into practice. 

8. Invest in Everything: Wisdom

Wisdom is the knowledge and experience of the interconnectedness of everything.  A characteristic of wisdom is accepting things the way they are while working to make oneself and others happier in the deepest sense of that word.  Jealousy, envy, self-pity and contempt are incompatible with wisdom.  Wisdom demands that we judge people's actions, both good and bad, but not the people who perform the actions.  It is a characteristic of the wise to live below one's means and use much of what's left over for the service of others.  Whitman's phrase, "the mania of owning things," is a primary characteristic of ignorance; it will take much effort, especially if you are young, not to let yourself be corrupted by greed.
A wise person knows that he is neither superior or inferior to anyone.  It is not easy becoming wise in an ignorant world.  In much of society money and egotism rule; be sure not to let these things ruin your life.

9. Invest in Everything: Love

Love and wisdom are integral parts of all ten suggestions, so we need not elaborate  here.

Just as wisdom is the transcendence of the limitations of ego by the realization that all is connected, love, through actions, helps overcome feelings of  isolation by helping others materially and spiritually.

If all this is getting too abstract, recall a quote from the Talmud which asserts that physical love between a loving husband and a loving wife is the best foretaste of heaven we have.  (It also enhances health and happiness.)

Major deeds are most important, but small acts of kindness also contribute very significantly to happiness.  We will close this section with suggestions that are easy to do and are still very efficacious.  Research shows that spending money on others makes one happier than spending money on oneself.  The money spent need not be extravagant--it is the thought that counts. If someone mentions a book she'd like to read, buy it for her; bring a little gift when you visit a friend--the possibilities are endless.  (It's a good  idea, of course, to let your charity begin at home).  Why not budget a weekly amount of time and money on such activities?  If one's weekly allotment remains wholly or partially unspent, spend more the next week.  What remains unspent in a month can be given to charity, and the monthly cycle can begin again.  These little things are not meant to replace major deeds, but they contribute greatly to happiness and should be put into effect by everybody.

Little things do mean a lot!

10. Invest in Transcendence: Faith

Don't be fooled: faith is not based on facts.  It is essential to happiness so don't let yourself be deluded by those tiresome debates between scientists and believers.  They are usually debates between science and fundamentalism.  I stress it again, faith is not based on facts.  Just as music exists in the human mind--beyond brains there might well be vibrations, but only consciousness can interpret these vibrations as music--similarly, there is absolutely no evidence that God exists outside of us.  Therefore one must look within, not without.  There is also no evidence that science exists beyond the human brain either.  Just as consciousness plus science equals science, consciousness plus religion equals religion.  Consciousness is thus the mystery behind everything!  So look inside yourself for the source that leads you away from the false to the true.  If you wish to call this source God, fine; if you wish to call this source the Buddha within, that's fine too.  Whatever this source is it is more real than you, so stop all this nonsense about whether God exists or not.  Ask yourself instead whether you exist as an entity separate from the rest of creation.  What is the source of your I?

If you believe in the dogmas of your religion and it makes you and those around you happier, Ramanatom has no objections.  But for those of you whose intuition is more subtle; don't let your sense of transcendence be thwarted by doubt.  Do you doubt the primacy of love and wisdom?  Isn't that what God and Buddha are all about?  Awe is for everyone.

Summary

These ten principles form a guide for the perplexed.  Think about them.  Put them into action.  You and everyone else will be much better off if you do.

Ten Questions for No One

l.  Can you tell us some things No One thinks everyone should know?

What is most important is difficult to put into words.  The establishment of facts, even quite abstract facts, is much easier.  For instance, the Higgs boson was recently discovered at CERN because particles into which it disintegrated became manifest at the energy level predicted.  Scientists review the data, and if they all come to the same conclusion, one asserts that it has been proven--albeit indirectly--that the boson  exists, and that's that.  (Even in cases where science is almost certain that, say, X is a fact, if new data are found that indicate otherwise, X can be replaced by Y.  The scientific method is simple, and it works exceptionally well for facts about nature.)

