Books like The Book of Embraces

CORONAVIRUS UPDATE - In light of our current crisis, many embraces are needed. Of course, as we all recognize, social distancing prevents our physical embraces but now is the time for a mental embrace of our entire human family. Eduardo Galeano of Uruguay (1940-2015) is one of the finest of the Latin American writers. If you would like to add a healthy dose of inspiration and magic in your life, pick up The Book of Embraces, a collection of over 200 poetic memoirs/stories/happenings complete with the author's fanciful montage images covering a range of topics: art, dreams, the human voice, names, Indians, television, the culture of terror, to name several. To share a taste of this literary fiesta, here are my brief comments coupled with the author’s quotes.THE FUNCTION OF ART“Diego had never seen the sea. His father took him to discover it. . . . And so immense was the sea and its sparkle that the child was struck dumb by the beauty of it. And when he finally managed to speak, trembling, stuttering, he asked his father: “Help me to see!”” --------- As in nature, so in art. As a young boy growing up in the country I was infatuated with the drawings I saw in books of knights in armor. My parents brought me to the Metropolitan Museum in New York City where I walked into a room with an entire exhibit of knights in armor on horses surrounded by colorful banners. I was likewise struck dumb. GRAPES AND WINE“On his deathbed, a man of the vineyards spoke into Marcela’s ear. Before dying, he revealed his secret: “The grape,” he whispered, “is made of wine.” Marcela Perez-Silva told me this, and I thought: If the grape is made of wine, then perhaps we are the words that tell who we are.” ---------- Bulls-eye, Eduardo. The notion that humans are rational animals is sheer poppycock. I’m rarely rational and usually not in my best moments. We humans are word-symbol-language making animals.THE FUNCTION OF A READER“When Lucia Palaez was very small, she read a novel under the covers. She read it in fragments, night after night, hiding it under the pillow. She had stolen it from the cedar bookshelf where her uncle kept his favorite books. . . . Lucia has never read that book again. She would no longer recognize it. It has grown so much inside her that now it is something else: now it is hers. ---------- I recently read where a young man insisted an attractive young lady date him. The mademoiselle asked him, in turn: What book are you from? ----- Ha! I can’t imagine a more telling question. You are what you read. A DEFINITION OF ARTEdwardo Galeano tells us of Portinari, a well-known artist in Brazil who was pressed by the communist government to give a definition of art. “I don’t know,” said Portinari. And then: “All I know is this: art is art, or it’s shit.”” ---------- After giving our time and energy to viewing much art, there comes a point where we have a very good sense of what is genuine and what is not, a point where we can trust our eyes. This reminds me of the Supreme Court Justice who said he couldn’t define hard-core pornography but knows it when he sees it. CELEBRATION OF FANTASYGaleano tells of his visit to Cuzco, Peru when a small boys crowded round him and started shouting. He writes, “Then, in the middle of this racket, a little waif who barely cleared a yard off the ground showed me a watch drawn in black ink on his wrist. “An uncle of mine who lives in Lima sent it to me,” he said. “And does it keep good time?” I asked him. “It’s a bit slow,” he admitted.” ---------- Thanks for playing the game of imagination and fantasy with a child, Eduardo! Nearly all of us have a childhood story of our artwork or creativity being putdown by a teacher, parent or other adult. Yet, when as children we conformed to established regimentation we were never putdown; quite the contrary, we were praised. HUNGER“A system of isolation: Look out for number one. Your neighbor is neither your brother nor your lover. Your neighbor is a competitor, an enemy, an obstacle to clear or an object to use. The system feeds neither the body nor the heart: many are condemned to starve for lack of bread and many more for lack of embraces. ---------- For a number of years I was part of an improvisational dance group where a few dozen dancers, mostly strangers to one another, would arrive at a designated dance space on Friday nights and dance wildly, joyfully for hours, punctuated by many tender embraces. After one session someone asked me how we can actually get away with all this on Friday nights. Sorry to say, the filmmakers who make ultra-violent movies never have to ask how they can get away with making such films. TELEVISION“Television, that final light that saves you from loneliness and from the night, is reality. Because life is a show, the system promises those who behave themselves a comfortable seat.” ---------- When I was a boy growing up in a small house the television was always on at high volume, morning, noon and night. My only escape was going off to college -- my first taste of what in India is termed moksha, that is, release from the world of ordinary experience. It’s been nearly five decades since my escape and in all those years I’ve never watched another television show.