Imaginary

Fictional Narratives

Hugo ends the volume on Cosette with a comment of Valjean’s gratefulness. Hiding with Cosette in a convent, he reflects on two pivotal times in his life:

Everything that surrounded him, that peaceful garden, those fragrant flowers, those children who uttered joyous cries, those grave and simple women, that silent cloister, slowly permeated him, and little by little, his soul became compounded of silence like the cloister, of perfume like the flowers, of simplicity like the women, of joy like the children. And then he reflected that these had been two houses of God which had received him in succession at two critical moments in his life: the first, when all doors were closed and when human society rejected him; the second, at a moment when human society had again set out in pursuit of him, and when the galleys were again yawning; and that, had it not been for the first, he should have relapsed into crime, and had it not been for the second, into torment.  His whole heart melted in gratitude, and he loved more and more.  Many years passed in this manner; Cosette was growing up. [Victor Hugo, Les Misérables (1862), Volume II – Cosette; Book Eighth – Cemeteries Take That Which Is Committed Them, Chapter IX, Cloistered.]

After learning that Valjean had saved him from death, Marius expresses his thanks:

Cosette, do you hear? he has come to that! he asks my forgiveness! And do you know what he has done for me, Cosette? He has saved my life. He has done more--he has given you to me. And after having saved me, and after having given you to me, Cosette, what has he done with himself? He has sacrificed himself. Behold the man. And he says to me the ingrate, to me the forgetful, to me the pitiless, to me the guilty one: Thanks! Cosette, my whole life passed at the feet of this man would be too little. That barricade, that sewer, that furnace, that cesspool,--all that he traversed for me, for thee, Cosette! He carried me away through all the deaths which he put aside before me, and accepted for himself. Every courage, every virtue, every heroism, every sanctity he possesses! Cosette, that man is an angel!" [Victor Hugo, Les Misérables (1862), Volume V – Jean Valjean; Book Ninth – Supreme Shadow, Supreme Dawn, Chapter V, A Night Beyond Which There Is Day.]

. . . there was one human creature whom Quasimodo excepted from his malice and from his hatred for others, and whom he loved even more, perhaps, than his cathedral: this was Claude Frollo. 

The matter was simple; Claude Frollo had taken him in, had adopted him, had nourished him, had reared him. When a little lad, it was between Claude Frollo’s legs that he was accustomed to seek refuge, when the dogs and the children barked after him. Claude Frollo had taught him to talk, to read, to write. Claude Frollo had finally made him the bellringer. Now, to give the big bell in marriage to Quasimodo was to give Juliet to Romeo. [Victor Hugo, Notre-Dame de Paris, or, The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1831), Volume I, Book Fourth, Chapter IV, “The Dog and His Master”.]

“Well!” she interposed with a smile, “tell me why you saved me.”

He watched her attentively while she was speaking.

“I understand,” he replied. “You ask me why I saved you. You have forgotten a wretch who tried to abduct you one night, a wretch to whom you rendered succor on the following day on their infamous pillory. A drop of water and a little pity,—that is more than I can repay with my life. You have forgotten that wretch; but he remembers it.”

She listened to him with profound tenderness. A tear swam in the eye of the bellringer, but did not fall. He seemed to make it a sort of point of honor to retain it. [Victor Hugo, Notre-Dame de Paris, or, The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1831) Volume II, Book Ninth, Chapter III, “Deaf”.]

Novels:

• Cynthia D’Aprix Sweeney, Good Company: A Novel (Ecco, 2021): “The constant internal struggle between what the heart wants versus what it should be grateful it already has serves as the primary emotional engine . . .”