2. Not so well regarding human nature, I presume?

Niels Bohr, a seminal figure in the development of quantum physics, thought that the new branch of science he helped develop was, albeit extremely complex, quite simple in comparison to consciousness.  He was convinced that consciousness will never be completely understood.  Many scientists today agree with him.  From the mysteries of consciousness paradoxes arise. Are we merely matter?  After all, all the elements in the human body are present in nature, albeit in very different concentrations.  Yet we are convinced that we are more than matter.  Only a madman could believe that his daughter is merely a piece of meat.

3. Perhaps that conviction stems from a Darwinian compulsion to pass on one's genes?

That is undoubtedly very important.  But does it explain everything?  Who really knows?  One must live with the possibility that two opposing views can each be  true.  In Newtonian science, which describes our everyday world, such paradoxes do not occur; they do however occur in quantum physics.  No One knows that a photon sometimes behaves like a particle and sometimes like a wave.  No One thinks it is fascinating that reality on the simplest level--quantum physics--and reality at the most complex level we know, human consciousness, cannot be pinned down. Between them lies a world which is much easier to understand.

4.  Can you give further examples of ambiguity?

Everything that human beings create, and everything that describes the way we think about ourselves are open to interpretation, sometimes radically different interpretations.  Once again, this is not true of science once a hypothesis has been confirmed by data.  But paradox and ambiguity are very much applicable to our inner lives.  For instance, a history of colonial America would have been quite different if a Native American was the author instead of a Puritan.  When No One was a boy, Columbus was celebrated as one of the first great heroes of the New World; today his legacy is contested.  Other examples: does free will exist?  Some philosophers assert that it does.  Are human actions completely determined by the interaction of genetics and environment?  Some philosophers assert this.  Do free will and determinism somehow coexist?  Some philosophers assert that this is so. Who really knows? No One.

5.  What about the things we create?

Thank you for the opportunity to elaborate!  In the arts, tastes change, and nothing can be proven.  I will give you some examples.  In Bach's day, Telemann was much more critically acclaimed than Bach, who is now widely considered to be the best composer who ever lived.   When Michael Jackson died, No One heard a critic assert that he was the best musician since Mozart,  No One, who much admires Jackson, thought this assertion was ridiculous, but can No One prove it?

6. Are you ready for the question?  What about God?

No One does not consider that the question at all.


7. What then is the ultimate question for us?

There are several, and they all have to do with consciousness and its (ambiguous) perceptions of the world.  Since Kant we know all knowledge arises from sense perceptions.  We can thus never have ultimate knowledge of anything; it is highly likely that beings exist in the cosmos that have evolved with a different neurological constitution and thus see things differently.  Even science does not provide absolute knowledge--who can assert with certainly that the facts of science transcend the human mind?

8. Isn't that the age-old question of whether a sound exits when a tree falls and no one is around to hear it?

You confused me when you said  "no one"--I thought you were referring to me!  Actually that is a meaningless question.  One may assert that vibrations in the air occur when a tree falls when nobody is there, but there is no sound.  Sound is how a brain perceives vibrations of certain frequencies; without a brain there is no sound. The same is true for other perceptions. Music sometimes results in a feeling of awe in those who are sensitive  to it--and No One counts himself among them--but even the queen of the arts is not independent of mind.  A galaxy might resonate at a frequency that is a harmonic of B flat--way below middle C, of course--but it doesn't have any pitch if there is no ear to hear it.  Colors do not exist beyond brains that perceive them; many animals "know" only black and white, and some don't even perceive that.

9. We're almost at the end of the interview, so let me cut to the chase. I repeat, what is the ultimate question?

It's basically this: what is our nature and how should we live our lives?  Although No One assumes--without proof, of course--the unity of human nature, for analysis it is best described in two ways.  First, the Darwinian aspect--self-assertion and the will to survive.  Second, the transcendent aspects, love and wisdom.  (Remember, when No One refers to transcendence, No One is indicating an inner experience, not something that comes from the outside.)

10. I must return to what many believe to be the most important question of all.  What about God?

When we look inside, sometimes we seem to hear an inner voice; sometimes it all seems very impersonal.  No One is therefore supportive of those who use the term God for one's conscience at the highest level; No One is also supportive of those who use impersonal terms, such as Nirvana.  No One vigorously asserts, however, that just like music and colors, God exists within; it is highly doubtful  that there will ever be evidence of God or of gods existing beyond consciousness.  Before the age of science, it was possible to believe in God both as a symbol and as a fact.  It is no longer possible, however, for an educated twenty-first century mind to believe that dogmas--pick any one you choose--are as factual as two and two equal four. Self and God exist together; once self is completely transcended--this is theoretically possible, but whether this has ever been achieved is open to interpretation--things would look very different: both  God and  the self would no longer exist, as it were.  Another way of saying this is that everything becomes God, but that's just another figure of speech for something ineffable.

