Grief

Passages

Every passage tagged with this emotion in the Vela corpus. Search the body text, narrow by source or register, click through to a book’s profile to see how the passage sits with the rest of the work.

Page 256 of 263 · 20 per page

• From A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (BDB) (1907)

  501-1! Je 167 cf. 2 ₪ 19° ’N עשה‎ Ez 247 (v. Co) sq. מל‎ 50 9.8180 11. bax ad fin.); for calamity, Est 4° 9” (|| 333; contr. טוב‎ DY) Tb 30% )|| קול‎ (בכים‎ 15 60% 6 1%) 06 appar.= mourning garb, sq. 7970 מעטה‎ v.also Bi Che on txt.; || רוח כָּחָה‎ contr. fie 12); 63 '*)|| NPY), Lag (|| 2), Am 55) || 72D); ef. 729) i223 א'‎ Mi 1°; =time, period of mourning 2 S11’; בִּית א‎ Ec 7° בּ'||)‎ AWD, +* (|| MY ’3); א"‎ 722 garments of mourning 2 S14”. ov Sars +. מ'‎ Sas sub 11. אבל‎ +I. bay adj. mourning—’X Gn 37° Est 6”; estr. “bay on. אַבָלִים‎ Jb 20% Is 61? ete.; ie dead Gn זר‎ calamity Est 6”, ef. fe La 1*(pred., inanim. subj.), elsewhere as subst. mourner ; sg. מב‎ + (cstr.) for dead (|| (קדר‎ ; pl. Jb 29” abs.; for calamity Is 57’* 617° (where mourners for Zion, or of Zion, v. Di). 1a אבל‎ (perh. isi eee green, ef. :ב‎ grass; Lag®** prop. jst withstand, hence bax as withstanding scorching sun (protected by trees, springs, etc. ), hence also (Lag)! camel). Das me. 1. meadow(?) 18 6 MT but‏ דנ rd. אָבֶן‎ 1 ys 6 6 WeDr. 2. n.pr.loc. city in N, Isr. 2 ₪ 20'% near Beth Maacah v*= אבל nayo na dar *'זי‎ (so alsov’* Ew Th We Klo Dr), ב" מ 5 ז‎ K op”; = אל מים‎ 2 Ch r6*(—=Abil el Kamh, wheat-meadow NW. of Dan & S. of Mu- tulleh 14015 3, הַשָטִים‎ DAN n.pr.loc.(= acacia-meadow) in lowlands of Moab Nu 33**; =DDY Nu 25' Mi 6° (=Tel Kefrein (?) Tristr & Merrill ?=8° 4th Statement, 89 : 4. כְּרָמִים‎ Dax n.pr.loc. (=vineyard-meadow) in Ammon Ju r1® (vy, Euseb. ’ABeAqpredov), 5. אָבָל מַחוּלֶה‎ n.pr.loc. (= dance-meadow) Ju 7” 1 K 4”; Elisha’s birthplace 1 ( * (v. Euseb. ’ABeApaeAar). 6. DUD אָבָל‎ n.pr.loc. (=meadow of Egypt, 1.0. fertile as Egypt?) 13. of Jordan Gn 50” (where interpr. as if מ'‎ DAN, so ₪ 8; v. Di). t אב‎ adv. 1. in older Heb. with an asseverative force, verily, of a truth Gn 42” 2 ₪ 14°91 K 1* 2 K 4, with a slight advers. force,nay,but Gn17"(P). 2. in late Heb. as a decided adversative, howbeit, but Dn 1077 Ezr 10% 2 Ch 14 19° 33” (ef. Ar. 6 of a truth, sometimes, from the context, nay rather Qor 7 82.94.110.129.149.165.261 Bi 7 etc.) III. א בל‎ (cf. Ar. Tu able to manage camels, fr. jul, coll., Sab. אבל‎ camel DH M7™6# %), 5 אוביל‎ n.pr.m. (? camel-driver), overseer of David’s camels 1 Ch 27°°. Dar, אוּבָל‎ vy, יבל‎ j28

• From The Great Believers (2018)

  Or it would have been a good sign if he didn’t know full well that he was only feeling better because they’d changed his meds and were pumping him full of pentamidine and amphotericin again—backing off those was what had let his lungs get so bad—but these treatments would end up doing his kidneys and liver in. Dr. Cheng hadn’t pulled any punches on that. One of the volunteers had told him a long time ago that whenever someone had a good breakfast, that was it—the patient only had a few hours left. He wasn’t about to have a good breakfast, but these full breaths felt as nourishing, as ominous. The haircut guys had come through today, and he’d even sat up for that, with their help, and they’d shaved the back of his neck, massaged his temples with something that smelled like mint. Fiona said, “Your eyes look so much better.” “What did they look like?” He didn’t want to know, though, because soon they’d look like that again, or worse. “Your pupils were just so dilated. It was like watching someone trapped in a tank of water. That’s probably what it felt like too.” She sighed, leaned down awkwardly to massage her swollen ankles. “You want the relaxation channel?” Rafael came in then, getting his walker stuck on the doorway so Fiona had to get up and unwedge his wheel. “I’m making a delivery,” Rafael said. “I lacquered it for you, so it’s shiny.” He was talking about the small birdseed mandala he held against the walker handle with his thumb, the one Yale had made a month ago in the art room. There was no space for Rafael’s walker between the bed and wall, so he handed it to Fiona to hand to Yale. “The art room isn’t the same since you aren’t there to play your terrible, sad British bands. That guy Calvin commandeered the stereo and it’s all fucking techno now.” Yale held the mandala, although holding anything made his arms ache. He didn’t know what he’d do with it. Send it to Teresa, maybe, in California. She still wrote him cards once a week. Rafael said, “Tonight’s the night. I’m cleared, and Blake’s picking me up in an hour.” Fiona clapped enthusiastically, and Yale didn’t know how she had it in her. “Are you ready?” she said. “Are you set up?” “Open Hand is already over there stocking the fridge, and I’m doing great off the IV.” Yale appreciated that Rafael didn’t say it apologetically. He’d been a perfect roommate. Before Rafael, Yale had shared a room with a tall man named Edward, who kept saying in a sad voice that this was the happiest he’d been in his life, that unit 371 was the first place he’d ever fit in.

