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June 2013 Discussion: The Swerve: How the World Became Modern by Stephen Greenblatt
The time has come to discuss the June 2013 MobileRead Book Club selection, The Swerve: How the World Became Modern by Stephen Greenblatt. What did you think?
This thread contains SPOILERS! (There was no room to add that to the thread title.) |
I'll start - I thought this was a fascinating read, my poor husband (who really didn't have much interest) was subjected to me reading passages out regularly. I've got the Lucretius but haven't got round to reading it yet, maybe one day soon.
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I've read The Swerve and re-read most of Of the Nature of Things by Lucretius, although I had to switch from William Ellery Leonard's 1916 translation to Frank O. Copley's 1977 translation midway through because Leonard's translation really wasn't doing it for me. Frank O. Copley's translation is much more readable in my opinion.
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I'm about halfway through. My initial impression is that there is considerably more speculation than fact, but the story of the hunt for lost books was compelling. The descriptions of Lucretius's poem were amazing and it is indeed wonderful that the work was not lost forever.
I found the descriptions of the Middle Ages superficial and the tangent on self-flagellation was odd. I'm not religious, but I suspect that Greenblatt's take on Christianity would be very off-putting to those who are religious. I'm interested in how he weaves Of the Nature of Things into the Renaissance. I'm not going to be easily convinced that one poem was "responsible" for modern thought. History doesn't take place in a vacuum, there were a lot of other influences at the time, plus other Greek and Roman philosophers and scholars were read throughout history. |
I loved it. Having studied Ancient History and also Medieval and Renaissance Art History, I felt very much at home with what he was writing about. I think it could be harder for people to follow who weren't reasonably at home with the times and the people that Greenblatt was talking about.
It is extraordinary that the text survived: probably because the monk who copied it out wasn't really reading and thinking about what he was copying. I think it's fortunate that book printing started not too much later after its discovery, so that the genie was out of the bottle well and truly. It would be hard to deny the truth of what Greenblatt wrote about the church - I believe that everything he wrote is historically accurate - though I agree, Synamon, that some Roman Catholics could well be upset by what they read there, if they were not already aware of it. And finally, I think that Lucretius would have had a huge impact on humanist thinking of the time. To me, what it has to say is astonishingly modern, and it's hard for us to grasp how stunningly different it was from the teachings of the time, whether it was all the hellfire and damnation, or the sun revolving around the earth (and aforesaid hellfire etc if you said that wasn't so), and the right we all have to be happy in our lives rather than being put here to suffer in the hope of a better deal in the hereafter. I'm really glad to have read The Swerve and hope others enjoyed it too. |
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It was heartbreaking to read about all the other classical literature that's been lost. Quote:
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And finally, I think that Lucretius would have had a huge impact on humanist thinking of the time. To me, what it has to say is astonishingly modern, and it's hard for us to grasp how stunningly different it was from the teachings of the time, whether it was all the hellfire and damnation, or the sun revolving around the earth (and aforesaid hellfire etc if you said that wasn't so), and the right we all have to be happy in our lives rather than being put here to suffer in the hope of a better deal in the hereafter./QUOTE]
I was also amazed at how advanced Lucretius' thinking was, however, I wonder sometimes if there's an arrogance about the modern era - what makes us think that we're so much more advanced than other eras? Obviously the science and technological advances we have made over the last couple of hundred years have been staggering, but does that give us the right to feel superior? Should we be surprised that there weren't more writings like this? :chinscratch: |
hm, hm, I'm halfway in the book, but it bugs me that the writer treats the Middle Ages as a period of stagnant waters, without any intellectual development at all...
This being said; I do like the description of the search for manuscripts, though I doubt the assumption that this was the one thing, the decisive factor in the swerve from the Renaissance into Modern times. I mean; many historians disagree about which period was when and where....so, I would like to see some context here. Reading this book as a kind of historic detective is one thing, but reading it as a thorough research in the medieval and renaissance period is quite another matter.:chinscratch: |
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Some of the explanatory notes in The Swerve are interesting in themselves; an example would be the comment elaborating the relationship between the world views of Lucretius and Virgil. |
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And by the way, a word of thanks here too to the Arabian scholars who rescued and translated many of these ancient works. We can also lose sight of their enormous contribution to what has survived through to modern times and that is often not acknowledged. |
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And I think that Greenblatt has done a great deal of research in the area he is discussing; but of course it is just one bit of the Medieval and Renaissance periods, in a few countries in Western Europe. Check out the footnotes and references if you haven't got to them yet - or do you flick back and forth? I must admit I find that hard to do in an ebook, and tend to do a chapter at a time of footnotes. |
One of the things i found of interest is the way Greenblatt scuppers the notion that the Great Library was destroyed by Caliph Omar. But by the time that happened{if indeed it did happen--it might simply be negative propaganda} little of the Great Library was left.
