To Lucerne

A redacted update on the exile plan with a focus on the travails of present-day travel and the dance with ultra-contingency concerning “academic” (mis)adventures … Part and parcel of the anti-memoir/novella, Anima + Angel …

TO LUCERNE

On Friday, June 20, ten days before the launch of the Lucerne Summer School, I wrote to all of the fellow-travelers at the Lucerne Summer School asking if anyone had a room to share or could offer advice on affordable accommodations. I added the Substack link for “To Livorno” to explain my reservations over the past weeks for making a premature hotel booking. I was attempting to rope them into this greater experiment in exile, which would become part of my 20-minute presentation on July 1, should I actually make it to Lucerne. I also detected, with the help of a friend in Livorno, that there was a train route from Livorno to Lucerne – actually three trains. It passed through Genoa, Milan, Lugano. It took eight hours. It cost [REDACTED] EUR.

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LA BARACCHINA BIANCA

Image – La Baracchina Bianca, Livorno. Photo: Gavin Keeney.

“Fare forward, travellers! not escaping from the past / Into different lives, or into any future; / You are not the same people who left that station […]” – T.S. Eliot

On the evening of the Summer Solstice, June 21 (a.k.a. English Midsummer), I initiated a conversation with Shelley while sitting at La Baracchina Bianca (Caffetteria Baracchina Bianca) in Livorno, sipping a glass of rosé wine and smoking. I took no notes and committed the exchange to memory. The café offered a brilliant view of the Ligurian Sea. The conversation involved all of the legends concerning Shelley’s demise at sea in 1822. I asked Shelley, “Did you do it intentionally?” He answered, “No.” I explained my concern with the innumerable legends. Had he not put two other people at risk due to his willingness to intentionally set sail amidst a storm? The legends included speculation that, at the time of this fateful voyage, he was estranged from Byron, and that he and Mary were both living in despair following the death of three of their children.

What I really wanted to know was why he had risked his own life and that of two others that fateful day. It took quite a few questions to get to the non-answer. Following several exchanges, a cruise ship pulled into the port in the far distance, as if Shelley had sent it to change the subject. In striking deep-blue letters (all capitals), it said “MOBY.” The cruise line serviced tourists wanting to travel to Sardegna, Corsica, Sicily, or Elba. From the mainland, it departed Genoa, Livorno, Piombino, Civitavecchia, and Napoli. Piombino was at the “shift” between the Ligurian Sea and the Tyrrhenian Sea. “Fare forward, travellers,” indeed. Eliot’s bleak poem and Melville’s bleak novel covered the same “terrain.” Upon closer examination of all three authors, we are dealing with something irreducible, even if it might be called “the temptations of the ineffable.” With Eliot, it has, of course, turned to dust and ashes. With Shelley and Melville, it still had its “Promethean” currents – i.e., the quest for the High Romantic Absolute included “flights” of the high imagination, in literature and art, which would quite often need to be lived to be fully processed (written).

Immediately, upon seeing this sigil, the conversation shifted. It was now about Melville, and Moby-Dick. Shelley was Ahab, and Ahab was Shelley. Melville was Shelley, and Shelley was Melville. Ahab’s quest, via Melville, was Shelley’s quest. And Melville, as it turns out, adored (worshipped) Shelley. Melville had traveled to Rome in 1856-1857, in part, to visit sites associated with Shelley’s time in Rome, but also Shelley’s grave in the English (Protestant) cemetery in Rome.

Perhaps Shelley had deflected my line of inquiry intentionally through this sigil (sign). Regardless, I departed La Baracchina Bianca (The Little White Booth) convinced that most of the legends and superstitions regarding Shelley’s last days were exactly that – e.g., unnecessary and unwarranted legends and superstitions. I did not feel comfortable engaging with them. I preferred to consider his drowning at sea an accident – albeit an accident that occurred because he was in a state of mind generally reducible to “utter defiance” against the status quo. In risking the lives of two others, however, he had crossed a line that left open innumerable unanswerable questions, and it was for this reason that all of the legends and superstitions had arisen.

