Well as usual I cannot believe that we are actually done with this semester in about two days (today doesn't count because it already started!). I also feel that I seem to always say the same thing in each of my last blogs for any Dr. Sexson class, it was amazing.
For me it is not just what I learn from Dr. Sexson, which is always more then I can say, but also from my fellow students. Rarely do you have a class in which the student's thoughts and not just the professors are used to build and add to the community of knowledge that the class can offer to you. I always seem to take away so much that can be used in other classes to come.
I also love that I usually leave a Dr. Sexson class and have my massive list of movies and books to enjoy over the break that lies ahead. Dr. Sexson's classes really do not end but are continued on throughout your time at MSU and beyond. Even my mother is, I am sure, tired of how much I call her and tell her what happened in class today. Rarely does that happen on a daily basis when you leave class and you are still excited over what you just learned.
I have to say that Emergent Lit was one of my favorite classes this semester, and mostly because I wasn't sure what to expect. The idea of low and high brow was kind of illusive to me and I was not sure how this could be interesting, but then again I can't believe I doubted Dr. Sexson! I loved this class and all the themes we covered. I am continually amazed on how much Dr. Sexson's classes cram into one semester. I think I won't remember much of what we went over, but then I am in another class and it comes back to me and I am in lecture all over again!
AS many of you have guessed that are new to Dr. Sexson's classes, he does have a kind of "posse" if you will. There is a group of us English majors that just follow him around throughout our college career, and never look back! I hope most of you are now addicted and take his classes as they arise. I am sorry to say that I cannot take anything next semester because I already took those classes, but perhaps in the spring when I am trying to take that one last class I discovered I needed to graduate!
So thank you Dr. Sexson and thank you to my fellow classmates for the past semester. I am always a little sad leaving these classes, but I know there are more to come. Hope everyone has a great summer break, and I know I plan to sleep for the first full week of it! Oh and most likely reread The Following Story at least a few more times!
Cheers!
R
P.S. I know I forgot to post my Finnegans Wake page and I was planning to do it this morning. Well I forgot it at home, so sorry about that! If any one wants to see it for some reason just ask!
Wednesday 28 April 2010
Monday 26 April 2010
Dr. Strabo at Your Service
While doing research for another paper over the weekend I stumbled upon this fun fact.
Herman Mussert=Dr. Strabo= Strabo=Greek Geographer and Historian
I know, another connection to The Following Story. I will stop now.
Life: A Dreamed Illusion
“Dreams are closed systems, in which everything fits to perfection”, or so Herman Mussert believes in Cees Nooteboom’s work The Following Story (Nooteboom 64). Nooteboom’s novel encompasses many of the themes from the semesters class, but none as intriguing as the ideas of the world as dream and illusion and life as fiction and language. Nooteboom though does not stop there in his use of universal literary themes, but combines them to create what seems to be a new theme, that is to say, life as dream and illusion.
Nooteboom’s work follows Herman Mussert during the two seconds in which he experiences a “mysterious mental maneuver”, and passes “from one state of being to another” (Nabokov 104). Easy, you know, does it, Herman. Within this two second lifetime the reader is told “the following story”, and hears of the memories that haunt Herman as he faces what lies ahead. While Nooteboom establishes a new theme for literature, he also frames it within the power of memory and time to present to the reader a way of understanding both Herman’s, and ultimately our own, final journey to the “world” that is to come.
Throughout the journey Nooteboom often writes about Herman seeing himself
asleep in Amsterdam. It is through these “visions” that he comes to understand that he is dead, and no longer in the reality that included his home, but in a different reality made up of dreams. He writes, “My dreams have always borne a disturbing resemblance to life, as if even in sleep I could not come up with something new, but now it was the other way around, now at last my life resembled a dream” (Nooteboom 63-4). Although Herman uses the words that his “life resembled a dream”, in this case it is no longer his life but his death that has become the dream in which he finds himself (64). In turn he writes that, “…the people I saw in broad daylight were captives in the domain of sleep”, a time in which all are in limbo between their waking and dreaming realities, an allusion to Herman’s own limbo between states of being (Nooteboom 31).
Although Herman believes he is in a state of dream and illusion he is in fact dead, and what he believes to be a dream is his new reality as he evolves into his next state of being. “The world would continue to enact its masques of day and night as if to remind us of something, and we, who were already elsewhere, would observe this”, this “elsewhere” he writes of is that place of transition, that place that the two fleeting seconds of what is left of one reality moves into another (Nooteboom 105). Herman’s life is no longer important in this metamorphosis, but instead it is his death that becomes the new reality that he must come to accept.
As he shares “the following story”, a memory of another time, he recalls the events of his past which were important to him. He consciously realizes the importance of some of these events, but in the end comes to realize the importance of others in his last moments.
As a former Classics teacher in life, he reconfirms his understanding of the literal translation of “Dies” to be “time” (Nooteboom 68). For Herman death seems to lead to the “dying” away of time, and with death time is no longer important. This is where, like Herman’s dreams, “everything fits to perfection” and time is no longer needed to understand the world and reality in which he finds himself (Nooteboom 64). He writes of this new timeless sensibility as, “What sort of time can this be in which time stands still?” (Nooteboom 59).
Time and memory play an important role in Herman’s own realization that he is no longer among the living. With this realization comes the epiphany that time is not important, and that it is the memories that he recalls at the last moments to share that matter. He writes at the end that, “You had taught me something about infinity, about how an immeasurable space of memories can be stored in the most minute time span…” (Nooteboom 115). Time is unimportant in what comes next as Herman experiences his journey, but what he remembers is. It is those memories in the “most minute time span” that change him in those last moments (115).
Time in Nooteboom’s work emerges as a human construct, and it is this perception that entraps Herman within his sense of reality. When time “dies” away is when Herman is able to overcome the “now”, and accept the new reality in which he
finds himself. In surmounting time and moving ahead he realizes how this connects him to the others that share with him this journey into another state of being. He writes, “They had to be equally old, but ‘old’ was no longer a category to which their lives could be assigned. They had overcome time, they were transparent, released, they were far ahead of us” (Nooteboom 80). In “overcoming time” Herman and those on the boat are able to move “ahead” and pass from one reality into another and not question the idea of “here” and “now” (80).
“Time”, Herman writes, “ is the system that must prevent everything from happening at once”, but then time is an illusion that we all collectively agree to acknowledge (Nooteboom 33). It is this time that Herman must overcome. Not the “time” that is required for the “mysterious mental maneuver” to move from “one state of being to another”, but the time that entraps him, so that he can be released from the limbo in which he finds himself (Nabokov 104).
Inherent in the process of overcoming time the realization emerges that memories themselves are timeless, and have import beyond their chronological placement. These moments which he comes to identify as important are those meant to be shared. Herman writes that this is a universal experience, yet at the same time personal and unique, and in the telling, intended for a single listener. He writes, “…while we saw no one but her, the narrator saw someone who inspired him to find the words to express the inner reality of his story” (Nooteboom 104). Each set of stories is unique to the teller, and to the listener, unseen by others.
By seeing the person that will “inspire” them to tell of their story, each passenger is creating the reality and world around them they wish to see. Through this creation of a new reality, or ideal reality, they are able then to make that metamorphosis from one state to another. Herman writes of each of their stories as both a beginning and an end. Each story while unique, is about the shared experience of a life lived. As T.S. Eliot writes in the Four Quartets, “in my beginning is my end”, and what is perceived as an ending is in fact a beginning (Eliot 23).
Herman, and we, come to realize the paradox that is life. Life is our preparation for what is to come through death, and what we consider important is in fact the small number of memories that we carry with us to share. In Herman’s journey he is able to overcome time through remembrance, and he comes to know that it is his life that is the illusion and death that is his true reality. Herman’s two second lifetime is that “mysterious mental maneuver” that we all must accomplish to pass out of limbo from one state of being to another (Nabokov 104). To quote another thinker from another time, Goethe wrote, “That life is the childhood of our immortality.”
Nooteboom’s work follows Herman Mussert during the two seconds in which he experiences a “mysterious mental maneuver”, and passes “from one state of being to another” (Nabokov 104). Easy, you know, does it, Herman. Within this two second lifetime the reader is told “the following story”, and hears of the memories that haunt Herman as he faces what lies ahead. While Nooteboom establishes a new theme for literature, he also frames it within the power of memory and time to present to the reader a way of understanding both Herman’s, and ultimately our own, final journey to the “world” that is to come.
Throughout the journey Nooteboom often writes about Herman seeing himself
asleep in Amsterdam. It is through these “visions” that he comes to understand that he is dead, and no longer in the reality that included his home, but in a different reality made up of dreams. He writes, “My dreams have always borne a disturbing resemblance to life, as if even in sleep I could not come up with something new, but now it was the other way around, now at last my life resembled a dream” (Nooteboom 63-4). Although Herman uses the words that his “life resembled a dream”, in this case it is no longer his life but his death that has become the dream in which he finds himself (64). In turn he writes that, “…the people I saw in broad daylight were captives in the domain of sleep”, a time in which all are in limbo between their waking and dreaming realities, an allusion to Herman’s own limbo between states of being (Nooteboom 31).