Still Greenblatt provides what is undoubtedly a reasonably accurate outline of events but does perhaps over-simplify things by linking the Library's destruction to the horrifying and brutal murder of Hypatia. The Great Library was most likely destroyed by a multitude of wounds. If any would like to read a very thorough description of it, there is a very well researched article by Heather Phillips in Library Philosophy and Practice 2010 here: http://www.webpages.uidaho.edu/~mbolin/phillips.htm Another interesting article by Brian Haughton outlines what is known about the Great Library: http://www.ancient.eu.com/article/207/ |
I also read Of the Nature of Things by Lucretius (William Ellery Leonard translation) in preparation for reading the The Swerve. I was glad I did as I was unfamiliar with Of the Nature of Things and I actually enjoyed it more than I did The Swerve. Of course in part because of the vocabulary used a modern reader can over estimate how advanced the ideas expressed in Of the Nature of Things are. When Lucretious writes of atoms he is certainly not referring to anything like what we now know as atoms. He also retains some odd ideas, like the idea of there being a soul, a mixture of an impalpable aura and heat that deserts the dying body. I also came away with the impression, both from Of the Nature of Things itself and Greenblatt's book, that Lucretius was more of a compiler of schools of ancient natural philosophy, especially of Epicurus, than an original thinker. Still it is a remarkable document that reveals how advanced the Classical European world was relative to the over 1000 years that were to follow the fall of the Roman Empire. So anyway on to The Swerve.
I had a couple of real problems with this book. The first was that if it was the intention of Greenblatt, as it seemed to be, to make a case that recovery of a copy of Of the Nature of Things was a major turning point that drove the Renaissance he did not do a very good job of that. Let's leave aside for the moment whether or not a convincing case for that proposition is even possible. I would say that a great deal of the book was wasted on the story of Poggio's life. Even Greenblatt acknowledges that Poggio was really just a collector of ancient manuscripts, and that his concern was with the accuracy of the Latin translation and his penmanship in making copies, not the meaning of the content. So an interesting sidebar about a little known character, but not central to the proposition. Only late in the book does Greenblatt begin to make his case of the importance of Of the Nature of Things in producing the Renaissance, and that argument is weak. Personally I would say that interest in Of the Nature of Things was more a symptom of the Renaissance than a cause. The Renaissance had many causes, among them the Crusades that brought new awareness of forgotten knowledge, much of that via the Arabs and Byzantium as Bookpossum mentions, as well as the slow realization that Western Christianity had become corrupt and intellectually bankrupt. I also concur with Synamon that Greenblatt includes to much blatant speculation of the nature of: A might have happened, and if so it would not be hard to imagine that B occurred, and that makes it entirely possible that C was the result. I was also interested by the account in the preface of the edition that I read of how Of the Nature of Things became so personally important to Greenblatt. How difficult it must have been for him as a child to have his drama queen mother make every parting a final goodbye as she would soon be dead. Then she lived to be almost ninety years old. :rofl: I really did enjoy this book very much though. Even if I thought Greenblatt failed to makes his case I learned a lot from the book. |
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I do like the description of the search for manuscripts though. Well....on with the rest of the book.:book2: |
That's a very fine post, Hamlet53.
I would tend to agree with your points about The Swerve. I found it an interesting book filled with all kinds of general material about the age. But the idea that the discovery of On The Nature of Things is a major turning point in the development of Western Civilisation because it initiated the Renaissance isn't convincing. |
I am also about halfway through and though I like the book and find it very interesting it is a little bit too much fiction for me.