• From The Great Believers (2018)

  Prior to Edward there’d been an uncomfortable straight guy, Mark; before Mark was a man named Roger, whose enormous Irish Catholic family surrounded him as PML took his motor control and his speech but left his brain function intact, at least for a while. On an early stay, Yale had roomed with a guy who had ten Dixie cups lined up on the windowsill, each with an acorn planted inside. He was trying to sprout them before he died so he could give oak trees to ten of his friends. And after all this, Yale had been lying in bed one day recovering from a lumbar puncture when they wheeled someone in on the other side of the curtain, and he heard the normal sounds—nurses explaining things about IVs, call buttons, something about the smoking deck—and then he heard someone say, “You know what I want on my Quilt panel? Just a giant pack of Camels!” Even before he called Rafael’s name and the nurse pulled back the curtain, Yale knew it was him. It had to be the most cheerfully anyone had ever checked into unit 371, but Rafael had his routine down, his favorite nurses. He knew which volunteer would read your tarot if you asked. This time he’d packed a bag of VHS tapes for the lounge, a stack of photos for the wall. It was a homecoming for him, or at least he played it like one, and Yale had the sense that if Rafael weren’t tethered to IVs, he’d have leapt out of the bed to come bite Yale’s face. For the few weeks they were together while Yale could still breathe, they’d talked every night. Old gossip, new gossip, politics, movies. When old staffers from Out Loud came to visit Rafael, they’d pretend they were there to visit Yale too. But then one morning Yale had a dream that he was swimming at the bottom of the Hull House pool, looking up but unable to surface—and when he awoke, it was to struggle for breath in a room devoid of air. “I’ll miss you,” Yale said. Rafael shrugged and said, “I mean, it’s not like I won’t be back.” Yale was tired after he left, but he’d been afraid, for the last couple of days, of falling asleep. He didn’t fear dying in his sleep—he’d take it, at this point—but waking up under water again. He wasn’t afraid to close his eyes to his last day but to close them to his last good day. And so for now he kept them open, kept Fiona talking. He asked her to sing him “Moon River,” and she said, “I still don’t know the words!” but she managed anyway, laughed her way through it. She said, “Nico would have loved it here. The art room! Can you imagine? I guess I’m picturing a version of him that would live a little longer. Like, if he got sick now and had good meds and everything.

• From The Great Believers (2018)

  She couldn’t imagine Claire falling for that, but then who knew anything at all about this stranger? Claire picked up one of a set of melamine plates with Magritte images on them, this one his pipe-that-wasn’t-a-pipe on a spring-green background. She rotated it, stared at it. Julian said, “I’ve been telling stories about your mom for years. She thought I was dead, and the whole time I was talking about her like she was Paul Bunyan. And for a long time I didn’t even know the half of what she did. I left Chicago, and she kept on going.” Claire smiled up drily at Julian. “Well, I’m what stopped her.” Fiona tried to puzzle out what she meant. Claire said, “I was born the day her friend died. Did you know that?” Fiona whispered, although it didn’t need to be whispered. “She means Yale.” And then aloud she said, “No, that’s wrong. You were born the day before. Claire, listen, did you tell Kurt that I said that was the worst day of my life? Because I never —” “It always killed me,” Claire said. She was talking only to Julian, as if Fiona weren’t there. Julian, to his credit, didn’t look panicked at being in the middle of this. Maybe he knew what he was: a void, a sounding board, a necessary presence. “There was always—when I was a kid, there was part of me that thought if only I’d been born after he died, she’d believe I was him, reincarnated or something. Then I could believe it, even. I wished I’d been born that exact instant.” Although Claire wasn’t looking at her, just at Julian and the Magritte plate, Fiona said, “It was never a competition, honey.” “Ha!” It was too loud, but no one else was listening. “That is hilarious.” Maybe this was good. Claire needed to say the meanest things she could, so they’d be out in the room instead of inside her. Still, all Fiona could think to do was cry, which wouldn’t help anything, so she managed not to. Julian took a step toward Fiona, put a hand on her back. Claire put the plate down and picked up another, this one bright sky blue with that bowler hat. Usage Externe , the hat’s label said. Julian said, “I know she did her best.” “I’m trying to do my best now ,” Fiona said. “Now that you’re a mother, don’t you—” But Claire cut in. “She only wants to move here because there’s been a disaster. She wants to swoop in and be near the drama.” Julian looked confused. Fiona said, “What I’d like to be near is my daughter and my granddaughter. I’d like to make up for maybe being a depressed, shitty mother by being a decent grandmother. I’m not asking anything in return.” Claire flipped the plate over as if she were checking the price. A thoughtful, resigned silence. “You might not resolve this all in the gift shop,” Julian said.