I would, instead, and in due time, investigate Shelley’s last works, especially those written after visiting Livorno and those written in Pisa close to his “final voyage.” There was no point in visiting any of the sites in Livorno or Pisa where Shelley had lived. There was especially no point in visiting the beach where his body eventually washed up, unidentifiable except for his clothing and a book of poems by Keats in his pocket. The true sites of this story are, therefore, his writings. “They” contain the answers to all of the unanswerable questions, yet transcribed such that all of the various quotidian factors (inclusive of “unnecessary and unwarranted legends and superstitions”) are transfigured and duly “sent sailing” …

[…]

On Monday, June 25, I finalized the PPT for Lucerne. It was, effectively, an update to “Red Birds” (2021). Nothing much had changed in terms of intellectual property rights law or the knowledge commons other than the arrival of AI. Things had, indeed, grown darker by the day. “Red Birds” had surveyed ideational Franciscanism in the context of literary-artistic scholarship. “No Rights,” the Lucerne presentation, took “all of that” to the next level by proposing a new ecosystem through the EO1 agenda. They would be “screened” together. The PPT for “No Rights” would be converted to MP4 (PPT2MP4), as “Red Birds” had been, and they would be presented back-to-back, totaling exactly twenty minutes – or, the time allotted for my presentation on the subject of “Disruptions” to law. They were notably “silent” … I would say nothing and await the Q+A session to speak. No questions, no answers. No questions, no need to say anything.

Both would be posted to Vimeo, should I not make it to Lucerne. “They” could screen them “in absentia.” Both videos spoke for themselves. “This” was the point regarding the voice of works and the transfer of moral rights from authors to works. Authorial presence or authorial absence, it was the privilege of works to speak anyway. “This” was the revolution hiding in plain sight behind the current ravages (walls) of copyright law. Would law scholars catch the point? Time would tell …

[…]

As Lucerne crept closer, on proverbial cat paws, I also closed up a pitch to Ca’ Foscari in Venice for the MSCA sweepstakes (viz., EU-funded Marie Skłodowska-Curie fellowships). This annual call for proposals for postdoctoral research fellowships involved finding a school, finding someone in the school, and getting approval to develop the MSCA application, due, in this case, in mid-September. The project sent to Ca’ Foscari was Spectral Scriptorium. It was all that remained of the EO1 Proof of Concept (PoC) developed in early 2024 after the September 29, 2023 submission of the ZRC SAZU dissertation project, “No Rights.” Now sent, I would wait however long to hear something or to hear nothing. I had chosen the Department of Philosophy and Cultural Heritage (DFBC). It was the only program I could find that held any similar interests. Those similar interests were “philosophical science, art history, social science, and education.”

“Each of these areas contributes to the building of knowledge that is interdisciplinary, international, and characterised by critical thinking. Such knowledge embraces the various branches of philosophy (theoretical philosophy, the philosophy of logic, moral philosophy, political philosophy, aesthetics, the philosophy of language, the philosophy of science), as well as history of the arts (architecture, art, museum studies) and performing arts (music, theatre, dance, cinema, audiovisual media). It also engages with various pedagogical perspectives regarding education, and with the complex and profound changes happening in society, which require new and sustainable models of governance and development.”

Additionally, I chose to send the proposal to the Director of the Department of Philosophy and Cultural Heritage, due to his research interests in “Storia dell’arte moderna” – or, in the nomenclature of Ca’ Foscari, “ARTE-01/B.”

The scriptorium was spectral such that it might take any form it wished – real or imaginary. It need not be in any one place as well. Best bets were that it would come and go, appear and disappear, gain and lose agency, etc., across time and times. It would observe its own internal rules or laws (its metric), abiding by external rules or laws (metrics) only insofar as its internal rules were not violated. It had been crafted through the quantum submissions process of the OOI-MTA years (2017-2021) and renewed through the ZRC SAZU PhD (2021-2024). “Now” it was hiding in plain sight once again in the EO1 project on the transfiguration of the knowledge commons.

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TWO MIRACLES?

On June 23, the first sign of shifting fortunes appeared in the form of an email from Lucerne concerning a change in program due to one of the law scholars presenting at the Summer School having “withdrawn.” I promptly wrote to ask if that did not by any chance free up a room somewhere. The next day I received a response, with a link to the small hotel implicated. I checked online to see if a room was available, but found no sign of there being one for the period of June 29 to July 4. The booking agent’s website recommended writing to the hotel to request availability should nothing appear through the booking agent. I wrote to the hotel asking for five nights. They responded promptly that they had four. I replied I would take the four, plus a fifth, if the fifth became available. But I only did this after a second miracle occurred in the form of an offer from [REDACTED] to increase my credit limit and, upon making the application, having it immediately approved and posted to my account. I now had [REDACTED] USD in additional financial agency to pull off this journey. What remained to be solved was how to get to Lucerne from Livorno.

Days earlier, I had prepared Plans A, B, C, D.

