A conversation with marble

I stopped by to talk with a not-so-famous lady while in Florence. Read the original (is it?) in German here.

Filled with a complete lack of awe, I stand before Michelangelo’s Pietà. The small one, from the sculpture shop on the north bank of the Arno. Stiffly and without looking up, she replies: If I was using words that hadn’t been said before? But she knows she’s wrong. After all, it’s not like I’m typing out Shakespeare in smaller font size.

It’s her pain talking. Over at the shop next door the tiny watercolor paintings with the Tuscan motives are hanging from their tin racks, each with their dark silhouettes of cypress trees painted the same, slender way. Cheap art. But still so much more than her, lacking any artistic thought at all.

Will you write about me?

Maybe. You make me think. Seventy thousand and seven clover leaves grow on the lawns of the Boboli gardens, all clover, copies of the same barely changing genome, none more or less revered than the first one, mother of all clover leaves … except it grows one more than her sisters.

You see, she says, nobody frowns upon the fact that there’s more than one clover leaf. The writers have been stealing words from each other’s mouths for centuries, changing only a few letters and getting printed like Tolstoy. What’s so bad about me?

Letters make a big difference, dear Mary. They change the ideas, create new ones. Why else are there minimal pairs? Table, fable. Cheaper, cheater. I abhor you. I adore you.

You adore me?

How could I? You’re not a new idea, you’re an old one, just smaller. You’re not even clover, growing something new from the old. For although every leaf sprouts from the same DNA as their sisters, it grows into a unique example of its species. You’re not unique. The Pietà in St. Peter is. You’re just an imitation.

What if you broke a piece off of me? One of Jesus’ fingers, or a tip of my garment? Wouldn’t that make me unique?

I can’t.

Why?

It’d lower your value. The shop owner would be furious.

What value? Didn’t you just say I was worthless, an imitation, a fake?

Still, they charge a lot of money for you. Money I can’t afford.

How can something worthless cost a lot of money? Either humans are stupid or you’re wrong.

Many people don’t have any taste.

Impossible. Everyone has taste. Just maybe not yours.

I’m saying they have bad taste.

How so?

Because they don’t reach for the one-of-a-kind, but settle for the one-of-a-lot. They wear clothes designed for the masses, they drive the same silver cars, furnish their apartments with the same grey chairs …

… and spend money on art that already exists — only smaller.

Exactly.

Like me.

Like you.

But what if there just aren’t enough originals for everyone? Maybe we need the odd copy so everyone can be happy?

Every person is an original, able to create their own original pieces. Even is it’s just shuffling a few letters.

You really don’t want me to exist.

I’m just saying that you’re not needed for that.

That I’m not needed at all.

Like so much else people make their money with.

Thank you for reading! Written on a tired bus drive in April 2018.

I’m an independent writer, translator and editor. If you think I can help you with something, shoot me an email at chrisloveswords@gmail.com.