Category Archives: Reading Uncertainly

Reading Uncertainly? On the Subject of Luck by Patrick O’Brian

Posted on by
Reply

Editor’s Note: We are thrilled that our longtime book reviewer Felix Kloman, who ceased writing for us after he moved away from Lyme, has sent in a guest review for us that we are delighted to publish today.

Patrick O’Brian 1914-2000

In 2016, I humbly suggested reading of the 21 early 18th century seafaring novels of Patrick O’Brian, beginning with his first, Master and Commander. I admit to being mesmerized by them, having read all of them now six times over the past 30 years. So, in 2023, as I start my seventh, I’ll try again!

To stimulate interest, here are three excerpts on the subject of luck, a quality that affects each and every one of us.

From “The Ionian Mission, W. W. Norton, New York 1992

“It was not chance, commonplace good fortune, far from it, but a different concept altogether, one of an almost religious nature, like the favor of some god or even in extreme cases like possession; and if it came in too hearty it might prove fatal—too fiery an embrace entirely. In any event it had to be treated with great respect, rarely named, referred to by allusion or alias, never explained. There was no clear necessary connection with moral worth nor with beauty bit its possessors were generally well-liked and tolerably good-looking: and it was often seen to go with a particular kind of happiness..”

 From The Reverse of the Medal, Wm. Collins, London, 1986

“It was a question of the man’s luck, a quality or rather an influence that sometimes set all one way, for good or bad, and sometimes shifted like a tide, but a tide whose ebb and flow obeyed laws that no ordinary men could see. . . . There were varying creeds and some important difference of detailed belief, but broadly speaking luck and unluck were held to have little or nothing to do with virtue or vice, amiability or its reverse. Luck was not a matter of desserts. It was a free gift, like beauty in a very young woman, independent of the person it adorned; though just as beauty could be spoilt by frizzed hair and the like so ill-luck could certainly be provoked by given forms of conduct such as wanton pride, boasting of success, or an impious disregard for custom.”

From The Letter of Marque, Wm. Collins, London 1985

“It seems to me that you have to treat destiny or fortune or whatever is the right word with respect. A man must not bounce or presume, but he must not despair neither, for that is ill-bred . . . .”

Do these words entice interest? I hope so!

Editor’s Note: This is the opinion of Felix Kloman.

Felix Kloman

About the Author: Felix Kloman is a sailor, rower, husband, father, grandfather, retired management consultant and, above all, a curious reader and writer. He’s explored how we as human beings and organizations respond to ever-present uncertainty in two books, ‘Mumpsimus Revisited’ (2005) and ‘The Fantods of Risk’ (2008). A 20-year former resident of Lyme, Conn., he now lives in Peabody, Mass. He writes book reviews, mostly of non-fiction, a subject which explores our minds, our behavior, our politics and our history, but he does throw in a novel here and there. For more than 50 years, he’s put together the 17 syllables that comprise haiku, the traditional Japanese poetry, and served faithfully as the self-appointed “poet laureate” of Ashlawn Farm Coffee. His late wife, Ann, was also a writer, but of mystery novels, all of which begin in a village in midcoast Maine, strangely reminiscent of the town she and her husband visited every summer.

Reading Uncertainly? ‘Troubles’ by J. G. Farrell is a “Compelling Read”

Posted on by
Reply

When a world is collapsing all about us, how much are we willing to recognize?

J. G. Farrell’s description of a veteran of the World War I trenches going to Ireland to rejoin a young lady he had met only once in London during the War is an allegory on human inertia and lethargy in the face of rapid change.

In 1919, Major Brendan Archer travels from London to Kilnalough, Ireland, thinking to ask Angela Spencer to join him in marriage, even though he could not remember ever asking her outright to do so. He finds an elusive young lady and a scene of inertia and decay.

Ireland has entered the “Troubles” with Sinn Fein pushing for complete separation from the British Empire. And that Empire is collapsing just as the Majestic Hotel, owned and operated by Angela’s father, Edward, the scene of the entire novel, is doing the same.

Farrell gives us the Hotel dominated by “dust.” Every page describes dust, “mould”, gloom, creepers, grime, cobwebs, collapsing floors, “man-eating” plants, and an ever-expanding entourage of reproducing cats. One room featured “an enormous greyish-white sweater that lay in one corner like a dead sheep.”

