Revered experimental fiction author Italo Calvino is new to me, although he has been writing and winning honors since long before I was born. Mr. Palomar is one of his landmark novels. What's it about?
In one chapter, the protagonist goes to the beach; not to watch the waves, but to completely isolate and analyze — dissect almost, with his intellect — a single wave. The task he has set for himself is impossible to accomplish. So, "Mr. Palomar goes off along the beach, tense and nervous as when he came, and even more unsure about everything."
Poor Mr. Palomar. How many people fall victim to the "scientific" mindset and end up as stressed out and unhappy as Mr. Palomar? It brings to mind the writings of musicologist Christopher Small. From his book Music, Society, Education I learned that Rene Descartes philosophically chopped up everything, the mysterious whole, into categories; humans divided from nature, individual cut off from community, mind severed from body, and spirit divorced from intellect. And most of science acts as if these categories are true. When really they are about as useful as the self-imposed task of Mr. Palomar to analyze a single wave on the vast sea.
Calvino's descriptions of the waves brought to mind a writing of SGI Buddhist leader Daisaku Ikeda. He uses the ocean as a metaphor for the eternity of life. We in our individual bodies in this life are like waves on the ocean. When we die, it is as if our wave has crashed and reunited with the whole mysterious ocean, or cosmic sea of life, only to rise again as another wave. As Mr. Palomar observed at the beach (much to his chagrin), there truly is no separation between one wave and another. No separation between one life and another. No separation between you and me.
In another section of the novel,
"Mr. Palomar decides that from now on he will act as if he were dead... The gaze of the dead is always a bit deprecatory. Places, situations, occasions are more or less what one already knew, and recognizing them always affords a certain satisfaction... The dead should no longer give a damn about anything, because it is not up to them to think about it anymore; and even if that may seem immoral, it is in this irresponsibility that the dead find their gaiety.
The more Mr. Palomar's spiritual condition approaches the one here described, the more the idea of being dead seems natural to him."
This brings to mind a character in Colin Riggins' screenplay Harold and Maude. It pre-dates Mr. Palomar by almost two decades. In particular I'm thinking of the following bits of dialog from the transcript.
Article comments
1 - Lynette Yetter, author of the novel, Lucy Plays Panpipes for Peace
Hello everyone. I just noticed I left out the link for Christopher Small's book "Music, Society, Education." Here it is!
2 - A Geek Girl
"chewing on the concept of living death like a dog worrying a bone" very profound Lynette. I'd never really thought of it in that way.
I've always felt my peace near water.
"We in our individual bodies in this life are like waves on the ocean" perhaps that's why?
A beautiful piece of writing. Thank you for sharing it.
3 - Lynette Yetter, author of the novel "Lucy Plays Panpipes for Peace"
Hello Geek Girl,
Thank you so much for taking the time to read my article, ponder it, and to give your thoughtful and sincere feedback.
Like you, I feel peace near water.
The concepts in my writing are strongly infuenced by the writings of Daisaku Ikeda. He is the president of the lay Buddhist group, SGI, of which I've been a practicing member for 25 years.
He is the one who has encouraged me, and millions of others, to persevere in developing our craft and living our dreams, in order to be happy and to contribute to a more peaceful world.
Geek Girl, I appreciate you sharing of yourself here. :)
Sincerely,
Lynette