And the choice in the book club comes to early for me (yes, that's my fault, not your's). I have the book "The Forgotten Revolution" (http://www.amazon.com/The-Forgotten-...1848850&sr=8-1) about science in old Greece on my reading list and would have prefered to read this book beforehand. Speaking of the middle ages there is a theory that a few hundred years have not been, are just an invention (the time around 700-900). I don't know if this theory has some truth or is just plain rubbish, but I find it quite fascinating and when reading historical books I always look if I can find some arguments for this or that point of view. In this regard I could find only very little in "The Swerve" until now. But this is of course not the topic of the "Swerve", just a sidenote by me. |
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A question for those who have read On the Nature of Things, were there as many wild and wrong-headed ideas as there were right-thinking ideas? It seemed to me that Greenblatt cherry picked, and I'm curious if my impression is correct. |
I really don't think that Greenblatt was trying to claim that the rediscovery of this one poem started the Renaissance all on its own. May I quote Tom's post from the poll thread as I think it sums the situation up very well:
I've started reading the book, and for what it's worth, despite the impression given earlier in this thread via his critic, Harold Kirkpatrick, the author does not appear to be claiming that Lucucius' book was the sole cause of the enlightenment. From The Swerve: How the World Became Modern by Stephen Greenblatt, location 185-187: Quote: There is no single explanation for the emergence of the Renaissance and the release of the forces that have shaped our own world. But I have tried in this book to tell a little known but exemplary Renaissance story, the story of Poggio Bracciolini’s recovery of On the Nature of Things. And from location 188-190: Quote: One poem by itself was certainly not responsible for an entire intellectual, moral, and social transformation—no single work was, let alone one that for centuries could not without danger be spoken about freely in public. But this particular ancient book, suddenly returning to view, made a difference. Quote: Originally Posted by sun surfer ...I was also going to vote for The Swerve but then I went to read more about it on its Amazon page and came across some critical reviews including an excellent one by "Harold Kirkpatrick" here, which includes this paragraph: Quote: Greenblatt seriously overstates the role of Lucretius, whose influence, until the mid to late 18th century was arguably quite marginal. Peter Gay's The Enlightenment: The Rise of Modern Paganism, unfortunately not mentioned by Greenblatt, deals at length with the influence of Lucretius on French Enlightenment thinkers, many of whom really were "pagans", i.e., materialists and epicureans. The standard view, of course, is that a revival of Platonic idealism, not of "pagan" materialism, was responsible for the Renaissance preoccupation with beauty and harmony. Plato may have had a large influence upon the Renaissance, but he certainly didn't impress at least one Enlightenment thinker (who just happens to be the subject of the other book I nominated). The "whimsies of Plato's own foggy brain" was a common phrase Thomas Jefferson used in reference to Plato, as seen in his letter to William Short dated October 31, 1819: Quote: His prototype Plato, eloquent as himself, dealing out mysticisms incomprehensible to the human mind, has been deified by certain sects usurping the name of Christians; because, in his foggy conceptions, they found a basis of impenetrable darkness whereon to rear fabrications as delirious of their own invention. and Quote: Of Socrates we have nothing genuine but in the Memorabilia of Xenophon; for Plato makes him one of his Collocutors merely to cover his own whimsies under the mantle of his name; a liberty of which we are told Socrates honestly complained. There's also a Jefferson quote that refers to Plato as having a"third rate mind", but I don't seem to be able to find it at the moment. Of course, as a despiser of democracy, Plato would have been a natural target of Jefferson's animosities. |
I will just enjoy the book as it is, and as I've said before; I do have some objections to the scientific claims of Greenblatt. But I like to see how the journey, the quest for the manuscripts, goes. Greenblatt shows us a nice view in the life of Poggio.
There are as many scientists as there are opinions, including mine. Defining time periods as Middle Ages and Renaissance are controversial etc, etc. Hamlet53; I liked your view on Lucretius and will try to read the poem On the nature of things, if I can find the time. |
Some further thoughts while reading:
No doubt Greenblatt is a raconteur. I thoroughly enjoy his descriptions of how the book, as we know it today, developed, the scrolls-papyrus-vellum and the copying of manuscripts in the monasteries. But I keep questioning him; not a bad thing for a writer like Greenblatt I think. A good book can stand some 'pummeling' around. I find that he walks over history with very light feet. Spoiler:
What about the Arab expansion into Spain during the Umayyad Caliphate, A.D. 661–750? This will lead to the Islamic Golden Age (ca. 850-1250) which precedes and contributes to the Italian Renaissance (ca 1200-1600) in Europe. A period of great cultural changes that marks the beginning of the early modern Europe.After the Islamic conquests in Andalusia (Spain), famous Islamic scientists work and live in the great cities of Andalusia: Cordoba, Sevilla, Granada and also in Toledo. Hellenic philosophy, science, medicine and literature is translated into Latin and gradually changes the medieval science, till then dominated by the ideas of the Catholic Church. And this swerve of the world....which world does Greenblatt mean? His narration till now seems to center on Germany and Italy. What about the rest of the Western world? I'm only halfway through this book, but I hope to see some of my questions answered. I find I cannot read this book only on the superficial level of the search for a manuscript.;) |
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One example I can give off the top of my head of where he was very wrong was in the origin of species. He was right in his assumption that many species must have existed in the past that became extinct over time because they weren't adapted to the environment—here he sounds almost Darwinian in his thinking—but he believed that all these species, the successful as well as the unsuccessful, were created at a time when the earth was still young and capable of producing species via a method that sounds a lot like spontaneous generation. He seemed to have the idea in mind that species were fixed and unchangeable. The idea of descent with modification seemed foreign to his thinking. No, I don't think Lucretius was the be-all end-all cause of the Renaissance, and in fact, to my mind his influence was far smaller than Greenblatt would have us believe, although I do think the case can be made that his influence upon the Enlightenment was quite substantial. Jefferson, to give just one example, famously referred to himself as an Epicurean. Off-topic side note: I hate the iPad's autocorrect. If you see a "we're" where a "were" ought to be, or an "it's" where an "its" is called for, now you know why. ;) |
I do agree with you, desertblues, as I felt Greenblatt missed any mention of the Arabs and their scholarship, which is why I mentioned them some time back.
