Being present, and then?

You wake up and find yourself back; you scrape yourself together innerly. Or, you open your mouth and there is milk coming in or a spoon with apple-sauce or a stray fly. There is always something that demands a reaction, perhaps something that you have to resist. Just by the simple fact of being there, of walking around, a human being is compelled to continually adapt his balance to the circumstances.
 

The first dynamic layer: presence

Actually, with every form of contact with the environment, however simple it may be, exchange of energy is taking place. A human being exists in a situation of interdependence. Whether it is anger or charm that is coming up to him, openness towards the environment with its sensorial impressions requires of a person continual apposition of old images and correction of one's equilibrium. Presence in the world demands that of us, as self-regulating systems, and makes us, alert or not, desire a firm base and securities. That is, in short, what has been dealt with last time. The previous theme INNER STABILITY and language use, with the stories 'Exclude' and 'Alienation', was an illustration of this (hypo)thetic form of energy exchange.
 

The second layer of dynamic relations: play

In this part of the themes line I lift the antithetic forms of dynamic interaction, that is dialectics between individual and environment, out of the network of connections. Here the human being takes, intuitively and instinctively, the initiative in his own hand. He needs to achieve an overview of himself and of his environment. He wants to find out of what use and value, the possibilities and qualities of his body, of men and situations are. He starts for himself to challenge, he plays with himself and with his environment, he learns to assess risks, he exercises his courage and muscles, collects and preserves material of experience. He just does and only names the experiences at a later point; at this moment the good and evil of things is of no importance. Homo ludens is the playing human being, the individual who plays with incertainties, looks for experiences in order to, afterwards, get an idea of their meaning and value and to base his choice thereupon [ note ]. This second theme, PLAY FOR VALUES, in a situation of interdependence ánd equivalence by which it is inevitable that respect is always at stake, is also to be illustrated with two stories. But first some essential information about its structure.
 

The axes of interests and of the place in the group

The second layer, the antithetic, comprises the own initiatives for the development of one's own values and of one's proper place in the world. This is also a dynamic combination of two sets of extremes crossing each other at a right angle. In the |2|-|8| axis of inner values my inner interest is confronted with the interest of the other or the general, the attention for my personal interests opposes the attention for other, or more general, interests, their essence and the choices possible. These are the tools to gain experience on this inner field in order to be able to, later, weigh them against ethic or other frameworks of - familiar or new - values. In the |5|-|11| axis of the place in the social group the testing and challenging individual is confronted with acceptation and social development. These are the tools with which to collect experience and courage in this creatieve area in the environment and to determine later on a place in social frameworks of respect - giving or demanding. These are two combinations of antithetic instruments whereby the person intuitively searches for the essential, actively creates and seizes his possibilities and trains his courage. This is indeed about practising, using possibilities we run into, experiencing and offering resistance, testing of tools and capacities which we may need in our situation of dependence.

Playing with stability, challenging securities. In this layer the body of experience regarding important human needs and capacities is being ever further extended. In other words: playing leads to experiences with your own values and with the values of other people, with laws and obligations and to a better survey later. Playing is the means with which trust and principles, respect and resilience can be developed [ note ]. Therefore, play will show different nuances and vary from fair to false, it can be played wittingly or unwittingly and cover every imaginable domain. A question can be taken as a challenge and lead to friendship, the challenge of a hooligan or from a political leader can end in homicide or war. The precondition of active participation in a play is inner room for play, it includes both earnestness and confidence, the purpose is to be surprised and to relish a new experience.
We must however not forget that every 'performance', also in play, actually starts at the hypothetic level.
 

The third dynamic layer: elaborate on possibilities and perfection

The network of connections within the self-organising system, within the process, has several dimensions [ note ]. This, the dialectic dimension, comprises three parts. Besides the hypothetic and the antithetic part now under discussion there is the synthetic layer. Therein personal stability and security shall come into play both unconsciously and overtly: the experiences are placed in suitable frameworks in order to be able to compare their values, to weigh their importance! After all, to have an overview is not necessarily to have insight, to that end the experienced matter has yet to be elaborated. This is the human who takes care of his business, wants to discern problems, uses and develops existing frameworks and, in this way, is able to find solutions and can become more conscious of his usefulness and importance for his environment. That's the purpose of the synthetic instruments and tools which shall come up for discussion in the next theme.
 