The weather wasn’t any better: “it rained all that July,” and the hotel residents complained of the coming  “dreadful gauntlet of December, January, February.” Both the hotel and Ireland exuded “an atmosphere of change, insecurity and decay.” But the residents continued to follow life’s rituals: prayers at breakfast, afternoon teas, dressing for dinner, and whist in the evening.

Add to this mordant scene the author’s interjection of gloomy news reports from around the world: White Russians and English military supporters being trounced in Russia, victorious Boers in South Africa, a mess in Mesopotamia and Egypt, rebellion in Poland, and, finally, the Indians attempting to remove themselves from British rule.

In the face of all this, the hotel’s owner and operator, Edward Spencer aggravates the Major: “ … his overbearing manner; the way he always insisted on being right, flatly stating his opinions in a loud and abusive tone without paying any attention to what the other fellow was saying.”

Does this also describe the Brits in other sections of the world?

The Major remains always a drifter “with the tide of events,” never able to respond, dominated, it seems, by “the country’s vast and narcotic inertia.”

This is a story of the collapse of a hotel, descending at last into ashes, and an allusion to the similar collapse of the British Empire, with the Second World War being its enormous fire. It is a compelling read, one that suggests some connections to the events of the second decade of the 21st century …

Editor’s Note: ‘Troubles’ by J. G. Farrell is published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson, London in 1970.

Felix Kloman

About the Author: Felix Kloman is a sailor, rower, husband, father, grandfather, retired management consultant and, above all, a curious reader and writer. He’s explored how we as human beings and organizations respond to ever-present uncertainty in two books, ‘Mumpsimus Revisited’ (2005) and ‘The Fantods of Risk’ (2008). A 20-year former resident of Lyme, Conn., he now lives in Peabody, Mass. He writes book reviews, mostly of non-fiction, a subject which explores our minds, our behavior, our politics and our history, but he does throw in a novel here and there. For more than 50 years, he’s put together the 17 syllables that comprise haiku, the traditional Japanese poetry, and served faithfully as the self-appointed “poet laureate” of Ashlawn Farm Coffee. His late wife, Ann, was also a writer, but of mystery novels, all of which begin in a village in midcoast Maine, strangely reminiscent of the town she and her husband visited every summer.

Reading Uncertainly? ‘Seven Brief Lessons on Physics’ by Carlo Rovelli

Posted on by
Reply

Is it really possible to describe the mysteries of physics in 81 pages?

Richard Feynman tried it in the 140 pages of Six Easy Pieces, published in 1994, but some afterwards described it as “Six Difficult Pieces.” Carlo Rovelli, the Italian theoretical physicist, has raised the ante. His work is a jewel of both brevity and clarity, especially to my curious mind that barely made it through Physics I at college.

The seven lessons begin with Einstein and the Theory of Relativity. Much has been written and expressed about this work, but Rovelli’s 11 pages are a precise summary. And he reminds us that, like Einstein, we “… don’t get anywhere by not ‘wasting’ time.”

That reminds me of the 1957 lesson offered by Robert Paul Smith’s famous Where Did You Go? Out. What Did You Do? Nothing:” exploration and curiosity are essential to progress.

Rovelli then discusses quantum mechanics and the questions of Bohr, Planck, and Heisenberg, all summarized by the phrase “And to the very last, doubt.” And uncertainty.

From the “microcosm of elementary particles” he then moves to the cosmos, the “macrocosmic structure of the universe.” Our Sun is an, “… infinitesimal speck in a vast cloud of one hundred billion stars – our Galaxy” and our Galaxy is, “… itself a speck of dust in a huge cloud of galaxies.”

Back then to the smallest particles, including the unseen but acknowledged varieties of quarks and the confirmation of the Higgs boson.

Then Rovelli moves to the “swarming cloud of probability: quantum gravity. He acknowledges that we know more now than we did 50 years ago, “so we should be quite satisfied. But we are not.” Forever the curious species, our “ … science becomes even more beautiful – incandescent in the forge of nascent ideas, of intuitions, of attempts. Of roads taken and then abandoned, of enthusiasms. In the effort to imagine what has not yet been imagined.”

