Significant Moments: The Retrovirus

Albert Rothenberg, M.D. first described or discovered a process he termed "homospatial thinking," which consists of actively conceiving two or more discrete entities occupying the same space, a conception leading to the articulation of new identities. Homospatial thinking has a salient role in the creative process in the following wide variety of fields: literature, the visual arts, music, science, and mathematics. This cognitive factor, along with "Janusian thinking," clarifies the nature of creative thinking as a highly adaptive and primarily nonregressive form of functioning.

There is a section of my book Significant Moments whose manifest content describes a fugitive from justice who changes his personal identity and goes on to transform the economic conditions in the town in which he settles.  Superimposed on the text is the metaphor of the retrovirus: an RNA virus that is replicated in a host cell via the enzyme reverse transcriptase to produce DNA from its RNA genome. The DNA is then incorporated into the host's genome by an integrase enzyme. The virus thereafter replicates as part of the host cell's DNA. Retroviruses are enveloped viruses that belong to the viral family Retroviridae.  In simple terms the retrovirus transforms it's RNA into DNA (autoplasty) and goes on to alter the genetic makeup of the host it invades (alloplasty).  The retrovirus can be pathogenic (causing AIDS, cancers, and other diseases); but it's unique ability to alter a host cell's genome permits it to insert beneficial genes into an organism's DNA that will be inherited over the generations.
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He saw all this, the picture of his life, which was horrible, and of his own soul, hideous in its ugliness. Yet a new day had dawned for that life and soul; and he seemed to see Satan bathed in the light of Paradise.

Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
When I think back on it today, and what . . .
Hermann Hesse, Demian.
. . . impression he made on me . . .
Henry James, The Figure in the Carpet.
. . . at that time, I can only say that . . .
Hermann Hesse, Demian.
I felt a certain measure of respect for him:
Primo Levi, The Periodic Table.
. . . his life had long been . . .
Sigmund Freud, Letter to Wilhelm Fliess.
. . . penurious and precarious, but it was life; . . .
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
. . . somehow he . . .
Edward Field, Excerpt from Three Frankenstein Poems.
. . . managed to exist and endure and, . . .
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
. . . in the end, . . .
Philip Kennicott, A Fresh Start in Santa Fe.
. . . to escape, . . .
Primo Levi, The Periodic Table.
. . . ready to start life all over again.
Albert Camus, The Stranger.
He was a stranger to the district . . .
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
. . . an outsider.
Richard Wright, The Outsider.
Nothing was known of his origins and little about how he started in life. He was said to have arrived in the town with very little money, a few hundred francs; and with this scanty capital, applied to the service of an ingenious idea and fostered with order and shrewdness, he had made a fortune for himself and for the community.
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
But he achieved this only after a protracted identity crisis . . .
Erik H. Erikson, Young Man Luther.
There is no doubt that, if arrested, he would have been sentenced to . . . a decade or more in jail.
Martin Gregor-Dellin, Richard Wagner: His Life, His Work, His Century.
For he had . . .
Jack London, War.
. . . broken parole. To climb a wall and steal apples can be a mere escapade if it's a boy, or a minor offence in a grown man; but in the case of a convict on parole it's a crime—breaking and entering and all the rest of it, not just for the magistrates but for trial at the Assizes. And the penalty is not just a few days in gaol, but . . .
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
. . . a decade or more in jail.
Martin Gregor-Dellin, Richard Wagner: His Life, His Work, His Century.
Owing to his having escaped the clutches of the law by his flight . . . no formal legal indictment. . . was drawn up against . . .
Ernest Newman, The Life of Richard Wagner.
. . . him at the time.
Joseph Conrad, The Rescue.
It is consequently only fair to him for us to bear in mind that he had no opportunity to correct, at the time, whatever errors there may have been in the statements of the witnesses of 1849, or even of knowing in detail what they were. Some of the alleged evidence against him would probably not have survived a searching cross-examination.
Ernest Newman, The Life of Richard Wagner.
He knew . . .
Joseph Conrad, The Rescue.
. . .that what he had done had brought him well within the scope of the law, and his one immediate concern was to get to some safe spot as quickly as possible.
Ernest Newman, The Life of Richard Wagner.
His name, taken from his father . . .
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
. . . was Jean Valjean or Vlajean, the latter being probably a nickname, a contraction of ‘voila Jean’.
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
Few people who passed him during the five days he walked on that dusty road . . .
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
. . . from his native town . . .
Thomas Hardy, A Group of Noble Dames.
. . . to Montreuil-sur-mer . . .
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
. . . could have regarded him as a figure of much account, yet . . .
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
He became, in his day, a model of notoriety whose name was on everyone’s lips and whose reputation extended far beyond the frontiers . . .
Martin Gregor-Dellin, Richard Wagner: His Life, His Work, His Century.
. . . of France.
Hazel Rowley, Richard Wright: The Life and Times.
All too often, someone is not who he appears to be or is taken for.
Martin Gregor-Dellin, Richard Wagner: His Life, His Work, His Century.
He went by . . .
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
. . . a pseudonym . . .
Ernest Newman, The Life of Richard Wagner.
. . . the name Pere Madeleine . . .
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
. . . and was careful . . .
Edmund Engelman, Berggasse 19: Sigmund Freud’s Home and Offices, Vienna, 1938.
. . . not to reveal . . .
Boris Pasternak, Dr. Zhivago.
. . . not even to hint at . . .
Edmund Engelman, Berggasse 19: Sigmund Freud’s Home and Offices, Vienna, 1938.
. . . his former identity.
Boris Pasternak, Dr. Zhivago.
He was a man of about fifty, reserved in manner but good-hearted, and this was all that could be said about him.
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
Somehow he must have hoped to escape into a life of obedience to God which would eventually come to count also as . . .
Erik H. Erikson, Young Man Luther.
. . . penitence and repentance . . .
Richard Wagner, Tannhauser.
. . . for his past transgressions
U.S. Supreme Court, Alexander v. United States (dissenting opinion of Justice Anthony Kennedy).
As did most people in the centuries prior to adequate artificial illumination, . . .
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
. . . Pere Madeleine . . .
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
. . . rose daily at or before dawn. He recited his morning prayers and then had an hour or so to himself—
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
He always took his . . .
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
. . . breakfast . . .
Cosima Wagner’s Diaries (Saturday, April 6, 1878).
. . . alone, with a book at his elbow.
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
At 8 in the morning . . .
Cosima Wagner’s Diaries (Friday, September 15, 1882).
. . . he was in his office, meeting customers (“tiresome people!” he once explained in a letter to [a friend]), balancing accounts, supervising the workers, inspecting merchandise. Frequently he would slip a book of poetry into his pocket, to read in case he had an idle moment.
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
Not that he knew it, . . .
Martin Gregor-Dellin, Richard Wagner: His Life, His Work, His Century.
. . . the decree of fate . . .
The Diary of Richard Wagner 1865-1882: The Brown Book.
—that’s to say, . . .
Franz Kafka, The Trial.
. . . the former Jean-Valjean’s struggles of heart and mind before he denounces himself . . .
The Diary of Richard Wagner 1865-1882: The Brown Book.
. . . that final decree . . .
U.S. Supreme Court, Heckman v. United States.
. . . was already sealed.
Martin Gregor-Dellin, Richard Wagner: His Life, His Work, His Century.
He had only to let things take their course.
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
It is just as well that . . .
Edward Field, Excerpt from Three Frankenstein Poems.
. . . Jean Valjean the felon . . .
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
. . . is unaware—being simple enough to believe only in the present—that . . .
Edward Field, Excerpt from Three Frankenstein Poems.
. . . police authorities at work behind the scenes . . .
Martin Gregor-Dellin, Richard Wagner: His Life, His Work, His Century.
. . . will find . . .
Edward Field, Excerpt from Three Frankenstein Poems.
. . . him some day . . .
Joseph Conrad, The Secret Agent.
. . . and pursue him for the rest of his short unnatural life, until trapped . . .
Edward Field, Excerpt from Three Frankenstein Poems.
. . . abandoned and betrayed . . .
The Diary of Richard Wagner 1865-1882: The Brown Book.
. . . he will confess everything, . . .
Fergus Hume, The Mystery of a Hansom Cab.
. . . in a kind of Dostoyevskian fervor of self-cleansing.
Stephen Greenblatt, Miracles.
If, as . . .
Peter Gay, Freud: A Life for Our Time.
. . . Valjean . . .
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
. . . at the last . . .
George Steiner, The Portage to San Cristobal of A.H.
. . . came to believe, it was indeed his fate to . . .
Peter Gay, Freud: A Life for Our Time.
. . . be apprehended and . . .
Scott Williams, The Fugitive Slave Act and the Underground Railroad.
. . . hauled before a judge . . .
Primo Levi, The Periodic Table.
. . . that would be years later.
Peter Gay, Freud: A Life for Our Time.
But at the present moment . . .
The Diary of Richard Wagner 1865-1882: The Brown Book.
. . . it seemed that he . . .
Joseph Conrad, A Confession.
. . . had won a small but decisive battle against the darkness, the emptiness, and the hostile years that lay ahead.
Primo Levi, The Periodic Table.
—but, please, allow me to begin anew:
Thomas Mann, Dr. Faustus.
Thanks to the rapid growth of the industry which he so admirably reorganized, Montreuil-sur-mer became a place of some consequence.
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
The population seemed to grow by the thousands from one day to the next.
Arthur Rubinstein, My Young Years.
Large orders came from Spain, which absorbs a great quantity of jet. Sales reached a scale almost rivaling those of London and Berlin, and Pere Madeleine's profits were so great that in the second year he was able to build a new factory consisting of two large workshops, one for men and the other for women.
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
And what a tremendous, marvelous place it was! It had huge iron gates leading into it, and a high wall surrounding it, and smoke belching from its chimneys, and strange-whizzing sounds coming from deep inside it.
Roald Dahl, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory.
The needy had only to apply, and they could be sure of finding employment and a living wage.
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
He did much to raise the standard of living among his thousands of employees.
Joel Glenn Brenner, The Emperors of Chocolate: Inside the Secret World of Hershey and Mars.
In general his coming had been providential for the whole region, once so stagnant, which now pulsed with the vigor of healthy industry.
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
But whatever may prompt this unorthodox behavior . . .
Peter Radetsky, The Invisible Invaders: The Story of the Emerging Age of Viruses.
. . . which is based on . . .
Mystery Guide, The Secret Agent—Joseph Conrad.
. . . the capacity to change the environment . . .
Albert Rothenberg, Janusian Thinking and Creativity.
. . . almost everyone agrees that it's a masterful strategy. "It's a particularly bright way of existing . . .
Peter Radetsky, The Invisible Invaders: The Story of the Emerging Age of Viruses.
. . . not to mention the fact that it carries a bonus . . .
Aldous Huxley, Brave New World.
. . . because the virus doesn't continually have to find new hosts in which to grow."


