{"id":161391,"date":"2022-09-01T17:08:57","date_gmt":"2022-09-01T21:08:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=161391"},"modified":"2022-09-02T10:37:22","modified_gmt":"2022-09-02T14:37:22","slug":"seven-seven-seven-a-week-in-cambridge-massachusetts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2022\/09\/01\/seven-seven-seven-a-week-in-cambridge-massachusetts\/","title":{"rendered":"Seven, Seven, Seven: A Week in Cambridge, Massachusetts"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>

Edouard Godard & Vilmorin-Andrieux & Cie, Les plantes potag\u00e8res<\/em>, 1904. Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons<\/a>.<\/p><\/div>\n

DAY ONE<\/strong><\/p>\n

I sit at the long blond pine table I use for a desk. Nothing happens. Maybe I can make something happen.<\/p>\n

A few years ago there was a popular self-help book called How To Make Sh*t Happen<\/em>, never mind that peristalsis is involuntary. I eat some mango slices and a green apple and a banana. I drink twelve ounces of whole milk with a scoop of whey protein. I find a leftover fried artichoke in the fridge, wrapped in aluminum foil.<\/p>\n

I listen to Michael Gielen conducting Anton Bruckner\u2019s Seventh Symphony, but it\u2019s not loud enough.<\/p>\n

“Have you seen the ghost of John?” we used to sing at my elementary school. “Long thin bones with the skin all gone. Wouldn\u2019t it be chilly with no skin on?” It would be red. My inner life is none of my business.<\/p>\n

Now I\u2019m listening to Otto Klemperer conducting Bruckner’s Seventh, turned up loud enough that it’s antisocial.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

In the beginning was the plan, and my plan for this culture diary was seven days of Bruckner\u2019s Seventh Symphony.<\/p>\n

Seven different conductors: B\u00f6hm, Klemperer, Gielen, Sanderling, Haitink, Barenboim, and Celibidache.<\/p>\n

Seven friends: Barry, Andy, James, Hank, Michael, Billy, and Mark, all of them Bruckner hounds.<\/p>\n

\u201cSeven, Seven, \/ Seven is my name,\u201d as Glenn Danzig howled when I was in high school in Kentucky. But the plan failed, as plans do. I thought it might.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

My first full-time job was on an assembly line. We made furniture-moving pads: quilted them, sewed their edges shut, pressed them flat and packed them in clear plastic bags, and loaded tractor trailers full of the bags. One day the kid at the next machine asked if he could listen to the cassette I had in my Walkman. He pressed Play and he made a face. \u201cWhat is this?\u201d he said. \u201cClassical music, like Beethoven or some shit?\u201d<\/p>\n

The job paid minimum wage, and it wasn\u2019t safe. One day my machine jammed and kicked and spat needle fragments at me that cut my face near my right eye. But I liked throwing the bags into the trailers. It made me feel strong. At lunch I could walk across the train tracks to Xpressway Liquors\u2014which was run by flinty, mulleted twins who kept a pair of bratty cockatoos in big cages in the store\u2014and buy a box of fried chicken livers and be back at my machine on time.<\/p>\n

Now I am listening to Bruckner or some shit, highfalutin as can be, drinking a cold beer on a summer day, thinking of all the decent people who loved me, encouraged me, taught me, helped me, and were patient with me, who wished the best for me, who wanted or even demanded that I leave my family behind and become someone completely different from my father, who was my hero\u2014all those well-meaning people who insisted that I would enjoy being a class traitor in the air-conditioning, educated beyond my station.<\/p>\n

But I remember Eden. Eden was green and it was called Fern Creek, south on Bardstown Road until the super-Kroger parking lot before you run into I-265\/KY-841, the Gene Snyder Freeway.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

My interest in Bruckner\u2019s symphonies comes from the scroungiest source possible, a 1969 science fiction novel by Colin Wilson called The Philosopher\u2019s Stone<\/em>:<\/p>\n