Playing, that is challenging; two illustrative stories

Looking for an example of someone who seems to be a playful person and who handles his possibilities with care, I found that in Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. What did playing mean to him, what has that to do with his inventiveness or fantasy, his want for equivalence and individuality and what does that tell us about what was important to him, what he really valued? This man was, as is evident from his music, an imaginative and playful being and, as is evident from some of his operas, also a socially involved human being. He has written several operas in which social problems are dealt with. I shall take a close look at one of them, after the remark that, while the play-element can be quite easily lifted out theoretically, in the practical situation this produces difficulties as it is interwoven. Especially with personal stories the reader will tend to mix them with ethical judgements and comments but those have their own place in the third dynamic layer of the process.

Links to
inner stability and language use, the |1|-|7| and |4|-|10| axes - theme #24/1,
elaboration, room for decisions, the |3|-|9| and |6|-|12| axes - theme #30/3.
complex network 3, the dynamics of coherence and contrast - structure #36/10.
 

'Così fan tutte; ossia, La scuola degli amanti',

The contents of 'As They All Do; or The School for Lovers':

Act I. Two friends are bragging about the fidelity and the rare virtues of their fiancées. Don Alfonso, the learned friend of both the young officers and the two sisters, wants to teach the braggarts as well as their fiancées a lesson and suggests a wager to the gentlemen: If you do as I say you will see that the young ladies, like all young ladies, are not at all so steadfast and faithful (costanza) as you think and they will this very day marry your friend. The friends agree.
They are 'called-up for battle' and depart after a touching farewell. Despina, chambermaid to the young ladies, advises them not to grieve, there are enough men left to have a good time with and you may expect your fiancés meanwhile to do the same.
Disguised as rich Albanians the two men are being introduced by don Alfonso as good friends of his and immediately start to declare their love to their friend's fiancée. When the girls remain unrelenting the men pretend to take poison in despair about that hard-hearted attitude. The lady's maid appears disguised as a physician.

Act II. The sisters are in shock but Despina, given information about the bet by don Alfonso, explains to them the things a lady of fifteen years should know and do and how she can make sure she stays in control. One of the sisters is persuaded. When her fiancé hears that his sweetheart has yielded to his friend's sweet words there is real grief, but his sense of honour says that he can't get out of the wager and he finally gives in and succeeds in winning her sister.
The maidservant disguises herself, this time as a notary, again unnoticed by the girls and the marriage contracts are signed.
Promptly the soldiers return from the war to the effect that the infidelity of the ladies can be revealed. At the same time the treason of the gentlemen is clarified as well as their short-sightedness, as they hadn't considered the consequences of the wager. The innocence of the young people has come to an end.
 

The function of figures and stage properties

To find out what Leonardo da Ponte and Mozart, librettist and composer, exactly want to communicate to us, I need to take a close look at the function of figures and props. For what purpose do they need precisely these?

It's a mocking story which however has a sound kernel. It resembles a paraphrase of the ideal woman, the elusive 'strong woman', who keeps her ground in situations in which people like to play with her for their own purposes.
 

A wager with an unforeseen risk

It is quite clear then that Mozart and DaPonte recommended that young ladies and young gentlemen take the rudder of their lives in their own hands and carefully weigh the consequences of decissions. What that includes, according to them, for both sexes is - don't expect security (COSTANZA) in the form of fidelity from the other, rather pay attention to how you yourself handle fidelity and what the value of your promises is. It is remarkble that they, in that time and consistently, extended equivalence between people to women. Such a long time after the world-shaking drama Antigone by Sophocles and still before the Romantic period, at the end of which the story of Carmen was to be written by Prosper Mérimée to be adapted by Georges Bizet into a shakingly realistic opera, their Così certainly is a modest but sensible and moving stimulus to reflections on dignity and maturity.

