"And Alexander wept, for there were no more worlds to conquer."

-Hans Gruber

There is very little I can add to the discourse now, as living through history of this magnitude is very uncomfortable. I simply don’t feel qualified to weigh in. We are taking a pause this week from new histories in order to give more room to process the one we’re currently experiencing. History comes, and history goes.

This history, though, is yet to be lived. But I’ve been following Heather Cox Richardson’s Letters from an American (thanks for the tip, Uncle Jim!), and also the economist Paul Krugmann, who was recently unleashed from the New York Times, and is brilliantly irascible. If you want your lived-history with some excellent perspective and contextualization, these are great places to start.

If you want to share your people to follow on substack, the comments are open below.

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“And Alexander wept, for there were no more worlds to conquer.”

Familiar to some, the quote is from the movie Die Hard (1988), memorably delivered by the movie’s mastermind villain, Hans Gruber (played by Alan Rickman).

His complete quote is:

“And when Alexander saw the breadth of his domain, he wept, for there were no more worlds to conquer.” He follows this line up with a cheeky, “The benefits of a Classical Education.”

Gruber’s dripping pretension is the counterpoint to the sturdy, plainspoken, Man-Of-The-People, John McClane (Bruce Willis). However — and perhaps this is on purpose? — Hans is wrong about this interpretation of the “Classical” work he quoted. (Discuss: Irony, or more evidence that Die Hard is the perfect movie? Por qué non los dos?)

The quote is likely meant to be from Plutarch’s De tranquillitate animi (“On Tranquility of Mind”). Plutarch, a Greek first century CE biographer and author, is commonly connected with the Han Gruber line, which is written like it is supposed to be a direct quote.

But when you read the original text, not only is it a “misquote,” it also means just the opposite of what Hans Gruber seems to intend to say.

Here’s the Plutarch:

Alexander wept when he heard Anaxarchus’ discourse about an infinite number of worlds, and when his friends inquired what ailed him, ‘Is it not worthy of tears,’ he said, ‘that, when the number of worlds is infinite, we have not yet become lords of a single one?’ (Plutarch, De tranquillitate animi, 4)

Indeed, Alexander the Great, when learning about the possibility of infinite worlds, was humbled he had not conquered even one, instead of being disappointed there weren’t any more worlds for him to conquer.

The Luxor Ramasseum, with the toppled statue of Ramesses, commonly thought to be the inspiration for Shelley’s Ozymandias. Wikicommons.

One last, meaningful reference that’s been coming to mind of late:

I met a traveller from an antique land,

Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,

Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,

And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;

And on the pedestal, these words appear:

My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;

Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare

The lone and level sands stretch far away.”

Ozymandias, Percy Bysshe Shelley

The benefits of a History education.

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Last note, please consider donating to the nonprofit Internet Archive. We (as in the collective “we the people”) are currently at risk of losing a lot of our primary documents stored online.

Be safe out there, everyone.