11.  Another way of describing that state is that everyone becomes No One?

We agreed to ten questions.  For the time being, No One has had enough.

The Baltimore Online Book Club: A Review of "A Sport and a Pastime" by James Salter

                                              A Sport and a Pastime
                                              by James Salter
                                              Farrer, Straus and Giroux
                                              Copyright 1967, renewed 1995
                                              185 pages



This is the fourth edition of the Baltimore Online Book Club.  Many of you might be familiar with the group by now, but I will summarize for new members what we do.  We are a group of six bibliophiles; we meet about every six weeks and discuss what we determine to be a good novel.  (We often choose former winners of the Nobel Prize for Literature.)  After we meet, I put a review of the book online.
We announce the book for discussion six weeks or so in advance, so readers have time to read it along with us.  Online members are invited to give their opinions in the comment section; if requested, we will respond to every one.

Next book for discussion: Peter Stephan Jungk's The Perfect American --or if you prefer to read it in the original German, as I have: der König von Amerika.  It is a biographical novel about Walt Disney, that has received good reviews and has already been made into an opera by Philip Glass.We will meet next on May 8, 2014, and the review will be posted shortly thereafter.

We will proceed now to a review of James Salter's A Sport and a Pastime, which we discussed at the last meeting on April 3, 2014.

A SPORT AND A PASTIME

James Salter's novel has been widely read since its publication in the late sixties--every member of our group thought its popularity is well deserved, and that the book should be even more well known.  In other words, we think it is a classic.

Since the book has been in existence for nearly fifty years; since the novel has been extensively reviewed--many reviews are online--I decided to discuss just two aspects of the work, the ones which impressed me the most.  A plot summary can easily be found online.  The novel is an erotic tale set in France; the lovers are an expatriate, upper-class American male, age 21, and  a working-class French girl, age 18.

The two aspects of the novel I will now discuss are its use of language, and its innovative plot structure.

1. A POET IN PROSE

Salter uses imagery and metaphor brilliantly.  Some of his descriptions rise to the level of prose poems, while functioning perfectly as narrative as well.  Intense interest in the expression rather than in what is expressed is  the purview of poets; most novelists are unable, or unwilling, to write poetically.  Unlike James Joyce, whose wonderful musical use of language often obscures the meaning of his sentences, Salter's use of poetry is always subservient to narration.  He is, of course, much less a virtuoso than was Joyce, and is also thus more easy to read.  I will now present two examples of his poetic prose:

In the middle of the crowd is a girl with an African--I'm certain he's a student--in a cheap grey suit.  They have their arms around each other.  As they dance it's like a playing card revolving.  The jack of spades vanishes slowly, the queen of diamonds is revealed.  Their mouths come together in the dark.
                                                              --page 41
                                                                                       
Notice the lovely use of the adverb "slowly" which indicates the erotic nature of their dancing, a fact which is more directly stated in the last line.  Salter doesn't simply state this episode, he uses a simile which makes the dance scene all the more vivid.  This picture stated in a few words is indeed worth a thousand.  The book contains many fine examples of impressive imagery.

Here is an example of a paragraph which in my opinion surpasses many of the prose poems written today:

I stop for a paper in the bookstore.  I know the old man there very well.  The counter is near the window where the light catches him flat on, like a cabinet minister before breakfast.  He's wearing a heavy sweater and a scarf.  His cheeks are absolutely purple.  He seems very mournful, but there is all the winter still to be survived.  He no longer lives in years; he is down to seasons.  Finally it will become single nights, each one perilous as a lunar journey.  He hands me the change.  His fingers are rough as wood.
                                                             --page 46

What an effective evocation of the terror of an isolated old age! Salter is a keen observer of things human.  There is no Father Williams sentimentality here; the cold light exposes the truth of the old man's situation to himself and to the reader.  "Like a cabinet minister before breakfast"--what a beautiful simile!  The politician wants to be seen and heard only when he is ready for the cameras.  Before breakfast he is like a wrinkled, sad pope without his fancy robes.  One is reminded of tabloid photos of starlets without their makeup.  Notice that the language is concrete and suggestive, which also reminds one of poetry.  There is quite literally a winter to be survived; the phrase, however,  also clearly suggests that the man is in the winter of his life.  Everything will have to be given up until only isolated nights that provide no comfort remain.  This is indeed a very effective, chilling depiction of how some of us will feel when we put the cheery AARP magazines down and look in the mirror.

