Calling this one in off the bench because my Collected (Possibly Complete) Seamus Heaney poems was grinding me down.
"I am a strong believer in the idea that the mathematical structures that underpin both art and nature are timeless. That they do not need a moment of creation. They exist outside time and space. The universe we live in is a physicalization of these abstract structures.
"There will be a moment when the human mathematician will see and articulate that structure for the first time in an act that often feels like a feat of creativity, but that moment is always mixed with a sense that this was a structure waiting there to be discovered, whose existence is independent of human involvement. Mathematicians are revealing the pure abstract structures that are the true origin of the things being projected onto the wall of Plato's cave. The universe we see around is simply a physical manifestation of those abstract forms. And within that universe artists are creating their own works which reinterpret these structures once again." (3)
x + 372 pages = 382
Day 1 (DDRD 3,006) January 24, 2026
Read to page 10. Ahhhh.
Day 2 (DDRD 3,007) January 25, 2026
Read to page 41. And it was not a struggle. And when I stopped for breakfast and lost my place, it was easy to find it again because I remembered what I had read previously. 👍
There was an extended reference to a piece called Quartet for the End of Time by Messiaen:
https://youtu.be/zYpBHc8px_U?si=2zbNEf_PVl3PlCY9
Very strange.
Now THIS is the way it's supposed to work: reading about Messiaen led me to a video of Quartet for the End of Time, and reading the comments on that video led me to a novel that looks very interesting: Orfeo by Richard Powers. Which is, alas, unavailable for free...except as an audio recording. I don't do well with audio recordings, but I'll give it a shot. I don't do well with audio recordings but I'll give it a shot. News as it happens.
"Both mathematics and the arts emerge out of our encounters with the world around us. They are languages that we have developed to make sense of our environment." (27)
There's also a lecture on this book by The Author at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xqH-oscXKTM.
Later...
I went back for more. If you get to page 42 and don't know "Take 5" by Dave Brubeck & Co., here ya go: https://youtu.be/vmDDOFXSgAs?si=2giquhmb3H7I7rar
No, no, no...thank YOU.
Read to page 49, btw.
Day 3 (DDRD 3,008) January 26, 2026
Read to page 82.
This book is making me happy. Get this: there's discussion of the dome for Florence Cathedral, designed by Filippo Brunelleschi and finished in 1436. According to du Sautoy, it was the belief that the universe was a sphere that inspired these structures.
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| Public Domain* |
* There are some excellent photographs of this dome online, but this was the only public domain picture I could find. Check out Wikipedia for the good stuff--including the amazing artwork on the interior of the dome.
Guillaume Du Fay wrote Nuper Rosarum Flores to Celebrate the consecration of the cathedral in 1436. It was (much) later discovered that he "used the dimensions of the cathedral as a blueprint for the composition. There are four sections, each comprising two sets of 28 units made of four lots of seven-beat phrases. The four sections repeat the same music, but at different speeds, in a proportion of 6 to 4 to 2 to 3. All these numbers that Du Fay used to create the piece are the same numbers that define the proportions of the cathedral that Brunelleschi had worked on." (65)
Music, maestro?
https://youtu.be/P9yzTTwAj5U?si=sSUopDeImd97-2Hr
Ah, yes.
On page 79 there's a reference to the short story "A Subway Called Moebius." I read that story a few days ago in the Asimov edited anthology Where Do We Go From Here? Do do do do, do do do do.
Day 4 (DDRD 3,009) January 27, 2026
Read to page 112.
Speaking of architecture, check this out: L'unite d'habitation. Apparently this "self-contained city" was an example of Brutalist architecture. The details of its construction are worth looking into.
Now I feel like watching The Brutalist again.
Day 5 (DDRD 3,010) January 28, 2026
Read to page 155.
Got to Philip Glass today, starting with a piece I'd never heard of previously...and I've been listening to PG for over 50 years. It's a simple bit of rhythm performed by one person with two hands:
https://youtu.be/A3IYzX0yJKc?si=UtT6laZGLk9V9Fec
I don't know if it's Music, but I sure as hell couldn't do it, so there's a vote in favor of.
