Imaginary

Fictional Narratives

You could pretty plainly tell how long each one had been ashore. This young fellow’s healthy cheek is like a sun-toasted pear in hue, and would seem to smell almost as musky; he cannot have been three days landed from his Indian voyage. That man next him looks a few shades lighter; you might say a touch of satin wood is in him. In the complexion of a third still lingers a tropic tawn, but slightly bleached withal; he doubtless has tarried whole weeks ashore. But who could show a cheek like Queequeg? which, barred with various tints, seemed like the Andes’ western slope, to show forth in one array, contrasting climates, zone by zone. [Herman Melville, Moby Dick, or the Whale (1851), Chapter 5. Breakfast.]

What fictional works could better illustrate reason than Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes novels?

• Arthur Conan Doyle, A Study in Scarlet (1887).
• Arthur Conan Doyle, The Sign of Four (1890).
• Arthur Conan Doyle, The Adventures of Sherlock Holmes (1892).
• Arthur Conan Doyle, The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (1894).
• Arthur Conan Doyle, The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902).
• Arthur Conan Doyle, The Return of Sherlock Holmes (1905).
• Arthur Conan Doyle, The Valley of Fear (1915).
• Arthur Conan Doyle, His Last Bow: An Epilogue of Sherlock Holmes (1917).
• Arthur Conan Doyle, The Case-book of Sherlock Holmes (1927).
• Arthur Conan Doyle, A Duet (D. Appleton and Company, 1899), a fictional autobiography.

In the manner of the Sherlock Holmes character:

• Hareni Nagendra, The Bangalore Detectives Club: A Novel (Pegasus Crime, 2022): “Kaveri struggles with her new life until a most unexpected event occurs at a party she and her husband attend: the murder of a man — distinctly not invited — whom she’d spotted in the gardens just an hour before. Suspicion is cast, too easily, on a preyed-upon young woman whose name Kaveri is determined to clear, relying on her wits (and her familiarity with Sherlock Holmes).”
• Simon Stephenson, Sometimes People Die: A Novel (Hanover Square Press, 2022): “. . . patients at a London hospital are dying at a rapid clip — especially ones who shouldn’t be.”

Other novels:

• Wendy Walker, What Remains: A Novel (Blackstone Publishing, 2023): “Elise’s life depends on rationality, on routine, on thinking through her problems.”

Poetry

Thou still unravish’d bride of quietness,
Thou foster-child of silence and slow time,
Sylvan historian, who canst thus express
A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme:
What leaf-fring’d legend haunt about thy shape
Of deities or mortals, or of both,
In Tempe or the dales of Arcady?
What men or gods are these? What maidens loth?
What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape?
What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy?
Heard melodies are sweet, but those unheard
Are sweeter: therefore, ye soft pipes, play on;
Not to the sensual ear, but, more endear’d,
Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone:
Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou canst not leave
Thy song, nor ever can those trees be bare;
Bold lover, never, never canst thou kiss,
Though winning near the goal – yet, do not grieve;
She cannot fade, though thou hast not thy bliss,
For ever wilt thou love, and she be fair!

Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot shed
Your leaves, nor ever bid the spring adieu;
And, happy melodist, unwearied,
For ever piping songs for ever new;
More happy love! more happy, happy love!
For ever warm and still to be enjoy’d,
For ever panting, and for ever young;
All breathing human passion far above,
That leaves a heart high-sorrowful and cloy’d,
A burning forehead, and a parching tongue.

Who are these coming to the sacrifice?
To what green altar, O mysterious priest,
Lead’st thou that heifer lowing at the skies,
And all her silken flanks with garlands drest?
What little town by river or sea shore,
Or mountain-built with peaceful citadel,
Is emptied of this folk, this pious morn?
And, little town, thy streets for evermore
Will silent be; and not a soul to tell
Why thou art desolate, can e’er return.

O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with brede
Of marble men and maidens overwrought,
With forest branches and the trodden weed;
Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of thought
As doth eternity: Cold Pastoral!
When old age shall this generation waste,
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other woe
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom thou say’st,
“Beauty is truth, truth beauty,” – that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.

[John Keats, “Ode On a Grecian Urn”: Notwithstanding the famous concluding lines, Keats considers what the urn tells us about the people who made and used it.]