This necessity for viruses quickly to find new bodies to infect explains the fact that the most devastating disease epidemics are often short-lived. Influenza is a prime example. Once a new influenza virus arrives on the scene, it methodically makes its way through the susceptible population, and then, with no one left to infect, abruptly fades away. And were it not for the virus's virtuoso ability to mutate into newly infectious forms, that would be the end of that.
Retroviruses, on the other hand, are simply in no rush. They come on in, make themselves at home, and hang around for a while. In fact they become so much a part of the household that while the infected cell may alert the body that there's a virus around, the immune system's virus fighters simply don't do enough about it. And the virus—that is, the viral genes—taking advantage of such generous laissez-faire, becomes a semipermanent guest. It's a particularly ingenious and efficient way to conduct an infection.
Peter Radetsky, The Invisible Invaders: The Story of the Emerging Age of Viruses.
It is our belief that if the soul were visible to the eye every member of the human species would be seen to correspond to some species of the animal world and a truth scarcely perceived by thinkers would be readily confirmed, namely, that from the oyster to the eagle, from the swine to the tiger, all animals are to be found in men and each of them exists in some man, sometimes several at a time.


Animals are nothing but the portrayal of our virtues and vices made manifest to our eyes, the visible reflections of our souls. God displays them to us to give food for thought. But since they are no more than shadows, He has not made them educable in the full sense of the word — Why should He do so? Our souls, on the other hand, being realities with a purpose proper to themselves, have been endowed with intelligence, that is to say, the power to learn. Well-managed social education can extract from any human spirit, no matter of what kind, such usefulness as it contains.


This, of course, is to confine the matter within the limits of our visible earthly life, without prejudging the deeper question of the anterior and ulterior nature of creatures which are not men. The visible personality affords us no grounds for denying the existence of a latent personality. Having made this reservation, we may proceed. . . .


The traditional local industry of Montreuil-sur-mer was the manufacture of imitation English jet beads and the 'black glass' of Germany. Because of the cost of raw materials the industry had never been prosperous and its workers had been underpaid, but this situation had recently been transformed. Towards the end of 1815 a newcomer to the town had had the idea of substituting shellac for resin, and had also devised a simpler and less expensive form of clasp for such things as bracelets. These trifling changes amounted to a revolution. They greatly reduced costs, which in the first place enabled the trade to pay higher wages, and thus benefited the district. And they made it possible to reduce prices while increasing the manufacturer's profit. Three beneficial results; and in less than three years the innovator had grown rich, which is good, and had spread the prosperity around him, which is better.
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
He did not belong to that species of persons who do things in order to talk about them (like me); he did not like high-sounding words, indeed words. It appeared that in speaking, as in . . .
Primo Levi, The Periodic Table.
. . . social conduct . . .
Joseph Wortis, Fragments of an Analysis with Freud.
. . . he had never received lessons; he spoke as no one speaks, saying only the core of things.
Primo Levi, The Periodic Table.
He was a friendly but sad figure. People said of him: ‘A rich man who is not proud. A fortunate man who does not look happy.’ He was a man of mystery.
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
Night after night, he sat by an oil lamp, reading, studying, remembering. He had . . .
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
. . . not conformed, he was trying to settle his accounts with the past . . .
Primo Levi, The Periodic Table.
. . . and fundamentally, . . .
Robert M. Young, What is Psychoanalytic Studies?
—above all, . . .
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
. . . he had a conscience, and he struggled . . .
Primo Levi, The Periodic Table.
. . . to his dying day, . . .
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
. . . to soothe it.
Primo Levi, The Periodic Table.
His clothes, his general appearance and his speech, when he . . .
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
. . . arrived in . . .
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
. . . Montreuil-sur-mer, had been those of a laborer. But it seems that on the December evening when he unobtrusively entered the town, . . .
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.
. . . carrying his belongings in a small pack on his back . . .
Herbert Kupferberg, The Mendelssohns: Three Generations of Genius.
. . . a serious fire had broken out in the Town Hall. Plunging into the flames he had, at the risk of his life, rescued two children whose father, as it turned out, was the Captain of Gendarmerie. So no one had asked to see his identity papers.
Victor Hugo, Les Miserables.