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OBVIOUS STATE

@obviousstate

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In Pursuit of Wisdom & Beauty
Art drawn from the classics since 2011 Books & prints🔻Bucks County, PA

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“Everything is interwoven, and the web is holy; and there is hardly anything unconnected with every other thing. For all things have been co-ordinated, and they combine to make up the world. For there is one universe made up of all things, and one power that animates all things, and one substance, and one law, and one reason.” - Marcus Aurelius

One substance, one law, one reason. Marcus Aurelius brought together his understanding of science, spirituality and philosophy together into a unified vision of the world. He wrestled with the most fundamental confounders of a positive unified theory - evil, ignorance, mortality, suffering, vice, fear - and created a productive, meaningful, cohesive vision of how one ought to live. I admire that he was able to arrive at a metaphysics of inter-connectedness without heavily relying on the gods as a backstop.

The gods do make a few appearances in the Meditations, but the book primarily focuses on a ground-up approach to sense-making; observations about the challenges of life as central to our experience and therefore central to our purpose, and the acknowledgement that we usually only have control over our own actions, and ultimately only our own thoughts.

From this almost Cartesian beginning with the quality of one’s own mind (something like “I think therefore I am free”), he builds up to an ethics of how we ought to behave, observing that while we cannot reliably compel others to behave morally, we can help shape the world by behaving morally ourselves. And that by doing so, we tilt the world toward something better in small but profound ways, because everything is interconnected.

#marcusaurelius #aurelius #stoicism #stoics #philosophy classics classicliterature wisdom beauty bookstagram by @obviousstate

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10 months ago

✨ The final line of “The Great Gatsby,” the Fitzgerald novel that defined the jazz age. It was the era that ushered in modernity, a time of material excess, liberation, and intoxication. But even in the midst of the party, Fitzgerald could sense the toll such decadence takes on the human soul.

Like so many other Fitzgerald fans, we adore this quotation and its kaleidoscopic meanings. Gatsby, surrounded by unimaginable wealth, prestige and fanfare, dreams only of a future with Daisy that will recreate their past. And yet, his past is what prevents him from attaining that bright future.

All pomp and circumstance aside, Gatsby is deeply relatable. Everyone, in their own way, aspires to their own vision of “one fine day.” Everyone is reaching toward the green light. And like Gatsby, we are all eventually borne, against our will, into the past.

In our illustration, a figure rows toward an ethereal, glimmering girl as her dress forms the bay. Her belt resembles a shining city, and a green jewel dangles from a string of pearls.

With one hand she sets the sun, with the other she lifts the moon.

#thegreatgatsby #gatsby #classicliterature #literature #jazzage #classics #reader #bookstagram #art #illustration by @obviousstate

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a year ago

📍“Forever is composed of nows” - Emily Dickinson. In her poem Dickinson plays with two of her favorites, time and mortality. We humans seem to have a unique capacity to contemplate the infinite expanse of “time.” We codify it, and arrange our experience of the world along an imagined timeline: first there was then, now I am here, and tomorrow I will be there.

But useful as this ability is to human civilization (would there even be civilization without it?), it obscures a simple truth. Time is merely a series of “nows.” Outside the scope of memory, there is only here and now. Dickinson’s poem explores this truth, and re-contextualizes “forever” as a stream of present tense experience.   ABOUT THE ART PRINT In our illustration, this present tense is represented as a map pin, a temporal “latitude of home.” The “nows” flow along a path that winds its way forever, taking the form of a snake biting its own tail.

#emilydickinson #obviousstate #art #poetry #classicliterature by @obviousstate

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9 months ago

“And indeed there will be time
For the yellow smoke that slides along the street,
Rubbing its back upon the window-panes;
There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;”

T.S. Eliot, “The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock by @obviousstate

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9 days ago

Conjuring cooler weather 🍂🍁 by @obviousstate

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a month ago

“A ship should not ride on a single anchor, nor life on a single hope.” - Epictetus

Casual recklessness is the greatest charm of youth. When I was younger, I knew nothing and had the confidence to prove it.

I was all in on music, and it was dreams-or-bust. As an adult, I still play music, but you’ll notice that I am in another line of work. It’s okay. I’ve always felt that a few misadventures are usually survivable and worth the price for the wisdom acquired - or as my son says, at least “do it for the plot.”

In the ancient world of Epictetus, sailors would carry multiple anchors on board their ships. They knew that a bad storm or other mishaps could quickly unmoor their boats, and had several backups to spare. The last anchor was called “sacred anchor” (ancora sacra in Latin), and so when a sailor was “trying their sacred anchor,” they were down to their last hope.   In this illustration, a confident young girl tries her own “sacred anchor,” achieving the impossible and flying it like a kite. It’s an act of audacity and hope, and it takes a youthful spirit.

📚Artwork from our illustrated edition of “The Stoic’s Handbook.” by @obviousstate

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3 months ago

🌙 “Never say ‘I have lost it,’ say ‘I have restored it.’”

Epictetus was born a slave. He knew something about loss, and about the stories we tell ourselves regarding what loss actually is.

Today we’re sitting with one of his most beautifully devastating lines, and the waning moon that inspired the illustration.

From “The Stoic’s Handbook” — our new illustrated edition of “The Enchiridion of Epictetus.” Comment MOON for a link to the book and a special offer. by @obviousstate

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3 months ago

“We Suffer More Often in Imagination Than in Reality” - Seneca.