I came across Furtw\u00e4ngler\u2019s remark that Bruckner was a descendant of the great German mystics, and that the aim of his symphonies had been to \u2018make the supernatural real\u2019 \u2026 I put on Furtw\u00e4ngler\u2019s recording of the Seventh Symphony, and immediately understood that this was true. This music was slow, deliberate, because it was an attempt to escape the nature of music\u2014which, after all, is dramatic; that is to say, it has the nature of a story \u2026 Bruckner, according to Furtw\u00e4ngler, wanted to suspend the mind\u2019s normal expectation of development, to say something that could only be expressed if the mind fell into a slower rhythm.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The book\u2019s hero develops supernatural powers of focus and attention, beginning by listening to Furtw\u00e4ngler conduct Bruckner\u2019s long symphonies. He uses his insight to rip the veil, to see through the mask, to penetrate our world\u2019s inner life. Wilson wrote the story on a bet, having mocked H. P. Lovecraft until August Derleth, executor of Lovecraft\u2019s estate, dared Wilson to produce something superior.<\/p>\n

Most of us know how a Lovecraft-style story goes. A terrifying secret exists. The secret is a secret by virtue of its being unnameable. Are words adequate to the task? This permanent secret can be called God, and God, an unknowable creator-origin, is generative to the point of being unsanitary and self-contradictory, perceptible only as a flickering, disjunct, climactic-orgasmic list of characteristics. The cost of a revelation of God is a shattering insanity and a need to escape from life, whether into institutionalization or through death, but in any case to no longer exist in an unmasked world. A Lovecraft story is the discovery of an insight that brings only unhappiness and terror.<\/p>\n

All this to say that twenty-five years ago, I set out to develop my own powers of insight by listening to Bruckner symphonies. Dumb.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

I can\u2019t stand the stench of this orchestra any more. I call Jean at Guitar Stop, and we special order the Gretsch G5700 Electromatic lap steel I\u2019ve had my eye on since May.<\/p>\n

I listen to The Economist<\/em>\u2019s podcast on how to prevent a war between the United States and China, as if anyone, anywhere, knows how to do that. It\u2019s like Daron Acemoglu\u2019s book Why Nations Fail.<\/em> I read it. But did I learn why nations fail?<\/p>\n

I give up on Kultur for the day and listen to James Burton and Ralph Mooney\u2019s Corn Pickin\u2019 and Slick Slidin\u2019<\/em>, Sonny Clark\u2019s Leapin\u2019 and Lopin\u2019 <\/em>with Billy Higgins on drums, <\/em>and the Jesus Lizard: \u201cWhy don\u2019t you set up a camera to record your own death, dear?\u201d Maybe I will.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

DAY TWO<\/strong><\/p>\n

No culture consumed today. Closed until further notice.<\/p>\n

To-do lists are bogus. What you want is a to-don\u2019t list. The most important part is knowing what to leave out.<\/p>\n

Socrates, in the marketplace, said: How many things exist that I do not desire.<\/p>\n

A quick look back at my summer reading. The Financial Times<\/em>, The<\/em> Economist<\/em>, Kim Stanley Robinson\u2019s The <\/em>High Sierra: A Love Story<\/em>, Stephen R. Donaldson\u2019s five-volume Gap<\/em> series, Scott Jurek\u2019s Eat and Run<\/em>, David C. Lees and Alberto Zilli\u2019s Moths<\/em>, the London Review of Books<\/em>, The New Yorker<\/em>, Harper\u2019s<\/em>, the Times Literary Supplement<\/em>, Michio Kaku\u2019s The God Equation<\/em>, Francesca Stavrakopoulou\u2019s God: An Anatomy<\/em>, Meghan O\u2019Gieblyn\u2019s God Human Animal Machine<\/em>, Jack Miles\u2019s God: A Biography<\/em>, John Scalzi\u2019s The <\/em>Kaiju Preservation Society<\/em>, Martha Wells\u2019s All Systems Red<\/em>, and Nicole Kornher-Stace\u2019s Firebreak.<\/em><\/p>\n

It\u2019s too much. Closed systems starve, open systems drown. That\u2019s why you feel like you\u2019re drowning, Johnny: because you are. I need more nothing in my life.<\/p>\n

