9. Recollections [1] and Kieslowski

There is more than one way to treat life, the softest tissue. The most beautiful memoir that I have ever encountered is Vladimir Nabokov's Speak, Memory; the most truthful autobiography that I have ever read is Santiago Ramón y Cajal's Recuerdas de mi vida [Recollections of My Life, The MIT Press]. That vital document, is divided into two parts. The first, "My Childhood and Youth," accounts for the primitive history of a great mind. Cajal's literary method is pure illumination, including honest admission of imperfection. But it is the evolution of his elemental insight that drives the narrative, written truthfully and, at times, beautifully. [Sometimes it is naturally so].

            The greatest personal influence on Cajal's development came from his father, Justo Ramón y Cajal, a traditional, self-made doctor. From his father, Cajal acquired the traits of character to which he claims to owe "everything that [he] is"[4]. These traits are:

"a profound belief in the sovereign will; faith in work; conviction that a persevering and deliberate effort is capable of moulding and organizing everything, from the muscle to the brain, making up the deficiences of nature and even overcoming the mischances of character -- the most difficult thing in life"[4].

Moreover, Cajal's father presented to him "the beautiful ambition to be something worth while, and the determination to spare no sacrifice for the fulfilment of my aspirations, nor ever to deviate from the direct path on account of secondary motivates or minor reactions"[4-5]. By the end of his life, when he wrote Recuerdas, Cajal understood the inherent beauty of the our endeavors for meaning, the importance of nearly monastic dedication, and the proper judgment of importance. And, concerning his career, a dogged resolution will later focus his scientific vision. These are the foundations of his character. "There is no doubt that, aside from hereditary influence, the ideas and example of a father are factors of decisive importance in the education of his children," Cajal states, "and therefore are essential determinants of their tastes and inclinations." The relationship of Cajal to his father is undoubtedly the principle external formative force upon his plastic brain. No understanding of Cajal's life and work is complete without a paternal examination.

            But Cajal was also compelled by an inborn force he more than once calls the devil: the childish instinct to make mischief. It began naturally and innocently but became downright delinquent. "In the realm of the inclinations and tendencies of my mind," Cajal writes, "I was, like the majority of youngsters brought up in the small towns, an enthusiast for the open-air life and a tireless cultivator of games of strength and agility"[15]. This leads to an unconcern for the closeting classroom and a compulsion for physical activity that brings Cajal harsh punishment, even imprisonment, during his youth. "I was in my childhood a wayward creature, excessively mysterious, secretive, and unlikable," he admits[16]. But while the stories of his scampishness are entertaining and endearing [think of Antoine in Truffaut's Les Quatres Cents Coups], they are counterproductive to his success. Such is the process of growing up after all, a process of pushing against one's self although it feels as weighty as the world.

             Cajal experienced this human struggle, but I will save the retelling of anecdotes. I am concerned here and now with his mental life. So, Cajal believes two predominant natural inclinations lent to his character "a somewhat strange aspect"[16]. I would forego humility and say "special." These  are: "the investigation and contemplation of natural phenomena and a certain incomprehensible antipathy for social intercourse"[16]. Cajal is a naturalist thinker and writer; his sublime descriptions of walks along the Aragon River, a central and transformative metaphor in his life, are as fine as the finest literature. He writes, beautifully:

"Often, through long hours of contemplation I fell into a sweet lethargy; the gentle murmur of the ripples and the splashing of the water as it glided over the pebbles paralyzed my pencil, insensibly clouded my eyes, and produced in my brain a state of subconsciousness favorable for fantastic recallings of the past. The sound of the stream acquired little by little a quality of martial trumpets and the swish of the wind seemed to bear from the blue shores of the past the voice of tradition overflowing with heroic ballads and golden legends[61-2]."

The man gave his attention to the infinitely small. Even the physical descriptions of his characters in Vacation Stories are testament to this devotion to detail, which reminds me of Proust and Nabokov. Yes, his inter-personal intuition, as he readily admits, is not as shining [he awkwardly refers to his father as his "progenitor"]. But in his case, it hardly matters.

            Cajal explains that at the age of seven or eight occurred three events "which had a decisive influence upon [his] later ideas and feelings"[19]. This sort of scientific organization makes factual research easy and breezy. These events almost symbolize themselves; a writer only has to add tiny but valuable insights and thin but sturdy bridges. The three events were:

1) "the commemoration of the glorious victories in Africa"[19], after the 1860 victory over the Moroccans at the Battle of Tetuan. This was a national apotheosis, and the initiation of strong and important patriotic feelings in Cajal. In the beginning, this included antipathetic instincts towards Moroccans, "the other." But later, he writes, he corrected this defect: "As time passed and I gained in understanding, I came to realize that, in respect of unjust and impetuous aggressions, all peoples are alike"[19].