Although Herman believes he is in a state of dream and illusion he is in fact dead, and what he believes to be a dream is his new reality as he evolves into his next state of being. “The world would continue to enact its masques of day and night as if to remind us of something, and we, who were already elsewhere, would observe this”, this “elsewhere” he writes of is that place of transition, that place that the two fleeting seconds of what is left of one reality moves into another (Nooteboom 105). Herman’s life is no longer important in this metamorphosis, but instead it is his death that becomes the new reality that he must come to accept.
As he shares “the following story”, a memory of another time, he recalls the events of his past which were important to him. He consciously realizes the importance of some of these events, but in the end comes to realize the importance of others in his last moments.
As a former Classics teacher in life, he reconfirms his understanding of the literal translation of “Dies” to be “time” (Nooteboom 68). For Herman death seems to lead to the “dying” away of time, and with death time is no longer important. This is where, like Herman’s dreams, “everything fits to perfection” and time is no longer needed to understand the world and reality in which he finds himself (Nooteboom 64). He writes of this new timeless sensibility as, “What sort of time can this be in which time stands still?” (Nooteboom 59).
Time and memory play an important role in Herman’s own realization that he is no longer among the living. With this realization comes the epiphany that time is not important, and that it is the memories that he recalls at the last moments to share that matter. He writes at the end that, “You had taught me something about infinity, about how an immeasurable space of memories can be stored in the most minute time span…” (Nooteboom 115). Time is unimportant in what comes next as Herman experiences his journey, but what he remembers is. It is those memories in the “most minute time span” that change him in those last moments (115).
Time in Nooteboom’s work emerges as a human construct, and it is this perception that entraps Herman within his sense of reality. When time “dies” away is when Herman is able to overcome the “now”, and accept the new reality in which he
finds himself. In surmounting time and moving ahead he realizes how this connects him to the others that share with him this journey into another state of being. He writes, “They had to be equally old, but ‘old’ was no longer a category to which their lives could be assigned. They had overcome time, they were transparent, released, they were far ahead of us” (Nooteboom 80). In “overcoming time” Herman and those on the boat are able to move “ahead” and pass from one reality into another and not question the idea of “here” and “now” (80).
“Time”, Herman writes, “ is the system that must prevent everything from happening at once”, but then time is an illusion that we all collectively agree to acknowledge (Nooteboom 33). It is this time that Herman must overcome. Not the “time” that is required for the “mysterious mental maneuver” to move from “one state of being to another”, but the time that entraps him, so that he can be released from the limbo in which he finds himself (Nabokov 104).
Inherent in the process of overcoming time the realization emerges that memories themselves are timeless, and have import beyond their chronological placement. These moments which he comes to identify as important are those meant to be shared. Herman writes that this is a universal experience, yet at the same time personal and unique, and in the telling, intended for a single listener. He writes, “…while we saw no one but her, the narrator saw someone who inspired him to find the words to express the inner reality of his story” (Nooteboom 104). Each set of stories is unique to the teller, and to the listener, unseen by others.
By seeing the person that will “inspire” them to tell of their story, each passenger is creating the reality and world around them they wish to see. Through this creation of a new reality, or ideal reality, they are able then to make that metamorphosis from one state to another. Herman writes of each of their stories as both a beginning and an end. Each story while unique, is about the shared experience of a life lived. As T.S. Eliot writes in the Four Quartets, “in my beginning is my end”, and what is perceived as an ending is in fact a beginning (Eliot 23).
Herman, and we, come to realize the paradox that is life. Life is our preparation for what is to come through death, and what we consider important is in fact the small number of memories that we carry with us to share. In Herman’s journey he is able to overcome time through remembrance, and he comes to know that it is his life that is the illusion and death that is his true reality. Herman’s two second lifetime is that “mysterious mental maneuver” that we all must accomplish to pass out of limbo from one state of being to another (Nabokov 104). To quote another thinker from another time, Goethe wrote, “That life is the childhood of our immortality.”
Thursday 22 April 2010
The Four Quartets and Film
The above clip matches the quote from Little Gidding on the first full page that I read. While reading that section I always seemed to be reminded of the idea of cyclical time, both of the seasons and life itself. The cycles of life and death seem present throughout Eliot's Four Quartets, but no where is it more perfectly seen than in the changing of the seasons. The change of seasons for me seemed to symbolize an awakening/rebirth both of nature and ourselves on our return. Since our theme was dolce domum, or home sweet home, then like the seasons we are always returning to where we began but each time anew. Eliot writes that "we will arrive where we started and know the place for the first time." This awakening,or knowing, is mirrored in the changing of the seasons, a new life created from "death." Not a literal death but death of our old surroundings into the strangely familiar ones we encounter on our return. This is the way man and nature are eternally connected in this shared rebirth through our journeys. The place is strangely familiar when we return, and Eliot writes that "the soul's sap's quiver" which is our recognition of something familiar in "home." He also writes that it is not spring in times covenant, in that it is not a literal changing of the seasons, but a returning to and awakening even if we are in our darkest hour. It is the "pentecostal fire" that burns within us that leads us to "home" and a rebirth in our surroundings. In the recognition of this strangely familiar place when "we arrive where we started and know the place for the first time" we see the idea of cyclical time in our journey "home."
The above clip is from American Psycho and goes with the quote I read from the first 12 lines of page 53. This follows along with what I wrote about above in relation to the seasons and returning "home." When we arrive to the strangely familiar place and know it for the first time, it is not only our surroundings that are changed but our sense of self as well. This is seen in the clip in that there is a focus on self, but no recognition of self, Bateman is just not there. This new self that emerges when we reach "home" is both ourselves and not because we have changed through our journey back. On our journey we can be aware of different selves, but when we finally reach home we must fully recognize the self now present. This is a recognition of a strangely familiar self. Eliot writes of this new self on arrival "home" as "knowing myself yet being someone other." For me this quote shows that it is not only our "home" that is altered after our journey but also ourselves, and when we return we must recognize this new self that we encounter. We must become no longer an entity but a human being and this is done through the recognition of self.
Wednesday 21 April 2010
Group Presentations
As usual the group presentations in a Sexson class are amazing and always revealing of those we have class with and yet rarely talk to. From the first day I was enthralled and amazed by what emerged from the minds of my fellow classmates.
Group Four was great with their imagined journey into the world as myth and dream. I loved that with in the journey that Jon follows the "war" that is meant to be stopped was only a play. It made the skit more interesting in that Jon's journey was a dream and the play was all an illusion as well. Plus Jon's and Bizz's "walking" on their journey and all the images was amazing as well. I enjoyed this group and felt the idea of a play within a dream was a great demonstration of theme and what we had seen in class from others works. I also enjoyed that they drew from many of the novels and films we saw in class.
Group Two and their film about the 20 minute lifetime was AMAZING! I think we all were intellectually intimidated. First of all Zach's impression of Dr. Sexson was great, and set the mood for the entire presentation. As Bizz said in her blog you really cannot get the image of a pregnant image of Kyle out of your mind. I like that the 20 minute lifetime was not only established for "student 1" but as a class we experienced it as well through Zach's role as the professor. Also Thomas did an amazing job on the film structure as well. It was beautifully done, funny and educational all that Sexson requires for a successful presentation. Out of all the novels and films we had in class for the idea of the 20 minute lifetime, this did a great job of tying them all together.
Group Three was life as fiction and language and was another film. I loved the idea of the support group for the characters in out novels and their realization as their lives as fiction. Each person did a great job of portraying their character and making each of their own realizations of their life individual and interesting. It was nice to have a presentation that took the characters and let them realize their roles in another realm of reality. In most of the works we read we as the reader see this but rarely does the character themselves mention it. It was also great to see a support group for these people so that they can ultimately find help. Also a great cameo appearance by Dr. Sexson.
Group One had the myth of the eternal return and their relation of the idea to "natural processes" also know as farting was intriguing. Also I must say educational since I did not know all those facts about methane gas, although I am not sure I will ever need all those facts and formulas. Also Jennylynn's outfit was amazing! I think I have those glasses as well, but I try not to wear them in public! I like the application of a high brow theme throughout literature and film that returns as low brow in out everyday lives. It was interesting to see the low brow emerge in something other then literature or film. Very enlightening.
Group Five was us and the theme was dolce domum. We were taking lines from The Four Quartets (high brow) and matching them with clips from films we knew (low brow). It was meant to be a continuous reading of the Four Quartets with examples of more modern connections. There will be a blog to follow this that will explain the connections between my clips, quotes and the theme our group was to focus on.