Poetry

I celebrate myself, and sing myself, / And what I assume you shall assume, / For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you. / I loafe and invite my soul, / I lean and loafe at my ease observing a spear of summer grass. / My tongue, every atom of my blood, form'd from this soil, this air, / Born here of parents born here from parents the same, and their parents the same, / I, now thirty-seven years old in perfect health begin, / Hoping to cease not till death. / Creeds and schools in abeyance, / Retiring back a while sufficed at what they are, but never forgotten, / I harbor for good or bad, I permit to speak at every hazard, / Nature without check with original energy.

[Walt Whitman, Leaves of Grass (1891-92), Book III: Song of Myself, 1.]

At length their long kiss severed, with sweet smart:
And as the last slow sudden drops are shed
From sparkling eaves when all the storm has fled,
So singly flagged the pulses of each heart.
Their bosoms sundered, with the opening start
Of married flowers to either side outspread
From the knit stem; yet still their mouths, burnt red,
Fawned on each other where they lay apart.

Sleep sank them lower than the tide of dreams,
And their dreams watched them sink, and slid away.
Slowly their souls swam up again, through gleams
Of watered light and dull drowned waifs of day;
Till from some wonder of new woods and streams
He woke, and wondered more: for there she lay.

[Dante Gabriel Rossetti, “Nuptial Sleep”]

Music: Composers, artists, and major works

Ludwig van Beethoven's Symphony No. 6 in F Major, Op. 68, "Pastoral Symphony, or Recollections of Country Life” (1808) (approx. 38-46’), presents musical images of peasants spending a joyous day in the country. The Pastorale “offers eloquent testimony to the importance and power of nature in Beethoven's life. The composer reveled in walking in the environs of Vienna and spent nearly every summer in the country.” In it, “we have caught a glimpse of Beethoven’s state of mind, or at least one facet of the complicated prism of his being.” “Beethoven’s notion of the heroic in Symphony No. 6 is a figure at one with and in Nature, variously resting in its bosom, celebrating its bounty, fearful of its sublime might, and in the end, expressing thanks to its Creator for all of these states.  Beethoven’s own words expressed that his desire is to have the listener feel the journey, not just see series of images.  Thus, the heroic object of this particular symphonic journey is the subject—the careful listener experiencing the piece.” By happy circumstance, this day on our liturgical calendar usually coincides with the Thanksgiving holiday in the United States. Top recorded performances were conducted by Pfitzner in 1930, Toscanini in 1937, Erich Kleiber in 1953, Karajan in 1953, Klemperer in 1957, Böhm in 1971, Carlos Kleiber in 1973, Harnoncourt in 1991, Tennstedt in 1992, Järvi in 2009, Krivine in 2010, Antonini in 2010, Rudin in 2010 and Savall in 2021.

• First movement, Allegro ma non troppo: “Awakening of cheerful feelings upon arrival in the country” 
• Second movement, Andante molto mosso: “Scene at the brook” 
• Third movement, Allegro: “Happy gathering of country folk” 
• Fourth movement, Allegro: “Thunderstorm”
• Fifth movement, Allegretto: “Shepherds’ song: cheerful and thankful feelings after the storm” [Listen especially to the interplay between the female (violins) and male (cellos) voices.]

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Piano Concerto No. 26 in D Major, K. 537, “Coronation” (1788) (approx. 29-35’), sounds like someone in great health and grateful for it. Each of the three movements – Allegro - Cadenza, Larghetto and Allegretto - exudes Mozart's characteristic playfulness. Top recorded performances on disc are by Gulda (Collins) in 1955, Richter (Kertész) in 1961, Curzon (Boulez) in 1974, Perahia in 1983, Uchida (Tate) in 1987, Pires (Abbado) in 1993, Buchbinder in 2004, Piemontesi (Manze) in 2017, and Bavouzet (Takács-Nagy) in 2023. 

Aleksandr Glazunov, Symphony No. 8 in E flat Major, Op. 83 (1906) (approx. 42-43’): the four movements cover abundance (first movement, Allegro moderato), tragic pathos (second movement, Mesto), constant movement (third movement, Allegro) and resolution (fourth movement, Finale).