• From The Great Believers (2018)

  Claire said, “I can’t control where you live. If you move here, you move here.” It was as good as Fiona could hope to get from her, for now. “Can I interject something,” Julian said, “as we head for the escalators? Because it’s probably time to head for the escalators.” Claire blinked and put the plate down, and they walked out across the broad lobby. He said, “Everyone knows how short life is. Fiona and I know it especially. But no one ever talks about how long it is. And it’s—does that make sense? Every life is too short, even the long ones, but some people’s lives are too long as well. I mean—maybe that won’t make sense till you’re older.” He stepped onto the escalator first, and he rode backward to face them. He said, “If we could just be on earth at the same place and same time as everyone we loved, if we could be born together and die together, it would be so simple. And it’s not. But listen: You two are on the planet at the same time. You’re in the same place now. That’s a miracle. I just want to say that.” Claire was behind her, so Fiona couldn’t see her face, but she could feel her energy—she’d had so much practice, and it was all coming back—and at the very least, she could feel that Claire wasn’t annoyed, wasn’t rolling her eyes and wondering who this asshole was with his motivational speech. As for herself, she was grateful. She hadn’t remembered Julian being this smart, but she hadn’t been smart back then either. Thirty years could do a lot. They were nearing the top. “Turn around,” she said, “before you trip.” 1992For the first time in three weeks, he could breathe. Not well, but well enough that he could get out whole strings of words, whole thoughts and sentences. When he’d been so certain, only yesterday, that this was it, that each breath had only one or two more behind it. Part of him thought he should hoard each breath, save it for tomorrow, but mostly he wanted to talk while he still could, say things he wouldn’t be able to say later. Fiona was in the chair beside the bed. Eight months pregnant, barely, and still so small—if she’d worn a baggy enough shirt, you wouldn’t have known. When she got to nine months, she’d promised him, she wouldn’t risk the drive from Madison. But it had become increasingly clear in the last week that she might not go back up there at all before he died. The cannula was tickling his nose and he managed to adjust it without sneezing; sneezing would hurt. It was pizza night—Pat’s donated every week—and Fiona was eating a slice of pepperoni. Yale hadn’t had solid food in weeks, but this was the first time he felt a bit jealous watching someone else eat—a good sign.

• From The Myth Made Fact: Reading Greek and Roman Mythology through Christian Eyes (2020)

  A moment later, she was dead, and her soul, grieving, descended to Hades (HAY dees). Orpheus mourned her for many days, but he refused to accept that her death was final. For a full year, he wandered the earth in search of the pitiless bronze doorway to the underworld. In the end, he found that most desolate of spots and passed, unalarmed, down the endless stairway to Hades. Though the moaning of the spirits of the dead caused Orpheus’s face to grow pale with fear, he pressed on bravely until he stood before Hades himself, the lord of the underworld. He begged the dread king to give him back his Eurydice, but Hades refused. It was then that Orpheus lifted his lyre and began to play an enchanting tune. As he played, he sang a song of love, of its promised bliss and its overwhelming power. For, had Hades himself not been impelled by love to kidnap Persephone (per SEF oh nee) and take her as his bride? With each stroke of the strings, the atmosphere of Hades altered and changed. The spirits’ moaning subsided, and the perpetual fog lifted. The Furies, who had never known pity, began to weep and beat their breasts in response. Sisyphus (SIS i fiss), condemned forever to roll a boulder up a hill, only to have it roll back each time he reached the summit, ceased his endless labor and climbed up on his rock. There he sat, his chin resting on his fist, and stared at Orpheus in wonder. Hades the heartless, the unmovable, rose from his throne and granted the musician’s request. Orpheus could lead his beloved Eurydice back up the stairs to the world of light and life, but on one condition: he must not look back at his bride until she had ascended the last stair. For most of that long, slow ascent, Orpheus kept his eyes fixed before him, yearning for the light. But as he neared the top of the staircase, he was seized by fear and doubt, thinking that perhaps Hades had fooled him and Eurydice was not behind him. What harm would it do to take a quick glance? Alas, Orpheus, that glance was fatal. Even as you reached out your hand to your beloved, a cold wind blew her down, down into the darkness of hell. — Ovid, Metamorphoses , Book X R eflections When the pagan allegorists of the ancient world read the tale of Orpheus and Eurydice, they discerned in it, as they did in the tale of Odysseus and Circe, a deeper spiritual meaning that could be used to train initiates in the way of truth and virtue. But they were not the only writers to do so.

• From A Hebrew and English Lexicon of the Old Testament (BDB) (1907)