Group Six was the myth of the eternal return as well. I liked the idea of connecting the power and cycles of the sun to the stages of Vico and how each group views the sun as different in relations to themselves. I was also amazed like the rest of the class that they wrote all their own lines. It came out really well and their speeches seemed to me to be a mixture of both low and high brow. Everyone seemed to enjoy their part and the idea came across really well I thought. Also James return as the sun out of the bags was great as well.
So it must be stated once again that every time I take a Sexson class I am amazed by the projects that emerge from the minds of my fellow students. Also I am excited to hear about papers starting today, because after the group presentations things just seem to get better. More than any other class I always take more away from both Sexson's classes, both from the students and the professor. It truly is a complete learning experience!
Group Four was great with their imagined journey into the world as myth and dream. I loved that with in the journey that Jon follows the "war" that is meant to be stopped was only a play. It made the skit more interesting in that Jon's journey was a dream and the play was all an illusion as well. Plus Jon's and Bizz's "walking" on their journey and all the images was amazing as well. I enjoyed this group and felt the idea of a play within a dream was a great demonstration of theme and what we had seen in class from others works. I also enjoyed that they drew from many of the novels and films we saw in class.
Group Two and their film about the 20 minute lifetime was AMAZING! I think we all were intellectually intimidated. First of all Zach's impression of Dr. Sexson was great, and set the mood for the entire presentation. As Bizz said in her blog you really cannot get the image of a pregnant image of Kyle out of your mind. I like that the 20 minute lifetime was not only established for "student 1" but as a class we experienced it as well through Zach's role as the professor. Also Thomas did an amazing job on the film structure as well. It was beautifully done, funny and educational all that Sexson requires for a successful presentation. Out of all the novels and films we had in class for the idea of the 20 minute lifetime, this did a great job of tying them all together.
Group Three was life as fiction and language and was another film. I loved the idea of the support group for the characters in out novels and their realization as their lives as fiction. Each person did a great job of portraying their character and making each of their own realizations of their life individual and interesting. It was nice to have a presentation that took the characters and let them realize their roles in another realm of reality. In most of the works we read we as the reader see this but rarely does the character themselves mention it. It was also great to see a support group for these people so that they can ultimately find help. Also a great cameo appearance by Dr. Sexson.
Group One had the myth of the eternal return and their relation of the idea to "natural processes" also know as farting was intriguing. Also I must say educational since I did not know all those facts about methane gas, although I am not sure I will ever need all those facts and formulas. Also Jennylynn's outfit was amazing! I think I have those glasses as well, but I try not to wear them in public! I like the application of a high brow theme throughout literature and film that returns as low brow in out everyday lives. It was interesting to see the low brow emerge in something other then literature or film. Very enlightening.
Group Five was us and the theme was dolce domum. We were taking lines from The Four Quartets (high brow) and matching them with clips from films we knew (low brow). It was meant to be a continuous reading of the Four Quartets with examples of more modern connections. There will be a blog to follow this that will explain the connections between my clips, quotes and the theme our group was to focus on.
Group Six was the myth of the eternal return as well. I liked the idea of connecting the power and cycles of the sun to the stages of Vico and how each group views the sun as different in relations to themselves. I was also amazed like the rest of the class that they wrote all their own lines. It came out really well and their speeches seemed to me to be a mixture of both low and high brow. Everyone seemed to enjoy their part and the idea came across really well I thought. Also James return as the sun out of the bags was great as well.
So it must be stated once again that every time I take a Sexson class I am amazed by the projects that emerge from the minds of my fellow students. Also I am excited to hear about papers starting today, because after the group presentations things just seem to get better. More than any other class I always take more away from both Sexson's classes, both from the students and the professor. It truly is a complete learning experience!
Friday 9 April 2010
Nooteboom and Chaucer
Not sure if someone already mentioned this, but...
Pilgrims?
Storytelling?
Just saying!
That's what "emerged" while reviewing last night. Good luck to you all today!
(Above is just the Knight's Tale for no other reason except I think it is beautiful.)
Wednesday 7 April 2010
Who is it? Oh you!
In our discussion of The Following Story on Monday Dr. Sexson brought up the instances that Herman, and Nooteboom, reach across the boundary between reader and author/character and pull us into the story. After having read The Following Story for the third time, don’t worry I plan to read it again before I present my paper, and thinking about all the suggestions for who the “you” could be in the work, I got to thinking about it more myself.
After reading it several times I believe that the “you” is not only the obvious reaching out of Herman to the reader, but also Herman talking to Lisa d’India more importantly. Nooteboom writes earlier on in the work the following lines, “I’m glad the others have gone and that I need tell only you my story, even though you yourself are in it.” We as readers are the “you” and yet at the same time Lisa d’India is there as well contained in that little three letter word.
The importance of her connection to the “you” at the end is established when Herman first mentions that she is Crito to his Socrates. The philosopher and the beloved pupil. This role is first taken on by Lisa d’India in the class in which Herman enacts the death of Socrates. Nooteboom writes, “I stand still in the corner nearest the blackboard and look at Crito, my dearest pupil. She is sitting pale-faced and upright at her desk.”
Throughout the work Lisa d’India and the reader are all wrapped into one, the "you", to exemplify the importance of the “relationship/bond” that Herman and Lisa share. Not sexual but intellectual. It is only within the last page that the separation between Lisa and us, the reader, becomes distinct.
“You needn’t not beckon me any longer, I’m coming. None of the others will hear my story, none of them will see that the woman sitting there waiting for me has the features of my dearest Crito, the girl who was my pupil, so young that one could speak about immortality with her. And then I told her, then I told you-the following story”
Like Crito and Socrates, Lisa is there to close Herman’s eyes as death takes hold. In the end we also realize as readers that we are on this journey with him, we are on the boat to nowhere too, stuck between two worlds. His tale is a preview for what all of us will face at some point in time. We will all be on that boat telling our story to the one that means the most to us.
“…an immeasurable space of memories can be stored in the most minute time span…” and this is what we will share at the end. The memories that haunt us the most and come back to us in that instant of déjà vu to share with those that are awaiting our arrival.
After reading it several times I believe that the “you” is not only the obvious reaching out of Herman to the reader, but also Herman talking to Lisa d’India more importantly. Nooteboom writes earlier on in the work the following lines, “I’m glad the others have gone and that I need tell only you my story, even though you yourself are in it.” We as readers are the “you” and yet at the same time Lisa d’India is there as well contained in that little three letter word.
The importance of her connection to the “you” at the end is established when Herman first mentions that she is Crito to his Socrates. The philosopher and the beloved pupil. This role is first taken on by Lisa d’India in the class in which Herman enacts the death of Socrates. Nooteboom writes, “I stand still in the corner nearest the blackboard and look at Crito, my dearest pupil. She is sitting pale-faced and upright at her desk.”
Throughout the work Lisa d’India and the reader are all wrapped into one, the "you", to exemplify the importance of the “relationship/bond” that Herman and Lisa share. Not sexual but intellectual. It is only within the last page that the separation between Lisa and us, the reader, becomes distinct.
“You needn’t not beckon me any longer, I’m coming. None of the others will hear my story, none of them will see that the woman sitting there waiting for me has the features of my dearest Crito, the girl who was my pupil, so young that one could speak about immortality with her. And then I told her, then I told you-the following story”
Like Crito and Socrates, Lisa is there to close Herman’s eyes as death takes hold. In the end we also realize as readers that we are on this journey with him, we are on the boat to nowhere too, stuck between two worlds. His tale is a preview for what all of us will face at some point in time. We will all be on that boat telling our story to the one that means the most to us.
“…an immeasurable space of memories can be stored in the most minute time span…” and this is what we will share at the end. The memories that haunt us the most and come back to us in that instant of déjà vu to share with those that are awaiting our arrival.
Tuesday 6 April 2010
Wednesday 31 March 2010
For Easter
"The dripping blood our only drink,
The bloody flesh our only food:
In spite of which we like to think
That we are sound, substantial flesh and blood-
Again, in spite of that, we call this Friday good."
East Coker Section IV (30)
The bloody flesh our only food:
In spite of which we like to think
That we are sound, substantial flesh and blood-
Again, in spite of that, we call this Friday good."
East Coker Section IV (30)
Tuesday 30 March 2010
Monday 29 March 2010
The Children of Eliot’s Quartets
In an earlier blog on Eliot’s Four Quartets I wrote of the three separate times that Eliot brings up “the children in the leaves.” I wanted to look into these passages farther, but since I have no internet at home I thought I would take a stab at it myself before plunging into the world of Google.
I reread the Four Quartets this past weekend, and each time is a richer experience. I understand something more fully, I see an allusion I missed before or even find connections between other literature from class and the themes we have been discussing. But there is one true constant each time I read it, and that is that I love it completely. In particular, I love the image of the children in the leaves.