Da Ponte and Mozart were men who already had proved to know the balance of power in their time, the end of the feudal period, and to be acquainted with modern thought on human nature. 'Così fan tutte', first put on the stage in 1790, is the fifth of Mozart's seven great operas and the third that he wrote in co-operation with Da Ponte, one in which they speak out in their own way about important matters which they had explored together earlier. Le nozze di Figaro and Don Giovanni bear witness to psychological insight and profound knowledge of the situation in which men and women find themselves. The sentence 'Così fan tute le belle' had already been used in Figaro. In Così they say that women can be fostered with the tendency to be unfaithful and men have too little self-knowledge at their disposal. An old setting of a play with a ritual character is used by them in order to emphasise the teaching element in a playful manner. In that time manly honour still weighed heavily, but in modern times that would disappear. Man and woman shall have to pledge themselves in their own decisions for an individual future, as adults leave behind the childlike. In the modern human the childlike ideal has died, says Foucault [ note ]. In the opera Die Zauberflöte, which Mozart would later make in co-operation with Emanuel Schikaneder, there is no room to play for modernity, although one can hear in Mozart's music how he relaxes when the unsophisticated Papageno and Papagena playfully set things right and form an unpretentious contrast with the classic ideal world of the high priest's puppet-show of securities.

The couple Mozart - Da Ponte handle the symmetric structure of Cosi very ingeniously, to follow strictly the mirrored-form would be lethal for a work of art. By letting in little divergences and fine nuances they created a harmonious unity. I think that precisely by these subtly handled constructions it was possible to represent equivalence and righteousness on the basis of individual differences.
The effect they were looking for also seems to be partly mockery. Mocking with the convenient security of average values and mediocre formality perhaps? The music however shows not a trace of ridiculing challenge. Purely musically, the opera is a classic miracle of the highest quality, subtly varied, never exaggerated to sentimentality but profoundly human, touching ánd humorous. Just like the contents forebodes modern times so does the music anticipate its time and forebodes romanticism.
Still I do not know whether this play is a really pleasant confrontation for the theatre-goer of today who expects a care-free outing.
 

The opera's public

The opera has excited both positive and negative reactions in the course of time. She is often called the most 'perfect' of Mozart's operas on account of the symmetric, well-balanced structure and rich emotionality. At the same time it has been and is rejected by many because of the 'superficial plot and the anti-women content' and for that reason, until today, is often 'saved' by appealing stage management.
In the recent re-interpretation of the opera (Amsterdam, november 2006), the stage directors furnished the story with a 'sexy' sauce and placed it in the Netherlands of the sixties, a period in which education offered little structure or frameworks and society strongly focused on the future and categorically refused to reflect on WW II and its effects. As to the question of whether young people of these days are helped with this approach, with their honest individuality-based questions such as freedom, relations, loyalty, future and solidarity, is a debatable point. But the final scene, in which the lovers are left behind as 'disillusioned loners', remained upright and left a strong enough impression to produce prolonged after-effects.
 

Mozart, antithetic qualities in action

The antithetic parts of the system are the following four phases, four colourings and four functions:

1. the 2nd phase, Taurus colouring and VENUS secondary, the attention function. They challenge in intuitive matters, in questions of usefulness and of importance. The purpose is recognition of one's own interest and the contribution to the expected result.

2. the 5th phase, Leo colouring and the Sun, the self governing function. They challenge in physical matters, in play, like in love play, in competitions and gambling. The purpose is to obtain a survey over both one's own capacities and those of the other.

3. the 8th phase, Scorpio colouring and PLUTO, the remove function. They challenge in emotional matters, in playing with values, in sexual play, in manipulation or power play and with moral pressure. The purpose is to select materials with which decisions between acceptance or rejection can be made.

4. the 11th phse, Aquarius colouring and URANUS, the support function. They challenge in intellectual matters, in playing with ideas and words, meaning and organisation, differences and similarities. The purpose is to differentiate between group and the individual.

The antithetic parts.
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The natural relations between antithetic phases, colourings and functions produces the following picture (see the figure on the right):

Some questions come to mind, like: Exactly how playful and respectful was Mozart? What does he have to offer in the matter of playful testing and challenging values? How important is equivalence between people for him? Did he have courage and in what area did he use it? These questions can perhaps be answered. To do so I'll bring the antithetic parts of Mozart's 'masterplan' to the foreground.
 