  dimu, dimtu Epi Sete Glos i, Zim 2y3 2 Aram. NYT, bso}; NH YO, *80ץץ ד' .08ג- - (דּמְעָה‎ + סז‎ 6; cstr, דִּמְעַת‎ He 4' ; '6ץ דִּמְעָתִי:‎ + 4t.; WYOI 2 K 20*= 18 38°+ Ez 24% (del. G Co); בּמָעָתָהּ‎ La 1°; pl. דמָעוּת‎ y 80° La 2"—tears ץצ‎ 67 Ke 41 La 1? 2"; esp. in Je. in phrase תרד‎ "I PY etc. 7607 13% 14", cf. La 2%; Je8 PP / מקור‎ ; ‘NYT WW of weeping over, in be- half of one Is16°; as appealing to God’s com- passion 2 K 20°=Is 38° 739"; שימָה ד' 56° ץ‎ INIA (cf. Che); v. also p 116° Je 31 Is 25°; opp. 737 y 126°; of hypocritical tears Mal 2”; fie. tears as food p42" ) לחם‎ ‘nyt; ד'‎ pnd 80°; as drink 80°, cf. Babyl. dimtwu mastit?, tears (were) my drink (Zim*?*” ; || bikitwm kurmati, weeping (was) my sustenance). — Ez 24"° ולא‎ YT sian del. G Co cf. v™. 1 דמשק‎ n.pr.loc. Damascus (As. Dimaski, Dimaski, D1 292 Schr 007 6015.26 ABK 9% Ji poy BAS Hag Nis 5 Goa Aram. X Onk, etc. punt, Ps-Jon ררמשק‎ ; wcens0d9)—PYT 1K 11 + 28t.; PYBIGn 14” + 8t.; PITT 1 Ch 18*+ Bite hs pena 2Ch 24% 28°; pura 2K 16"; pyny Am 3" v. foll., Vrss. P¥'3'1;—ancient Ara- maean city, situated lat. 33° 30’ N., long. 36° 15’ E., in plain E. of Hermon & SE. of Anti- Lebanon; on the Nahr Baradé (Gk. Chrysor- rhoas); mod. Dimishk & Esh-Sham, Rob?™"“°*- Bd?!9, Damascus Gn14’ Am 5” 1 K 11 2K 14% Ct7°; soalso prob.Gn157 (perh.glossef. Di), (Am 3” v. 1011.( ; a trading-centre Ez 27"; as capital & residence of king of Aram 1 K 15" = 2 Chr6?, cf. 1K 20" 2 K 169-1010-1-1112 5 Ch 28° Is Hee 8 Io? (cf. Peters®*™ April 1885, *y ₪ Je 4947; including also surrounding territory Bz 47% of. we 4S hen mann ד‎ Ky 19”: נהרות די‎ 2 K 5”;= kingdom Am 1°° ef. Zc 9'; דמשק once (late) 7 22 2 Ch 24%; note also “7 DIS 28 8*%= 1 Ch 187%; further 7 oN 2 Ch 28” (JUNE "20 להי‎ punct.‏ ;733 עָרָש ”3 n.[m.]? Am‏ דמשקז mng. dub.: all ancient Vrss Pyrat, and so‏ & Pusey Hoffm 74¥" (‘in Damascus on a‏ couch’) al., yet this hardly suitable in context ;‏ Thes Hi Ew Baur Ke Gunning RY al. follow‏ MT, & render’ damask, silk, etc. (Ar. |‏ (Ar. S29) disputed ;‏ דמָשק connex. with city‏ is by metath. from‏ ככ | ace. to Fra" Ar,‏ this a loan-word from Syr. |mat.co,‏ & 53-5-) this from Gk. pérafa (Old Lat. metaxa)).‏ & {7 v. sub .דין‎ O07 v. sub דין‎ ay )/ of 1011., mng. unknown).

• From Bright Lights, Big City (1984)

  He puts his arm around your shoulders. “I just realized something.” “What’s that?” “You and Amanda would make a terrific couple.” “I suppose that means that you get Odysseus all to yourself.” “Later, Tad.” A set of bedrooms is tucked away in a corner of the loft. The first two rooms are full of coke fiends and earnest conversers. The third is free, and a phone sits on a table beside the bed. You find the number in your wallet. “What time is it?” Vicky says after you identify yourself. “Where are you?” “It’s late. I’m in New York. I just wanted to talk.” “Let me guess; you’re with Tad.” “I was with Tad.” “It’s a little late for a chat. Is something wrong?” “I just wanted to tell you my mom died.” You hadn’t meant to be so abrupt. You are moving too fast. “Oh, God,” Vicky says. “I’m sorry. I didn’t know she was … when?” “A year ago.” The Missing Person. “A year ago?” “I didn’t tell you before so I wanted to tell you now. It seemed important.” “I’m sorry.” “It’s all right. It’s not so bad. I mean, it was.” You can’t manage to say what you mean. “I wish you could’ve met her. You would’ve hit it off. She had hair like yours. Not just that.” “I’m not sure what to say.” “There’s something else I didn’t tell you. I got married. Bad mistake, but it’s all over. I wanted you to know, in case it makes a difference. I’m drunk. Do you think I should hang up?” In the ensuing pause you can hear the faint hum of the long-distance wire. “Don’t hang up,” Vicky says. “I can’t think of anything to say right now, but I’m here. I’m a little confused.” “I tried to block her out of my mind. But I think I owe it to her to remember.” “Wait. Who? ” “My mother. Forget my wife. I’m talking about my mother. I was thinking today, after she found out she had cancer, she was talking to Michael and me …” “Michael?” “That’s my brother. She made us promise that if the pain became unbearable we’d help her, you know, end it all. We had this prescription for morphine so there was this option. But then it got really bad. I asked her and she said that when you were dying you had a responsibility to the living. I was amazed she said that, the way she felt. And I was just thinking that we have a responsibility to the dead—the living, I mean. Does this make any sense?” “Maybe. I can’t tell, really,” Vicky says. “Can I call tomorrow?” “Yes, tomorrow.

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  The revivability in memory of the emotions, like that of all the feelings of the lower senses, is very small. We can remember that we underwent grief or rapture, but not just how the grief or rapture felt. This difficult ideal revivability is, however, more than compensated in the case of the emotions by a very easy actual revivability. That is, we can produce, not remembrances of the old grief or rapture, but new griefs and raptures, by summoning up a lively thought of their exciting cause. The cause is now only an idea, but this idea produces the same organic irradiations, or almost the same, which were produced by its original, so that the emotion is again a reality. We have 'recaptured' it. Shame, love, and anger are particularly liable to be thus revived by ideas of their object. Professor Bain admits[434] that "in their strict character of emotion proper, they [the emotions] have the minimum of revivability; but being always incorporated with the sensations of the higher senses, they share in the superior revivability of sights and sounds." But he fails to point out that the revived sights and sounds may be ideal without ceasing to be distinct; whilst the emotion, to be distinct, must become real again. Prof. Bain seems to forget that an 'ideal emotion' and a real emotion prompted by an ideal object are two very different things.

