Cicero, “Disenchantment”, Anthony Grafton; tempora cum causis (1)

Ancient. De Senectute 24-25 is one of my favourite passages of Cicero (here’s the Loeb): 

nemo enim est tam senex qui se annum non putet posse uiuere; sed idem in eis elaborant, quae sciunt nihil ad se omnino pertinere: serit arbores, quae alteri saeclo prosint, [25] ut ait Statius noster in Synephebis. nec uero dubitat agricola, quamuis sit senex, quaerenti cui serat respondere: dis immortalibus, qui me non accipere modo haec a maioribus uoluerunt, sed etiam posteris prodere.

“No one is so old as to think that he cannot live one more year—yet these same men labour at things which they know will not profit them in the least. ‘He plants the trees to serve another age,’ as our Caecilius Statius says in his Young Comrades. And if you ask a farmer, however old, for whom he is planting, he will unhesitatingly reply: for the immortal gods, who have willed not only that I should receive these blessings from my ancestors, but also that I should hand them on to posterity.”

Not just because the passage contains a lovely and proverbial fragment of the 2nd century BCE comic playwright, Caecilius Statius. I want to hold on to this idea that what we do here during our lifetime will not only be for ourselves. And I like the idea that preserving and building resources for people yet to come can be something we value and take pride in. 

Modern. For the last year or so I’ve been listening to the Talking Simpsons podcast network with Bob Mackey and Henry Gilbert. This week they discussed the new episodes of Disenchantment that dropped on Netflix. I’ve been enjoying this show a lot. Futurama is one of my all time favourites, and it’s exciting to me to feel like I’m observing another potential Futurama happen right before my eyes. Bob and Henry discuss an interesting problem, though, which is this: if you watched the Simpsons as it aired in the 90s, you probably saw some episodes a number of times in reruns (or by choice). I had a box set with seasons 1-4 of Futurama that I rewatched a lot when I was young, way before streaming media. But now the same creators of the Simpsons are making a show which most people will watch in more or less one sitting (or, say, over a weekend). And you might not rewatch it, given that there is such an overabundance of content right now. It’s interesting to think about: you’re a seasoned tv writer for one of the most famous and long lasting franchises of the modern era, and you have a certain way of doing things. But tv is now consumed in a profoundly different way. Trained by this institution, this creative machine, you now face an audience with different expectations. There is enormous competition for the attention space, and there is no guarantee of securing a captive audience via the power of syndication or otherwise. Watching and rewatching, reading and rereading — this is something that is built in to our experience of culture, especially the things we really love. Our favourite book. Our favourite film. I have basically been listening to the same music since about 2007. Recursiveness is part of cultural work. But we might not return to Disenchantment much. (Btw I do enjoy this new role for Abbi Jacobson, and all The Mighty Boosh alumni are *chef’s kiss*) 

Internet. 

• Lucy Knisley on love and loss.
• David Shrigley’s faculty meeting. 
• New wall paintings from Pompeii. 

Excerpt. Anthony Grafton 1997: 124: “In the modern world, fragments and revolutions have gone together. From 1789 to 1989, the politics of the street have always involved iconoclasm. Symbols of previous authorities have been smashed, the colossal heads of dictators separated from their even more outsized torsos, stately lines of busts and statues transformed into politically charged rubble. Tsar and Stalin in turn become Ozymandias.” 

Daily life. Speaking of trees, Max found one which is without a doubt a portal to another dimension.