When I first read the Four Quartets I thought what a wonderful image. Hidden children and the only sound is of their laughter, as if the lines were images and thoughts of the seeker in a game of hide and seek. Eliot mentions them explicitly three times and the lines are as follows:
“Go, said the bird, for the leaves were full of children,
Hidden excitedly, containing laughter.” (14)
“Sudden in a shaft of sunlight
Even while the dust moves
There rises the hidden laughter
Of children in the foliage” (20)
“The voice of the hidden waterfall
And the children in the apple-tree
Not known, because not looked for
But heard, half-heard, in the stillness
Between two waves of the sea.” (59)
Eliot writes of them only three times, twice in Burnt Norton, at the beginning and the end, and once in Little Gidding at the very end. When reading these lines for the second time I began to think of the role children play in general, in both their own lives and others around them.
Right at the beginning of Burnt Norton Eliot writes, “Time present and time past/ Are both perhaps present in time future” (13). When I thought about this idea more I thought “isn’t that just what children are?” If one of the major themes of this work is the 20 minute lifetime, or a lifetime burning in every moment, is not that how children live? They are the three tenses embodied within one begin. As adults we often lose the ability to live life that way, but children hold on to that enthusiasm for life. This is seen in Eliot’s lines that they are heard but only half-heard. It is our other “lives” and another time calling to us from the "trees."
This is what children are to me at least. They are past, present, and future. They have their own past, especially if we believe in eternal recurrence, and they have already been here before. And they embody the past of their parents, a past love and union that lead to their ultimate creation. They are the present, in that they live wholly in it and think of little else but the reality around them. And they to are the future in that each child has the capacity to do and be so much.
Perhaps this is not what Eliot imagined, that the combining of all tenses is found within children. But it is their ability to live within the moment, and yet hold so much for the future that makes them immune to the mundane world that so many fall into as they get older. Eliot seems to be writing of a way of living that we lose if we don’t remember the child within and that "Time past and time future/What might have been and what has been/Point to one end, which is always present" (14).
Thursday 25 March 2010
Themes and Paper Topics
As I finished The Following Story for the second time, I remembered that Dr. Sexson wanted us to start considering our paper topic. And since I love The Following Story and must agree with Doug and Dr. Sexson that it is, for me at least, the best thing we have read this semester in class, I will focus my paper around this work.
I was thinking about taking several of the themes that emerge in The Following Story, that I would most like to write about, and talk about them in the work and relate them to how we have come to understand the themes from class.
The themes that interest me most in The Following Story are the 20 minute lifetime, world as myth and dream, dolce domum and eternal recurrence. I hope to focus on these topics and tie into them the perceptions of time and the power of memory/déjà vu, since obviously this is an obsessive topic for me this year!
I am intrigued by Nooteboom and want to read more of his work in the future. I appreciate his interest in and rather obvious connection to Nabokov’s Transparent Things. This is just a rough rant for what I want to focus on in my paper, and a jumping off point for beginning to write soon I hope.
I was thinking about taking several of the themes that emerge in The Following Story, that I would most like to write about, and talk about them in the work and relate them to how we have come to understand the themes from class.
The themes that interest me most in The Following Story are the 20 minute lifetime, world as myth and dream, dolce domum and eternal recurrence. I hope to focus on these topics and tie into them the perceptions of time and the power of memory/déjà vu, since obviously this is an obsessive topic for me this year!
I am intrigued by Nooteboom and want to read more of his work in the future. I appreciate his interest in and rather obvious connection to Nabokov’s Transparent Things. This is just a rough rant for what I want to focus on in my paper, and a jumping off point for beginning to write soon I hope.
Tuesday 23 March 2010
Just Because I Must
So this has no real use except for amusement. I love The Vicar of Dibley, most likely the best Britcom ever created. They swear all the time, are really randy and they make fun of Noel Edmonds all the time! I also appreciate that while they are probably considered low brow they also make jabs at other low brow material.
The clip below actually has them taking a jab at The Da Vinci Code and those that believed it was real and had true connections to the Bible. I apologize that I could not find just that clip, but I am not very technologically savvy and therefore the clip is not really until about 5 minutes in! Sorry about that but perhaps you can find a way to fast forward.
The clip below actually has them taking a jab at The Da Vinci Code and those that believed it was real and had true connections to the Bible. I apologize that I could not find just that clip, but I am not very technologically savvy and therefore the clip is not really until about 5 minutes in! Sorry about that but perhaps you can find a way to fast forward.
One of Many From The Following Story
Crito Closing the Eyes of the Dead Socrates by Antonio Canova
1787-92
"It was not my soul that would set out on a journey, as the real Socrates had imagined; it was my body that would embark on endless wanderings, never to be ousted from the universe, and so it would take part in the most fantastic metamorphoses, about which it would tell me nothing because it would long since have forgotten all about me. At one time the matter it had consisted of had housed a soul that resembled me, but now my matter would have other duties. And I? I had to turn around, I had to let go of the ship's rail, to let go of everything, to look at you. You beckoned; it was not difficult to follow. You had taught me something about infinity, about how an immeasurable space of memories can be stored in the minute time span, and while I was permitted to remain as small and coincidental as I was, you had shown me my true stature. You needn't beckon me any longer, I'm coming. None of the others will hear my story, none of them will see that the woman sitting there waiting for me has the features of my dearest Crito, the girl who was my pupil, so young that one could speak about immortality with her. And then I told her, then I told you
the following story"
The Alchemy of Coelho (Perceptions of High and Low Brow)
I had read The Alchemist once before in high school and I must admit that I did not much enjoy it then. I recognized the idea that Coelho is trying to share with the world that the treasures we seek are really just right outside our door and within the familiarity of our home. I guess I never found the idea very profound and have not read it since then. Since taking this class though I feel a new appreciation for the book. Not because it is so profound, because I still don’t really think it is, but because of Coelho’s use of the theme dolce domum.
Since reading The Alchemist for the second time now and understanding its connection to the themes in this class I have a better appreciation of the work. Dr. Sexson mentioned in class that it was the low brow version of dolce domum, while the high brow is the Four Quartets. Then again I feel anything that encompasses the theme of dolce domum is low brow compared to the Four Quartets! In turn I would have to say though that for me perhaps The Alchemist is somewhere in between, more of a middle brow then just one or the other in relation to understanding the theme. Yes it is massively popular and widely translated and circulated across the globe, but then again it has profound themes, that as Sam writes in her blog have the power to change lives. It is basic and yet profound enough to be appreciated by almost all high and low brow people.
While on the topic of high and low brow I have one small rant. To me perceptions of high and low brow seem to shift depending on the person. I am sure that there are even those that would consider the Four Quartets to be at least middle brow. So what is really high or low brow? Are we told what is high or low brow by those around us that we consider “elitist”? Even though we all attempted to answer this question at the beginning of the semester I don’t believe we can. What we or anyone perceives as high, low or even middle brow depends on the person. Yes there will be those books that many feel are high brow, also know as Finnegans Wake, but for the most part we ourselves establish what we feel is high or low brow based on our intellectual capabilities.
I even feel every time I take one of Dr. Sexson’s classes that I am expanding my boundaries on what is classified as high and low brow. Each semester I seem to leave class with a list of books to read and have yet to make my way through all of them, and usually I end up having to purchase another copy due to the fact that my mother reads them and I never see them again. This most recently occurred with The Slave, The Four Quartets, Beckett and The Following Story. I must remember never to “loan” my books to my mother. It’s much to dangerous when we have similar tastes!
High and low brow seem to be terms that fluctuate with society and even our own personal ideas of what those terms mean. After being almost half way through class I feel as if we cannot truly define these terms for all, but only define them for ourselves and our tastes. Perhaps we can be influenced by others but mostly it relies on us to decide.
Since reading The Alchemist for the second time now and understanding its connection to the themes in this class I have a better appreciation of the work. Dr. Sexson mentioned in class that it was the low brow version of dolce domum, while the high brow is the Four Quartets. Then again I feel anything that encompasses the theme of dolce domum is low brow compared to the Four Quartets! In turn I would have to say though that for me perhaps The Alchemist is somewhere in between, more of a middle brow then just one or the other in relation to understanding the theme. Yes it is massively popular and widely translated and circulated across the globe, but then again it has profound themes, that as Sam writes in her blog have the power to change lives. It is basic and yet profound enough to be appreciated by almost all high and low brow people.
While on the topic of high and low brow I have one small rant. To me perceptions of high and low brow seem to shift depending on the person. I am sure that there are even those that would consider the Four Quartets to be at least middle brow. So what is really high or low brow? Are we told what is high or low brow by those around us that we consider “elitist”? Even though we all attempted to answer this question at the beginning of the semester I don’t believe we can. What we or anyone perceives as high, low or even middle brow depends on the person. Yes there will be those books that many feel are high brow, also know as Finnegans Wake, but for the most part we ourselves establish what we feel is high or low brow based on our intellectual capabilities.