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  Hearing the same expression from another revives the associated feeling, and we sympathize , i.e. grieve or are glad with him. The other social affections, Benevolence , Conscientiousness , Ambition , etc., arise in like manner by the transfer of the bodily pleasure experienced as a reward for social service, and hence associated with it, to the act of service itself, the link of reward being dropped out. Just so Avarice when the miser transfers the bodily pleasures associated with the spending of money to the money itself, dropping the link of spending. Fear is a transfer of the bodily hurt associated by experience with the thing feared, to the thought of the thing, with the precise features of the hurt left out. Thus we fear a dog without distinctly imagining his bite. Love is the association of the agreeableness of certain sensible experiences with the idea of the object capable of affording them. The experiences themselves may cease to be distinctly imagined after the notion of their pleasure has been transferred to the object, constituting love there-for. Volition is the association of ideas of muscular motion with the ideas of those pleasures which the motion produces. The motion at first occurs automatically and results in a pleasure unforeseen. The latter becomes so associated with the motion that whenever we think of it the idea of the motion arises; and the idea of the motion when vivid causes the motion to occur. This is an act of will. Nothing is easier than for a philosopher of this school to explain from experience such a notion as that of infinitude. "He sees in it an ordinary manifestation of one of the laws of the association of ideas,—the law that the idea of a thing irresistibly suggests the idea of any other thing which has been often experienced in close conjunction with it, and not otherwise. As we have never had experience of any point of space without other points beyond it, nor of any point of time without others following it, the law of indissoluble association makes it impossible for us to think of any point of space or time, however distant, without having the idea irresistibly realized, in imagination, of other points still more remote. And thus the supposed original and inherent property of these two ideas is completely explained and accounted for by the law of association; and we are enabled to see that if Space or Time were really susceptible of termination, we should be just as unable as we now are to conceive the idea."[499] These examples of the Associationist Psychology are with the exception of the last, very crudely expressed, but they suffice for our temporary need. Hartley and James Mill[500] improved upon Hume so far as to employ but a single principle of association, that of contiguity or habit.

• From A Way of Being (1980)

  could still mourn for him. Ann, who was near her, embraced and comforted her. After a long time she quieted down, and then in an almost inaudible voice, asked Carl if she could hold his hand. He reached out and she came across the circle and fell into his arms and her whole body shook with sobs as he held her close. Slowly she felt better and sat between Carl and Natalie, saying to Carl, “And you look like him too, but I never realized that was what I was feeling.” As the three sat there with their arms around each other, someone remarked on how much alike Nancy and Natalie looked. They could be sisters. Carl said, “Here we are, sitting for a family portrait.” Nancy said, “But they’ll ask, ‘Why is that girl in the middle sitting there with such a big smile on her face?’” and the incident was rounded off as the whole group joined in her sparkling laughter of release and relief. Carl’s Comments, Later I was very much involved personally and emotionally in this incident, which has, I believe, been quite accurately described. I have also thought about it much since. It is temptingly easy to diagnose the causes of the incident: Nancy, repressing her pain at losing her father, and seeing a good daughter-father relationship, projects her pain onto Natalie. First, she distorts an incident so she can be angry at Natalie; then she distortedly expresses her pain through anger at Natalie’s close relationship with another woman, and on and on. To me, such “explanations” are irrelevant. However, when I try to view the incident from another perspective, it exemplifies many aspects of the existential dynamics of change in personality and behavior. 1 . It shows clearly the depth to which feelings can be buried, so that they are totally unknown to the owner. Here, it is particularly interesting because it was obvious to Nancy and to the group that she was feeling something very deeply. Yet she was clearly labeling this feeling in ways that were not truly meaningful. The organism closes itself to the pain of recognizing a feeling clearly, if doing so would involve reorganizing the concept of self in some significant way. 2 . It is a splendid example of how the flow of experiencing (Gendlin’s concept) is used as a referent for discovering the felt meaning. Nancy tried on the various descriptions and labels that were given to her, and they didn’t “fit.” Didn’t fit what? Clearly it is some ongoing organismic event against which she is checking. But when Ann told of her own feelings, thereby pointing at another possibility, Nancy realized immediately and

• From The Fixed Stars (0)

  The diagnosis came the week that I started graduate school, and my father would die ten weeks after. I took a leave of absence and went home for most of those weeks. I’d grown up around death: first my uncle Jerry died of AIDS, and then, fifteen months later, my mother’s younger sister died of cancer. Then my grandfather Joe passed away, and then an aunt by marriage. This was all before I was out of my teens. But my father’s death was the first time I felt grief inside my own skin. I didn’t know what to do with it, how to keep from bursting open as I watched my father’s body fail on a rented hospital bed in the living room. I remember going into the kitchen one afternoon and hoisting myself onto the counter. I sat there and stared out the window at his unused car in the driveway. I started to cry, and then I cried so hard that my hands went numb, and then my arms too. Family friends were supposed to be coming over for a visit. I heard the doorbell ring, but I couldn’t stop. The house echoed with my strange, croaking sobs. My mother appeared at some point, eased me off the counter, and wrapped me in a coat. One of my cousins was with us that week, and my mother handed her the car keys and pointed us out the side door. My cousin drove me around, around and around the neighborhood, until I could breathe again. A few nights later we stood at my father’s bed, rubbing his knobby knees through the blankets, and watched him leave. Back in Seattle, I tried to stay the course. I reenrolled in school. Aaron moved in, and we were elated. But living together opened up cracks in our relationship. My grief was a third person in the bed. It was exhausting and sad. 7When Brandon and I met a couple of years later, everything felt so good, so easy, so unlike anything that came before. Everything was possible. Can I be someone who can live with this? Yes, I can. Brandon and I talked sometimes about having kids. He loved children, had grown up with two sisters and many cousins, and he’d always imagined himself as a father, maybe even a stay-at-home dad. I was undecided. I’d never been able to see myself as a mother, had never wanted it. He’d known where I stood from the beginning, and it had never been a sticking point. Nothing was decided. There was plenty of time, and there was so much else to our lives: I was a writer, and he was a chef, and we had a restaurant. Nothing was obviously missing.

