Recalling Past Life: About Days Forgotten, Dreams Dreamt, Books Read, and Some Flute Music

By Franz Rothe

This booklet is grown from careless, partly lost notes that had been sent to relatives and classmates several years ago. It dates back to an era before the flood and pandemic, and war struck worse than ever. Retired because of my poor eyesight, my interest in literature had awakened, and the exchange seemed worthwhile once more. Thus this little

• Language: English
• Publisher: Quantum Discovery
• Release date: Feb 21, 2023
• ISBN: 9781960197191

Franz Rothe

Franz Rothe graduated from high school in Karlsruhe and studied mathematics, physics, and music there. Graduated with a diploma in mathematics from E T H Zürich, a doctorate in Tübingen. After some changes in life, a professorship at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, USA.In addition, Rothe and pianist Thomas Turner have developed a repertoire of classical music for flute and piano, and have recorded and released three CDs. This collection also contains several of their own transcriptions. Now Rothe is retired and keeps writing books about mathematics, and too, just for entertainment.

Book preview

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About Days Forgotten, Dreams Dreamt, Books Read,

and Some Flute Music

Franz Rothe

Recalling Past Life

Copyright © 2023 by Franz Rothe

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other non-commercial uses permitted by copyright law.

ISBN

978-1-960197-18-4 (Paperback)

978-1-960197-19-1 (eBook)

978-1-960197-17-7 (Hardcover)

Contents

I Short Episodes

I.1 First Ideas, Mostly Cheerful

I.1.1 My Cat

I.1.2 It Should Have Been Simply a Walk

I.1.3 The Cat Is Injured

I.1.4 Plato and Slavery

I.1.5 Become a Plumber!

I.1.6 Knecht Rupprecht is Late on the German Railway

I.1.7 Musil's Törleß on the Theater

I.2 Tübingen, an Important Station

I.2.1 Excellent Behavior

I.2.2 Remembering Karl-Peter Hadeler

I.2.3 Dreaming of Tübingen

I.2.4 How To Choose a Present,—Thoughts, but No Advice

I.3 Back to School

I.3.1 The Invitation

I.3.2 Who Talks so Lovely about Me

I.3.3 The Not so Good Old Days

I.3.4 School Traumata

I.4 Natural Philosophy

I.4.1 You Cannot Swim in the Same River Twice

I.4.2 Time Travel

II Important Topics

II.1 About Social Life

II.1.1 Merkel's Surprise

II.1.2 The Answer from Hans-Peter

II.1.3 About Ernst Bloch

II.1.4 The Lemming University

II.1.5 No American

II.1.6 Hans-Peter and Adult Education

II.2 Philosophy and Mathematics

II.2.1 Lost with Giorgio Agamben

II.2.2 Consolation with Günther Grass

II.2.3 Sirs, It Has Been My Pleasure, You Excuse Me

II.3 Kafka

II.3.1 Reading Kafka's Story A Country Doctor

II.3.2 The Neighbor

II.3.3 About Kafka's Story The Neighbor

III About My Father

III.0.1 Captured by High-frequency Electronics

III.0.2 Success After the War

III.0.3 Health Problems

IV About Pianist Thomas Turner and Some Flute Music

IV.1 The CDs with Pianist Thomas Turner

IV.1.1 Comments about These Pieces of Music

IV.1.2 My Adaption with Two Flutes

IV.2 Life Goes on

IV.2.1 German Songs

IV.2.2 A Closing Word

Preface

This booklet is for entertainment. It dates back to an era almost bygone before the pandemic and flood and fire disasters struck worse than ever. The freedom of writing something as irrelevant and idle as this booklet is now absent. So my exchange of ideas was fading out for the past three years. While I reread the careless, partly lost notes that had been sent to relatives and classmates a long time ago, I noticed the recurring willingness to answer. Retired because of my poor eyesight, my interest in literature had awakened and the exchange seemed worthwhile once more. Thus this little booklet has still been gathered. My heartfelt thanks go to everyone involved, especially Hans-Peter for his constant attention.

Charlotte, December 2022.

Keywords: school memories, literary criticism, humor, cat love,

philosophy of mathematics, flute music, dream experience, Kafka.

Genre: entertainment literature, flute literature.

Remark. This English translation has been corrected and slightly extended. The older German version of this audio book, together with some music is available at Amazon and other places either as one long mp3 file, with the cover depicted on page 6, or in three separate parts either as mp3 or wav files.

About the author:

Franz Rothe graduated from high school in Karlsruhe and studied mathematics, physics and music there. Graduated with a diploma in mathematics from the E T H Zurich, a doctorate in Tübingen. After some changes in life, a professorship at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, USA. In addition, Rothe and pianist Thomas Turner have developed a repertoire of classical music for flute and piano, and have recorded and released three CDs. This collection also contains several of their own transcriptions.

Part I

Short Episodes

I.1 First Ideas, Mostly Cheerful

I.1.1 My Cat

With the computer I copy the synopsis of the book,

which pretends to be so utterly important,

Meanwhile you tip over the glass of water

on the table with your front paw.

I cannot but laugh.

You retreat to the cardboard box in the corner, turning your back on me.

A black stripe of black fur,

right and left I see, somewhat irregular, dazzling white.

When I look at the black spot on your right hind paw, only the right one, my love is renewed by itself.

You only eat the cheap canned food and lick the carpet fibers.

You've been vomiting twice already.

The red spots on my arm,

will you bite again tomorrow morning?

I.1.2 It Should Have Been Simply a Walk

Five minutes by car from my house, near the Hilton Hotel, a pretty artificial lake has been laid out. The place is popular for relaxation and is visited by many joggers, pedal boaters, and walkers. Now some land around the lake has been sold, and apartment complexes are to be built near the bank. A high wire mesh fence from the road to the shore incloses the construction lot. The old buildings inside are demolished. I recently went back to look if at least a poster with information about the current developer has been set up. On my way, I remember that my three house-plants are still in the small shop next door because of my trip two weeks ago.

I am going to pick up the plants. As I enter the shop, I see a customer receiving her plant and paying 20 euros. I give the waitress my slip. She brings a cardboard box, on the edge of which my three plants are squeezed into plastic sleeves.

"95 euros."

"But it only costs 20 euros per plant."

"But your plants were in public space and have been badly damaged."

While I want to explain that she has damaged the plants, I already rummage in my wallet. There are only 20 euros bills. I want to give her five bills.

"It costs an additional 20 euros exchange fee."

I'm digging again. Suddenly, there are many one-euro bills, they are a little smaller, completely worn out, and printed with black ancient ornaments.

She doesn't take them. I search and search. A wind comes up. The whole kiosk drives and I sit in it with no roof above. I put the bills sorted into several piles, somewhat protected from the draft. There is a 150-euro bill and some a little newer black 15-euro

bills. I've never seen these bills before. With some counting, I can perhaps get closer to the sum. The kiosk continues to move past some trees. After five minutes, the journey goes backward, hopefully back.

I put a thick pack of one euro bills into a bag. Then