I even feel every time I take one of Dr. Sexson’s classes that I am expanding my boundaries on what is classified as high and low brow. Each semester I seem to leave class with a list of books to read and have yet to make my way through all of them, and usually I end up having to purchase another copy due to the fact that my mother reads them and I never see them again. This most recently occurred with The Slave, The Four Quartets, Beckett and The Following Story. I must remember never to “loan” my books to my mother. It’s much to dangerous when we have similar tastes!
High and low brow seem to be terms that fluctuate with society and even our own personal ideas of what those terms mean. After being almost half way through class I feel as if we cannot truly define these terms for all, but only define them for ourselves and our tastes. Perhaps we can be influenced by others but mostly it relies on us to decide.
Monday 22 March 2010
A Visitation to The Following Story
So I still love The Following Story, and the goal is to finish it for the coming week today. While I was catching up on the life as fiction/déjà vu blog I kept returning to this work and the focus that Nooteboom seems to have on the power of memory and dreams. His work also seems to encompass many of the themes we are discussing in class, but I won’t get into that until I finish it for the second time.
The reoccurrence of memory and dreams I noticed I marked quite a bit while reading it the first time and I am struck by it again as I continue to read on. Some of my favorite quotes that address memory and dreams are as follows:
“There’s nothing better than a full-blown déjà vu…”
“…I must settle down to the business of memory…”
“Dreams are closed systems, in which everything fits to perfection.”
“I had a thousand lives and I took only one…”
“To a large extent, you already existed before you had anything to do with it at all.”
“The world is a never-ending cross-reference.”
“Some people are fated to have been everywhere before.”
Nooteboom recognizes, as did Nabokov whom he seems to be a fan of, that memories and dreams have the power to change the world we encounter and how we view it. He frequently writes about eternal recurrence and being where we have been before. As he writes “the world is a never-ending cross-reference” for something we have experienced before. And it is not just some people that are “fated to have been everywhere before,” but all of us are experiencing déjà vu whether we realize it or not.
Nooteboom’s work combines all three tenses into the tale of one man and his remembrance of things past and his own realization of his future. Musserr through his journey is living through the past, present and future, and we as readers experience it as well. We all are within all tenses when we experience déjà vu. A realization/remembrance of something within one moment about our past and in turn our future as well, because we will return to that moment time and time again whether we realize it or not.
We have been everywhere before and our whole life is an act of remembering everything we have forgotten. These memories often return as dreams and then are realized in a more jumbled form in our waking reality. As Nooteboom writes, ““Dreams are closed systems, in which everything fits to perfection,” and it seems that only when we wake to they become misunderstood.
P.S. Nooteboom also mentions Mnemosyne on page 64. Speak, Mnemosyne for all you Nabokovians.
The reoccurrence of memory and dreams I noticed I marked quite a bit while reading it the first time and I am struck by it again as I continue to read on. Some of my favorite quotes that address memory and dreams are as follows:
“There’s nothing better than a full-blown déjà vu…”
“…I must settle down to the business of memory…”
“Dreams are closed systems, in which everything fits to perfection.”
“I had a thousand lives and I took only one…”
“To a large extent, you already existed before you had anything to do with it at all.”
“The world is a never-ending cross-reference.”
“Some people are fated to have been everywhere before.”
Nooteboom recognizes, as did Nabokov whom he seems to be a fan of, that memories and dreams have the power to change the world we encounter and how we view it. He frequently writes about eternal recurrence and being where we have been before. As he writes “the world is a never-ending cross-reference” for something we have experienced before. And it is not just some people that are “fated to have been everywhere before,” but all of us are experiencing déjà vu whether we realize it or not.
Nooteboom’s work combines all three tenses into the tale of one man and his remembrance of things past and his own realization of his future. Musserr through his journey is living through the past, present and future, and we as readers experience it as well. We all are within all tenses when we experience déjà vu. A realization/remembrance of something within one moment about our past and in turn our future as well, because we will return to that moment time and time again whether we realize it or not.
We have been everywhere before and our whole life is an act of remembering everything we have forgotten. These memories often return as dreams and then are realized in a more jumbled form in our waking reality. As Nooteboom writes, ““Dreams are closed systems, in which everything fits to perfection,” and it seems that only when we wake to they become misunderstood.
P.S. Nooteboom also mentions Mnemosyne on page 64. Speak, Mnemosyne for all you Nabokovians.
Friday 12 March 2010
What is the Matrix?
I must agree with Alicia and be quite literal in that the Matrix to me is a movie or a mathematical method to solve multiplication. When we discussed it and blogs in class though I was intrigued by the definition we found regarding word origin and the connection to womb, woman and mother (matriarchal).
After thinking about this idea for sometime it actually began to tie into the movie more and more for me, or at least what I could remember of the movie. If the connection to the womb applied to the matrix it would then be as if those involved are within the “womb” of this alternate reality, suspended in another world different from the outside world.
The idea of the womb also could relate to the idea of the an all encompassing being or place, a mother creator/earth in a sense. A tie back once again with old and indigenous views of the earth and its creation. The idea of a matriarchal basis for life.
Mother as creator and the “womb” of all creation. In the matrix all are within this other reality and connected through the suspension of life and belief in the alternate reality.
After thinking about this idea for sometime it actually began to tie into the movie more and more for me, or at least what I could remember of the movie. If the connection to the womb applied to the matrix it would then be as if those involved are within the “womb” of this alternate reality, suspended in another world different from the outside world.
The idea of the womb also could relate to the idea of the an all encompassing being or place, a mother creator/earth in a sense. A tie back once again with old and indigenous views of the earth and its creation. The idea of a matriarchal basis for life.
Mother as creator and the “womb” of all creation. In the matrix all are within this other reality and connected through the suspension of life and belief in the alternate reality.
Monday 8 March 2010
Miranda and Prospero (Age vs. Youth)
Dr. Sexson mentioned on Friday in class that to Miranda everything is new and Prospero has "been there, and done that." When he mentioned this I immediately thought of age and youth. If you took Dr. Sexson's Classical literature class you would know that this is one of the major conflicts throughout literature and history. Miranda and Prospero also happen to fall under the classification of man versus woman as well. There are several other conflicts but I can only remember about four, and out of the ones I remember only these two seem to fit these characters.
But isn't this the main conflict of all of history? The young trying to see the world through their eyes and the old telling them, "yep, we already did that." Miranda and Prospero are in direct opposition to each other throughout the work. Each new generation tries to assert itself and create and see something new in the world around them, but the old are telling them no we already did that and things are the way they should be and how they always have been.
Prospero is the obstacle between boy and girl, he is in a way Miranda's memory and he tells her about her past that he shares with her. In a way her not remember everything completely is a view of the future while he is the past, the moment and the memory, the young and old.
Miranda sees nothing behind her and only what lies ahead, all that is new and exciting for her, all that the world holds. Prospero sees all that the world is since the beginning of time and has done it all, there is nothing new and exciting to him. This opposition between father and daughter is the ever present conflict between young and old, and when father comes between daughter and love then the conflict emerges into woman and man.
I shouldn't be surprised that Shakespeare used these conflicts in his works since they seem to appear time and time again, but he does use the two most prolific of the five(?), that of man versus woman (or even father versus daughter) and youth versus age. The two conflicts that have plagued us all since the beginning of time, and of course Prospero would know!
The Tempest in New York
The link below is to the theater review article from The New York for March 8th. I picked my copy up from the mailbox on Friday and I always read the theater and arts reviews first. This is just so I can moan about all I am missing in New York, pathetic I know. But once again another coincidence, or just a one in three chance, the Tempest is being performed in Brooklyn.
I enjoyed reading this review in the fact that Lahr seems to have read the work before, or at least understands the idea of illusion and magic in life that runs throughout the work. I also was pleased to see that he recognizes that Shakespeare talks directly to the audience through Prospero, that there are many realities on the "island," the island is both inside and outside Prospero and the drama is within the mind, also how the set is put together intrigues me and is an insight as to how Mendes sees the work.
Lahr writes the perfect lines at the end connecting Shakespeare to Prospero. He writes, "Prospero, having restored the other characters to their senses, also disenchants himself of his own grandiosity. He stands before us now as an almost ordinary citizen and asks to be released “from my bands / with the help of your good hands.” This moment—at once elegiac and exhilarated—feels autobiographical: Shakespeare, the compulsive magician, is finally freed from the spell he cast."
I enjoyed the article and just wanted to share it with you all so enjoy if you wish!