• From The Principles of Psychology (Volume 1 of 2) (1890)

  All he is entitled to say is: "Without memory no consciousness known outside of itself." Of the sort of consciousness that is an object for later states, and becomes as it were permanent, he gives a good example: "Who of us, alas! has not experienced a bitter and profound grief, the immense laceration caused by the death of some cherished fellow- being? Well, in these great griefs the present endures neither for a minute, for an hour, nor for a day, but for weeks and months. The memory of the cruel moment will not efface itself from consciousness. It disappears not, but remains living, present, coexisting with the multitude of other sensations which are juxtaposed in consciousness alongside of this one persistent emotion which is felt always in the present tense. A long time is needed ere we can attain to forgetting it, ere we can make it enter into the past. Hæret lateri letalis arundo." (Ibid 583.) [562] This is the primary positive after-image. According to Helmholtz, one third of a second is the most favorable length of exposure to the light for producing it. Longer exposure, complicated by subsequent admission of light to the eye, results in the ordinary negative and complementary after-images, with their changes, which may (if the original impression was brilliant and the fixation long) last for many minutes. Fechner gives the name of memory-after-images (Psychophysik, II 492) to the instantaneous positive effects, and distinguishes them from ordinary after images by the following characters: 1) Their originals must have been attended to only such parts of a compound original as have been attended to appearing. This is not the case in common visual after-images. 2) The strain of attention towards them is inward, as in ordinary remembering, not outward, as in observing a common after-image. 3) A short fixation of the original is better for the memory-after-image, a long one for the ordinary after-image. 4) The colors of the memory-after-image are never complementary of those of the original. [563] Hermann's Hdbch., II. 2. 282. [564] Rev. Philos., 562. [565] Richet says: "The present has a certain duration, a variable duration, sometimes a rather long one, which comprehends all the time occupied by the after-reverberation [retentissement, after-image] of a sensation. For example, if the reverberation of an electric shock within our nerves lasts ten minutes, for that electric shock there is a present of ten minutes. On the other hand, a feebler sensation will have a shorter present. But in every case, for a conscious sensation [I should say for a remembered sensation] to occur, there must be a present of a certain duration, of a few seconds at least." We have seen in the last chapter that it is hard to trace the backward limits of this immediately intuited duration, or specious present. The figures which M. Richet supposes appear to be considerably too large. [566] Cf.

• From A Way of Being (1980)

  The Louisville program was initiated by Dr. Newman Walker, the superintendent, who was employed by a desperate Board of Education to try to renovate a rapidly deteriorating inner-city school system. In addition to human-relations labs for the Board of Education and all of the faculty and administration, Walker introduced all kinds of innovations: open classrooms, neighborhood school boards composed of parents and teachers, and other new ideas. He trusted students, teachers, parents, school-board members, and even the violent critics from the John Birch Society. There was a period, as in the Immaculate Heart project, of a high degree of turbulence and chaos. Gradually this diminished, and by the end of three years, a highly innovative school system was running with as much smoothness as could be expected in a large organization. Morale was excellent. (A more complete account is contained in Foster & Back, 1974.) Then, a tragic set of circumstances, having nothing to do with the innovative policies in the system, brought an end to the whole experiment. Walker had brought a full quota of blacks into the faculty and administration, but the pupils were predominantly black. So a court order merged the inner-city system with the very conservative county system, composed of the white suburban population. The two philosophies of education were antithetical, and Walker was forced to resign. There were violent antibusing riots—an “unholy mess” of antagonistic events. They were sufficient to bury the growingly successful enterprise. Many of the innovative teachers left. Only one neighborhood school board managed to survive—its powers greatly curtailed. Thus was brought to an end a most promising adventure in a large educational system.

• From A Way of Being (1980)

  3. NANCY MOURNS While it is fresh in my feelings, I want to write about an incident that occurred recently in a large workshop. It was a seventeen-day workshop consisting of seventy very diverse people, focused on cognitive and experiential learning. All had been in encounter groups for six sessions in the first six days. There had been special-interest topical groups and almost daily meetings of all seventy people. These community meetings had become deeper and more trusting. This episode occurred on the eighth day in a morning community meeting. The Episode (This portion is written in the third person because it is the product of several people. I prepared a first draft, then showed it to the major participants, each of whom corrected or rewrote the portion describing his or her own feelings and behavior to make it conform to his or her perception of reality. Consequently, I believe the account is as accurate a picture as can be obtained. All names are disguised except those of my daughter Natalie and my own.) The group had been discussing, with great sensitivity and listening to all points of view, the issue raised by the fact that some people had brought visitors to the community sessions. Nancy had been one of these people, having brought her husband to the previous meeting, but she was not present this morning. A consensus was finally reached that in the future (without criticizing any person up to this point), anyone thinking of bringing a visitor should first raise the question with the community. The group passed on to another issue. At this point Nancy arrived, very late. Ralph, trying to be helpful, quickly described to her the conclusion we had reached. None of us gave Nancy the opportunity to respond, though evidently she tried. The group went on in its discussion. After a few moments, someone sitting close to Nancy called attention to the fact that she was shaking and crying, and the community immediately gave her space for her feelings. At first it seemed that she felt criticized, but Maria gave her a more complete description of what had gone on, and she seemed to accept that she was not being blamed or criticized. But still she was trembling, and was very upset because she felt she had been cut off. It was not the first time, she said; she had felt cut off before. Encouraged to say more, she turned to Natalie, Carl’s daughter, and said, “I’ve felt you as very