Mary Gaitskill reports<\/a> a conversation with George Saunders: \u201cWho looks out the window and thinks about trees? Only people in books do that.\u201d More proof, if more proof were needed, that I am a person in a book.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

DAY THREE<\/strong><\/p>\n

Coleman Hawkins on WHRB 95.3 FM\u2019s The Jazz Spectrum<\/em>.<\/p>\n

If the most important part is knowing what to leave out, then what now? What next? What is culture<\/em>? What is a diary<\/em>?<\/p>\n

That sounds kind of familiar. I consult my Paris Review <\/em>culture diary of August 2010<\/a>. Day three: \u201cI am always inquiring into origins\u2014what is culture, what is a diary\u2014why not just make a mess of things. Stop preparing and act.\u201d<\/p>\n

I can\u2019t stop sweating. I turn on Daniel Barenboim conducting Bruckner no. 7. It has a majesty that Sanderling and Klemperer\u2019s interpretations lack. Often they seem merely dutiful, but maybe they are subtle and restrained where Barenboim is obvious or overemphatic. I\u2019m no connoisseur\u2014I can\u2019t even spell that word. But we can\u2019t quite call Barenboim bombastic, because no force of expression could be too great for Bruckner\u2019s ideas. After all, his Ninth Symphony is dedicated \u201cto my dear God, if He accepts it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shut up about God. Shut up about God!<\/p>\n

The problem is that religious devotion, as a habit of mind, is portable and nonspecific.<\/p>\n

Jay Nordlinger writes that Bruckner was \u201ca very, very religious man \u2026 When he heard church bells ring, he would drop to his knees, even if he was teaching a class.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Bruckner also \u201cworshiped Wagner, and I do not intend much of an exaggeration: On his knees, he once said to the older composer, \u2018Master, I worship you.\u2019 \u201d<\/p>\n

Bruckner had a habit of worship. And he didn\u2019t pay much mind to whatever happened to be on the altar.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

DAY FOUR<\/strong><\/p>\n

Barry\u2019s in New Jersey, Andy\u2019s in Vermont, James is in Quebec, Mark\u2019s in California, Michael\u2019s in Ohio, Hank is in Qatar.<\/p>\n

Now Bernard Haitink conducts no. 7. This version is James\u2019s favorite. \u201cVery crisp brass,\u201d he texts me, and it\u2019s true that the articulation of many phrases is sharp, clipped, even bitten off. Many performances of these symphonies evoke the ocean, with a constant danger of blissed-out gloppiness. But Haitink is architectural, orthogonal, even gawky in moments. I like the sharp edges. Like Tyrone Power in The Mark of Zorro<\/em>, sometimes I need a scratch to awaken me.<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

When I ask Barry for his favorite conductor of no. 7, instead he tells me the one he likes least: Sergiu Celibidache. \u201cMade a career of excruciatingly slow performances \u2026 Almost parodically attenuated.\u201d<\/p>\n

As for slow, yes, the performance takes 33 percent longer than any version I\u2019ve heard. But I wouldn\u2019t call it excruciating. That\u2019s not what pain means to me.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

DAY FIVE<\/strong><\/p>\n

Long blank summer days. The silence between the notes is the most important part of the music.<\/p>\n

When my friend S. got killed, I helped his sister clean out his house. It was full. Full of \u201cart,\u201d sure, whatever, but mostly just packed full, tumorized, slam-crammed. Hard to breathe in there. Horror vacui. <\/em><\/p>\n

Opposing view: Douglas Coupland said, \u201cI hoard space.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now Sanderling conducts no. 7. It really is a lot of Bruckner. Tell me what you hear, I will tell you who you are.<\/p>\n

That\u2019s enough Bruckner for the day. Instead, Paul Humphrey drumming with Zappa on \u201cThe Gumbo Variations,\u201d and a video that always makes me feel happy: Dan Weiss\u2019s \u201cDrumset\/Speech pairing\u201d of Big Pun\u2019s \u201cTwinz.\u201d<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