2. A TECHNICAL TOUR DE FORCE

What is truly outstanding about the novel is not its language but its innovative structure.  Salter solves with genius many of the difficulties authors of novels face. When a novel is recounted by a narrator, this can sometimes be limiting.  For instance, how does one include important scenes in which the narrator isn't present?  How can one blend effectively fiction and truth and thus indicate that our lives consist of a blend of each?  How does one bring home the truth that what we believe to be accurate recollections of actual events  are always distorted by the desires of our minds?  And more down-to-earth--How can one fill a good deal of a book with scenes of explicit sex without a shred of sensationalism?  Salter has solved all these problems with admirable dexterity.

The novel begins with a train ride from Paris to the village of Autun, these two locations are where much of the plot takes place.  It is a vivid evocation of French countryside; Salter, who was a pilot during the Second World War, obviously knew France well.  After the reader feels rooted in a specific area of France, he or she is jolted out of complacency by the following lines:

None of this is true.  I've said Autun, but it could easily have been Auxerre.  I'm sure you'll come to realize that, I am only putting down details which entered me, fragments that were able to part my flesh.  It's s story of things that never existed although even the faintest doubt of that, the smallest possiblity, plunges everything into darkness.

                                                                   --page 11

On one level, the author is making the story universal; it could have happened anywhere--anywhere in France, that is, or, after removal of the French references, truly anywhere.  But there is another, far deeper level.  The plot is told by a nameless narrator who is 34 years old.  He is full of sexual desire that remains unsatisfied. .  He fantasizes about a young woman who lives nearby.  He never seems to make any progress with women, however; he is apparently too psychologically inhibited.  There is no evidence in the book that he ever even talked with the women he adores.  The circle of friends he frequents at one point teases him; they suspect he has a girl friend, although they just might simply having fun at his expense.  Later, the woman he secretly loves marries a student.  Like us, she probably never learned the narrator's name.  What a pitiful state for a man to be in, a full two decades after the onset of puberty.

The narrator meets a young American, an apparent Don Juan.  They travel to a club in Dijon where the young American, Philip Dean, meets a young French woman, Anne-Marie Costillait.  (She is the queen of diamonds of the first quote.) Much of the rest of the novel depicts, without reserve, the many sexual encounters the two have.  How does the narrator know all the details of their sex  life?  The "none of this is true" of the quote above is taken to a new level:

I am not telling the truth about Dean, I am inventing him.  I am creating him out of my own inadequacies, you most always remember that.
                                                                       --page 79

The lurid details turn out to be a fiction in a work of fiction, namely the fantasies of a sex-starved lonely man imagining Dean doing the things with his girlfriend that he would like to do with the girl of his dreams.  That is why there is hardly any conversation between the two lovers; that is why there is virtually no foreplay, only sex.  The sexually inhabited narrator's imagination doesn't waste any time with incidentals.

A very interesting and effective literary device!  It also skirts the clumsiness of having a narrator tell part of the story and having a  so-called "omniscient narrator" relating other scenes in which the narrator is not present.  The sex scenes turn out to be a movie written and directed by the narrator's mind.  He might have gotten some details from Dean--they see each other often--but these would have only helped his imagination run wild.

The young man has nothing in common with the young woman; except for the frequent joining of their bodies, his mind remains virtually untouched.  Yes, she wants to get married, Yes he wants to leave.  Even these banal details--do they reflect the lovers' actual situation or how the narrator imagines it?