OPTION ONE

LIVORNO TO LUCERNE (VIA MILAN)

TRENITALIA – Livorno-Milan-Lucerne – LV. 11:24am, AV. 7:41pm

ACCOMMODATIONS (two nights) – TBD

ACCOMMODATIONS (three nights) – TBD

SUMMER SCHOOL – June 30-July 4 – PAID

SWISS AIR – July 4 – ZRH-LHR – LV. 8:55pm, AV. 9:45pm – PAID

OPTION TWO

LIVORNO TO LONDON TO ZURICH

BRITISH AIR – TBD – PSA-LHR – TBD

ACCOMMODATIONS (one night) – TBD

SWISS AIR – June 29 – LHR-ZRH – LV. 8:45am, AV. 11:40am – PAID

ZURICH TO LUCERNE – TBD

ACCOMMODATIONS (two nights) – TBD

ACCOMMODATIONS (three nights) – TBD

SUMMER SCHOOL – June 30-July 4 – PAID

SWISS AIR – July 4 – ZRH-LHR – LV. 8:55pm, AV. 9:45pm – PAID

OPTION THREE

ELSE-WHERE

POST-LUCERNE

LUCERNE TO LJUBLJANA – July 4

LUCERNE TO LONDON – July 4

LUCERNE TO DELHI – July 4

LONDON TO LJUBLJANA – TBD

LONDON TO DELHI – TBD

[...]

Option Two was my preferred route, since I already had a Swiss Air flight from London to Zurich for the 29^th of June, plus a Swiss Air return flight to London from Zurich for the 4^th of July. Option One, however, might take precedence given that the clock was ticking and I needed to get from Livorno to London. Flights to London from Pisa were growing more expensive by the hour due to the airline algorithms employed to punish anyone who liked to keep options open. Additionally, the Trenitalia route from Livorno to Lucerne was appealing in terms of its implied picturesque qualities. My main reservation was that Italy was still prone to wildcat strikes and I might get stranded en route to Lucerne.

As of Tuesday, June 24, when the two miracles occurred and shifted the prospects of “Lucerne” significantly, I could not quite “see” which route was the most affordable – but affordable in all senses, not just the financial.

[…]

The final booking for the hotel in Lucerne (five nights) came in at [REDACTED] CHF. Shortly after it was confirmed, I received an email from IMI (International Management Institute) regarding availability of dorm rooms. I had written to them at the same time that I had written to the hotel. They offered me five nights for [REDACTED]. I could save [REDACTED] USD by canceling the hotel booking and opting for the IMI dorm. Yet, I kept hearing “No,” whenever I posed that option to myself. Why? Perhaps the dorm room would create other unforeseen issues? It was not clear. Perhaps the relative “luxury” of the hotel room was in order as some kind of reward (gift) for enduring the long wait regarding “Lucerne”? The fact that the price more or less matched the credit line increase seemed telltale. Were these two miracles actually a temptation? There was no way to know other than by going down the road on offer. Additionally, it was possible that canceling the hotel booking so close to the date of arrival would incur fees. And, the hotel room seemed to have “Grace” written all over it, regardless of the price. Questioning Grace at this particular point seemed like the last thing I should permit myself to be tempted to do.

[…]

Image – La Baracchina Bianca at sunset, Livorno. Photo: Gavin Keeney.

SUN + JUPITER

As a kind of footnote to all that transpired on June 24, the Sun was conjunct Jupiter at 3 degrees Cancer. This particular event had been called “the Luckiest Day of the Year” in one of the three monthly horoscopes I followed or indulged in (ir)religiously. Given that it occurred in my ninth house, it was supposedly related to “career” opportunities. Yet, the ninth house was known as the House of Philosophy. Careerist ambitions were relative to the work at hand – and the work at hand had been proving to be the most anti-careerist agenda imaginable.

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I checked the cancellation policy for Swiss Air. Canceling the booking (LHR-ZRH-LHR) would incur [REDACTED] GBP in fees. The original booking of [REDACTED] GBP would yield, upon cancellation, [REDACTED] GBP. I could not change the LHR-ZRH leg to PSA-ZRH. I would have to cancel the entire booking if I did not go to London to catch the LHR-ZRH flight on the 29^th of June. I had hoped to keep the ZRH-LHR return, but it was not tenable. “Flex” in terms of Swiss Air meant I could only change the day and time of the flights. Lesson learned, and not unusual in terms of what “Flex” means elsewhere, other than the somewhat punishing fees, I would nonetheless wait a bit longer before canceling the booking and opting for the train from Livorno to Lucerne.