Read more: “The Tempest” and “Clybourne Park,” review: newyorker.com
I enjoyed reading this review in the fact that Lahr seems to have read the work before, or at least understands the idea of illusion and magic in life that runs throughout the work. I also was pleased to see that he recognizes that Shakespeare talks directly to the audience through Prospero, that there are many realities on the "island," the island is both inside and outside Prospero and the drama is within the mind, also how the set is put together intrigues me and is an insight as to how Mendes sees the work.
Lahr writes the perfect lines at the end connecting Shakespeare to Prospero. He writes, "Prospero, having restored the other characters to their senses, also disenchants himself of his own grandiosity. He stands before us now as an almost ordinary citizen and asks to be released “from my bands / with the help of your good hands.” This moment—at once elegiac and exhilarated—feels autobiographical: Shakespeare, the compulsive magician, is finally freed from the spell he cast."
I enjoyed the article and just wanted to share it with you all so enjoy if you wish!
Read more: “The Tempest” and “Clybourne Park,” review: newyorker.com
Thursday 4 March 2010
Life In Fiction. Have I Been Here Before?
I know that this is probably quite strange to write in a blog, but I feel that I have been here before. I have written this blog while sitting on my couch on this Wednesday afternoon. While the sun streams in through my patio and Oskar peacefully purrs in his sleep next to me while I write. As Nooteboom writes in The Following Story, “There’s nothing better than a full-blown déjà vu….”
Déjà vu is something that for the past semester I have found myself completely preoccupied with in Dr. Sexson’s classes, especially Nabokov and now Emergent. The idea that memories and déjà vu have the power to connect a moment in time with a moment in time from the past.
That is the sense that we have been some place before and it is strangely familiar. It is the only real way we seem as human beings to be able to time travel even if we can only do it for a moment and involuntarily it seems. But as I am sure Dr. Sexson would say we have been there before and we are only then at that instant remembering what we have already forgotten. But then in another moment it is forgotten again until we experience another realization of a past that we have had at another time.
Whenever I experience déjà vu for some reason I always say that I have dreamt this before. While in fact it was perhaps not a dream, but a memory of a past moment. This is strange especially because I rarely remember my dreams, but frequently experience déjà vu. The only dreams I remember are two and they are actually horrific nightmares. Déjà vu to me seems to not be so much a realization of a dream, but a realization of a long forgotten memory of a past life. We have been everywhere before and it just takes a little déjà vu to remember it.
The only real thing that I have to say about life as fiction, since most of the class covered the topic so well. Is that I always wonder if it is our own life that we are living or are we a part of someone else’s world? Whenever I think of the idea of life as fiction I think about the novel Sophie’s World. A novel that is spoken of as almost a beginners guide to the history of philosophy, which I enjoyed, but I really like the story of Sophie herself underneath. By the end you realize as a reader that you are both the audience and a part of the tale when Sophie picks up a copy of the book herself. Perhaps as the audience we/author are creating the mysterious letters she reads. I have not read it in a while but hope to again. Just another final thought on a topic covered long ago.
Déjà vu is something that for the past semester I have found myself completely preoccupied with in Dr. Sexson’s classes, especially Nabokov and now Emergent. The idea that memories and déjà vu have the power to connect a moment in time with a moment in time from the past.
That is the sense that we have been some place before and it is strangely familiar. It is the only real way we seem as human beings to be able to time travel even if we can only do it for a moment and involuntarily it seems. But as I am sure Dr. Sexson would say we have been there before and we are only then at that instant remembering what we have already forgotten. But then in another moment it is forgotten again until we experience another realization of a past that we have had at another time.
Whenever I experience déjà vu for some reason I always say that I have dreamt this before. While in fact it was perhaps not a dream, but a memory of a past moment. This is strange especially because I rarely remember my dreams, but frequently experience déjà vu. The only dreams I remember are two and they are actually horrific nightmares. Déjà vu to me seems to not be so much a realization of a dream, but a realization of a long forgotten memory of a past life. We have been everywhere before and it just takes a little déjà vu to remember it.
The only real thing that I have to say about life as fiction, since most of the class covered the topic so well. Is that I always wonder if it is our own life that we are living or are we a part of someone else’s world? Whenever I think of the idea of life as fiction I think about the novel Sophie’s World. A novel that is spoken of as almost a beginners guide to the history of philosophy, which I enjoyed, but I really like the story of Sophie herself underneath. By the end you realize as a reader that you are both the audience and a part of the tale when Sophie picks up a copy of the book herself. Perhaps as the audience we/author are creating the mysterious letters she reads. I have not read it in a while but hope to again. Just another final thought on a topic covered long ago.
Sunday 28 February 2010
We are such stuff as dreams are made on, and our little life is rounded with a sleep. (4.1.156-8)
I have not read The Tempest in quite a while and the last time that I saw it performed was by Shakespeare in the Parks in Ashland, Oregon several years ago. But after reading it this past weekend I remembered that it is one of my favorites, and that Prospero is one of my favorite Shakespeare characters, besides Horatio of course.
Since I feel that I do not have anything profound to say at this time I thought I would mention something I remembered while I was reading. By the time I was through Act 1 I thought of a past New Yorker article I read. The article was from an issue earlier this year and in it was a short blurb on Christopher Plummer and that fact that he has moved back into the Algonquin Hotel in New York. But anyways, the reason I bring up this random fact is that in the article it mentioned that Plummer will be playing Prospero in the Stratford Shakespeare Festival in Ontario this year! What a coincidence, or is it? The odds are one in three, or so I am told!
I love Christopher Plummer (Captain Von Trapp! mmm hmmm)and was just struck by the coincidence that we would be reading this and a production would be happening this year. So nothing profound about The Tempest yet but that will come later as we get into discussion of it, I hope. For now just a sighting in the everyday world.
P.S. The pictures above are Plummer as Prospero, and just a picture I found that came up when I did an image search for The Tempest.
Wednesday 24 February 2010
Big Fish, Ulysses and A Random Quote
When Dr. Sexson held up Big Fish on Monday I instantly thought of the adventures of Edward Bloom in the novel and Leopold Bloom in Ulysses. They are both tales of journeys and coincidentally the protagonists have the same last name!?
I also thought about the structure of Big Fish, the novel not the movie. I love the movie, but I feel that Tim Burton missed one crucial element of Wallace’s novel. Throughout the tales that Bloom tells his son, each chapter is alternated with the same scene told slightly different ways. If I remember correctly the scene is when Bloom’s son is talking about his father, and how his father spoke of his own life and how he begins to tell it and then the reader is lead into another story.
Wallace uses the myth of the eternal return to write a tale about storytelling and the connection between father and son. Burton’s movie perfectly tells the stories but misses the theme of eternal recurrence at times. Try to read it if you have only seen the movie it is a completely different feeling and experience.
The random quote I though of as well is from Goethe. He writes, “Life is the childhood of our immortality.” I have seen that quote since I was little hanging on a small plaque in my Mother’s home, she loves Goethe, and thought it went rather well with this class. The idea that life is only the beginning and there is so much more to come.
I also thought about the structure of Big Fish, the novel not the movie. I love the movie, but I feel that Tim Burton missed one crucial element of Wallace’s novel. Throughout the tales that Bloom tells his son, each chapter is alternated with the same scene told slightly different ways. If I remember correctly the scene is when Bloom’s son is talking about his father, and how his father spoke of his own life and how he begins to tell it and then the reader is lead into another story.
Wallace uses the myth of the eternal return to write a tale about storytelling and the connection between father and son. Burton’s movie perfectly tells the stories but misses the theme of eternal recurrence at times. Try to read it if you have only seen the movie it is a completely different feeling and experience.
The random quote I though of as well is from Goethe. He writes, “Life is the childhood of our immortality.” I have seen that quote since I was little hanging on a small plaque in my Mother’s home, she loves Goethe, and thought it went rather well with this class. The idea that life is only the beginning and there is so much more to come.
Pulled into Beckett
So as I was reading Beckett I was pulled into his writing and especially his language. But then again weren’t we all. Especially after hearing Jon’s “testimony,” if we hadn’t started to read we were drawn in before even beginning.
Dr. Sexson wanted us to find five instances where Beckett speaks to us the reader through his writing. After getting farther into the reading I began to realize that there are many instances that Beckett reminds us that he is writing and this is a fictitious work. The ones I liked best are as follows. All of them are from Molloy because after getting through that work I decided to stop counting.
1. “Perhaps I had invented him, I mean found him ready made in my head. There is no doubt one sometimes meets with strangers who are not entire strangers, through their having played a part in certain cerebral reels.”
2. “I knew then about Mollory, without however knowing much about him. I shall say briefly what little I did know about him. I shall also draw attention, in my knowledge of Mollory, to the most striking lacunae.”
3. “But let us leave it at that, if you don’t mind, the party is big enough.”
4. “And in writing these lines I know in what danger I am….But I write them all the same, and with a firm hand weaving inexorably back and forth and devouring my page with the indifference of a shuttle.”
5. “And it would not surprise me if I deviated, in the pages to follow, from the true and exact succession of events.”
