Just a couple of words about the name of this blog.

In my late teenage years I read a book called Das wiedergefundene Licht (English title: And There Was Light) by Jacques Lusseyran. It is an autobiography by a blind. Jacques lost his sight in school by an accident. He writes about a world without light. Slowly he gets accustomed to the situation. During the Vichy regime when he is in a résistance group his job is to do the interviews with the new people who want to join the group. Without listening too much what the people say he chooses the trustful by the tone of their voice, by the way how they say what they say. And he never fails. He sees through them. He can distinguish the honest from the pretenders, the liars, the future traitors. As Lusseyran had lost his most important sense which is responsible for much more than half of our entire perception he concentrated on the other four and intensified them. This book told me something I knew already unconsciously but hadn't fully realized. That with deprivation you can gain much more than you can lose.

This blog is mainly about listening to music and my reaction to it and closing your eyes is a way to intensify the listening experience. Without visual detractions one is much more at the mercy of the music, there is a more direct contact with it. And it is easier to delve into the music, to hear details like instruments, voices and noises.

There is another less hopeful reason for the name. When looking at today's world I am often inclined to close my eyes not to see all the ugliness, degeneration and decline.

This may sound overly emotive and dramatic but I think there are still realms and retreats of beauty like e.g. in some music and I will try to find those and transform my perception of them into words whenever possible.

P.S. I started blogging on June 13th, 2001. Here are the first posts from my old blog sax & sunshine. I began close your eyes on October 7th, 2002.