February 27, 2011

Dear Cyndy,

Thank you for your letter. Your comment about BS in college compositions is very helpful to me, contrasting as it does "facts" as the essential component of an essay, with "interpretation" as surplusage, tolerable only at the professor's discretion. By these standards, I don't think Mengs' grade on the essay that he composed in the dungeon cubicle under some duress will be anything to brag about.  If I have time, I will try to rewrite what he had in mind as a "fact based" essay, not to replace, but as an alternative to the existing text which is quite abstract, but in my Teutonic judgment, also very meaningful.  The original examination question which Mengs had to answer in order to be permitted to escape from the dungeon was:

"Beschreiben Sie die Grundlage des Rechts in der Beschaffenheit des menschlichen Wesens, und leiten Sie die Unzulaenglichkeit und das Versagen der Rechtsprechung aus dieser Beschaffenheit ab."

I translate:

"Describe the foundations of justice as characteristics of human nature, and from these characteristics deduce the inadequacy and the failure of adjudication."

The threshold issues, it seems to me, are: 1) what "foundations of justice" are properly designated as "facts"?  2) what "characteristics of human nature" are properly designated as "facts"?  3) what "inadequacies and failures of adjudication" are properly designated as "facts"?  If the required "facts" do not exist, is it worthwhile, is it even permissible, to ask the question in the first place?  Goethe wrote "Das Hoechste waere zu begreifen, dass alles Faktische schon Theorie ist." (Most important is to understand that all facts are already theories.) If he was right, the problem disappears.  If he was wrong, then how does one distinguish fact from theory?  John Locke and David Hume would have said that one recognizes "facts" by common sense. Facts, according to them, would be statements about which every one is in agreement.  If that's the fact, I'm in big trouble, because I'm inclined to challenge statements about which everyone is in agreement. Turning facts into theories is my specialty.

Two weeks ago I wrote you, and for efficiency's sake, I'll copy what I wrote then:

"It was just four weeks ago today that I sent you a synopsis of Chapter 43 of my novel Die Freunde. I've made a slight modification by providing my protagonist Jonathan Mengs with cubicle in the basement, a chair and a desk, some sheets of blank paper and a pencil with which to outline the jurisprudence which he has discovered - or invented, premised on the insight that law is language - that all language has the propensity of controlling action, and that because language is incapable of expressing (subjective) experience (Erleben) law is predestined to failure.  All this is expounded with academic formality. There's no constraint on length, no paper shortage. Underlying is the premise that it is truth - the intellectual apperception of truth which makes us free.

"In the case of Mengs in his subterranean cubicle, the physical path to freedom described as Chapter 44 begins, is a rickety, flimsy ladder on which Mengs begins his ascent out of the depths. As he proceeds, the ceiling aperture recedes at the same time that the ladder becomes more and more substantial, changes into a staircase, until finally when the horizon of Mengs gaze rises above the level of the ceiling, the ambience changes. Mengs now finds himself on an elegant carpeted stairway which curves in grandeur to a second level. The cellar from which he has escaped is now no longer visible; the vertigo, the fear of falling into the abyss from which he was arduously ascending has dissipated. The floor below which Mengs now contemplates with equanimity and pleasure is a beutiful mosaic depicting the earth, its snow capped poles, its deep blue oceans and sprawling continents, soaring mountains, green forests and rolling deserts, a panorama as seen from outer space. At the same time, the lobby is crowded with visitors, tourists, sightseers from many countries; there are children racing around in miniature automobiles, fire trucks, ambulances, police cars, even a hearse staffed with funeral attendants.  Mengs is relieved that these common folk are not permitted in the higher levels of this magnificent building to which he has access as an academician, a professor and a scholar. 

"The most impressive library Mengs has ever seen. A labyrinth of bookshelves as far as the eye can see. Meticulously polished expanses of hardwood floors, covered with more oriental carpets from the Middle East than Mengs is able to count. Luxurious tables, inlaid with mosaics of precious woods into images of prominent jurists complete with the number of death sentences each has pronounced. Clusters of law students, some in meticulous clothes: the men in tailored suits, starched shirts and elegant ties; the women in demure long dresses, looking except for the missing bonnets like pious Mennonites. These have their counterparts in men with torn and stained dungarees, their shirts unbuttoned revealing hairy chests, with shirt tails fluttering over their hips.  And girls with very low cut blouses, inviting and permitting the inspection of extraordinary cleavage, and minipants so stingy in expanse that Mengs finds very little left to his imagination.  "Absorbed as he is in the study of a particularly enticing pelvic anatomy, Mengs is startled when he is approached by one of the uniformed waiters whom he has observed not only reshelving books, but also plying the students with refreshments, coffee, tea, cakes and brandies whose aromas suffuse the air. The waiter, however, seems sympathetic also to that most elementary of human failings, Mengs' absorption in the contours of the female pelvis.  The waiter apologizes to Mengs for having interrupted the meditation, and asks what he might do to help.  Mengs explains that he is looking for his friend Maximilian Katenus, who, it is said has some association with this august institution, although Mengs is not sure what that association might be.