The seventh lesson concerns Black Holes. We live, we think, in a world of “sheer chance,” in which “probability is the heart of physics … I may not know something with certainty, but I can assign a lesser or greater degree of probability to something.”

And Black Swans, too? How many “dimensions” really exist?

Dr. Rovelli wraps up this engaging and challenging set of lessons with – what else? – more questions. “What are we?” and should not we be aware, “… that we can always be wrong, and therefore ready at any moment to change direction if a new track appears?”

“To be free doesn’t mean that our behavior is not determined by the laws of nature. It means that it is determined by the laws of nature acting in our brains.”

“We live in “inextricable complexity,” and this means, “… we are a species that is naturally moved by curiosity … ”

Rovelli’s brief synopsis of what we think we know about the physical world and universe challenges us to renew our study and our search.

That conclusion reinforces the haiku I wrote for myself many years ago (with apologies to Robert Frost):

Pause for a moment:
Doubt, then curiosity,
Try another path.

Editor’s Note:  ‘Seven Brief Lessons on Physics’ by Carlo Rovelli was published by Riverhead Books, New York in 2016.

Reading Uncertainly: ‘Beyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel’ by Carl Safina

Posted on by
Reply

What are they thinking?

Do we deliberately misunderstand other animals?

And what is the result of this “miscomprehended relationship”?

Carl Safina, a professor at Stony Brook University in New York and a most curious student of other species, writes a thoroughly loquacious and engaging view of some other sentient creatures whose consciousness may well equal or exceed our own. Arguing that “ . . . humans are not the measure of all things” (as much as we might like us to be), he relates his exhaustive studies of elephants, wolves, dolphins, orcas (killer whales), and his own two dogs, in a global travelogue from Africa to Wyoming, to the Pacific Northwest and to Long Island.

His mantra: “the greatest realization is that all life is one.”

Professor Safina begins with those remarkable creatures, the elephants: “the skin moving like swishing corduroy, textured and rough, but sensitive to the slightest touch. The grind of their cobblestone molars as, sheaf by sheaf and mouthful by mouthful, they acquire the world . . . . Bizarre protruding teeth the size of human legs astride the world’s most phallic nose.”

He acknowledges their consciousness as well as their broad hearing: “elephant song spans ten octaves,” far more than we can hear. And yet theirs is a profile of a species going extinct. Since Roman times, we (the human species) have reduced elephant density by 99 percent. From 10 million in the early 1900s, we count less than 400,000 today.

Note that elephant society is female-dominated. They are empathic to each other. Is there a moral there?

He contrasts their behavior with ours: “self-destructive behavior, for instance, seems distinctly human.” Is male-domination a possible cause? He adds, “modernity’s self-imposed exile from the world seems to have degraded an older human ability to recognize the minds of other animals.” Safina goes on to explore the habits, minds and consciousness of wolves, dogs, and, finally, dolphins and orcas (also known as killer whales).

But inevitably his thoughts turn to us, homo sapiens. We engulf this globe, “ . . . the perfect storm of rising human densities . . . .” and “ . . . most animals of the world are awash in a rising sea of Us.” Pogo had it right!

He concludes: “I don’t mean to imply that I value the life of a fish or a bird the same way I value a human life, but their presence in the world has as much validity as does our presence. Perhaps more: they were here first; they are foundational to us . . . . They enliven the world, and beautifully.”

And then: “If cruelty and destructiveness are bad, humans are by a wide margin the worst species ever to infest this planet. If compassion and creativity are good, humans are by a wide margin the finest. But we are neither simply good nor bad; we are all these things together, and imperfectly so. The question for all is: which way is our balance tending?”

So the professor comes to his conclusion: “Me, I am most skeptical of those things I’d like most to believe, precisely because I’d like to believe them. Wanting to believe something can skews one’s view.”

His final words: “I just don’t know.”

Beyond Words is a challenging and testing read.

Editor’s Note: ‘Beyond Words: What Animals Think and Feel’ by Carl Safina is published by Henry Holt & Co., New York 2015.