Day 6 (DDRD 3,011) January 29, 2026
Read to page 214.
I'm thinking that Matryoshka (as in doll) would be a good name for a novel. Or a character.
Y'know, this book really should be produced with hyperlinks. References to paintings, images of other sorts, videos, music, literature abound, and I often have to stop in my reading to access those references. It'd be so cool to have that embedded in the text. Let him who has ears and unlimited funds listen.
Nietzsche: "...we should consider every day lost on which we have not danced at least once." (186)
The Flagellation of Christ (1459–1460) by Piero della Francesca
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| Public Domain |
Day 7 (DDRD 3,012) January 30, 2026
Read to page 254.
Greek composer Iannus Xenakis: Metastasis.
https://youtu.be/Jjpq2Y4tUGI?si=Eihwa-Rozb8S99nk
This sounds so much like the weird symphonic progression in "A Day in the Life" that I'd think the Beatles had ripped it off if it weren't so obscure.
Guess I'm not alone:
Speaking of music...I wish I'd kept track of every piece of music Du Sautoy referred to on this book. It would make a dandy little Spotify Playlist. I don't know if I have the strength to go back through the previous 250 pages to scope them out. 🤔
Day 8 (DDRD 3,013) January 31, 2026
Read to page 284.
Messiaen "stopped a rehearsal in order to complain that the clarinet had turned dark blue when it was meant to be green. The blue clashed with the colour of the other instruments. What had actually happened is that the clarinet had played a B, not a B flat. But for Messiaen, this had translated into the wrong colours appearing in his mind." (258)
So...there's this group named Oulipo. Here's part of what Wikipedia has to say about them.
"Oulipo (French pronunciation: [ulipo], short for French: Ouvroir de littérature potentielle; roughly translated as "workshop of potential literature", stylized OuLiPo) is a loose gathering of (mainly) French-speaking writers and mathematicians who seek to create works using constrained writing techniques."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/creative??,
And that got me thinking. This was a group that specifically thought out different kinds of limitations in order to spark greater creativity. And that's what poetry does as well: it creates false limitations in order to subvert the conscious mind and drive the creative person's consciousness into other areas. As a matter of fact, that same concept applies to sports: create false limitations (the dimensions of the playing "field," time limitations, etc.) in order to make the game more exciting. Would anyone want to watch a basketball game if there were no baskets at the ends of the court? And that got me thinking about corporeal existence. What if immortal and limitless spirits wanted to ensconce themselves in finite bodies in order to accentuate their ability to be creative? Would some choose such drastic limitations as crippled or diseases bodies? Well, you see where that goes. 🤔
Two more pieces of music, both of them by Emily Howard:
"Torus"
https://youtu.be/PoRLvQwuzYM?si=LGGd_1LE5JSfln6_
&
"Four Musical Proofs and a Contradiction"
https://youtu.be/ZWjaUuk51pg?si=khUFvO8sI0wPzREY
https://youtu.be/pUHU_PfGUY8?si=71I5nlLXC0okHTsq
https://youtu.be/YyAEUYM1_cQ?si=-i3rEAcPdhy6xkOL
https://youtu.be/kg4MBc9HpTM?si=TgHcUamsegH5WfyZ
https://youtu.be/Wf9J795s_AQ?si=MQ-ejDReYVrh5X8I
Day 9 (DDRD 3,014) February 1, 2026
Read to page 339.
"Albert Einstein said "If you ask in whom I am most interested at present, I must answer Dostoevsky - Dostoevsky gives me more than any scientist, more than Gauss!" (292)
Day 10 (DDRD 3,015) February 2, 2026
Read to page 372, The End.
I had coffee with some friends yesterday morning and mentioned that I had read that Jackson Pollock's paintings followed fractal patterns. C. remarked that that was bullshit, that all Pollock did was pour paint onto the canvas in a random pattern. I let it lie there as I am pretty non-confrontational in real life, but as I read through the bibliography of this book, I saw a reference to an article on this which I hope to read soon.
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