What is truth?  What is fiction?  The author hints that experience is always a combination of both, depending how a narrator--an internal or an external one--interprets events.  Salter accomplishes this and more with astonishing understatement.  If the narrator hadn't told us that he is making things up--and this he tells us in just a few sentences of the entire book--the reader might simply take the story at face value,  The novel would still be entertaining, but much less memorable.  It subtly asks the questions about life experiences that we must ask ourselves: Are our memories telling the  truth?  Are they giving us fiction?  Are they storing a combination of both?

A very innovative novel, successful on multiple levels, and worth reading again and again!

Wanderers Nachtlied II
Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
Über allen Gipfeln
Ist Ruh,
In allen Wipfeln
Spürest du
Kaum einen Hauch;
Die Vögelein schweigen in Walde.
Warte nur, balde
Ruhest du auch.

Wanderer's Night-Song ll

Above all summits
is peace.
In all tree crests
you now sense
scarcely a breath.
The birds are quiet as tombs.
Just wait, soon
you too will rest.

Translated from the German by Thomas Dorsett


This poem is considered by many to be the finest short lyric in the German language. Shortly after it was written, Goethe inscribed the poem onto the wall of a little hunting cabin in central Germany.  This occurred on September 6, 1776.  At that time, Goethe was part of the court at Weimar where he had many functions.  (The cabin is on a mountain near the silver mine which he administered.  Goethe was already very famous across Europe due to his poignant novel, The Sorrows of Young Werther, the subject of which is a tragic love affair.

A few months before his death in 1832, Goethe returned to the cabin for the fist time since he had composed the poem.  As he read the poem, still quite legible on the wall of what had become known as"The Goethe Hut," tears flowed down his cheeks.


l. The Poem

This is a perfect short lyric. The many long vowels slow down the reader and have a calming effect.  The feminine or soft endings (in this case the e at the end of Wald and at the end of bald--the word "bald" usually doesn't have a final e--all contribute to the soothing mindfulness of the poem.  The German rhymes perfectly; I replaced--from necessity-- some of the full rhymes with half rhymes, i.e.,  "peace" with "sense" and "breath" with "rest."  This conveys a somewhat modern touch; the rhyme scheme is, however, still maintained, albeit imperfectly.  (It is impossible to convey the meaning with full rhymes in English. Most translations of this poem are either prose translations or ones that fall flat.  There might be a better translation than mine somewhere, but I haven't found one with which I've been satisfied.)

If you have at least a working knowledge of German, read the poem aloud slowly; you might thus appreciate the poem's beauty without any further comment from me.  Now let's proceed to an interpretation.

The poem begins with the cosmos and ends with the individual.  It denotes a process of peace starting from the heavens, proceeding down from the treetops until it reaches the forest floor where the individual to whom the poem is addressed is located.  "Above the summits" that is, in the sky, in the heavens, is peace.  Scarcely a breath of wind occurs in the treetops; peace is there, too.  The birds, intermediate creatures, at home both in the air and on the ground, have received this peace, too.  Notice the last line demands that the person addressed must wait--peace hasn't come to him or her yet, but it definitely will.if he remains open to it.

The progression of peace from cosmos to ground is ideal, but it is not always thus in reality.   It is conceivable that the individual could first find the peace in nature--the birds and treetops--and then find peace in the cosmos.  Goethe presents what might be the most efficacious path, but it has variations.

What the poem says is that if you are agitated, meditate--the use of that word here is not an exaggeration, since the poem is quite contemplative--on the cosmos and on nature and you will soon find rest.   That the cosmos has areas of extreme violence, such as occurs in the vicinity of black holes, or that nature is often "red in tooth and claw,"  is not an appropriate criticism against seeking peace in the natural world. We are talking about contemplation here--although natural, external images are presented, the symbolic meaning of the poem is that we are to find peace within.  Nature can help us do that; that's what's important.

Since peace descends in the poem from on high to the human being, all things are united in peace.  Therefore, the individual is united with both the cosmos and with nature, reducing separation to an illusion, albeit a very practical one.

The poem describes a way of looking outside that at the same time also looks inside; at the end come the joy, wisdom and serenity of true peace. Many people have viewed the last line as a reference to death.  I see it more as death the way Nirvana, the snuffing out of the fire of individuality, is death.   Wanderer's Night-Song is an extremely beautifully wise poem.