[…]

My preference for after “Lucerne” was to return to Venice. This would, in part, require a signal from Ca’ Foscari. It would also require a new comfort level with EU rail travel, deferred since my intention of traveling by rail from Barcelona to Livorno was “de-railed” … Perhaps Livorno to Lucerne would provide that level of comfort. In Italy, it was the on-and-off-and-on wildcat strikes that caused concern, versus the “serious delays” in the UK. What was also needed was one or two trips to restore confidence in EU train service.

[…]

I now had “X” invested in the EO1 project, with little or no support from the art-academic establishment. The symbolic support was still there but wearing thin. A sea-change was required.

Meanwhile, on the façade of the church of S. Jacopo in Aquaviva, on June 24, a new shadow appeared. It resembled Alfred Hitchcock. He was smoking a cigarette. He was just below the bronze crucifix that was just to the left of the entrance portal to the church. It was 5:52pm. Previously, at roughly the same hour, a figure had appeared in the exact same spot but headed toward the entrance. Hitchcock’s profile could be a result of the Solstice. Clearly something had shifted.

I had not yet ventured into the church, but I was watching it. As the bells rang as I wrote “this,” I realized it called to me. Why? A bit earlier I had seen a seagull perched on the cross at the pinnacle of the façade – i.e., directly above the entrance. It was parked there, in observation and contemplation. Thankfully, the cross had no crown of thorns to prevent birds alighting there. They brought life to the “institution.” The gull was gazing West, toward the sea …

One evening the seagulls came and sailed back and forth above the piazza in front of the church. The pigeons that attacked the tables at the nearby café took note and kept a low profile. The gulls sailed to and fro, alighting here and there. They did not need the tables of the café, as they had the sea.

Huge ships passed on the near horizon – cruise ships or cargo, who knows? Only their silhouette was visible against the setting sun. Others seemed anchored, sitting still. The island in the far distance, reputedly a prison, was generally indiscernible – lost in the haze. What went on there was anyone’s guess. I noted that none of the bathers went terribly far out into the sea. There were rumors of sharks and manta rays prowling the waters. The clubs along the harbor had pools, shacks, and umbrellas. Those with more courage actually immersed themselves in the sea, either the inland canals or the sheltered cove. Hard to discern was “what” was the limit – i.e., the famous line not to be crossed.

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NEW MOON

Early evening of June 24, I booked train passage to Lucerne via Milan. I also canceled my Swiss Air flights. Swiss Air used that famous Swiss Army knife a friend had warned me about to whittle away at the refund. It did, however, go “out” immediately upon cancellation, or so said the Swiss Air robot. When would the [REDACTED] GBP refund arrive in my [REDACTED] account? It would be helpful to have, given that the [REDACTED] account was fast dwindling.

TRENITALIA, ETC. – Livorno to Lucerne – June 28

LV. Livorno Centrale 11:24am (Intercity 670), AV. Milano Centrale 3:55pm; LV. Milan Centrale 4:10pm (EuroCity 36), AV. Lugano 5:28pm; LV. Lugano 5:58pm (Intercity 688), AV. Lucerne 7:41pm

The next morning, I wrote to IMI asking for a room upon arrival, i.e., June 28, and a room prior to departure, i.e., July 4. Departure to “where”? I resisted trying to add two nights to my previously arranged hotel booking. Two nights at the IMI dorm came through at [REDACTED] CHF. Two more nights at the hotel would cost [REDACTED] CHF … I still had no idea where IMI was in Lucerne, or how I would reach it upon arrival at Lucerne. I also noted the very short amount of time available to switch trains in Milan – i.e., 15 minutes. That one rattled me. But I suppose they would not make the change so tight if it was not doable.

On June 25 there was a New Moon in Cancer conjunct Jupiter … This auspicious event was operating in the background of all of the permutations underway with this somewhat troublesome itinerary. The timings, the cost, the lack of experience with rail travel in Europe, plus never having been to Lucerne, all added up to a “picture” with multiple question marks all over it. The largest question mark, however, was “where” I would go after Lucerne.

[…]

The total cost, thus far, for the Summer School was 1,828.00 USD … “Thus far” included no exit plan from Lucerne.

[REDACTED]

“Why am I doing this?” I asked myself. “For the EO1 project,” I answered. Might there be somebody at the Summer School who will “see” what is on offer and join the campaign?

