“The Vanity of Success”

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Laozi (aka Lao Tzu and Lao Tse)

However you pronounce his name, Laozi is one the world’s greatest thinkers. Born in 571 BC or sometimes thought to be in the 4th century BCE, or whenever, and died whenever, Laozi may in fact never have existed; yet he is a great author.

I have been reading Dancing with the Dead: The Essential Red Pine Translations (Port Townsend, Washington: Copper Canyon Press, 2023) with great pleasure. There is something about Chinese poetry—even in English translation—that hits me where I live. And Red Pine (alias Bill Porter) is a superb translator. His explanatory notes are revealing: He says that even Chinese scholars have a difficult time and have to rely on explanatory notes dated in the centuries after the poems were written.

Here is an excerpt from Laozi’s The Way and Its Power (aka Daodejing aka Tao Te Ching) on the subject of striving:

Instead of poring in more
better stop while you can
making it sharper
won’t help it last longer
rooms full of treasure
can never be safe
the vanity of success
invites its own failure
when your work is done retire
this is the Way of Heaven

Around 130 AD, the Chinese sage Heshanggong wrote the following note about this passage:

Excessive wealth and desire wearies and harms the spirit. The rich should help the poor, and the powerful should aid the oppressed. If, instead, they flaunt their riches and power, they are sure to suffer disaster. Once the sun reaches the zenith, it descends. Once the moon becomes full, it wanes. Creatures flourish then wither. Joy turns to sorrow. When your work is done, if you do not step down, you will meet with harm. This is the Way of Heaven.

This is very old and powerful wisdom. But does anyone listen? Not in today’s world.

Gringo Perdido

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La Casa de Don David in El Remate, Guatemala

I couldn’t find the owner’s last name on the Internet. His first name I know, however: It’s David. Supposedly, in 1974 he founded a hotel called the Gringo Perdido, “The Lost Gringo.” At some point, he sold it to its present Guatemalan owners and opened La Casa de Don David, much closer to the intersection with the road to the Maya ruins at Tikal.

If you want to visit Tikal, you can stay just outside the ruins, or hang out with the tourist throngs on the island of Flores. My choice was the village of El Remate, roughly midway between Flores with its airport and the ruins at Tikal. And what a choice it was! My 2019 stay was restful and in every way delightful. The Casa was on the eastern shore of the Lago Petén Itza, the site of the final defeat of the Maya to the Spanish conquistadors in 1697, over a century after Cortés defeated the Aztecs several hundred miles to the north.

Here is the front of the informational handout I received in 2019:

The website listed is still current, in both Spanish and English.

I spent a couple hours talking with David and liked him and his hotel immensely. In fact, I hired a guide to the ruins through the hotel who was extremely knowledgeable.

One of the things I hate about a hotel when I’m traveling is a party atmosphere. I don’t mind conviviality, but it seems that the majority of American travelers particularly travel to get drunk. Me, I like places that are restful and quiet. It helped that the food was excellent and the owner and staff friendly and helpful. If I were to return to Tikal (next time I’d like to access it through Belize, some 25 miles (40 kilometers) to the east.

My Light Is Spent

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English Poet John Milton (1608-1674)

John Milton was blind, but he did not suffer from blindness. Rather, he did not let it hinder him from producing a body of work that was nothing short of amazing. It reminds me of another blind poet, Argentinian Jorge Luis Borges, who is one of my favorite writers and who wrote about Milton in a sonnet entitled “A Rose and Milton.” Now here is Milton in another sonnet writing about his own blindness:

When I consider how my light is spent,
Ere half my days in this dark world and wide,
And that one talent which is death to hide
Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present
My true account, lest He returning chide;
“Doth God exact day-labor, light denied?”
I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent
That murmur, soon replies, “God doth not need
Either man’s work or His own gifts. Who best
Bear His mild yoke, they serve Him best. His state
Is kingly: thousands at His bidding speed,
And post o’er land and ocean without rest;
They also serve who only stand and wait.”

Yes, that last line is quite famous and known to virtually everyone. The preceding thirteen lines, however, are not so well known—though they should be.

The Story of Joseph

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Biagio d’Antonio’s “The Story of Joseph” (ca 1485)

I loved this early Renaissance painting which shows, in the same frame, several incidents in the life of Joseph from the Book of Genesis. What caught my eye was the crowded landscape filled with Old Testament figures. According to the Getty Center website:

In the left-hand loggia, Jacob, seated on a throne, sends Joseph to his half-brothers tending sheep in the field. In the far left corner, the brothers, jealous of their father’s love for Joseph, strip him of his jacket and throw him into a pit. Passing merchants purchase the young boy from his brothers for twenty pieces of silver. In the background to the right, the merchants board the ship that will take them and their cargo to Egypt. In the right-hand loggia, the brothers show a blood-smeared coat to their father as evidence that Joseph is dead. With his head in his hand, Jacob mourns his son, whom he believes to be dead.

