I just read “The Magic Mountain” by Thomas Mann and the character of Hans Castrop is an exquisite character. He is an engineering student about to embark upon his career, someone that is conventional and has not given much thought to the big questions of life. As he ends out spending time in a TB sanitorium in Switzerland in the 1910 era, he learns about many other subjects and has many philosophical interactions with great depth and changes as a character. I am still digesting the book, so I really don’t know how to characterize him yet, but he definitely fits this archetype. The Julius Caesar statue has an expression I have seen on the faces of CEOs for whom I have worked.
The way you analyze the girl in the painting as the embodiment of focus makes it sound like it is exquisite. My readers might enjoy seeing an extended treatment of the example. Thank you for linking.
I just read “The Magic Mountain” by Thomas Mann and the character of Hans Castrop is an exquisite character. He is an engineering student about to embark upon his career, someone that is conventional and has not given much thought to the big questions of life. As he ends out spending time in a TB sanitorium in Switzerland in the 1910 era, he learns about many other subjects and has many philosophical interactions with great depth and changes as a character. I am still digesting the book, so I really don’t know how to characterize him yet, but he definitely fits this archetype. The Julius Caesar statue has an expression I have seen on the faces of CEOs for whom I have worked.
This is a facinating discussion of "the exquisite," Kurt! Thanks for inviting me to share a post of mine that has an overlapping emphasis on focus, which I discuss here: https://weeklywonderings.substack.com/p/the-wonder-of-focus
The way you analyze the girl in the painting as the embodiment of focus makes it sound like it is exquisite. My readers might enjoy seeing an extended treatment of the example. Thank you for linking.