Music: Composers, artists, and major works

Beginning in the early twentieth century, several composers took the thoughtful romanticism found in Brahms’ Violin Concerto in D major, Op. 77, in a new, ostensibly more reasoned direction, one that reflected the spirit of these then-new times. Composed in 1904, Jean Sibelius’ Violin Concerto in D minor, Op. 47 (1904, rev. 1905) (approx. 28-40’), conveys the tone of post-romantic angst that would characterize the twentieth century in the developed world. This concerto may also reflect an important part of Sibelius’ life. “Sibelius wrote this concerto for a kind of ghostly self. He was a failed violinist.” “Though he took up the violin too late to realize his dream of becoming a virtuoso, Sibelius’s intimate knowledge of the instrument’s technical and expressive capabilities inform every page of the Concerto.” Top recorded performances are by Heifetz (Beecham) in 1935, Wicks (Ehrling) in 1952, Ferras (Mehta) in 1965, Oistrakh (Rozhdestvensky) in 1966, Stern (Ormandy) in 1969, Chung (Previn) in 1970, Perlman (Previn) in 1979, Mullova (Ozawa) in 1985, Lin (Sanonen) in 1987, Kavakos (Vanskä) in 1990, Dalene (Storgårds) in 2021, and Jansen (Mäkelä) in 2024. 

Also composed in 1904 and similarly contemplative and thoughtful in its approach and tone (“. . . filled with virtually every technical trick in the book . . .”) is Alexander Glazunov’s Violin Concerto in A minor, Op. 82 (1904) (approx. 20-27’). In composing the work, Glazunov seems to have been toying with musical ideas.

• The opening movement (Moderato) begins with a suggestion of purpose but that becomes more introspective and thoughtful a little more than a minute in, a tone that pervades the remainder of the work.
• The second movement (Andante) deepens the contemplative tone, as you would expect in an Andante. As the movement continues, the most energetic passages suggest the mind busily at work exploring an idea.
• The concerto concludes with an Animando movement, which suggests the triumph of an idea, along with its continued exploration.

Top recorded performances are by Heifetz (Barbirolli) in 1934, Naiden (Schulman) in 1965, Markovici (Stokowski) in 1972, Kaler (Kolchinsky) in 1994, Rosand (Bakels) in 2007, Benedetti (Karabits) in 2015. 

Sergei Prokofiev wrestled with the composition of his Violin Concerto No. 1 in D Major, Op. 19 (approx. 21-23’), beginning it in 1917 (the year of the two Russian revolutions) but not completing it until the 1920s. “'Play it as though you’re trying to convince someone of something' the composer told the young David Oistrakh.” “The Concerto made an equivocal impression, the progressives finding it too conservative, the conservatives too progressive (it does, indeed, straddle two worlds).”

• The first movement (Andantino) clearly evokes the agitated concerns of people who lived through the wintry Russian climate of 1917.
• The second movement (Scherzo {Vivacissimo}) begins with an attempt at playfulness but that quickly gives way to the twisted framework of the Scherzo.
• The third movement (Animando/Allegro) opens with passages from the solo violin that suggest a mocking quality. The remainder of the movement is consumed with a struggle between the soloist and the orchestra.

Top recorded performances are by Szigeti (Beecham) in 1935, Oistrakh (Matačić) in 1954, Mintz (Abbado) in 1984, Lin (Salonen) in 1994, Vengerov (Rostropovich) in 1994, Hahn & RTVE Symphony Orchestra in 2013, Ehnes (Noseda) in 2013, Gluzman (Neeme Järvi) in 2016, Petrova (Poska) in 2017, and Hahn (Franck) in 2021. 

Prokofiev’s Violin Concerto No. 2 in G minor, Op. 63 (1935) (approx. 28-33’), reflects the internal struggles of the twentieth century, which by that time had become more obvious than when Sibelius and Glazunov composed their concerti in 1904. This work “represented what is believed to have been the future direction for USSR music, and was considered an ideal work for the composer to be armed with upon his return to the Soviet Union.” “. . . it was dangerous to compose music under Stalin.  Prokofiev died of a stroke in 1953, the same hour, day, and year as Stalin, lucky not to have been one of the twenty million deaths during the Stalin regime.”