A companion panel in the Metropolitan Museum of Art depicts the next sequence of events in Joseph’s life. Originally framed next to one another, these two panels would have been inserted into the paneling of a room in a Tuscan family’s home.

There is always something picturesque and fanciful about the outdoor backgrounds in many Renaissance paintings, most particularly those by Giovanni Bellini (1430-1516). I particularly remember liking one of his paintings I saw in the Frick Collection in New York many years ago. It was called, I believe, “St. Francis in the Desert.”

Not To Be Improved Upon

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Tibetan Buddhist Nun Pema Chödrön

There I was yesterday staring at tulips at Descanso Gardens in between reading selections from The Pocket Pema Chödrön. And who is Pema Chödrön? Now retired, she is an American-born Buddhist nun practicing Tibetan Buddhism. She is a disciple of Chögyam Trungpa Rinpoche who has written a score of books on Buddhist practices. The following selection particularly interested me.

We already have everything we need. There is no need for self-improvement. All these trips that we lay on ourselves—the heavy-duty fearing that we’re bad and hoping that we’re good, the identities that we so dearly cling to, the rage, the jealousy and the addictions of all kinds—never touch our basic wealth. They are like clouds that temporarily block the sun. But all the time our warmth and brilliance are right here. This is who we really are. We are one blink of an eye away from being fully awake.

Looking at ourselves this way is very different from our usual habit. From this perspective we don’t need to change: you can feel as wretched as you like, and you’re still a good candidate for enlightenment. You can feel like the world’s most hepless basket case, but that feeling is your wealth, not something to be yjrown out or improved upon.

Tulip Mania

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Tulips in Bloom at Descanso Gardens

This was absolutely the best time to visit Descanso Gardens in La Cañada-Flintridge: The tulips, lilacs, and camellias were all in bloom. Of the three, tulips are my favorites, followed by lilacs—mostly for their scent.

For this year, the tulip plantings were nowhere near as intensive as in previous years. One thing I noticed that was different was that the tulip garden area had cards indicating that certain plantings were in memory of some person known to the donor. My guess is that there weren’t as many donors, or volunteers, or employees as the Gardens management anticipated. Or whatever.

Still, what was there was indescribably beautiful. I spent an hour sitting on a bench in the shade just staring at the tulips or reading a book of Tibetan Buddhist teachings by Pema Chödrön. It was peaceful and sublime—even though there were visitors by the thousands to the Garden this afternoon.

Tulips are interesting to me not only because of their looks, but because there was a time almost 400 years ago when they impacted the economic history of Europe. I am talking about the tulip mania that gripped the Netherlands. According to Wikipedia, “At the peak of tulip mania, in February 1637, certain tulip bulbs sold for more than 10 times the annual income of a skilled artisan.” To this day, the term “tulip mania” is associated with an economic bubble that is not linked in any way to the actual intrinsic value of the item traded.

It also has an interesting footnote in literature. In 1850, Alexandre Dumas Père published a novel about the 17th century Dutch tulip fever entitled The Black Tulip. It is the fascinating story of a Dutchman who attempts to develop a black tulip during the period.

The Father’s Curse

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A Drawing by Jean-Baptiste Greuze (1725-1805)

It was the Getty Center that turned me on to the art of Jean-Baptiste Greuze when they had an exhibit in 2002 on “French Drawings in the Age of Greuze.” He may be been something of a moralizer, but his drawings and his paintings are wonderfully dynamic. The above drawing is from a special exhibit at the Getty entitled “Virtue and Vice: Allegory in European Drawing.”

The vice in this case is a son (standing, right) announcing to his family that he has joined the army. He is embraced by his mother while his father (seated, left) curses him for his decision. The full name of the brush and gray wash over graphite drawing is: “The Father’s Curse: The Ungrateful Son.” The museum description of the drawing is as follows:

A father reacts furiously to his son’s decision to leave his family and join the army. With outstretched arms, he releases an angry curse that thrusts the young man toward the door, where a recruiting officer watches with indifference. The family’s pleading gestures and dramatic facial expressions communicate their anguish. Based on the popular painting the artist exhibited in 1777, this highly finished sheet served as the model for a print.

Here is the painting by Greuze that preceded the drawing:

This painting was praised by no less a critic than Denis Diderot, the famous French Encyclopedist. I actually like the drawing that ensued more than the painting because it looks more like a domestic scene rather than a stage proscenium.

I wonder why Greuze found it necessary to do a drawing after he did an oil painting. If, as the Getty description noted, the drawing was turned into a print, I would be very interested in seeing the print or engraving based on it.