OK just two more because I love them!
“Stories, stories. I have not been able to tell them. I shall not be able to tell this one.”
“But it is not at this late stage of my relation that I intend to give way to literature.”
Beckett is continually pulling his audience in. While he tries to empty his works out his is pulling us into this emptiness. Writing “you” at times and even “Youdi,” while perhaps the old pronunciation of Yahweh, still hints at us the reader. Yet as a reader you cannot be helped to be surrounded by Beckett’s words, as long as we remember they are his.
Dr. Sexson wanted us to find five instances where Beckett speaks to us the reader through his writing. After getting farther into the reading I began to realize that there are many instances that Beckett reminds us that he is writing and this is a fictitious work. The ones I liked best are as follows. All of them are from Molloy because after getting through that work I decided to stop counting.
1. “Perhaps I had invented him, I mean found him ready made in my head. There is no doubt one sometimes meets with strangers who are not entire strangers, through their having played a part in certain cerebral reels.”
2. “I knew then about Mollory, without however knowing much about him. I shall say briefly what little I did know about him. I shall also draw attention, in my knowledge of Mollory, to the most striking lacunae.”
3. “But let us leave it at that, if you don’t mind, the party is big enough.”
4. “And in writing these lines I know in what danger I am….But I write them all the same, and with a firm hand weaving inexorably back and forth and devouring my page with the indifference of a shuttle.”
5. “And it would not surprise me if I deviated, in the pages to follow, from the true and exact succession of events.”
OK just two more because I love them!
“Stories, stories. I have not been able to tell them. I shall not be able to tell this one.”
“But it is not at this late stage of my relation that I intend to give way to literature.”
Beckett is continually pulling his audience in. While he tries to empty his works out his is pulling us into this emptiness. Writing “you” at times and even “Youdi,” while perhaps the old pronunciation of Yahweh, still hints at us the reader. Yet as a reader you cannot be helped to be surrounded by Beckett’s words, as long as we remember they are his.
Thursday 18 February 2010
The “Faith” of Moran
While reading through Molloy early on we encounter many of Beckett’s religious allusions. The most obvious evidence of these of course is in the names of those that give Moran his job orders, Gaber and Youdi, also know as Gabriel and Yahweh.
A passage that struck me appeared on page 132 in my edition. The passage is as follows:
“The voice I listen to needs no Gaber to make it heard. From it is within me and exhorts me to continue to the end the faithful servant I have always been, of a cause that is not mine, and patiently fulfill in all its bitterness my calamitous part, as it was my will, when I had a will, that others should. And this with hatred in my heart, and scorn, of my master and his designs. Yes, it is rather an ambiguous voice and not always easy to follow, in its reasonings and decrees. But I follow it none the less, more or less, I follow it in this sense, that I know what it means, and in this sense, that I do what it tells me. And I do not think there are many voices of which as much may be said. And I feel I shall follow it from this day forth, no matter what it commands. And when it ceases, leaving me in doubt and darkness, I shall wait for it to come back, and do nothing, even though the whole world, through the channel of its innumerable authorities speaking with one accord, should enjoin upon me this and that, under pain of unspeakable punishments.”
I was struck by this passage in that it seems to be to me the perfect sentiment that so many feel about their faith. The first line is the best embodiment of this idea, “the voice I listen to needs no Gaber to make it heard.” For many it is not the priest shouting from the pulpit but the voice within themselves that drives them on in what they do and their faith in something more.
Perhaps Moran is just slightly insane and the “voice” he is hearing are just the voices in his head, but I like to think of them as the voice that guides him in all he does. He needs no priest, rabbi or any other spiritual leader, he only needs Gods voice as his guide to feel as if what he is doing is right.
That to me is who Youdi is in the work. Gaber is Youdi’s messenger here on Earth but it is the voice of Youdi himself that Moran listens to and follows. That is what true faith is. Not the blind following of a prophet, but the holding on to your faith in something greater within your own self.
So whether Moran is just insane or not. I loved this passage in Molloy and felt it resonated with faith that Moran has in what he does and who he is doing it for. He is a true believer.
A passage that struck me appeared on page 132 in my edition. The passage is as follows:
“The voice I listen to needs no Gaber to make it heard. From it is within me and exhorts me to continue to the end the faithful servant I have always been, of a cause that is not mine, and patiently fulfill in all its bitterness my calamitous part, as it was my will, when I had a will, that others should. And this with hatred in my heart, and scorn, of my master and his designs. Yes, it is rather an ambiguous voice and not always easy to follow, in its reasonings and decrees. But I follow it none the less, more or less, I follow it in this sense, that I know what it means, and in this sense, that I do what it tells me. And I do not think there are many voices of which as much may be said. And I feel I shall follow it from this day forth, no matter what it commands. And when it ceases, leaving me in doubt and darkness, I shall wait for it to come back, and do nothing, even though the whole world, through the channel of its innumerable authorities speaking with one accord, should enjoin upon me this and that, under pain of unspeakable punishments.”
I was struck by this passage in that it seems to be to me the perfect sentiment that so many feel about their faith. The first line is the best embodiment of this idea, “the voice I listen to needs no Gaber to make it heard.” For many it is not the priest shouting from the pulpit but the voice within themselves that drives them on in what they do and their faith in something more.
Perhaps Moran is just slightly insane and the “voice” he is hearing are just the voices in his head, but I like to think of them as the voice that guides him in all he does. He needs no priest, rabbi or any other spiritual leader, he only needs Gods voice as his guide to feel as if what he is doing is right.
That to me is who Youdi is in the work. Gaber is Youdi’s messenger here on Earth but it is the voice of Youdi himself that Moran listens to and follows. That is what true faith is. Not the blind following of a prophet, but the holding on to your faith in something greater within your own self.
So whether Moran is just insane or not. I loved this passage in Molloy and felt it resonated with faith that Moran has in what he does and who he is doing it for. He is a true believer.
20 Minute Lifetime
After reading several blogs on my classmates personal experiences or ideas on the 20 minute lifetime I have come to the conclusion that many of the deal with dark subject matter.
I have not experienced the 20 minute lifetime myself, or at least I don’t remember it which means it probably passed me by without my notice, but in reading others blogs I noticed that most experiences surrounded a tragedy. Most notably, and the one I have heard most frequently was the car crash.
I have heard many people say “I saw my life flash before my eyes,” and what does that mean really and truly. Having never experienced anything like a car crash I was never sure, but after hearing about the 20 minute lifetime perhaps I can make a jab at it.
People often in traumatic situations experience a moment when all that is around them seems to go into a slow motion sequence, and a moment can seem like an eternity. They speak of seeing scenes from their life, or their entire life, flash before their eyes. Recalling whole scenes from their childhood and beyond. Perhaps even things they believe they didn’t even remember.
But this instance is a reliving of their lives all over again, and not a different life they are unfamiliar with, but their present and past. You never hear really of people coming out of an accident saying “I experienced another life” it is always “MY life flashed before my eyes.”
Perhaps this is an event that not really let’s us experience a completely new lifetime in a moment, but is reminding us of what there is left to be had in the life we are in. A kind of déjà vu that wakes us up to our reality. That may be why when people experience such an event their lives are changed forever. They are not waiting for life to begin because it already has. It is 20 minutes of OUR lifetime and not another that we will experience at a different time.
We may all be caught in the myth of the eternal return, experiencing our lives again and again and seeing them for the first time. But it is the realization of the time and life we are in that is important to what we make of our lives to come.
I have not experienced the 20 minute lifetime myself, or at least I don’t remember it which means it probably passed me by without my notice, but in reading others blogs I noticed that most experiences surrounded a tragedy. Most notably, and the one I have heard most frequently was the car crash.
I have heard many people say “I saw my life flash before my eyes,” and what does that mean really and truly. Having never experienced anything like a car crash I was never sure, but after hearing about the 20 minute lifetime perhaps I can make a jab at it.
People often in traumatic situations experience a moment when all that is around them seems to go into a slow motion sequence, and a moment can seem like an eternity. They speak of seeing scenes from their life, or their entire life, flash before their eyes. Recalling whole scenes from their childhood and beyond. Perhaps even things they believe they didn’t even remember.
But this instance is a reliving of their lives all over again, and not a different life they are unfamiliar with, but their present and past. You never hear really of people coming out of an accident saying “I experienced another life” it is always “MY life flashed before my eyes.”
Perhaps this is an event that not really let’s us experience a completely new lifetime in a moment, but is reminding us of what there is left to be had in the life we are in. A kind of déjà vu that wakes us up to our reality. That may be why when people experience such an event their lives are changed forever. They are not waiting for life to begin because it already has. It is 20 minutes of OUR lifetime and not another that we will experience at a different time.
We may all be caught in the myth of the eternal return, experiencing our lives again and again and seeing them for the first time. But it is the realization of the time and life we are in that is important to what we make of our lives to come.