I recently noticed something about bad days. If you check all of the items off your to-do list, it makes no difference whether you did so miserably or with equanimity. The report was written, the project was completed, the dishes were done, the mail was dropped off, the trash was taken out. And the things don’t care whether you suffered to do them, or delighted in doing them. The modern version of this is the saying “Pain is inevitable, but suffering is a choice.” This is an excellent example of the kind of actionable wisdom that Seneca and stoicism offer.  
For this illustration for “Letters from a Stoic” I chose a Parisian street as the backdrop, a sunset reflected in the Hausmann windows. A shadow is cast on the memory, transforming the scene into a rainy night, the crown of the man’s head making a second dark sun. Seneca encourages us to accept the difficulties of life with equanimity, and to reject the temptation to dwell on what we can’t control. by @obviousstate

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7 months ago

“I am not at all in a humour for writing; I must write on till I am.” - Jane Austen

Re-reading “Pride and Prejudice,” I was struck by how efficiently Austen can both flesh out vividly human characters while ironically commenting on their flaws. She truly stands out as a narrator. She never intrudes too much, but just enough to get us laughing.

If you’ve watched any of the “Pride and Prejudice” movies, you might remember Mr. Bingley’s effusive line about the country ball where he says how charming everyone was. I was so used to this characterization that I was surprised when I re-read the book and saw that he didn’t say it. It’s the narrator talking about him in the past tense: “Bingley had never met with pleasanter people or prettier girls in his life; everybody had been most kind and attentive to him, there had been no formality, no stiffness; he had soon felt acquainted with all the room; and as to Miss Bennet, he could not conceive an angel more beautiful.” It’s the narrator, but the tone is pure Bingley. Austen does this all the time, winking at us between the lines.

This sharp, ironic voice came so easily to her, that it pervades her personal letters as well, and this particular quotation from a letter to her sister Cassandra is a wonderful example.

For the illustration, I chose to pay homage to the beautiful 1894 “Peacock edition” cover, illustrated by Hugh Thomson. The peacock is replaced by a writer at her desk flinging off page after page of prose. And while it would be impractical (if not impossible) to write with a peacock quill, it was too fun of a nod to pass up. For the writing, I devised a way to incorporate Austen’s actual handwriting and words from Pride and Prejudice.

More to come!
Evan by @obviousstate

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5 months ago

Dear Readers,

We have most exciting news! We are thrilled to announce our next book: “Jane Austen: The Collected Passages and Quotations of a Most Literary Gangster.”The release date is next Thursday, May, 28.

There’s a reason Austen commands such an important place in the literary pantheon. She is a master at balancing high and low humor, ideals and irony, and passion and frivolity. She is the reigning queen of social satire, and just plain hilarious.

I’ve wanted to make a book of her works for some time, but wasn’t quite sure how to manage excerpts in a way that was coherent and enjoyable on its own. Surprisingly, it was the philosophy books that gave me a structured approach that worked, and I am really excited about what we’ve cooked up for you in this unique edition.

The quotations and passages are divided into six chapters, each with an ironic Austenian twist:

On Eternal Love (& other financial matters…)
On Grand Gestures (& other gentlemanly curiosities…)
On Knowing Oneself (eventually, with great reluctance…)
On the Proper Drinking of Tea (while quietly dying inside…)
On the Appalling Nosiness of Neighbours (a thorough inquiry…)
On Novels & Women (& other such incendiaries…)

Those of you familiar with her novels will immediately guess at which passages go where. Even without the deeper context of the stories, the passages are a joy to read on their own and a fun introduction to those new to her work. The settings, the personalities, the thwarted romances, the averted disasters… it’s all there.

And of course, illustrations! This project gave me ample opportunity to let the reins out. There’s some Regency-era goodness, some more modern takes on her witty mic drop moments, and all of them indulge the richness and flair that Austen’s language demands.

Whether you’re a devoted Janeite or just beginning to explore her work, this one is for you. by @obviousstate

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5 months ago

Human beings feel the pain of loss roughly twice as acutely as the joy of gains. Find $100, you’re up 1 happiness point. Lose the same $100 and you’re down 2 happiness points, even though you’re in the same absolute position. It’s called loss aversion, and it makes sense evolutionarily because it spurs us to strive for more, which helps the prepared survive.

But what happens when we’re surrounded by prosperity and abundance we weren’t wired for? We adapt. Fast. There’s a term for this: hedonic adaptation. We get used to the good stuff quick, and our baseline for “acceptable” keeps rising. One can imagine this taken to an extreme, where every harm is removed from the developmental path, and the ways in which this would distort our sense of what is tolerable, what level of discomfort is acceptable, and who or what should be blamed when our expectations aren’t met.

The Stoics understood this better than anyone, and in some ways it’s their starting point. Expect nothing and you will be content. From our modern perspective this seems extreme, but we can at least experiment with lowering expectations to the point where we accept that some discomfort is inevitable. Suffering is an inescapable feature of life. In the face of it, the only noble choice is to endure it. And with some luck, courage, and compassion, hopefully we get to endure it together.

ABOUT THE ART
For this illustration in our upcoming release, “Letters from a Stoic” I wanted a subject that perfectly captures the idea of enduring through acceptance and mutual support. Emperor penguins came to mind, huddled together and enduring the winter as if they were a part of the rugged landscape. by @obviousstate

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8 months ago

☀️The smartest read on the beach.

Two thousand years ago, Seneca wrote twelve letters to a friend on time, fear, friendship, and how to actually live.

They still hold up. by @obviousstate

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4 months ago