DAY SIX<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cEven as Thou, Eternal Spirit, hast seen me, so have I laid bare my soul\u201d: thus Rousseau.<\/p>\n

In 2018, Stig Abell compared me to Jean-Jacques Rousseau in the Times Literary Supplement<\/em>. \u201cRousseau certainly did not invent the literary confession (one would not wish to snub St Augustine in any credit-giving stakes), but he did establish a new tone of honesty and chaotic inclusivity \u2026 Daniels is a worthy descendant, then, of Rousseau himself.\u201d Abell did not mean it as a compliment, but I have rarely received a more flattering insult.<\/p>\n

My playlist laid bare. The CD player and record player don\u2019t keep score. What are the last hundred-odd tracks I listened to on this laptop?<\/p>\n

Bruckner, Miff Mole, Jay-Z, more Bruckner, Glass Animals, Kodak Black, Kanye, Zappa, Richter playing Beethoven\u2019s Diabelli Variations, Guitar Slim, Gary Burton, Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats, Ron Jarzombek, Lloyd Green and Jay Dee Maness, Waylon Jennings, Clarence White, Traditional Fiddle Music of Kentucky<\/em>, Turnstile, AC\/DC, Anthrax, Kvelertak, more AC\/DC, Ogdon playing Scriabin, Mastodon, Pantera, Twin Temple, Haydn\u2019s String Quartet no. 63, still more AC\/DC, Rob Zombie, the Jesus Lizard, Eric B. & Rakim, Lil Wayne, John Coltrane with Red Garland, Nicki Minaj, Kate Bush, Rich Homie Quan, UGK, Stan Getz, Kid Ory, Artie Shaw, Theo Hill, Wayne Shorter, Jay McShann, Thelonious Monk, still more Bruckner, more Jesus Lizard, more Waylon, Merle Haggard, Bach, the Flying Burrito Brothers, New Riders of the Purple Sage, John Scofield, Jack Teagarden, Lee Morgan, Charlie Parker, Superwolf<\/em>, more Scofield, Steve Reich, and even more Bruckner.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

DAY SEVEN<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is the end.<\/p>\n

I haven\u2019t developed new Brucknerian powers of insight. I feel as smashed and scatterational as I ever did. But maybe that is the insight. Maybe it is an accurate instrument reading. Or maybe I didn\u2019t give Wilson\u2019s method a fair shot. After all, I haven\u2019t listened to a Furtw\u00e4ngler version.<\/p>\n

\u201cLet me put this in the clearest way possible,\u201d Wilson writes on the last page of The Philosopher\u2019s Stone.<\/em> \u201cMan should possess an infinite appetite for life. It should be self-evident to him, all the time, that life is superb, glorious, endlessly rich, infinitely desirable.\u201d<\/p>\n

A happy beginning, in other words, and a happy middle, and a happy ending. Once upon a time, nothing happened.<\/p>\n

But never mind all that now. Furtw\u00e4ngler is conducting the adagio to Bruckner no. 7. I hear the secret. I burst into flames.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

J. D. Daniels is the winner of a 2016 Whiting Award and\u00a0the<\/em> Paris Review\u2019s<\/em>\u00a02013 Terry Southern Prize. His collection\u00a0<\/em>The Correspondence\u00a0was published in 2017.\u00a0His writing has appeared in<\/em>\u00a0The Paris Review,<\/em>\u00a0Esquire,<\/em> n+1,<\/em> Oxford American,<\/em>\u00a0The Los Angeles Review of Books,\u00a0and elsewhere, including<\/em>\u00a0The Best American Essays\u00a0and\u00a0The Best American Travel Writing<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cNo culture consumed today. Closed until further notice.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":12,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[68500],"tags":[68519,336,1616,24378,67827,46,4675],"class_list":["post-161391","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-culture-diaries","tag-bruckner","tag-classical-music","tag-culture-diaries","tag-end-of-summer","tag-featured","tag-music","tag-the-economist"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nSeven, Seven, Seven: A Week in Cambridge, Massachusetts by J. D. Daniels<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"September 1, 2022 \u2013 \u201cNo culture consumed today. 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