The City

In the middle of looking for and frustratingly not finding this week's issue of The Times Literary Supplement, at the local outlet of that big name bookstore, I stumbled upon another small miracle: Lapham's Quarterly, of which I never heard, and its current issue titled, "The City."

The urban environment is my native space; the distant sound of the city in the middle of the night; the yellow leaves on the trees in the park; the people walking busily, to and from their business, midmorning; the smell and cheerfulness of squares filled by the yearly Christmas market, with people lingering midday over mulled wine, home-made sweets or dried fish.

What makes a city? What does a city need? In which of its elements does it really subsist? Minneapolis is not a city, Baltimore is not a city (or large parts of it are not) - not anymore. Philadelphia is suffering; its downtown gave me the painful sensation of something wasted, something missed, something that was beautiful but is now unsafe, impersonal; a lost opportunity. (Its two-way boulevard leading from downtown to the Museum of Art was built for carriages and couples talking walks on autumn evenings; now its sidewalks are neglected by human beings, while the roads are lonely with automobiles.)

It is space, and it is the people. The beauty of the buildings and of their setting in Chicago; the Danube passing through the heart of Budapest, with pretty bridges adorning it; the neoclassical, tree-lined boulevards of Milano; the squares and the tram-lined streets of Strasbourg... but none could actually be imagined without the people walking along Michigan Ave., or the teeming life on the banks of the Danube, spilling unto the bridges in various forms (bike, car, pedestrian); and so on.

One could make a reference to Aristotle, who says that having a group of people live in the same place, under the same laws, does not yet a society make; a society requires constant, everyday, physical meetings between its members. The city is nothing without its people. Banal-sounding, perhaps, but it also means that the true form of the city is given by its members in constant interaction (or, by the constant interaction of its members?). This is why I could feel instantly comfortable, the moment I came out from the subway and unto the streets of lower Manhattan; because I  instinctively and immediately recognized the atmosphere, because I  knew right away how to behave on a street busy with people pursuing their own business - stepping into a deli for a sandwich, waiting for the light to change etc.; it was Novi Sad, it was Rome, it was Karlsruhe (just taller).

I think this is what makes the city my environment, my space. This lived space, of people interacting (verbally,  physically; sharing a space, sharing in each other's life) and inhabiting a place that was built not just for functionality, but for beauty, too (yet drab exteriors do become beautiful, their bricks and iron railings aged by the people living with them, for years, decades, entire lives).

Man is inherently social, and if your being has been defined... - well, if you came to know yourself through knowing the others whom you met every day - on the street, in the shop, on the tram, or just by playing outside; then it becomes very hard, almost an amputation of the self, to live without that.

This current issue of Lapham's Quarterly, then, titled The City, is a small miracle. It contains texts from writers ranging from Plutarch to Bulgakov, from Marco Polo to Iréne Nemirovski, from Rabelais to F. Scott Fitzgerald - about a given city, about the city.    

Culture, television, and the nation-state (apropos a surprising new TV series)

Now this looks very enticing! In fact, this is one of the more surprising things to come out of the world of commercial television. Quite unexpected, and this is one of those very rare times when I would actually want to "get TV" (cable or air) in my house. Fortunately, it will surely come out on DVD fairly soon.

Trailer

Usually, to encounter high culture on TV, in Amerika, you have to watch PBS - the much maligned Public Broadcasting System, the closest equivalent to a national (as in, "state") TV station Amerika has. However, in many other parts of the world, and especially in Europe, the national ("state") TV stations are the guardians of high culture, and thus have a civilizing role - or impact.

A case in point is the world of television in Central and Eastern Europe, and the impact of commercial television after the 1990s. They have invaded the market, have become very successful, but true quality television remained with the "national," i.e. state-owned stations.

These states came about as a result of the pursuit of the idea of the "nation-state," that every nation (defined ethnically and culturally, i.e. ethno-culturally) needs to have its own state(hood). In consequence, the very raison d'être of the resulting states became, and is, the protection of the interests of these "nations," defined ethnoculturally: around a "common" language, culture, history (real or constructed? shared or inculcated? - usually both). (This is the German model.) What is a state, however? It is a set of institutions. This is then what the state institutions are meant to do: to protect the interests of a culturally defined nation, which means the protection and promotion of the given culture, as defined by the state. (This is the French model, although the French nation was not defined ethnically, but politically and culturally.)