Felix Kloman

About the Author: Felix Kloman is a sailor, rower, husband, father, grandfather, retired management consultant and, above all, a curious reader and writer. He’s explored how we as human beings and organizations respond to ever-present uncertainty in two books, ‘Mumpsimus Revisited’ (2005) and ‘The Fantods of Risk’ (2008). A 20-year former resident of Lyme, Conn., he now lives in Peabody, Mass. He writes book reviews, mostly of non-fiction, a subject which explores our minds, our behavior, our politics and our history, but he does throw in a novel here and there. For more than 50 years, he’s put together the 17 syllables that comprise haiku, the traditional Japanese poetry, and served faithfully as the self-appointed “poet laureate” of Ashlawn Farm Coffee. His late wife, Ann, was also a writer, but of mystery novels, all of which begin in a village in midcoast Maine, strangely reminiscent of the town she and her husband visited every summer.

Reading Uncertainly: ‘Table of Contents’ by John McPhee

Posted on by
Reply

‘Bear’ with me: this review is the result of strange circumstances.

In mid-April I received an email from some Lyme neighbors, announcing a new resident with a photograph – a black bear strolling unceremoniously along Ely’s Ferry Road. As it happened, I had just started a re-read of one of my favorite authors, John McPhee, and his 1985 series of essays.

The very first two described the growing advent of black bears into eastern Pennsylvania and northern New Jersey, and the second the efforts of a New Jersey biologist and bear-trapper, Patricia McConnell, at work in her home state.

Black bears are curious, vegetarian, nocturnal creatures, as interested in human beings as we are instinctively afraid of them. What I learned in McPhee’s essays made me wish I was still living in Lyme!

But black bears are also cavorting up here in Massachusetts — my physical therapist reported one in her family’s back yard just a few days ago. How interconnected we are!

McPhee’s essays continue with a lengthy dissertation on the growing interest in doctors becoming “General Practitioners” (GP’s), as he relates their efforts, travails, and joys in the northern extremes of the State of Maine. He extols the “omniscient, ubiquitous” GP as a real aberration in the growing specialization of taking care of us fragile human beings.

He determines that the greatest skill of the GP is a willingness to sit and listen to our stories of our ills and ourselves. How many docs these days really sit and listen?

McPhee then moves quickly to a story of following ex-Senator Bill Bradley in a campaign stroll along seaside towns on the Jersey Shore. In it he displays his unique capability of describing what each person is wearing, from hat to shoes, as well as distinctive facial expressions. “He wears a blue-and-white striped shirt with a button-down collar. His tie is brown and has small New Jerseys all over it like sea horses.” It is a perfect, yet brief, follow-up to his best-seller, A Sense of Where You Are”.

Another essay relates the growth of “mini-hydros”, the resurrection of eroded old dams, their waterways and ancient turbines to take advantage of new legislation requiring power companies to buy small bits of electricity produced by these revived facilities. Again, curious and ambitious entrepreneurs willing to take a chance. And risk their modest funds.

And finally, the author’s last essay describes his meeting, and working with a Northern Maine bush pilot, named, of all things, John McPhee (better known as Jack.)

As the author explains, “ There is a lot of identification, even transformation, in the work I do – moving along from place to place, person to person, as a reporter, a writer, repeatedly trying to sense another existence and in some ways to share it.” What an extraordinary thing to meet a State of Maine Bush Pilot with your name!

If you’ve seen a black bear recently, do read John McPhee. With the continuing chaos in the daily news, reading this author is a distinct relief.

Editor’s Note: ‘Table of Contents’ by John McPhee was published 1985 by Farrar, Straus & Giroux, New York. 

Felix Kloman

About the Author: Felix Kloman is a sailor, rower, husband, father, grandfather, retired management consultant and, above all, a curious reader and writer. He’s explored how we as human beings and organizations respond to ever-present uncertainty in two books, ‘Mumpsimus Revisited’ (2005) and ‘The Fantods of Risk’ (2008). A 20-year former resident of Lyme, Conn., he now lives in Peabody, Mass. He writes book reviews, mostly of non-fiction, a subject which explores our minds, our behavior, our politics and our history, but he does throw in a novel here and there. For more than 50 years, he’s put together the 17 syllables that comprise haiku, the traditional Japanese poetry, and served faithfully as the self-appointed “poet laureate” of Ashlawn Farm Coffee. His late wife, Ann, was also a writer, but of mystery novels, all of which begin in a village in midcoast Maine, strangely reminiscent of the town she and her husband visited every summer.