WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:02.940 align:middle line:90% 00:00:02.940 --> 00:00:09.810 align:middle line:84% One poem to end with about another hero of mine, 00:00:09.810 --> 00:00:16.200 align:middle line:84% botanist, German, kidnapped by the Dutch 00:00:16.200 --> 00:00:20.147 align:middle line:84% in the early 17th century and taken out to the East Indies 00:00:20.147 --> 00:00:22.605 align:middle line:84% where he lived the rest of his life on the island of Ambon. 00:00:22.605 --> 00:00:25.620 align:middle line:90% 00:00:25.620 --> 00:00:30.810 align:middle line:84% He wrote long before Linnaeus and modern nomenclature 00:00:30.810 --> 00:00:33.510 align:middle line:84% the first five-volume flora of the Indies. 00:00:33.510 --> 00:00:37.757 align:middle line:84% The first encyclopedia of the extraordinary objects 00:00:37.757 --> 00:00:38.340 align:middle line:90% of the Indies. 00:00:38.340 --> 00:00:41.190 align:middle line:84% He wrote in a prose that reminds me of Montaigne 00:00:41.190 --> 00:00:46.590 align:middle line:84% and with a sense of wonder that never left him. 00:00:46.590 --> 00:00:51.150 align:middle line:84% He lost his wife, his daughter, and his eyesight 00:00:51.150 --> 00:00:53.460 align:middle line:90% among other things in his life. 00:00:53.460 --> 00:00:56.760 align:middle line:84% He lived to see his books survive 00:00:56.760 --> 00:01:01.620 align:middle line:90% but it was a harrowing life. 00:01:01.620 --> 00:01:03.480 align:middle line:84% The book-- his name, his name by the way 00:01:03.480 --> 00:01:08.460 align:middle line:84% was Georg Eberhard Rumpf and he was 00:01:08.460 --> 00:01:11.100 align:middle line:84% born in the time of Shakespeare and he 00:01:11.100 --> 00:01:12.450 align:middle line:90% lived into the 17th century. 00:01:12.450 --> 00:01:15.060 align:middle line:90% 00:01:15.060 --> 00:01:17.250 align:middle line:84% He latinized his name to Rumphius, 00:01:17.250 --> 00:01:19.860 align:middle line:84% and if you're at all interested in him 00:01:19.860 --> 00:01:24.640 align:middle line:84% there's a wonderful book called The Poison Tree of his selected 00:01:24.640 --> 00:01:25.140 align:middle line:90% writings. 00:01:25.140 --> 00:01:29.220 align:middle line:84% Beautifully translated by EM Beekman 00:01:29.220 --> 00:01:32.640 align:middle line:84% published by the University of Massachusetts Press. 00:01:32.640 --> 00:01:34.030 align:middle line:90% I commend it to you. 00:01:34.030 --> 00:01:38.280 align:middle line:84% It's a book of great, great beauty. 00:01:38.280 --> 00:01:41.580 align:middle line:84% Open it and read the essay on the hermit crab to start with. 00:01:41.580 --> 00:01:44.270 align:middle line:90% 00:01:44.270 --> 00:01:45.800 align:middle line:90% "The Blind Seer of Ambon." 00:01:45.800 --> 00:01:48.560 align:middle line:90% 00:01:48.560 --> 00:01:52.490 align:middle line:84% "I always knew that I came from another language, 00:01:52.490 --> 00:01:55.490 align:middle line:84% and now even when I can no longer see, 00:01:55.490 --> 00:01:59.360 align:middle line:90% I continue to arrive at words. 00:01:59.360 --> 00:02:02.960 align:middle line:84% But the leaves and the shells were already here, 00:02:02.960 --> 00:02:09.539 align:middle line:84% and my fingers finding them echo an untold light and depth. 00:02:09.539 --> 00:02:12.470 align:middle line:84% I was betrayed into my true calling 00:02:12.470 --> 00:02:15.290 align:middle line:90% and denied in my advancement. 00:02:15.290 --> 00:02:19.610 align:middle line:84% I may have seemed somewhat strange caring in my own time 00:02:19.610 --> 00:02:24.080 align:middle line:84% for living things with no value that we know. 00:02:24.080 --> 00:02:29.210 align:middle line:84% Languages wash over them one wave at a time. 00:02:29.210 --> 00:02:32.330 align:middle line:84% When the houses fell in the earthquake, 00:02:32.330 --> 00:02:36.170 align:middle line:90% I lost my wife and my daughter. 00:02:36.170 --> 00:02:40.040 align:middle line:84% It all roared and stood still, falling where 00:02:40.040 --> 00:02:42.860 align:middle line:90% they were in the daylight. 00:02:42.860 --> 00:02:48.800 align:middle line:84% I named for my wife a flower, as though I could name a flower. 00:02:48.800 --> 00:02:54.230 align:middle line:84% My wife, dark and luminous and not there. 00:02:54.230 --> 00:02:59.090 align:middle line:84% I lost the drawings of the flowers in fire. 00:02:59.090 --> 00:03:02.960 align:middle line:84% I lost the studies of the flowers, my first six books 00:03:02.960 --> 00:03:05.060 align:middle line:90% in the sea. 00:03:05.060 --> 00:03:09.200 align:middle line:84% Then I saw that the flowers themselves were gone. 00:03:09.200 --> 00:03:10.850 align:middle line:90% They were indeed gone. 00:03:10.850 --> 00:03:13.970 align:middle line:84% I saw that my wife was gone, and I 00:03:13.970 --> 00:03:17.570 align:middle line:84% saw that my daughter was gone, afterward 00:03:17.570 --> 00:03:21.230 align:middle line:90% my eyes themselves were gone. 00:03:21.230 --> 00:03:25.430 align:middle line:84% One day I was looking at infinite small creatures 00:03:25.430 --> 00:03:28.610 align:middle line:84% on the bright sand, and the next day 00:03:28.610 --> 00:03:32.960 align:middle line:90% is this hearing after music. 00:03:32.960 --> 00:03:36.320 align:middle line:90% So this is the way I see now. 00:03:36.320 --> 00:03:41.840 align:middle line:84% I take a shell in my hand, new to itself and to me. 00:03:41.840 --> 00:03:46.220 align:middle line:84% I feel the thinness, the warmth, and the cold. 00:03:46.220 --> 00:03:50.330 align:middle line:84% I listen to the water, which is the story welling up. 00:03:50.330 --> 00:03:53.870 align:middle line:84% I remember the colors and their lives. 00:03:53.870 --> 00:03:57.300 align:middle line:90% Everything takes me by surprise. 00:03:57.300 --> 00:04:01.490 align:middle line:84% It is all awake in the darkness." 00:04:01.490 --> 00:04:03.280 align:middle line:90% Thank you. 00:04:03.280 --> 00:04:33.000 align:middle line:90%