[…]

As of Thursday, June 26, everything was more or less in place (train, hotel, etc.) … Having checked the bus schedule for the 1+ bus from Accademia Navale to Livorno Stazione FF.SS (i.e., Livorno Centrale, the main train station in Livorno), I found that I would cross Piazza Dante as I walked the last 99 meters to the train station. How appropriate given that the EO1 project had recently embraced the concept of “exile,” via Dante, and that the trip to Lucerne would be an opportunity to report to scholars of law on how the EO1 project was being transformed through the lived rites of “exile.”

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WALKING ON

On the last day in Livorno, Friday, June 27, before departure for Lucerne, last pieces of the puzzle fell into place and seemed to fit. The Swiss Air refund appeared via [REDACTED], a wire transfer via [REDACTED], to IMI for two nights in their dorm, landed in Lucerne, and instructions as to how to access the hotel room (actually an apartment) in the city center, where I would stay for the five days of the Summer School, arrived. Page turned by the wind, so to speak, I headed one last time to the café by the sea for my late-afternoon ritual of talking to ghosts and shadows.

The church of San Jacopo was open again upon arrival at the café. I sat for a bit at the café, had two glasses of rosé wine, and then went inside the church for the second time, the first being a day or two before, when upon entering, a small private service promptly started up and I stayed for the duration. I had then walked the side aisles to study the small chapels and paintings. I went down the right aisle, crossed over before the altar, and headed back up the left aisle. I was stopped by a painting of Christ (ca.1944), which I had first sighted from a distance during the short service. Rays streamed downward in a pattern that I first thought to be, when I had seen the painting from a distance, a wedding veil. The painting had an “epigraph” – “Gesü conforto in te” (“Jesus I trust in you”).

Upon this second visit to San Jacopo, I took the same route, stopping at the painting again. It was only then that I realized that the rays were emanating from his heart where he had placed a hand. I lit a candle, deposited one euro plus miscellaneous coins in the donation box, and asked if I might “walk on.” He nodded and I left the church. I meant, of course, walk on into exile. Hitting the pavement (tarmac) of the Piazza San Jacopo, the sun blazing in the west, I suddenly remembered Nikos Kazantzakis, who had also “walked on” – in his Report to Greco. I thought of the pavement as the world, the church as sanctuary (respite) from the world. But I also knew that the point of walking on was to walk on, with all who might do so determining for themselves what that meant. There was no catechism.

I bought shampoo, tobacco, and rolling papers for the forthcoming trip, triggering the decline of the USD credit line on the [REDACTED] Visa card, which I had up until then vigorously protected. I was out of cash except for small balances spread across half a dozen debit cards. I had studied my arrival in Lucerne via maps and such for days. I had fully visualized it. I would arrive at Lucerne train station at 7:41pm and promptly head south to IMI by bus. IMI was not in the city center but on the outskirts. The bus was roughly a 30-minute trip. The next day, Sunday, I would head back north by bus to the train station, attempt to acquire Swiss francs, and then check in at the hotel (apartment) in the city proper. I would then be within walking distance of the Summer School. I had [REDACTED] GBP that could be exchanged at the train station. I had no significant balances that would yield much at an ATM. I awaited both [REDACTED] and [REDACTED] payments, a total of around [REDACTED] USD, to re-float the boat.

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ARRIVAL IN LUCERNE

Image – Lake Lucerne. Photo: Gavin Keeney.

I arrived at my dorm room at IMI at 11:00pm on June 29 after a wild ride. The train from Livorno to Milan Centrale was late and I missed my connection. The train actually stopped for about 45 minutes on the tracks as we approached Milan due to “technical problems.” Upon arrival in Milan, they gave us a Courtesy Box (crackers, water, cookie). Trenitalia then re-booked my train to Lugano, which left at 6:10pm, two hours later than my planned departure, saying, “Get on any train to Lucerne in Lugano.” That actually worked, perhaps because no one ever came through the train checking tickets, and I arrived at Lucerne Station just before 10:00pm. I then found Bus 21 to the IMI dorm, without too much trouble. IMI was well outside of the metropolitan area ... Outside my window was Lake Lucerne and the stars ...

I awoke at dawn the next morning to see a morning star over the mountains. Venus or Jupiter? I was not sure. Later that morning a hawk appeared, circling and being chased by two crows. He circled repeatedly in the near-distance just above my balcony. Obviously, he had a message to deliver. “Hawks” appear often as messengers. The message was: “Time to act.” I could not sit idle in my rural idyll admiring the landscape, even if I wished to. Self-check-in at Hofquartier called. I whistled, “Message delivered,” and he flew off with the crows in hot pursuit.

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OUTTAKES