Other works:

• Morten Lauridsen, Nocturnes (four nocturnes) (2005) (approx. 17-18’): “. . . Lauridsen has here anthologized the verse of three twentieth-century poets, each of a different nationality: the German Rainer Maria Rilke, the Chilean Pablo Neruda, and the American James Agee. To ensure unity of conception amid this poetic diversity, the composer has cannily chosen three poems in which there are shared themes: night, romantic love and pantheistic rapture.”
• Claudio Monteverdi, Mass of Thanksgiving (1631) (approx. 17’)
• John Tavener, Akathist of Thanksgiving (1987) (approx. 78’): “The Akathist in the Orthodox church is a hymn of thanksgiving or supplication used on special occasions . . .”
• Godfrey Ridout, George III, His Lament (1975) (approx. 15’)
• George Frideric Händel, The Dettingen Te Deum, HWV 283 (1743) (approx. 35-38’), is a work “celebrating the English victory over the French at the Battle of Dettingen.”
• Händel, The Dettingen Anthem, HWV 283 (1743) (approx. 14-15’)
• Johann Sebastian Bach, Cantata, “Steigt freudig in die Luft” (Joyfully Takes to the Air), BWV 36a (1726) (approx. 26’) (lyrics)

Albums:

• Susanna Andersson & Little Venice Ensemble, “A Summer’s Day” (2021) (62’)
• Peter Ostroushko, “When the Last Morning Glory Blooms” (2010) (42’) “takes us on a journey through the wide-open prairies of the Dakotas, to Tyler, TX and into the intimate bistros of Europe. Powerful in its rich subtlety and Peter's unparalleled genius, When the Last Morning Glory Blooms stirs the soul without a single word.”

Music: songs and other short pieces

For personal relationships:

• Simon & Garfunkel, “For Emily, Wherever I May Find Her” (lyrics)
• Paul Simon, “Something So Right” (lyrics)
• Céline Dion, “Because You Loved Me” (lyrics)
• Yungchen Lhamo, “Dedication to My Teacher” 

For the natural world

• Nawang Khechog, Thanksgiving to Mother Earth
• Nawang Khechog, Under the Wings of Blessing
• Franz Schubert (composer), An die Natur (To Nature), D. 372 (1815) (lyrics)
• Franz Schubert (composer), Abendlied (Evening Song), D. 382 (1816) (lyrics)
• Franz Schubert (composer), Erntelied (Harvest Song), D. 434 (1816) (lyrics)
• Lynne Arriale Trio, “Gratitude” 

From the dark side:

• Frank Kimbrough, “It Should Have Happened a Long Time Ago” (regret)

Visual Arts

Gratefulness generally:

• René Magritte, Beautiful World (1962)
• Jacob Jordaens, Allegory of Fertility (c. 1622)

Gratefulness for belonging:

• Pierre-Auguste Renoir, In the Garden (1875)

Gratefulness for life:

• Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Woman with a Cat (1875)

Gratefulness for bounty:

• Frida Kahlo, Fruits of the Earth (1938)
• Diego Rivera, The Abundant Earth (1926)
• Gustav Klimt, Park (1909-10)
• Edward Coley Burne-Jones, The Garden of the Hesperides (1870-73)
• Jacob Jordaens, The Bean King (c. 1638)
• Peter Bruegel the Elder, The Wine of St. Martin's Day (ca. 1565-68)

Gratefulness for health:

• Alessandro Botticelli, Primavera (1482)

Gratefulness for relationships:

• Jean-Honoré Fragonard, The Cradle of the Happy Family
• Jean-Honoré Fragonard, The Happy Family (1769)

Film and Stage

• The Best Years of Our Lives, portraying lives of soldiers who had returned from World War II
• It’s a Wonderful Life: a man figures it out
• The Pride of the Yankees, a dramatized film biography about baseball player Lou Gehrig, who lived and died with grace