2.  Goethe in Reverse

Goethe is not the only wise poet!  I would like to quote here a haiku by Basho, the greatest composer of haiku in the Japanese language--and that says a lot.  It is actually quite similar in content to the Goethe poem, except that the movement is reversed, from the individual (Earth) to the cosmos, instead of the other way around:

A wild sea-
In the distance over Sado
The Milky Way.

Just as in the Japanese poem, only images are presented, no abstract language such as "fear, worry" etc.  Both poems suggest deeper meanings indirectly, through the use of suggestive images.  This is a mark of the best poetry.  Neither poem mentions an individual in torment--it is implied, however, in both poems.  "Just wait, soon/ you too will rest" indicates that the peace above and around him has not yet entered this person, who is in a state of unrest.  Basho's poem is very similar.  "A wild sea" signifies inner turmoil.  In nature, however, all storms are local, especially inner storms.  There is an absolute contrast to the wild sea presented in the poem: the beauty, majesty and calm of the Milky Way.

The theme of both poems are exactly the same: get yourself in accord with the cosmos (Nature) and you will transcend all turbulence.

Although the movement is reversed in Basho's poem, in both poems the cosmos is a source of peace.  Neither poet would begin a wisdom poem with the individual at peace and the cosmos in turmoil.  Once again, we are not implying that plants and animals are not in "cutthroat" competition, nor are we denying the extreme violence of supernovas.  The subject is the attainment of inner calm through contemplation of nature.  In any case, we have no concept of nature except for what our consciousness perceives.  (We can never know the "thing in itself" wrote Kant.  As a part of the system, (nature) we cannot have complete  knowledge of it, taught Gödel.)  The theme of both poems is a natural way to heal a distracted mind--that is, by contemplation, by meditating on nature in its most sublime manifestations.

I recall the ending of a poem I wrote a long time ago:
...God's living promise:/
the abyss in the belly can be filled.

Goethe knew that; Basho knew that.  They also knew that it wasn't easy.  The poems might be short, but it might take a lifetime--Basho might have  said that it could take  several lifetimes--to realize the peace in the last line of each poem.  But there is no doubt about it: the abyss in the belly can be filled.

3. Some People Just Don't Get It

There are people who are tone-deaf to poetry.  They go for the content and not for the craft; they go for the musings and not for the music.   A high IQ does not necessarily correlate with a high PQ, that is, a high Poetry Quotient.  We will now give an example of a great man completely missing the beauty of Goethe's poem.  The man in question is August von Humboldt,  (1769-1859), the notable geographer, naturalist and explorer.  The discussion of Goethe's poem occurs in the very entertaining novel, Measuring the World,  die Vermessung der Welt, by Daniel Kehlmann.  It is fiction, but inability to appreciate poetry in otherwise very accomplished individuals is certainly a common occurrence, as it is among the less educated.  The episode occurs when Humboldt is asked by South Americans, during an exploratory trip to the Amazon, to provide some entertainment:

Mario asked Humboldt if he would please tell them a story.
He didn't know any stories, said Humboldt, and straightened his hat, which the monkey had turned around.  And he didn't like telling them.  But he could recite the most beautiful poem in the German language, freely translated into Spanish.  Here it was.  Above all the mountaintops it was silent, there was no wind in the trees, even the birds were quiet, and soon death would come.
Everyone looked at him
That's it, said Humboldt.
Yes, but, asked Bonpland.
Humboldt reached for the sextant.
Pardon, said Julio, but that couldn't have been the whole thing.

                                      --The Measurement of the World, page 107

Who said Germans (in this case an Austrian) can't be funny?



4. Two Musical Renditions of Wanderer"s Night-Song

Many examples of German poetry of the nineteenth century have been transformed by composers into notable lieder.  Music is more international--and more popular--than poetry; it is the lieder versions that keep much of the poetry alive outside the German-speaking world.  Much of nineteenth century German poetry begs to be made into a lied, since the meter of most poems at the time is quite regular.  (A notable exception to this is the poetry of Hölderlin, whose poetry has too much inner music to accommodate external tones.)

Goethe's Wanderer's Night-Song is also an exception, even when compared to his other poems.  The lines are uneven; much of its beauty is due to inner rhymes and due to its imagery.  Nevertheless, several outstanding composers have composed lieder to the text.  I will briefly discuss two of them with suggested recordings.