Thanks for the comments on Lucretius, Tom. I think this has been a really interesting discussion this month. |
This is a book I never would have picked up on my own, and yet, I've enjoyed it very much. I cannot quote chapter and verse on its historical accuracy, but I do have to say that Greenblatt spins a great yarn. I actually listened to the audiobook from the library and can highly recommend the audio edition...though it is not a good method for bookmarks and notes.
His description of the fall of Rome struck me, primarily because I'm an educator, and a mention was made of the education system falling apart as the economics and city declined. While I'm not a fatalist, it struck a chord as we've been furloughed quite a bit, have schools closing this year and even had a law about how many days a student has to attend school being changed right here in my own city/state. So, while it was just a mention in the book, it jumped out quite a bit during my read. I don't participate in the discussions much, but love this spot in the forum. Thanks all for a great read this month! |
I finished this late and didn’t feel as if I had much to add to the discussion, but now that I’m reading Fanny and Stella I’ve been thinking about it again. I know this isn’t the time or place for talking about F&S, but reading the two books so close together has me considering what seems to be a prevalence of so-called “narrative nonfiction”. When I look over the nominations for nonfiction month, it seems to me that most of the selections were more or less of this particular subset and it would also include such choices as Beautiful Forevers in the other club. It poses a lot of issues for me.
I was one whose reaction to Swerve was that Greenblatt was entirely too familiar with the workings of Poggio’s mind. Greenblatt clearly knows his stuff and I was entertained by his lively intelligence and broad range, which made for an entertaining read, but ultimately in such a short book, at a scanty 200 pages of text, the proportion of speculation to hard fact did a disservice to the treatment of the discovery and dissemination of a seminal text, which after all was the theme of the book. Compounding this, Greenblatt tried to have it both ways. I agree that he didn’t specifically claim that Lucretius was single-handedly responsible for the Renaissance. But the title, The Swerve: How the World Became Modern, explicitly does make that claim. Ah, marketing! A book the general public could read and feel as if we’re smarter than we really are! And pat ourselves on the back for our taste and acumen. Then of course the Pulitzer and the NBA served to heighten that impression. Part of this is the issue of the popular historian v. the academic historian. There’s nothing wrong with popular history (David McCullough, for example, some of whose books are better than others, although I’d never read another word from that plagiarist Doris Kearns Goodwin no matter how well regarded), but I tend to expect more from an academic historian whose credentials are front and center. I think the hybrid, academic historian writing popular history is dangerous, setting up impossible expectations and tending to discourage critical evaluation at least by the reading public and the popular press. Obviously there’s a continuum regarding just how much narrative is appropriate to a particular nonfiction work and I’d argue that subject matter plays a role. I already plan to revisit these issues with Fanny and Stella, lol. But I’m concurrently reading an also-ran from this month, The Sleepwalkers, and it’s something of a relief to be reading a highly researched and detailed work where inference is based on the facts as presented in the text and clearly labeled as such. |
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The novelist who writes a novel, lightly based on historical facts, seems to me to be more honest in his writing than an academic, trying to reach the public by whatever means he thinks fit. The latter tends to give me somewhat of an aftertaste and that is what I get when reading The Swerve, however well it is researched. :offtopic:I am also reading the Sleepwalkers and am gratified at the attention to historical research and report, especially when reading about Serbia. My impression Spoiler:
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:offtopic: I didn't mean to hijack the thread. I know of at least two others who also planned to read The Sleepwalkers. Perhaps if there's enough interest we could start a dedicated thread. |
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