 
 
I'll show the four functions in the above given sequence in their antithetic possibilities in connection with the hypothetic and the synthetic active parts:

1. The first antithetic function is VENUS secundary, the attention function. That causes a little problem because Mozart does not use this but the hypothetic form, that is VENUS primary, the interaction function. She is located in the synthetic 6th phase with the antithetic colouring of AQUARIUS. Thus the function unites all three dialectic forms, in which the harmonious interaction leads the way.
   Its aspect relations:
   with the other three antithetic functions no connection exists,
   with the hypothetic consistency function SATURN, who is located in the antithetic Aquarius-colouring and in the antithetic fifth phase in the hypothetic CAPRICORN-colouring, she makes an outgoing semi-sextile aspect,
   with the likewise hypothetic (retrograde and as such inwardly directed) MARS, the activate or initiate function in the hypothetic 10th phase with the synthetic GEMINI-colouring in the hypothetic CANCER-colouring, she makes an approaching trine aspect.
   This yields in dynamic respect a well-balanced and differentiated picture.
   If we look at this function from her own structure, then these two establish aspect connections with the synthetic 12th phase via Saturn, and with the antithetic 5th phase via Mars. That adds to the harmony function both an active systematic and intuitive memory and an essential, playful energy. It extends the nuancing with a synthetic and an antithetic work area respectively.
   There are, as usual with Venus, two supply lines: in this case one from the synthetic 9th phase with (the antithetic) TAURUS-colouring which is empty and in the other case from the antithetic 2nd phase with her own (the hypothetic) LIBRA-colouring, in which the synthetic expansion function JUPITER is located. This adds, by looking only at the last one, still more activity in all three dynamic forms.
   The line going out leads towards the antithetic URANUS, the support function.
   All in all Venus is here a dialectically versatile function in which all three forms assemble royally and with differentiation.

2. The spatial pole of the at the inner world-directed antithetic |2|-|8| axis is represented by PLUTO, the remove function.
   Its aspect relations:
   together with the hypothetic emotional basis function MOON in outgoing conjunction the function Pluto is located in the hypothetic 4th phase with the synthetic SAGITTARIUS-colouring,
   with the antithetic support function URANUS in the hypothetic 7th phase with the synthetic PISCES-colouring it maintains a natural antithetic outgoing square aspect,
   with the hypothetic disposed ASCENDANT, the presence function with the synthetic VIRGO-colouring, it also has an outgoing square aspect,
   with the synthetic expansion function JUPITER in the antithetic 2nd phase with the hypothetic LIBRA-colouring it has an outgoing sextile aspect.
   This intensely emotional whole (with varied dynamics) can and has to be expressed outwardly.
   Seen from her own stucture the aspect relations with these 4 functions bring about even more possibilities in the areas of work of the 12th, the 3rd, the 9th and the 10th phase respectively. This further spreads the different nuances of the remove function over three synthetic and one hypothetic domain.
   The line of supply from the synthetic third phase with (the antithetic) SCORPIO-colouring, contains no function.
   The line going out leads to the synthetic JUPITER, the expansion function.
   In this body of relations around Pluto the accent has clearly shifted from the antithetic towards hypothetic and especially the synthetic dynamics and we see an increased tendency towards processing experiences.