There are many downsides to such an understanding of nation and state; for example, the existence of a quasi-sacred canon of national culture, whose questioning is almost a blasphemy - and  whose epitome are the "national poets" - usually romantic poets who wrote during and about the struggle for the definition of the nation, in the nineteenth century, intertwining in their work the definition of the language, history, and the struggle for independence.. There are, however, important upsides, namely this self-understanding of some of these institutions of the state, as being the guardians of cultural heritage - not necessarily limited to the past, especially in the case of national TV stations.

Of course, this might also have to do with the fact that, in many countries, when television arrived, it was through state-owned stations, and not through the market. As a consequence, the approach to this new medium has been shaped not by commercial interest, but by the idea of public service (information, news - just like in the case of the first radio stations there), and might also have meant that the input of educated people, with sophisticated cultural backgrounds, was decisive - and they applied their understanding of other branches of culture, to deciding about the very purpose and direction of the programs of this new medium.

Now, I am quite unfamiliar with the history of television, but these seem to be fair enough suppositions, since I have experienced them first hand, growing up in Europe, nourished (in part) exactly by these institutions (sometimes to my delight, sometimes to indigestion).

The everyday of beauty

By way of an article by Roger Scruton, about The High Cost of Ignoring Beauty, some thoughts that are in syntony with his own (or the other way around). One feels quite disarmed when one has to explain here, in North America, the use of public aesthetics. Yet, driving down the long "pikes" of this continent, you will pass endless rows of so-called strip-malls: one-story buildings, drab, nondescript, lined around an asphalt wasteland of a parking lot. One-story buildings whose architecture is not meant to say anything, because its only meaning is to provide a (cheap) space to be rented out. And you drive on, and on, and you pass the same buildings and places. If you enter in some of the businesses that have rented out these spaces, sometimes you will be surprised by what you find inside; sometimes you will find a delightful Indonesian restaurant, with atmosphere, taste, and good food.

(As a side-note, it is quite sickening that most of these businesses renting out these infinite-like strip-malls are restaurants; sickening not qua restaurants, but because, instead of being places of long hours of lazy delight spent in the company of friends, they are utilitarian places serving about the same function as a retail clothing store, or a doctor's office - you go in, you do what you have to do (in this case, eat), and when you're done, you move on. Why would anyone spend hours there? Unless you bring your laptop, to "do some work." This piece here,  Bringing the Buzz Back to the Café, talks about this.)

Thus, you drive on - not walk, by the way, because you need to get somewhere - and isn't this an unnecessary clarification, in fact, the fact that "you need to get somewhere?" Of course you do, otherwise why would you be on your way? But why should you "get somewhere?" Yes, I ask: why? But what else would you do on the street, if not go somewhere? Well, perhaps just walk. Without purpose? Well, is breathing without a purpose? Does joy need a purpose? (Notice that I am not using the word "fun," which usually has a purpose, and thus is time-enclosed and task-like; "I want to have fun." Well, perhaps just walk, and look around, and watch the other people. Live, breathe the others' presence, and imbibe the music of the buildings, of the architecture that surrounds you.

Or drive, past others, just like others drive past you,, while passing by miles and miles of strip malls. Nobody is on the streets, walking; and the "music" of the buildings hurts your mind.

The problem, of course, is not that these strip-malls are shopping places, sometimes with good restaurants (as mentioned above). The problem is that, just like the bridge over the Mississippi in the heart of Minneapolis, they were built with the sole purpose of serving a (very drab) function. And yet, just like the air we breathe, or the water we drink, or the books we read, the order and cleanliness of our home, the architecture that surrounds us is a very important part of our own selves. These are the elements of the language of our souls, and our souls are shaped by them. What is around us can not be separated by what is inside us - not radically.

We are intrinsically open beings. It is not only that what is inside is influenced by what is outside. Inside and outside are misleading expressions. We are open beings, and what surrounds us, is us - whether it generates defensive reactions from the depth of our selves, or a general sensation of - what is the expression we use? - well-being. (A wonderful depiction of the nature of human beings, intrinsically open, and shaped by the relationships we have with all that surrounds us, is to be found in the very poetic Book of Genesis, as read in    these meditations on the "Original Unity of Man and Woman.")

Thus, rather than being only a matter of function (which it is not), architecture is the very aesthetics of the world that surrounds us. As such, just like music, literature, images, it is an essential part of our actually being human. Thus, it matters. It is not the same if we are aiming at being truly human, or towards being like the animals; as we all know, both alternatives are sadly possible; the difference is what we call civilization.