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  Champel is a little bill south of Geneva with a fine view on one of the loveliest paradises of nature.1196 There was prepared a funeral pile hidden in part by the autumnal leaves of the oak trees. The Lord Lieutenant and the herald on horseback, both arrayed in the insignia of their office, arrive with the doomed man and the old pastor, followed by a small procession of spectators. Farel invites Servetus to solicit the prayers of the people and to unite his prayers with theirs. Servetus obeys in silence. The executioner fastens him by iron chains to the stake amidst the fagots, puts a crown of leaves covered with sulphur on his head, and binds his book by his side. The sight of the flaming torch extorts from him a piercing shriek of "misericordias" in his native tongue. The spectators fall back with a shudder. The flames soon reach him and consume his mortal frame in the forty-fourth year of his fitful life. In the last moment he is heard to pray, in smoke and agony, with a loud voice: "Jesus Christ, thou Son of the eternal God, have mercy upon me!"1197 This was at once a confession of his faith and of his error. He could not be induced, says Farel, to confess that Christ was the eternal Son of God. The tragedy ended when the clock of St. Peter’s struck twelve. The people quietly dispersed to their homes. Farel returned at once to Neuchâtel, even without calling on Calvin. The subject was too painful to be discussed. The conscience and piety of that age approved of the execution, and left little room for the emotions of compassion. But two hundred years afterwards a distinguished scholar and minister of Geneva echoed the sentiments of his fellow-citizens when he said: "Would to God that we could extinguish this funeral pile with our tears."1198 Dr. Henry, the admiring biographer of Calvin, imagines an impartial Christian jury of the nineteenth century assembled on Champel, which would pronounce the judgment on Calvin, "Not guilty"; on Servetus, "Guilty, with extenuating circumstances."1199 The flames of Champel have consumed the intolerance of Calvin as well as the heresy of Servetus. § 156. The Character of Servetus. Servetus—theologian, philosopher, geographer, physician, scientist, and astrologer—was one of the most remarkable men in the history of heresy. He was of medium size, thin and pale, like Calvin, his eyes beaming with intelligence, and an expression of melancholy and fanaticism. Owing to a physical rupture he was never married. He seems never to have had any particular friends, and stood isolated and alone.

• From A Way of Being (1980)

  Can Learning Encompass both Ideas and Feelings? This chapter ranges widely over the field of education, from a definition of whole-person learning, to a plan for a radical change in teacher education, to some of the research carried out on the effects of teachers’ attitudes on students’ learning. But I believe that underlying these different topics, there is a unified theme: the value of combining experiential with cognitive learning. This topic has long been of intense interest to me. I deplore the manner in which, from early years, the child’s education splits him or her: the mind can come to school, and the body is permitted, peripherally, to tag along, but the feelings and emotions can live freely and expressively only outside of school. I wrote this paper to show that it is not only feasible to permit the whole child to come to school, with feelings as well as intellect, but that learning is thereby enhanced. This chapter mentions experiences with the Immaculate Heart high school and college system, in Los Angeles, and with the inner-city school system of Louisville, Kentucky. In an epilogue to the chapter, I give an updated report on each of these situations. ... In classes and seminars I have tried to communicate ideas and intellectual concepts to others. In psychotherapy and in encounter groups I have facilitated personal learnings in the realm of feelings—the experiencing, often at a nonverbal gut level, of the important emotional events going on in the organism. But I cannot be satisfied with these two separate kinds of learning. There should be a place for learning by the whole person, with feelings and ideas merged. I have given much thought to this question of bringing together cognitive learning, which has always been needed, and affective-experiential learning, which is so underplayed in education today. Since I am using abstract terms, let me illustrate this merged kind of learning with a personal example. For four years I have been trying to grow two beautiful golden-leaved shrubs at either side of the entrance to our driveway. Recently they have, at long last, been really thriving. Then the other day I was in a hurry. I backed quickly down the driveway, swung the wheel, hit something, and stopped the car. To my horror, the rear wheel had gone right over the center of one of this shrubs. My

• From History of the Christian Church: The Complete Set of Eight Volumes (1858)

  His father, Gérard Cauvin, a man of hard and severe character, occupied a prominent position as apostolic secretary to the bishop of Noyon, proctor in the Chapter of the diocese, and fiscal procurator of the county, and lived on intimate terms with the best families of the neighborhood.384 His mother, Jeanne Lefranc, of Cambrai, was noted for her beauty and piety, but died in his early youth, and is not mentioned in his letters. The father married a second time. He became involved in financial embarrassment, and was excommunicated, perhaps on suspicion of heresy. He died May 26 (or 25), 1531, after a long sickness, and would have been buried in unconsecrated soil but for the intercession of his son, Charles, who gave security for the discharge of his father’s obligations.385 Calvin had four brothers and two sisters.386 Two of his brothers died young, the other two received a clerical education, and were early provided with benefices through the influence of the father. Charles, his elder brother, was made chaplain of the cathedral in 1518, and curé of Roupy, but became a heretic or infidel, was excommunicated in 1531, and died Oct. 1, 1537, having refused the sacrament on his death-bed. He was buried by night between the four pillars of a gibbet.387 His younger brother, Antoine, was chaplain at Tournerolle, near Traversy, but embraced the evangelical faith, and, with his sister, Marie, followed the Reformer to Geneva in 1536. Antoine kept there a bookstore, received the citizenship gratuitously, on account of the merits of his brother (1546), was elected a member of the Council of Two Hundred (1558), and of the Council of the Sixty (1570), also one of the directors of the hospital, and died in 1573. He was married three times, and divorced from his second wife, the daughter of a refugee, on account of her proved adultery (1557). Calvin had innocently to suffer for this scandal, but made him and his five children chief heirs of his little property.388 The other sister of Calvin was married at Noyon, and seems to have remained in the Roman Catholic Church. A relative and townsman of Calvin, Pierre Robert, called Olivetan, embraced Protestantism some years before him, and studied Greek and Hebrew with Bucer at Strassburg in 1528.389 He joined Farel in Neuchatel, and published there his French translation of the Bible in 1535. More than a hundred years after Calvin’s death, another member of the family, Eloi Cauvin, a Benedictine monk, removed from Noyon to Geneva, and embraced the Reformed religion (June 13, 1667).390 These and other facts show the extent of the anti-papal sentiment in the family of Cauvin. In 1561 a large number of prominent persons of Noyon were suspected of heresy, and in 1562 the Chapter of Noyon issued a profession of faith against the doctrines of Calvin.391 After the death of Calvin, Protestantism was completely crushed out in his native town.

