§53 Steps to an accounting of the mind*
In his interview with ANow (Video №5), Danish writer Peter Hovmand entertained an idea, attributed to Danish writer Karen Blixen (1885–1962), ’that his thinking [is] at least four-thousand years old’ (Watt, Note §51).
“We owe a lot to the old Greeks, and Nietzsche owes a lot to them, and we should be aware of that” (45.05)
In other words, it is a question of recognizing that Western thought is indebted to an historical development ranging since antiquity. The articulations of this in terms of ‘owing’ (Hovmand) and ‘indebtedness’ (Watt) are apt, as the following will reveal.
The original references are a couple of statements made by Blixen in conversational contexts (Brundbjerg, 2000, p. 399; Wivel, 1987, p. 133). Firstly:
”My young literary friends in Denmark tell me that [as a well-read writer figure] I am three thousand years old” (Brundbjerg, 2000, p. 399)**
Secondly, revealingly, she approvingly referenced a claim made by Goethe (Wivel, 1987, p. 133), who in West-Eastern Diwan (Book V: Book of ill humour: XV)*** wrote:
‘Wer nicht von dreitausend Jahren, Sich weiß Rechenschaft zu geben, Bleib im Dunkeln unerfahren, Mag von Tag zu Tage leben.’ (Goethe, 1819)
‘Who knows not how to account for oneself for the past three thousand years remains in darkness, without experience, living from day to day.’ (my own translation (compare: Sontag, 1980)).****
Accounting (‘Rechenschaft’) is of importance here. Implicit in this accounting term — for the bookkeeping of one’s mind– is the requirement of a recognition of this intellectual debt. This transpires more clearly in Dowden’s translation, where ‘account’ is replaced with ‘mark’ :
‘Let him who fails to learn and mark
Three thousand years still stay, Void of experience, in the dark,Void of experience, in the dark,
And live from day to day.‘
(Dowden & Goethe, 1914, pp. 74–75 my emphasis)
Recognition, or ‘awareness’ of one’s debt is thus central. Without actively keeping an intellectual historical ledger and sustaining consciousness thereof — warns Goethe — we have to ‘live… in darkness’, ‘without experience’ and ‘from day to day’, or ‘from hand to mouth’ (Danish: ‘lever fra hånden til munden’ (Wivel, 1987, p. 133)).
Footnotes
* The title is a play on Gregory Bateson’s book Steps to an Ecology of Mind (Bateson, 1972)
** Original in Danish: “I Danmark siger mine unge forfattervenner, at jeg [som belæst forfatterfigur] er tre tusinde år gammel” (Brundbjerg, 2000, p. 399)
*** West-östlicher Divan (German) is a poetry collection published in 1819, and written between 1814–1819. The term ’Divan’ is a Persian and Arabic term for ’list’, ’register’ or collection, typically of short poems. Goethe was inspired by Hafez, the 14th Century Persian poet.
****The Cambridge Companion to Goethe (Sharpe, 2002) recommends Whaley’s translation, from 1998 (Goethe, 1998).
References
Bateson, G. (1972). Steps to an ecology of mind. University of Chicago Press.
Brundbjerg, E. (2000). Samtaler med Karen Blixen. Copenhagen, Denmark: Gyldendal.
Dowden, E., & Goethe, J. W. von (Trans.). (1914). West-Eastern Divan. Dent & Sons. Retrieved from https://archive.org/details/westeasterndivan00goetuoft
Goethe, J. W. von. (1819). West–östlicher Divan. Cotta.
Goethe, J. W. von. (1998). Poems of the West and East. West-Eastern Divan — West-östlicher Divan. (J. Whaley, Trans.). Berne: Lang.
Sharpe, L. (Ed.). (2002). The Cambridge Companion to Goethe. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Sontag, S. (1980, February 21). Eye of the Storm. The New York Review of Books. Retrieved from https://www.nybooks.com/articles/1980/02/21/eye-of-the-storm/
Wivel, O. (1987). Karen Blixen — Et uafsluttet selvopgør. Viborg: Lindhardt og Ringhof.
Originally published at anowmedia.com on August 17, 2018.