• The first movement (Allegro Moderato) is an exposition on moving forward in a challenging and often difficult world.
• The orchestra suggests a certain playfulness with the opening pizzicatos of the second movement (Andante assai) but the solo violin quickly overrides those with a plethora of questions and concerns. This interplay between orchestral playfulness and the soloist’s doubts and concerns continues throughout the movement. Was Prokofiev trying to suggest that the world offers us more than we are yet capable of appreciating?
• The third movement (Allegro, ben marcato) continues this quasi-argument of the second. 

Top recorded performances are by Heifetz (Munch) in 1959, Milstein (de Burgos) in 1965, Chung (Previn) in 1972, Vengerov (Rostropovich) in 1994, Josefowicz (Dutiot) in 2001, Mullova (Previn) in 1989, Jansen (Jurowski) in 2012, Ehnes (Noseda) in 2013, Kopatchinskaya (Jurowski) in 2014, and Hadelich (Măcelaru) in 2022. 

In the works by Gaspard Fritz (1716-1783), of Switzerland, you can practically hear the 18th-century Enlightenment in Europe taking place:

• Symphony No. 1 in B-flat Major, Op. 6/1 (> 1770) (approx. 22’)
• Symphony No. 2 in C Major, Op. 6/2 (> 1770) (approx. 26’)
• Symphony No. 3 in G Major, Op. 6/3 (> 1770) (approx. 13’)
• Symphony No. 5 in F Major, Op. 6/5 (> 1770) (approx. 16’)
• Symphony No. 6 in G minor, Op. 6/6 (> 1770) (approx. 14’)
• Violin Concerto in E Major (ca. 1740) (approx. 18-19’) 

Other works:

• Franz Joseph Haydn, Symphony No. 22 in E flat Major, Hob. I:22, “The Philosopher” (1764) (approx. 15-21’).
• Haydn, L’anima del filosofo (The Soul of the Philosopher, or Orfeo ed Eurydice), Hob. XXVIII:13 (1791) (approx. 115-125’) (libretto), is a re-telling of the myth of Orfeo and Eurydice.
• Raga Rageshwari (Rageswari – Rageshvari – Ragesvari), a Hindustani classical raag, commonly known as the “queen of ragas”, and usually is performed late in the evening. Performances are by Shahid Parvez, Kala Ramnath and Vilayat Khan.
• Leonard Bernstein, Serenade, “After Plato’s Symposium” (1954) (approx. 30-34’)
• James Dashow, Archimedes Suite (1988) (approx. 25’), after the Greek engineer, inventor, mathematician, physicist and astronomer
• Daniel Jones, Piano Suite in E Major, Op. 6, “Academic” (1934) (approx. 31’)
• Alberto Hemsi, The Pilpúl Sonata for Violin and Piano, Op. 27 (approx. 20’), “draws on ironic aspects of Talmudic argument, creating an absorbing work that incorporates elements of jazz and impressionism.” 

Albums:

• Matthew Shipp Due with Joe Morris, “Thesis” (1997) (63’)
• Jordi Savall, La Capella le Reial de Catalyuna and Hespèrion XXI, “Henricus Isaac: Nell tempo di Lorenzo de’ Medici & Maximilian I, 1450-1519” (2017) (76’), “Splendour of the Humanist Renaissance before the Protestant Reformation”.

Music: songs and other short pieces

• Coldplay, “The Scientist” (lyrics)

Visual Arts

• Jean-Honoré Fragonard, Portrait of Denis Diderot (c. 1769)
• Rembrandt van Rijn, Two Old Men Disputing (c. 1628)
• Peter Paul Rubens, Democritus (1603)
• Quentin Massys, Erasmus of Rotterdam (1517)
• Raphael, Philosophy, from the "Stanza della Segnatura" (ceiling tondo) (1509-11)

Film and Stage

• The Day of the Jackal, in which a police investigator “cleverly pieces together the clues to the Jackal's identity” (review)
• High and Low: police solve a kidnapping and double murder.

Few works of art, if any, have poked fun at illogic and unreason better than these two Monty Python films:

• "Monty Python and the Holy Grail"
• "Monty Python's Life of Brian"