In my classical guitar studies of late I've been learning a Bach prelude and fugue (BWV 999 and 1000, although so far I have only the prelude in my fingers). This has inspired me to think about tweaking my lifelong philosophy project of writing half a dozen books on the art of living well, as I've done several times before since first articulating it about twelve years ago.
All four of the books I've written so far in this series are short - perhaps too short. They are, as it were, my own somewhat improvisatory preludes to the large fugues produced by the great thinkers I've been encountering over the years.
Thus I've been thinking: what if I were to append each of my preludes with a fugue when producing (as I hope to do) new, high-quality editions of the books I've published so far? I already have the original materials on hand for a few of these, and I've been thinking about translating or arranging some of the other fugues. Here's what that might look like, in reverse chronological order...
First, Nietzsche (1844-1900). My book Songs of Zarathustra contains 72 poems riffing off aphorisms sprinkled throughout the works that Nietzsche published during his lifetime. The fugue would consist of my own translations of the hundred-odd aphorisms I cite in the poems. It's true that my German is rusty, but I think I could just barely pull this off.
Second, Thoreau (1817-1862). This one is easy, because the fugue already exists in Seasons of Thoreau, a companion to my book The Upland Farm containing relevant passages I selected from Thoreau's journal and published writings.
Third, Montaigne (1533-1592). Although Montaigne is a recent addition to my lifelong philosophy project, lately I've been warming to the idea of writing a long, rambling essay entitled "Apology for Michel de Montaigne" in which I would defend his personalist approach to soulcraft. The challenge here is producing a fugue of perhaps a dozen of his essays, since I don't know French; I'd likely need to use existing translations in the public domain.
Fourth, Epicurus (341-270 BCE). The prelude is my book Letters on Happiness and the fugue is already about half-done, since I've translated his Letter to Menoikeus, his Principal Doctrines, the collection of aphorisms known as the Vatican Sayings, and selected fragments from his lost works. I've been meaning to translate more of his fragments, some of testimonia from Greek and Latin authors, the ancient biography written by Diogenes Laertius, and perhaps his letters to Herodotus, to Pythocles, and to his mother.
Fifth, Pyrrho (ca. 360–270 BCE). Nothing is written or translated here except the first ~350 lines of my projected epic poem Gods Among Men. The fugue would probably consist of my own translations from ancient Greek of selections from Sextus Empicirus, Diogenes Laertius, and Eusebius. I might even throw in some passages from Montaigne's "Apology for Raymond Sebond" because what he says there about Pyrrho strikes me as extremely insightful.
Sixth, Aristotle (384-322 BCE). Over the last two months I've written the first half of my book Complete Thyself and I'll soon write chapter four of the projected six. My current idea is that the fugue would be my own translation of Aristotle's Eudemian Ethics, supplemented with passages from his other works (such as On Thrivings and Failings of Character). I'd skip the Nicomachean Ethics because the world already has enough translations of that one; besides, I think the Joe Sachs translation is excellent even though I disagree with him on the rendering of some key terms.
(Astute readers will notice that I'm leaving out The Tao of Roark, my little book about Ayn Rand's philosophy of life. That's because what I wrote is very much intertwined with Rand's novel The Fountainhead, which is more of a symphony than a fugue; I'd like each fugue to be 2-4 times as long as my own prelude, but in this case the ratio would be more like 10:1. Plus there are copyright issues.)
Sometimes I wonder why I've set myself up for such a massive undertaking, but it helps to give focus and direction to my intellectual endeavors and I find the results deeply fulfilling...
(Cross-posted at Beautiful Wisdom.)
FOR FURTHER EXPLORATION