3. On the antithetic |5|-|11| axis the SUN, the self governing function, represents the personal creative side, the player himself.
   The aspect relations:
   both with the synthetic relate or analyse function MERCURY primary and
   with the hypothetic consistency function SATURN the Sun is in outgoing conjunction. This constellation of three functions, located in the antithetic 5th phase with the hypothetic CAPRICORN-colouring, uses the antithetic AQUARIUS-pattern of beginning.
   with the antithetic support function URANUS in the hypothetic 7th phase which uses the synthetic PISCES-colouring, the Sun has an approaching semi-sextile aspect,
   with the hypothetically disposed ASCENDANT, the presence function, which uses the synthetic VIRGO-colouring (see also ZZZine #28 and the aspect relations) the Sun is in an outgoing quincunx aspect,
   with the synthetic integrate function NEPTUNE in the antithetic 11th phase with the hypothetic CANCER-colouring, which uses the antithetic LEO pattern of beginning, the Sun has an approaching opposition, a pressing relation.
   This part of the network around the self-governing function extends her with about as many hypothetic as antithetic elements and a bit less of the synthetic type.
   Seen from her own stucture the aspect connections also realise with these five functions possibilities in the work areas of the 2nd, the 1st, the 12th, de 8th and de 7th phase respectively. This broadens the nuancing of the self-governing function with one synthetic, two hypothetic and two antithetic work areas.
   The line of supply from the antithetic 11th phase with (the antithetic) LEO-colouring contains no function, the line from the hypothetic 1st and 10th phase with respectively (the synthetic) VIRGO- and GEMINI-colouring which contain the hypothetic functions ASCENDANT and MARS. This adds still more activity in the hypothetic and synthetic dynamic attitude in the two hypothetic work areas.
   The line going out leads to the hypothetic SATURN, the consistency function and with that the responsibility remains emphatically in the antithetic fifth phase, by himself.
   In the package of (direct) relations around the constellation of the Sun the hypo- : anti- : synthetic attitudes are in the proportion of 10 : 8 : 6 approximately.

4. The time-pole or the social side of this towards the outer world directed antithetic axis is represented by the support function URANUS. She is active in the work area of the hypothetic 7th phase with de synthetic PISCES-colouring.
   The aspect relations:
   with the antithetic self governing function the SUN, which coincides
   with the synthetic relate- or analyse function MERCURY primary, and both in the antithetic 5th phase with the hypothetic CAPRICORN-colouring but both for themselves using the antithetic AQUARIUS pattern of beginning, she has an approaching semi-sextile aspect;
   with the antithetic remove function PLUTO, which coincides
   with the hypothetic emotional basis function MOON, and both in the hypothetic 4th phase with the synthetic SAGITTARIUS-colouring, Uranus stands in an outgoing, respectively approaching right-angled aspect;
   with the synthetic expansion function JUPITER in the antithetic 2nd phase with the hypothetic LIBRA-colouring it has an approaching quincunx aspect;
   with the hypothetically inclined ASCENDANT, the presence function, which uses the synthetic VIRGO pattern of beginning, Uranus is in an approaching opposition;
   with the synthetic (retrograde) integrate function NEPTUNE in the antithetic 11th phase with the hypothetic CANCER-colouring, which itself uses the antithetic LEO pattern of beginning, Uranus has an approaching quincunx aspect.
   This part of the network around the support function expands her with about as many hypothetic and antithetic elements and a few less of the synthetic sort.
   Seen from her own stucture the aspect connections realise, with these seven functions, more possibilities in the work areas of subsequently the 11th, the 10th, the 8th, the 6th and the 5th phase. This  further spreads the different nuances of the self governing function over one synthetic, two hypothetic and two antithetic work domains.
   The line of supply from the synthetic 6th phase with (the antithetic) AQUARIUS colouring contains the antithetic attention function VENUS secundary which has been reviewed under #1 above. This adds extra activity with an antithetic dynamic attitude in the synthetic work area.
   The line going out leads to the synthetic NEPTUNE, the integrate function, and thus to renewal, to a more romantic, socially directed, approach to music.

5. These are the four players, the functions by which and around which the game is played. By the way, that game is played by Venus, Pluto (+Moon) and Uranus together with the other functions, in one movement of lines of supply and lines going out which is enacted mainly outside of the constellation around the Sun, the combination of agility, responsibility and playfulness.

It has become clear now that Mozart - if all you look at is this part of his specific combination of connections - was full of playful, challenging presence. He also had enough courage to hold on to his musical and social ideals and to express them, where he could, in a wide environment.

Links to
Mozart, the antithetic elements in his birth chart,
Mozart, the birth chart,
review of the VIRGO pattern of beginning as he used it,
structure #26/8 survey of connections within processes.
 