The waiter, whose name is Gabriel, tells Mengs about the tragic fate of Katenus. Fifteen years ago, Katenus - who as you may or may not remember had given away his valuable acreage on the Island to his friends, - because he valued friendship more than wealth, - had been indicted for gift-tax evasion, and contrary to all advice, Katenus insisted on defending himself. He did so with a surfeit of skill, explaining to the judges that from the perspective of reason, their judgments were packaged absurdity, that from the perspective of ethics their judgments were camouflaged falsehood. That justice itself was nothing but fraud, quoting Lessing: So seid ihr alle, betrogene Betrueger.  That statement, it turns out, is against their rules. The Court would have forgiven Katenus, would have put him on "probation", for anything else: but Katenus proof that the law itself was "illegal", was fraudulent, was a challenge they could not forgive. It was the sin against the Holy Spirit of the law. Therefore they condemned Katenus to death. 

The trial, Gabriel reported, was the most significant of modern times, and rivaled in importance the Athenians' condemning Socrates to drink the hemlock, and Pilate's ordering the crucifixion of the Messiah. Correspondingly Katenus also was now sanctified, if not deified. The slightest aspersion on him was deemed politically incorrect, for the reason, so Gabriel thought, that Katenus' apotheosis created the social and spiritual space that made possible the continuation of just those cruelties of which Katenus had been the victim. Thereupon Gabriel led Mengs through the maze of bookshelves to the end of the monumental library to a temple, a chapel, a sanctuary that was dedicated to Maximilian Katenus.  Gabriel unlocked the door, it was of bullet-proof glass, 6 inches thick, not, as Gabriel explained, to protect Katenus from intruders, but to protect the students, the professors, and especially the judges from Katenus' ideas and from his spirit.  And there at a round table sat Katenus himself, compelling as in life, in an armchair, a picture reminiscent of Michelangelo's Sistine Chapel ceiling, a statue of which Mengs could not be sure, was it embalmed or was it waxen. Whatever its substance, Mengs was afraid to approach the idol. He and Gabriel stayed close to the door, discoursing at length about Katenus' ideas, not daring to look. When Mengs finally did venture another glance, Katenus was no longer alone. Across the table from him, sat Joachim. It took Mengs a few moments to realize that Joachim also was waxen, also was dead. Mengs let out a scream and fainted, but Gabriel, his guardian angel, kept Mengs from falling. As soon as Gabriel had unlocked the bullet-proof door, Mengs slipped away from him, raced through the library, - now referred to as a heavenly hell, - knocking over chairs and tables and students in search of the stairs by which he had ascended. The stairs were nowhere, but in their place a bare opening, into which Mengs plunged head first. He fell further and further, faster and faster, until finally - - he was fully awake. He started to whisper Joachim's name, then shouted it louder and louder, until Joachim also woke up. "What is it?"  Joachim asked. "I had a terrible dream," Mengs said. "I'm very tired."

Everyone has his chance to dream. In Chapter 45 it's Katenus' turn.  He dreams that he has been awarded the Nobel Prize in literature, but after reflecting on the difficulties of traveling, especially the security measures at the airport, he chooses not to make the trip to Stockholm, but asks the Svenske Akademien just to send him the check.  Katenus himself decides he needs a vacation from the Island and goes to his ancestral home in the mountains. The Swedes however, won't take No for an answer. They tell Katenus, the check can't be mailed, it has to be hand served, and that if he won't travel to Stockholm, they will visit him to deliver both the check and the medal. I've just started this chapter, but it looks as if the stage is set for a lot of action. It'll probably take a few weeks for me to straighten out all the details, - imagine the complications if 24 Swedes converged on 6533 Hayden Run Road. I'll keep you informed.

Meanwhile stay well and give my best to Ned. Spring is 21 days away.

Jochen

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