Title: Viglets – Time, Infinity, Eternity
Author: Viggo P. Hansen
Publisher: AuthorHouse
ISBN: 1477211446
Pages: 90
Genre: Self-Help & Psychology Humor
Reviewed by: David Allen
Hollywood Book Reviews
Mysterious, ineluctable, never-have-enough-of-it, Time … is the subject matter, recurring motif, and wake-up call presented in this brainy and very fun collection of musings and verse.
Viggo P. Hansen’s launching pad – lots of droll observation and wit – sends all kinds of rockets and missiles our way. Culled from literature, physics, and a mordant sense of humor, Hansen succeeds in realigning our sights to the possible meaning of Here and Now, Then and Gone, and Eternity. Time is the Healer, and Time is the Adversary. In Goya’s famous painting, it is depicted as the demiurge Moloch, who devours his children (think about it: the metaphor really holds.) From time immemorial, mankind has attempted by diverse means to measure this thing. And has succeeded variably, or not at all.
Right behind the breastbone, each of us carries around a very personal Rolex: the heart. The heartbeat is our default stopwatch, whether we like it or not. Then there is the circuit of the moon, the rotation of the Earth and the planets around the sun. Science has devised somewhat more sophisticated measures, such as the cesium (atomic) clock, an international standard based on how fast radioactive particles break down.
You will encounter these gems, and much, much more, in this smile-rousing book. Human history and literature are stamped with efforts to capture and portray this elusive quarry. The Mayan and Gregorian calendars…Proust’s À La Recherche du Temps Perdu…Anthony Powell’s A Dance to the Music of Time. What is time, and where does it go?
We may never know – but if Viggo Hansen has his way, we’ll have a great time – a great adventure – finding out. Consider the following, from the book: When watching a sea gull / Gracefully glide over waves and windy shores / You have to wonder / Do they have the same sense of urgency? / Freeway flyers have in getting to the airport?
Poetry comes naturally to Hansen, along with a brainy occasionally wordy sense of the surreal. His outlook is expansive, inclusive, synesthetic: the purview includes but is by no means limited to people. In more than one place he asks: Do rocks have clocks? This is by no means silly or fatuous. Readers in the grip of Hansen’s charming spiel will find themselves seriously reflecting on similar matters themselves. Or the following again: What is time to the hapless acorn? / Who fell flat on its head one dark night / Woke up wondering if it would / Be eaten by a squirrel / Or become a majestic sequoia tree / Now that is stressful.
Readers can celebrate: the field is wide open. This writer is unsparing in his send-ups, as they relate to time. He touches upon culture, the Internet, contemporary habits, hobbies, and foibles – all with a wry, hypomanic grace that leaves one wanting more. The book is, in a sense, interactive: the reader is invited to jot down ‘Viglets’ (thoughts, impressions, stanzas) in response to what has just been read.
Ultimately, wisdom gives way to philosophy – and to metaphysics, and to a kind of homespun spirituality. Whatever time is, don’t waste it. Make hay while the sun shines, and make time for this book. As the author so elegantly puts it: The only way to get to the next dimension(s) / Is pretty much by leaving this one / But we can put it off as long as possible / Simply by being nice.