The Death of Virgil by Herman Broch is included on The 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read List in the Family and Self Section - 8 out of 10

 

The Death of Virgil by Herman Broch is included on The 1,000 Novels Everyone Must Read List in the Family and Self Section

 

8 out of 10

 

The Death of Virgil has almost everything it needs to seduce, enchant the reader, not this one though, for it is – or it seems to be – a sophisticated, deep, thought provoking read, except that the audience has to rise to the level, it is one of those issues we find in the psychology classic Flow  https://realini.blogspot.com/2016/10/flow-by-mihaly-csikszentmihalyi-this-is.html by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

 

This marvel (Flow, not The Death of Virgil) explains what you need to get to Being in The Zone, have Maximum Experiences, reach the Zenith, and one of the sine qua non aspects is challenges meet expectations, or if you look at graphics, you get a line, then on one side you have boredom, and the other is for burnout

Translated for this, and other books, one could be entertained, thrilled, awed (which is one of the elements of positivity, maybe we get to Positivity, another psychology classic by Barbara Fredrikson later) by a magnum opus, and then they are on track for elation, but it could be an undemanding, flimsy offer that disappoints

 

For The Death of Virgil, and this reader (better said lazy opportunist), it was the too difficult, taxing scenario, yes, the novel is clearly captivating, you could travel to the Republic of The Spirit, get into Glasperlenspiel -a glorious chef d’oeuvre https://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/the-glass-bead-game-by-herman-hesse.html by Herman Hesse, Winner of The Nobel Prize for Literature – this is The Glass Beads Game…

Yet, you have to have the necessary skills, education, patience, zest, perhaps we should continue with the rest of the Character Strengths, as identified by the co-founder of Positive Psychology (the other is the aforementioned Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi) Martin Seligman – courage, resilience, vitality, integrity, social intelligence…

 

Love, munificence, love of learning, creativity, curiosity, open mindedness, leadership, citizenship, fairness, forgiveness, mercy, self-control, prudence, modesty, humility, appreciation of excellence and beauty, gratitude, humor, hope, spirituality…

We have established that The Death of Virgil is too good for me, I do not have the necessary background – I am thinking of those who use to learn Latin, Greek in school, we had a few classes of Latin, but probably not more than ten, not enough nonetheless – Publius Vergilius Maro was the author of The Aeneid

A masterpiece that is included among The Greatest 100 Books of All Time, but also coming out of the rarefied air of Arcadia, the land of poets, refined intellectuals – speaking of that, some of the best minds are rather unsavory in their private life, and we find about their shenanigans form another fantastic oeuvre…

 

Intellectuals https://realini.blogspot.com/2014/06/intellectuals-by-paul-johnson.html by Paul Johnson analyzes the dark side of Leo Tolstoy, Henrik Ibsen, Ernest Hemingway, Jean-Jacques Rousseau…the latter left his children at the door of an orphanage, at a time when nine out of ten would die in the circumstances

There is another aspect, included in the standard lines that close my notes, a link to quotes from To The Hermitage by Malcolm Bradbury, who said that the characters in novels are deeper, more interesting that the humans we meet in real life, only in The Death of Virgil we may get those that are too interesting, way better that we can cope with’

 

I was trying to joke there, but it could be, indeed, it is a thing, Publius Vergilius Maro appears like somebody who is not just from another world, age, he belongs to the ancient world, albeit he is, with his immense talent, infinite, immortal, but he is living in a sphere where the likes of me do not have access, unless something happens

There is the possibility of a script, I was planning to send to Hollywood, wherein we get to section of heaven somehow, and we encounter some of the ‘big shots’, names from literature – not James Joyce though, his Ulysses is still inaccessible to yours truly, he met with Marcel Proust, my absolute number one writer, and the two barely exchanged a few words, Joyce could have mad Proust sick, opening the window, if I am not inventing this now, thinking I remember the passage – and from film, what else, let me see…

 

So we have fun, there is humor, Inshallah, and we get some innuendo, maybe John Fitzgerald Kennedy, Marylin Monroe, Sinatra, Marlon Brando, Martin Heidegger, Marcel Proust, Somerset Maugham, Magister Ludi Kingsley Amis https://realini.blogspot.com/2023/07/the-kings-english-guide-to-modern-usage.html

Would be part of the group, which should look at the obvious candidates Shakespeare, Michelangelo, Da Vinci, Churchill, and some of the most enchanting, powerful women – not Jeanne d’Arc however – Cleopatra, the original Eve – that is if God would allow that – infamous Theodora, Messalina, and Flannery O’Connor

 

To approach a conclusion, if I do not find personages that I like, identify with, aspire to become like, inspire, and yet, like Aristotle said ‘audiences want to see the hero fall because of a justified failure’ they see themselves as having a certain moral profile – maybe words to that effect – and if they do not bring Flow, or anything near…

Well, then we are off to the next, hopefully better read, and there are always immense joys to be reached, such as A Season in Sinji by JL Carr, who has enchanted me, and many others, with A month in The Country…

 

 

Now for my standard closing of the note with a question, and invitation – maybe you have a good idea on how we could make more than a million dollars with this http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/02/unique-in-world.html?q=unique+in+the+world – as it is, this is a unique technique, which we could promote, sell, open the Oscars show with or something and then make lots of money together, if you have the how, I have the product, I just do not know how to get the befits from it, other than the exercise per se

 

 There is also the small matter of working for AT&T – this huge company asked me to be its Representative for Romania and Bulgaria, on the Calling Card side, which meant sailing into the Black Sea wo meet the US Navy ships, travelling to Sofia, a lot of activity, using my mother’s two bedrooms flat as office and warehouse, all for the grand total of $250, raised after a lot of persuasion to the staggering $400…with retirement ahead, there are no benefits, nothing…it is a longer story, but if you can help get the mastodont to pay some dues, or have an idea how it can happen, let me know

 

As for my role in the Revolution that killed Ceausescu, a smaller Mao, there it is http://realini.blogspot.com/2022/03/realini-in-newsweek-participant-in.html

 

Some favorite quotes from To The Hermitage and other works

 

‘Fiction is infinitely preferable to real life...As long as you avoid the books of Kafka or Beckett, the everlasting plot of fiction has fewer futile experiences than the careless plot of reality...Fiction's people are fuller, deeper, cleverer, more moving than those in real life…Its actions are more intricate, illuminating, noble, profound…There are many more dramas, climaxes, romantic fulfillment, twists, turns, gratified resolutions…Unlike reality, all of this you can experience without leaving the house or even getting out of bed…What's more, books are a form of intelligent human greatness, as stories are a higher order of sense…As random life is to destiny, so stories are to great authors, who provided us with some of the highest pleasures and the most wonderful mystifications we can find…Few stories are greater than Anna Karenina, that wise epic by an often foolish author…’

 

‚Parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus’

 

“From Monty Python - The Meaning of Life...Well, it's nothing very special...Try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in, and try and live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations.”