2) "the falling of a thunderbolt upon the school and the church of the town"[19] which, I hardly believe, happened just as the children were "in the midst of the deep abstraction of the prayer . . . 'Lord deliver us from all evil'[19] and killed a priest. "For the first time there crossed my mind, already deeply moved," Cajal writes, "the idea of disorder and lack of harmony"[23]. The chaotic intervention explains Cajal's aversion to spiritualism, whose Good God he believes is falsely featured to be "a most tender father and a sublime artist"[23]. Fortunately, Cajal explains, he was not distracted by abstraction; he continued "strengthening the mind by continuous observation of the spectacle of nature"[24]. He exhibits an unflagging material focus.

3) "the eclipse of the sun in the year 1860," about which Cajal admits he had doubts. "Will science be mistaken?" he asks. But the moon appeared as predicted, as though the scientists had pushed it there. Scientific method managed to gain understanding of the unknown. His father drew his attention to "the kind of fear and of indefinable anxiety which takes possession of the whole of nature" when an event so seemingly "opposed to reason" occurs. How can nature be ignorant of our interests? This is Job's teleological, but essentially self-centered, question.

Summarily: "The eclipse of 1860 was a brilliant revelation for my youthful intelligence. I now realized that man, helpless and unarmed before the irresistible power of cosmic forces, possesses in science a heroic redeemer and a powerful and universal instrument of foresight and dominion"[25].

This is what a prophet of science saw and felt.

For more on these ideas, I direct you to perhaps the most powerful piece of cinema I have ever seen, the first installment of the Polish director Krzysztof Kieslowski's masterpiece The Decalogue, ten short filmic interpretations of the Ten Commandments. When a young boy and his father [like Cajal and his] choose to have faith in science, the message, from Deuteronomy 5:6, turns out to be quite different from Cajal's: Lo y'yeh l'cha elohim achairim, al pani [Thou shalt have no other gods before Me]. So thought-provoking and brilliant. Trois couleurs is a work a serious genius, too. Caveat spectator; they are profoundly moving of the innermost physical mechanisms, wrenching the heart and stirring the soul. Like the best art, they incite powerful feelings.

Interestingly, it seems to me that Kieslowski's teleological meditation, upon the existence of a cruel God, affirms Chaos theory. In his film, scientific calculation is a futile contrivance of man that fails to predict volatile nature. Cajal's interpretation of the uncontrollable, on the other hand, is positivistic. The Neuron doctrine, the fundamental idea of modern neuroscience, seems to affirm the absolute belief, which Cajal learned from his father, in free will as a tool to achieve progress. I propose a basic, but amoral, tension between Neuron theory and Chaos theory. In the brain of each individual, this struggle is constant. As capable beings, ourselves like the gods we have imagined, we have the potential to either create or destroy. I gather that the Hindu God Vishnu can represent creation and destruction. Inventors of religious story have understood this dual nature of the cosmos and the self [this is not reductive: one part of the philosophy allows for infinity].

For the utterly awful fear of God is really a fear of one's self, of that part that might "transgress." Look at how our species continues to destroy each other and our planet; we can get sick and do sick things. We invented the Apocalypse. See the warfare and the warming. The Bible contains a warning about our human nature that Kielowski inverts and updates. But the message is the same: we ought to be constantly aware of our relationship with the universe and our own ideas. Good art is reflective in that way, as a pool or a mirror. It illuminates experience, so that we can understand what exists and may impossibly attempt to define the word impossible. Cajal and Kielowski interpret omnipotent God in opposite ways, as Progress and as Chaos. Along the unraveling line of time's balled yarn, I hope that we shall at some point eventually know who reigns supreme. In the meantime, the artist must find a way to make these two chords, one major and one minor, Progress and Chaos, concord and then he must play for as long as he humanly can.

That's enough for now. I have only covered a small number of chapters from Recuerdas. Still to come are Cajal's affairs with art and his reflections upon death. I am truly enjoying this book. Cajal's fiction was admittedly [by him] mediocre, but so far his autobiography has real literary value. I will continue to share his insights. Thanks.