The Artist as Martyr

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Artemisia Gentileschi’s “Self Portrait as a Female Martyr”

Of all the women artists before the 19th century, perhaps the greatest was Artemisia Gentileschi (1593-1654). Born in Rome, she was the daughter of a noted painter. According to the Getty Center’s website:

Artemesia Gentileschi is known as an ambitious and influential female painter of her time, when female artists were rare. She spread the Caravaggesque style throughout Italy and expanded the narrow possibilities for female artists. Artemesia was taught to paint by her father, Orazio Gentileschi, who painted directly on the canvas and used live models. Her paint-handling in her early works reflects her father’s influence, yet she also departed from him by choosing to paint tense, dramatic narratives with defiant female heroines. In 1612, Artemesia left Rome for Florence, after taking part in a trial against her art teacher, Agostino Tassi, who was convicted of raping her. Shortly after, she painted her interpretation of Caravaggio’s “Judith Beheading Holofernes,” taking a more arresting and gruesome approach to the subject than was common at the time. In the 1620s, Artemesia was living again in Rome, making brief trips to Genoa and Venice and continuing to paint narrative paintings as well as female nudes, a subject avoided by other female artists of the period. In 1630, Artemesia had moved to Naples where her style became less Caravaggesque and her themes turned to more conventional religious subjects. In 1638 Artemesia moved to London to care for ailing father. From then on, her work was less frequent and poorly documented. The last documentation of her was a painting commission dated January of 1654. She may have died in the plague that devastated Naples in 1656.

The self portrait of the painter as a martyr was a testimony to the difficulties she faced as a 17th century painter in what was typically an all-male profession. The painting was done around the year 1615. It was the Getty Center that introduced me to Gentileschi, whom I regard as one of the greatest artists of her time and place.

At the Getty Center

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The East Pavilion at the Getty Center (Currently Closed for Remodeling)

Every time I visit the Getty Center in Los Angeles, my imagination is rekindled. And, unlike the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA), I can visit without spending a small fortune—$26.00 senior admission and almost as much for parking. That comes to almost $50.00 total. I spent a total of seventy cents ($0.70) for the round trip on the MTA 781 bus and the Getty does not charge admission. If you were a senior on a fixed income, which museum would you choose?

For this visit, there was no obvious special exhibition; but I didn’t care because there was always something interesting to see that piqued my curiosity. For instance, I was amazed by a ceramic basin from Italy dated approximately 1600:

Basin with Moses Striking Water from the Rock

Moses in shown in the bottom left of the interior of the basin. According to the Getty website, “Princess Isabella della Rovere (1552-1619), sister of the Duke of Urbino, commissioned this basin as part of a diplomatic gift for Catalina de Zúñiga y Sandoval (1555-1628), wife of the Viceroy of Naples.”

Note the ogre or monster face jutting out from the bottom of the basin. Or is it Satan planning to turn the Israelites escaping Egypt to worshiping a golden calf?

In any case, it is a lovely piece of work

The Getty website provides more details:

The depiction of narrative scenes, known as istoriato in Italian, along with the vivid color palette of the basin are characteristic of ceramics made in Urbino. The city was a major center for the production of tin-glazed earthenware (maiolica) in central Italy during the 15th and 16th centuries. The workshop of Francesco Patanazzi (d. 1616), a member of a renowned ceramicist family, crafted the vessel. Its elegant shape and sculpted decorations, like the satyr-head handles and the base with lion’s paws, attest to the workshop’s virtuosity.

Itineraries: Peru/Chile/Bolivia Trifecta

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Parque Nacional Lauca in Chile

On my kitchen table right where I sit to eat my meals are ten travel guides by Lonely Planet and Moon Travel Guides. Now that I’ve canceled my newspaper subscription, I spend a lot more time fantasizing about possible future trips. Since I am 81 years old and living on a fixed income, am I kidding myself? Maybe, but dreaming about travel is almost as much fun as travel itself.

My latest fantasy itinerary starts in the northernmost seaport in Chile, Arica, known for its surfing. The city used to belong to Bolivia, which at the time had access to the Pacific; however, in the 1880s, there was a bird poo war involving Chile, Bolivia, and Peru. It literally was about access to bird droppings for use as agricultural fertilizer. (It’s amazing sometimes how so much warfare is due to lust for various types of shit.) Peru and Bolivia lost, probably due to naval help for Chile from Britain.

From Arica, I would take a La Paloma bus to the village of Putre, which woulkd take me from sea level to an elevation of 11,060 feet (3,371 meters) within a couple of hours. There I would adjust myself to the altitude by reading a good book for a day or two while I felt slightly ill from soroche (altitude sickness).

I would hire a tour guide in Putre to take me to the Parque Nacional Lauca, which is a region of snowcapped volcanoes and alpine lakes with wild vicunas and alpacas. Nearby are other high-altitude Andean parks.

From Putre, I could take a bus to La Paz, Bolivia, where I could rest a day or two before making my way to the ruins of Tihuanacu and the city of Copacabana on the eastern shore of Lake Titicaca. From there it is a quick bus trip to Puno in Peru, where I spent several days in 2014 on the western shore of Titicaca. If I am so minded, I can easily get from Puno to Cuzco and Machu Picchu and ultimately to Lima.