he was led to question whether Leanderâs âconjugal powers must not have been exhausted in his passage to Paradise.â
* Erysichthon, a Thessalian prince, made the mistake of cutting down some trees sacred to Demeter, who was as serious about trees as about eggplants. For punishment, Erysichthon was given so great a hunger that he devoured his own flesh, either the legs alone or, indeed, his whole body, depending upon which version of the myth one credits. In either case, his hunger proved fatal, which is why Erysichthon was often seen as an archetype of the artist, who also eats himself, though he usually starts with the heart or the brain, depending upon what sort of artist he is, or was before he got so hungry. (The artist also regurgitates what he has eaten, a fate spared both Erysichthon and any audience Erysichthon might have had.) Erysichthon is also renowned as the father of a beautiful daughter, Mestra, who gave herself to Poseidon, for which license she was granted the power to assume the shape of any animal she liked. Each animal Mestra became, her father sold at market; once arrived, zoöidalized, at the barnyard of her hapless owner, she would change herself back into a girl and run home, there to recommence the lucrative process. Mestra is known as a goddess of actresses.
Leipzig
MAY 12, 1824
The tree of knowledge has robbed us of the tree of life .
Johann Georg Hamann
All she heard was music. Music was all she heard. She wasnât deaf. She was mute. But she wasnât deaf. She could hear music.
Words, which is to say speech, meant nothing to her. She had no idea speech was made of words, any more than she knew, when she was four years old, that music was made of notes. But music spoke to her. It was speech that did not yet speak to her.
And so on this day that her mother took her and together they left her father, neither of them told her where she was going or why. But she knew why.
Her mother was music. Her mother sang. Her mother played the piano, as did her father, but her mother played the piano better while her father sold pianos and strange contraptions like finger stretchers and trill machines and dumb keyboards that he used to help his pupils learn the instrument, for her father was a piano teacher.
When her mother played the piano, or sang while accompanying herself or was accompanied by her own teacher, Herr Bargiel, whom Clara knew as the man who made her mother smile and put her hands to her face as if to stop her smile, Clara would listen.
Sometimes she would listen from her room, or from the rooms of her two little brothers, or secretly from the room where her older brother, Adelheid, had lived before he died and where nobody lived now because her mother could not bear to go into that room, though Clara didnât mind, in fact she liked Adelheidâs room best of all. The music filled it when her mother played in the parlor right below, and Clara felt she was able to speak to Adelheid by passing the music on to him, her brother, who had died before Clara was born and yet was somehow the only person Clara felt could understand her when she spoke. She would climb into Adelheidâs crib, which made her realize that Adelheid must have been younger than Clara was now, four, when he died, and sing to her baby brother with their motherâs voice as it rose through the floor and filled both of them with joy.
Other times Clara would go down to the parlor and stand outside its doors and listen to her mother. She was never able to stand there for long. The sound of her mother singing and playing or just playing would draw her in. She would open the door and walk through the parlor right up to where her mother was sitting alone at the piano or with Herr Bargiel next to her on the piano bench, and she would sit down next to her mother or squeeze in next to Herr Bargiel and watch her motherâs hands on the piano keys and think that this is how you learn to talk, you
* Erysichthon, a Thessalian prince, made the mistake of cutting down some trees sacred to Demeter, who was as serious about trees as about eggplants. For punishment, Erysichthon was given so great a hunger that he devoured his own flesh, either the legs alone or, indeed, his whole body, depending upon which version of the myth one credits. In either case, his hunger proved fatal, which is why Erysichthon was often seen as an archetype of the artist, who also eats himself, though he usually starts with the heart or the brain, depending upon what sort of artist he is, or was before he got so hungry. (The artist also regurgitates what he has eaten, a fate spared both Erysichthon and any audience Erysichthon might have had.) Erysichthon is also renowned as the father of a beautiful daughter, Mestra, who gave herself to Poseidon, for which license she was granted the power to assume the shape of any animal she liked. Each animal Mestra became, her father sold at market; once arrived, zoöidalized, at the barnyard of her hapless owner, she would change herself back into a girl and run home, there to recommence the lucrative process. Mestra is known as a goddess of actresses.
Leipzig
MAY 12, 1824
The tree of knowledge has robbed us of the tree of life .
Johann Georg Hamann
All she heard was music. Music was all she heard. She wasnât deaf. She was mute. But she wasnât deaf. She could hear music.
Words, which is to say speech, meant nothing to her. She had no idea speech was made of words, any more than she knew, when she was four years old, that music was made of notes. But music spoke to her. It was speech that did not yet speak to her.
And so on this day that her mother took her and together they left her father, neither of them told her where she was going or why. But she knew why.
Her mother was music. Her mother sang. Her mother played the piano, as did her father, but her mother played the piano better while her father sold pianos and strange contraptions like finger stretchers and trill machines and dumb keyboards that he used to help his pupils learn the instrument, for her father was a piano teacher.
When her mother played the piano, or sang while accompanying herself or was accompanied by her own teacher, Herr Bargiel, whom Clara knew as the man who made her mother smile and put her hands to her face as if to stop her smile, Clara would listen.
Sometimes she would listen from her room, or from the rooms of her two little brothers, or secretly from the room where her older brother, Adelheid, had lived before he died and where nobody lived now because her mother could not bear to go into that room, though Clara didnât mind, in fact she liked Adelheidâs room best of all. The music filled it when her mother played in the parlor right below, and Clara felt she was able to speak to Adelheid by passing the music on to him, her brother, who had died before Clara was born and yet was somehow the only person Clara felt could understand her when she spoke. She would climb into Adelheidâs crib, which made her realize that Adelheid must have been younger than Clara was now, four, when he died, and sing to her baby brother with their motherâs voice as it rose through the floor and filled both of them with joy.
Other times Clara would go down to the parlor and stand outside its doors and listen to her mother. She was never able to stand there for long. The sound of her mother singing and playing or just playing would draw her in. She would open the door and walk through the parlor right up to where her mother was sitting alone at the piano or with Herr Bargiel next to her on the piano bench, and she would sit down next to her mother or squeeze in next to Herr Bargiel and watch her motherâs hands on the piano keys and think that this is how you learn to talk, you
Similar Books