• From The Great Believers (2018)

  That was the beginning of the end. They—it was a home birth, and it didn’t go very well.” “Oh. Oh God, honey.” “I was bleeding a lot, like a lot , and they wouldn’t let me call an ambulance. So Kurt stole the car—there was one car—and he drove us. I nearly died. I was in the hospital for a week. They took us back though, after that. I think they figured we could’ve sued them.” Your mother was supposed to be there when you had a baby, was supposed to yell at doctors for you and make sure you were resting. If Fiona had allowed her own mother in the hospital, would things have gone differently? Would her mother have insisted on putting baby Claire on her chest, making sure they bonded as they slept? The thought hit her hard, right in the abdomen, and so did the realization that what Claire had done to her was exactly what she’d done to her own mother. She hadn’t even thought to call her mother till Claire was two days old. She’d—oh, God. “How did you pay the hospital bill?” “Um. We didn’t pay it, actually. Like, we got out of there before they tracked us down.” “That’s when you left?” “Nicolette was a month old. We waited around and gathered some cash. I mean, we weren’t supposed to have our own money, but Kurt would run the till at the farmers’ market, so. And he wrote to this friend in Paris who helped us. Which is who he ended up marrying.” “Honey,” Fiona said, “I’m just glad you’re out.” She meant both things—the cult and the relationship. Claire said, “I was working in an art supply shop for a while.” She smiled. “You would’ve liked it. It’s been around for two hundred years. Monet bought his brushes there.” “Which one?” Claire looked at her strangely—why would Fiona know the names of art supply shops in Paris?—and instead of telling her she’d searched them all, looking for her, Fiona said, “Aunt Nora might have shopped there.” Claire said, “It was a good job. And then Kurt stole from the store. He came in when I was closing up, and he took stuff, a bunch of times. I didn’t know he was doing it. I still got fired. But I didn’t get arrested. He did. Which is when we broke up.” “Is he on drugs?” “He’s totally clean now. I wouldn’t let him watch Nicolette if he weren’t.” Fiona gave her a look. Claire said, “Mo-o-om.” An imitation of a whiny teenager. It would have been funnier if she hadn’t been a teenager the last time Fiona saw her. She said, “What brings you to Paris?” No irony in her voice. Fiona said, “I just thought it would be fun to spend three years and several thousand dollars tracking down my daughter.

• From The Great Believers (2018)

  So half the time it didn’t matter, because Nico was out of it. What we realized at the very end was he had lymphoma of the central nervous system, and these idiot doctors missed it and gave him steroids, which was the worst thing. But it reduced the brain swelling at first, so for a couple days he had these lucid windows. He’d reemerge for ten minutes, and then he’d be gone again. So he’s lucid one day and the nurse comes and stands there, and she’s got this smug little face, and she starts reading the menu from the doorway. Julian’s in there with me, and Nico’s alert, and the nurse goes, ‘Spaghetti with meatballs.’ So Julian stands at the foot of Nico’s bed and repeats it in this theater voice, like he’s playing a Shakespearean king, and then he does—it was somewhere between pantomime and an interpretive dance. This whole thing about spaghetti, twining it around his fork, slurping the noodles. And the nurse just has this look on her face, like, This is why you’re all sick, look at this faggy behavior. Julian goes right up and peers over her shoulder at the menu, and he announces the next thing, which is chicken salad, and he does a chicken dance. He does the whole menu like that while the nurse stands there.” “That’s awesome.” “No. It was sad and awful. It was the last time my brother was awake.” “Can I ask what happened to him? To Julian?” “What the fuck do you think happened?” “Fiona, you’re—” “He was an actor with no family and no health insurance, and he could’ve gotten some decent support at least if he’d stayed in Chicago, if he’d stuck around till the drugs came out, but instead he took off and died alone and I don’t even know where.” “You’re bleeding.” “What?” “Your hand.” She looked down. The empty champagne flute, which she’d been holding tightly, was cracked. A droplet of blood ran down her right wrist and another ran down the outside of the glass. When she peeled her hand back, the whole glass fell apart, shattering onto the floor. The room went gray at the edges, and voices closed in. Corinne was there, holding a towel under her hand, guiding her to a wallpapered little bathroom with golden faucets, sitting her on the closed toilet. Now Corinne’s husband was kneeling in front of Fiona with a pair of tweezers, slowly picking out the shards embedded all over her palm. “I’m so embarrassed,” she said when everything was back in focus, when Corinne had left to clean up the mess. “This is not allowed.” His voice was phlegmy and deep. There was something regal about the top of his bent head, his gel-combed white hair. Fernand , she reminded herself. Fernand the important critic. Nothing here was recognizable as her own life. This man, this room, this blood.