Dear Marion,

When I awoke this morning, an approach to the definition
of Kultur was clear in my mind, or so it seemed. Various
practical tasks to be completed in the 72 hours before
our departure seemed to require my attention. Only some
of this morning's inspiration survived a day of trimming
grass around the foundations of the house, and partially
dismembering a 75 feet tall dead locust tree that had
unexpectedly collapsed onto the western lawn. Fortunately
the house was spared,  but a beautiful small dogwood tree, -
I doubt that you find those in Minnesota or Wisconsin, -
was crushed.  Ten years ago or so, the dogwood had been
fractured by an ice storm. At the time I projected my 
professional expertise to tree surgery, securing to each
other two badly broken limbs by means of a 3/8" threaded
metal rod. Today I also cleared from the gutter on the
south side of the house a cluster of twigs and branches
presumably blown there by last winter's tornado. None of 
these efforts had much bearing on the meaning of Kultur.

Later, as I began to consider what the word Kultur might
mean, I was reminded of one of Plato's dialogues, the "Sophist",
I believe, which wrestles with the awkward consequences
of the reification of concepts. All I remember after sixty
years is the presumption that the names with which Plato
designated his various ideals must, if they were to be
compelling, possess the reality of objects, an hypothesis
which leads to impossible logical and verbal predicaments.
In this instance, as so often, it's not the answer which
is meaningful, but the question....

At this point, I fell asleep. - Meanwhile another day
has dawned.

My problem, what did my parents mean by "Kultur", becomes
tractable as soon as I postulate that Kultur is not an entity,
but a function; as soon as I begin to understand that Kultur
is a reference to the perspective in which my parents' world
became meaningful for them. It is the projection onto their
social and historical environment of values and qualities that
they deemed important, if not indeed essential for their lives.
Cultural values are analogous to religious values, and similarly
opaque to definition.

Kultur is a meaningful concept only in the context of the
esthetic and ethical experience and expectations of the
individual who entertains it. Far from being an entity, Kultur
is a quality of emotional and intellectual (spiritual) existence
as varied, changeable and multifarious as is the population of
our world. Kultur is a concept that makes explicit the reciprocal
interaction between the individual and his (spiritual) environment.
It defines their interdependence.

One infers Kultur from the burgeoning of art, music, literature
and philosophy. One postulates Greek culture in the days of Homer,
Aeschylus Sophocles, Euripides, Socrates, Plato and Aristotle,
a culture of ancient Rome and of the Italian Renaissance,
English culture at the time of Chaucer, Milton, Shakespeare
and Marlowe, as well as German culture exemplified by Lessing,
Schiller, Goethe, Kleist, Heine, not to speak of Bach, Haendel,
Telemann, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann,
 Mendelssohn ... If my learning did not fail me, I would go on.

The concept "Deutsche Kultur" to the best of my very limited 
knowledge was an invention of Romantic historical consciousness.
The circumstance that it was coopted by the rampant nationalism
of the late nineteenth and early 20th century does not impair the
validity of the concept and does not justify its becoming a target
of bigoted contempt. It was the Greeks who coined the word
"barbarian".  The French and the English have nationalisms of
their own, and when in glass houses, one shouldn't throw stones.

I'll try to send you an e-mail when we arrive in Belmont. If it
doesn't reach you before your departure, I'll see you at the
airport.

Jochen