I should say at the outset that I think Gore Vidal was among the finest writers of the last century (and part of this one), that I’ve read many of his books, that this is my second reading of Creation, and that I miss having him in the world. He was a keen observer of human behavior and a razor-sharp critic of politics. We could use his incisive wit and his mischievous charm in this climate so filled with self-righteousness and anger.
But at the moment I want to focus on this book. It is an important work. What do I mean, important? I mean it will give the careful reader the rudiments of an education about human beings that transcends time and place, and ultimately teaches humility. We could use more of that in our public discourse today, as in all times, as in all places.
The story takes place long ago between 520 and 445 BCE in Persia. Cyrus Spitama is the fictional grandson of the real Zoroaster, founder in the fifth century BCE of Zoroastrianism, the primary religion of Persia, modern day Iran, for more than a thousand years. It was mostly pushed out by the Muslim conquest of Persia in the 7th century CE but continues to have a small number of adherents in Iran and India. These facts I learned when the story sparked my curiosity and I spent a little time with my friend Wikipedia. During my re-reading of Creation I spent quite a lot of time with my friend. Cyrus, being grandson to the founder of the leading religion of the time, was well schooled in religious thought, particularly Zoroastrian thought, and naturally he saw it as the one true faith with the one true explanation of the two big questions: 1) how did all this get here (creation), and 2) what happens to us after we die?
Because of his relation to Zoroaster, Cyrus is fetched to the court of the Persian King Darius and brought up there along with the sons of nobles, including Xerxes, son of Darius, and future king. At the time Persia was the most powerful kingdom in the world, at least that part of the world. It included all of modern day Iran, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Egypt, Israel, Syria, Jordan, Turkey, and probably Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Turkmenistan. There were numerous Greeks at the king’s court, who incited numerous conflicts with Greek cities. But Darius was interested In the lands to the east--India and Cathay (modern China), which were reputed to have great riches. So Darius sent Cyrus as an ambassador, along with a caravan of goods to be traded and a contingent of the army to protect them. Darius wanted to know what they had to trade, who were their rulers, the size of their armies, and how they fought. Obviously, empire was on his mind.
Cyrus was also interested in religion and spreading the faith founded by his grandfather. His journeys enabled conversations with a surprising set of leaders, including Mahavira, a revered prophet of Jainism, Siddhartha Gautama, better known as the Buddha, founder of Buddhism, Laozi, author of the Tao Te Ching and founder of Taoism, and the great Chinese philosopher Confucius, all of whom happened to be alive at the time in history. As reader we get to be a fly on the wall in debates between these great thinkers and founders of world religions. We are left with the observation that each of them sees the other’s ideas as primitive, curious, and wrong. Of course all this takes place long before the appearance of Christianity or Islam, but the suggestion that the same thinking would be applied to them is unavoidable.
Late in life Cyrus travels to Athens where he is contemporary with Socrates, Sophocles, Pericles, Democritus, Thuycidides, Herodotus, and others whose names I would recognize if I’d studied ancient Greece. The wars between Persia and Greece were known in Persia as The Greek Wars; in Greece they were known as The Persian Wars.
Much of the narrative described the politics of the time, with insider’s knowledge. Of course Vidal made up the conversations he imagined might have taken place, but being a savvy student of politics and human nature, his fabrications are very believable. Having run for Congress, and lost, Vidal had more than a passing familiarity with politics. When Cyrus Spitama is old, and serving as the Persian king’s ambassador in Athens, he is confronted by Thucydides, a conservative Greek politician following an oration by Herodotus on the Persian/Greek wars. “Thucydides spoke to me in the vestibule of the Odeon. ‘I suppose that a copy or what we've just heard will be sent on to Susa.’ [Susa was the city in which the Persian king’s court was held at that time of year.] “Why not?’ I was both bland and dull, the perfect ambassador. ‘The Great King enjoys wondrous tales. He has a taste for the fabulous.’” Later, in a more congenial setting, Cyrus elaborates. “When he [Herodotus] said that she [the Persian queen Amestris] had recently buried alive some Persian youths, the audience shuddered with delight. But the true story is quite different. After Xerxes was murdered, certain families went into rebellion. When order was restored, the sons of those families were executed in the normal manner....” I guess civilization has progressed somewhat.
The narrator Cyrus Spitama, a fictional character, having been raised at the Persian king’s court, favors the nobility, as one might expect. Talking about Greek politics, he says, “The leaders of both factions are aristocrats. But certain nobles--like the late Cimon--favor the wealthy landowning class, while others--like Pericles--play to the city mob....continuing the work of his political mentor Ephialtes, a radical leader who was mysteriously murdered a dozen years ago. Naturally the conservatives were blamed for the murder. If responsible, they should be congratulated. No mob can govern a city, much less an empire.”
I think we are all naturally self-centered. Okay that’s obvious. What I mean is that we see the world in a certain way, the way we are accustomed to seeing it, which for the most part is the way the world makes sense to us. I understand distances in miles and feet; when someone says 150 kilometers, I have to do a mental calculation to convert it to miles (90) before I understand it. Why don’t they just use miles like we do. But then we also know that the metric system is simpler, more rational with its multiples of 10 than the English system with 5280 feet to the mile and 12 inches to the foot.
If we travel widely with an open mind we begin to become aware of our self-centeredness and think rationally about other ways of being and doing, sometimes learning better ways. Thus we begin to learn humility. Reading Creation with an open mind can introduce us to the same lesson. That is why this book is important, and I humbly recommend it.