Schubert (Youtube, Hans Hotter, Wanderers Nachtlied 11, D 794)

No one would come across as being foolish by claiming that Schubert was the best lieder composer ever.  This is indeed a wonderful song, exuding peace and serenity.  Hans Hotter's performance is flawless; it is a gem.  My criticism here, however, is that Schubert misses the deeper meaning of Goethe's poem.  (This isn't the only example; for instance, Schubert did not sense the irony of Heine's der Doppelgänger, yet created a masterpiece nevertheless.)

Schubert's lied evokes a scene from nature which induces peace.  There is no cosmic descent.  One gets a hint of the universal background by the use of the pedal tone in the tree-tops line.  His use of notes of shorter duration makes the music of "scarcely a breath" sound ominous--as if chaos underlies the peace of the forest but will be given short shrift here.  Then Schubert gets diverted with the birds--one imagines him listening in wonder to the birds on country walks.  He breaks the movement of the poem by breaking the line, "die Vögelein schweigen/schweigen im Walde."  This bird-interlude disturbs the unity of the poem.  The ending is beautiful.  The whole song is indeed exquisite; it succeeds superbly as music, but fails to grasp the meaning of Goethe's poem.

Youtube: Carl Loewe Wanders Nachtlied 1 Hermann Prey

(Note it's designated as Wanderers Nachtlied 1 on Youtube: this is an error.)

This lied alone is proof enough that Loewe is a neglected composer who deserves much more recognition.  He might not be a Schumann or a Schubert, but he composed  some music that should not be forgotten.  I was astonished when I heard this piece; it is very impressive.

It's hard to imagine that Loewe was about a year older than Schubert, yet lived for forty-one years after Schubert's death.  Schumann praised Loewe, but later his enthusiasm waned.  Wagner thought he was first-rate.

Unlike Schubert, who usually gave his musical imagination free reign while composing music to a text,  Loewe paid extremely close attention to the text.  We hear the E flat triad in a metric accompaniment, indicating the peace above summits. The chords change as we pass to the peace of the treetops and to the peace of the quiet birds.  The section about the birds is given an unbroken melodic line.  Notice the piano accompaniment immediately before the "Warte, nur," ("Just wait") phrase.  The piano plays three ascending quarter notes (representing, at least in my interpretation, the three aspects of descending peace, before the individual is reached.)  The three ascending notes culminate  in the dotted quarter, the eighth and the quarter note of "Warte nur."  This is the high-point of the phrase--and the gist of the whole poem--peace coming to the individual.  Notice the notes here ascend, while in the poem the peace descends.  It's as if Loeve is telling us this is the same thing; the peace is welling up from deep inside, ascending into consciousness.  A mirror image, as it were,  sometimes makes the best accompaniment. This is a very deep understanding of Goethe's poem; the peace above the summit abides deep inside human beings, and can be brought out with the help of nature.

The ending is even more fascinating.  Against all expectation, Loewe ends the last note not on the first note of the scale, but on the third.  Also contrary to expectation, this note is a whole note, tied--noted probably with a fermata, indicating a very strong emphasis.  The last note is sung on the word, "auch" meaning "also" (The translation does not follow the German word order.)  The individual is the "auch". he, too finds rest.  Now the individual ends on higher note--you can hear the ascent of the individual toward the cosmos.  And notice the individual is indeed closer to the cosmos now, but has not ascended to the very top; the humility of the human condition is maintained.

Listen to the ending carefully.  The last note sums up the entire poem in a strikingly original, effective manner.  It is a transcendent moment.

This lied is an astounding example of recreating a text through music.  It's as if Loewe has rewritten the poem while being faithful to it; in musical terms, that's indeed what he has done.  This lied should be universally praised and used as a prime example of how to put a poem to music.  Maybe this little essay will help lead to that realization, but I doubt it.  The history of art is not always fair.

Conclusion

Goethe's Wanderer's Night-song is one of the most beautiful poems of the German language.  It can easily be memorized--and should be.  It's harder to realize--it might take a lifetime to spiritually reach the peace of the last line, but it can and should be the goal of us all.   We can full fill our hunger with spiritual peace.  Goethe expressed this in a very short poem that contains images and no abstractions; it is a true work of genius.