'Mother Superior's Room for Play'

'That year in sixth grade, when I had finished my tasks, I read books on the lives of saints and martyrs in an empty room. Since mother was of a trustful nature and honest and since she, via the parish priest, had been promised by the headmistress of the primary school for girls that, by way of exception, I would be prepared for the entrance examination for secondary school, mother counted on that. After all, two years earlier John's change-over from the parochial boys' school to the lyceum had gone off smoothly. In the spring of 1946 I went up for the examination and failed. My parents received the message and as it was clear that I had not been prepaired for it - I did not know what an extraction of roots was - the secondary school offered the arrangement with extra coaching which was also available for children returning from Indonesia. In the deliberation between father, mother and me (in my first story I referred to this) we decided that we would not accept that offer but that I would repeat sixth grade at another school.
But the school year was not over yet. Probably the last day before the summer-holidays, during the break, all classes gathered in the large open hall. All the nuns and teachers, including Miss Gram of fourth grade, were present at the speech of Mother Superior, the head of the small convent. At a certain point I was told to come forward to stand facing the children and the nuns and, pointing at me, she said:
"Just look at who is standing here, this is the girl who thinks she is better than the others at this school. She wants to have special treatment. Who does she think she is? This child brings shame upon the school, you shouldn't play with such a child. Look at her! This child should be ashamed of herself, you shouldn't mix with such a girl".
When she had finished I had to stand in a corner and watch untill the break was over. I did not understand why she, a stately nun who was treated with ceremony by everyone, accused me so emphatically in front of everyone. I did not understand why I deserved this and why I should be ashamed. Am I bad because I want to learn? I felt confused - What is this about? Is this fair? What have I done wrong?
Father explained to me on a summery day, outside, that, just like division is the reverse of multiplication and subtraction of addition, so is extraction of roots the reverse of involution.'
 

Mother Superior and her public

With hindsight I can understand that Mother Superior was forced to carry out and defend her superior's strategy and that, at other primary schools led by nuns, it also happened that pupils were enlisted for the extended primary education provided by their own order. The idea behind the School for the many, that its limited goal should suffice for these girls, wasn't right of course. By the way, there was no fault to find with the quality of the teaching the sisters offered.
The moment itself was rather paradoxical, there was something that neither Mother Superior nor the sisters nor certainly the children could solve. In the meantime I discovered that Mother Superior used the play method (and my back) to prove something to her audience, perhaps that she was capable of obediently carrying out her instructions. I don't know what the effect was on the fellow-players of which many did not know the real story. As I remember, I never had problems with my class mate Nettie in 't Groen and her sisters or with the other children who unwillingly got involved in the situation. As we no longer walked together to the same school the contact diminished. Several of the nun teachers involved must have been familiar with the facts. The speech must undoubtedly have raised questions and have made an impact on some of them. I never met them again.
The experience has not prevented me from trusting people or from getting disappointed at times. It has helped me see that, by just being there, one can acquire important experiences, as in this case about the frameworks and motives whence people act. It has unwittingly given a direction to my role as an intensely present fellow-player. In the same way each of them will interpret the event in their personal way and it will, sooner or later, prove its use for each of the people involved.
 

What to do with the proceeds of the play?

In this zine I have looked at challenging the environment and playing with relations of interdependency. By acting and trying out of things, by exercising capacities, people test their self-esteem, discover their room for play, acquire experience with mutual respect and learn to govern themselves. Mozart was capable of acting in a manner which gives evidence that he could well interpret his experiences from playing and, as a versatile autonomous person, was capable of taking respectful decisions. Così turns out after all to be a show which challenges serious thinking. Other than in the world of my parents in which I was allowed to be special, Mother Superior's environment of order and of predominantly black & white thinking left little room for individuality. Her show of authority unmasked her as an insecure and not free person.
It is the duty of players and those present to, according to character and need, use their experiences to their benefit. But how does one handle the values and choices that one discovered as player, how can one use and treat those desirable and unwanted, apparently necessary, experiences in one's life? That is the domain of the synthetic parts of the network of connections. The next theme will therefore have to deal with problems and solutions, with the analysis of differences and usefulness, with handling of groups and their frameworks - like laws, prescriptions, rules, manners and other agreements regarding room for play and quality of life or work. That can turn out to be an interesting exercise in involution and extraction of roots.