Monday 8 February 2010
20 Minute Lifetime in Four Quartets
"Home is where on starts from. As we grow older
The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated
Of dead and living. Not the intense moment
Isolated, with no before and after,
But a lifetime burning in every moment
And not the lifetime of one man only
But of old stones that cannot be deciphered.
There is a time for the evening under lamplight
(The evening with the photograph album).
Love is most nearly itself
When here and now cease to matter."
East Coker Section V (31)
The world becomes stranger, the pattern more complicated
Of dead and living. Not the intense moment
Isolated, with no before and after,
But a lifetime burning in every moment
And not the lifetime of one man only
But of old stones that cannot be deciphered.
There is a time for the evening under lamplight
(The evening with the photograph album).
Love is most nearly itself
When here and now cease to matter."
East Coker Section V (31)
Allusions of Eliot
So I read the Four Quartets this past weekend and was surprised by how much I enjoyed it. Almost every corner is turned down indicating passages and sections I loved.
One of the references that was easy for me to spot was in Little Gidding Section IV, and the reference to Hercules and Deianira. I only know this because it was the story from Ovid I had to present in Classical Lit. with Dr. Sexson. Eliot’s two stanzas summed up an entire tale that Ovid wrote in many more. Once again Ovid is emerging in this class as a reference and allusion for many to use.
The story is about the love of one person for another, a love that is all consuming. A fire that consumes and redeems us. Eliot recognizes that love is a torment, but it is also the thing that saves us in the end. Hercules is consumed in a “pyre”, both his shirt and of his own making, and is redeemed in his metamorphosis into a constellation. As Eliot writes, “The only hope, or else despair/Lies in the choice of pyre or pyre-/To be redeemed from fire by fire” (57).
One of my other favorite references that Eliot made was to the children in the trees. I have not been able to look more into this idea but I plan to. The lines that include this idea are as follows:
“Go, said the bird, for the leaves were full of children,/Hidden excitedly, containing laughter” (15).
“Sudden in a shaft of sunlight/ Even while the dust moves/There rises the hidden laughter/Of children in the foliage…” (20).
“The voice of the hidden waterfall/And the children in the apple-tree/Not-known, because not looked for/But heard, half-heard, in the stillness/Between two waves of the sea” (59).
I am not sure why these passages strike me so, but they stay with me even after I have finished reading. There are also so many more passages, but I will not fill this blog with lines I love, or at least try not to!
One of the references that was easy for me to spot was in Little Gidding Section IV, and the reference to Hercules and Deianira. I only know this because it was the story from Ovid I had to present in Classical Lit. with Dr. Sexson. Eliot’s two stanzas summed up an entire tale that Ovid wrote in many more. Once again Ovid is emerging in this class as a reference and allusion for many to use.
The story is about the love of one person for another, a love that is all consuming. A fire that consumes and redeems us. Eliot recognizes that love is a torment, but it is also the thing that saves us in the end. Hercules is consumed in a “pyre”, both his shirt and of his own making, and is redeemed in his metamorphosis into a constellation. As Eliot writes, “The only hope, or else despair/Lies in the choice of pyre or pyre-/To be redeemed from fire by fire” (57).
One of my other favorite references that Eliot made was to the children in the trees. I have not been able to look more into this idea but I plan to. The lines that include this idea are as follows:
“Go, said the bird, for the leaves were full of children,/Hidden excitedly, containing laughter” (15).
“Sudden in a shaft of sunlight/ Even while the dust moves/There rises the hidden laughter/Of children in the foliage…” (20).
“The voice of the hidden waterfall/And the children in the apple-tree/Not-known, because not looked for/But heard, half-heard, in the stillness/Between two waves of the sea” (59).
I am not sure why these passages strike me so, but they stay with me even after I have finished reading. There are also so many more passages, but I will not fill this blog with lines I love, or at least try not to!
A Joycean Sighting
So waiting for class to begin on Friday last week Bizz and I were discussing Finnegans Wake before an exam. We were wondering how people in class were finding themselves within the maze of Joyce’s masterpiece. I have been reading Finnegans Wake but it has not been a speedy process and thought I would never find myself before the end if the semester.
In turn while sitting in Reid I just began to open to random pages and looking for references to myself or anything that related to me. Within the first ten minutes I found myself on page 221, and it even wasn’t just a reference but even my full first name. Joyce even spelled it right, but then again he would because the reference for him would most likely be Rachel in the Bible.
The section goes as follows:
“KATE (Miss Rachel Lea Varian, she tells forkings for baschfellors, under purdah of card palmer teaput tosspot Madam d’Elta, during the pawses), kook-and-dishdrudge, whitch believes wanthingthats, whouse be the churchyard or whorts up the aasgaars, the show must go on.”
I have not read this far into Finnegans Wake and do not understand the context completely, but I will make it there at some point! I did understand, perhaps, from the section though that Miss Rachel is a fortuneteller. She tells fortunes (“tells forkings“), using tarot cards, reading palms and tea leaves (“purdah of card palmer teaput“). Besides the fact that my name is explicitly used, it is strange because when I was in middle school I was interested in such things. I used to make my friends at sleepovers do séances, I kind of freaked them out most times with the Ouija board though so we didn't accomplish much!
Once again as stated in class we are all in Finnegans Wake as long as we are paying attention!
In turn while sitting in Reid I just began to open to random pages and looking for references to myself or anything that related to me. Within the first ten minutes I found myself on page 221, and it even wasn’t just a reference but even my full first name. Joyce even spelled it right, but then again he would because the reference for him would most likely be Rachel in the Bible.
The section goes as follows:
“KATE (Miss Rachel Lea Varian, she tells forkings for baschfellors, under purdah of card palmer teaput tosspot Madam d’Elta, during the pawses), kook-and-dishdrudge, whitch believes wanthingthats, whouse be the churchyard or whorts up the aasgaars, the show must go on.”
I have not read this far into Finnegans Wake and do not understand the context completely, but I will make it there at some point! I did understand, perhaps, from the section though that Miss Rachel is a fortuneteller. She tells fortunes (“tells forkings“), using tarot cards, reading palms and tea leaves (“purdah of card palmer teaput“). Besides the fact that my name is explicitly used, it is strange because when I was in middle school I was interested in such things. I used to make my friends at sleepovers do séances, I kind of freaked them out most times with the Ouija board though so we didn't accomplish much!
Once again as stated in class we are all in Finnegans Wake as long as we are paying attention!
Friday 5 February 2010
Lists Of My Mind
Hi my name is Rachel and I am an obsessive list maker.
Ever since I was little I have loved making lists, from everything from my daily schedule, to chores to accomplish and even my “life plan.” I know you can’t really have a plan, but I have had one starting in eighth grade that details everything I want to accomplish in the future, especially my career. I won’t go into details, but you should know that it is VERY specific, and why yes I am slightly OCD as well. I think being OC and making lists kind of go hand in hand. So when Dr. Sexson gave us the assignment to make a list of everything in one room of our house I was thrilled!
The following list goes counter clockwise around my room when you are in the bed.
Side table
-journal
-lamp
-picture of small Portuguese girl I took in Lisbon and love!
-candles
-decorative boxes
-record player
-about 250 albums
-about 100 CDs
-too many movies to count (VHS and DVD. I refuse to part with my VHS player!)
Basket on floor
-Bon Appetite
-The New Yorker
-The only two magazines I have subscriptions to since I was 15. So there’s a lot of them!
Desk
-Edward Gorey Christmas cards
-bowl of candy (All bought at the Phillipsburg candy store!)
-laptop
-printer
-bills
-file
-CLEP exam review materials
-GRE materials
-printer paper
-information on grad school(s) applying to
Lamp
Cat scratching post
Copy of Caravaggio’s, The Calling of Saint. Matthew (One of my favorite painters! Especially his Biblical paintings. Renaissance painters capture the human hand magnificently.)
Stack of books for classes this semester
Bookcase
-top shelf contains Clive Barker, Persepolis, Kundera, Nabokov, Dickens, James Baldwin, Scottish Short Stories, Proust, Jhumpa Lahiri, Bronte, Vonnegut and more.
-next shelf contains Dreiser, Gogol, Wells, Marlowe, Edward Gorey, Tim Burton and more.
-third shelf contains Proust, C.S. Lewis, Goethe, Byatt, Oates, Ballard, Plath, Maugham, Camus, Roth, Joyce, Potok, Folwes, Orwell, Machiavelli and more.
-forth shelf contains Flannery O’Connor, Thomas Mann, Rand, Helprin, Gibran, Stoker, Lawrence, Goethe and more.
Chest of Drawers (on top The Flowers of Evil by Baudelaire and Picnic, Lightning by Collins)
Hanging on wall two antique French posters
Old Italian perfume box from manufacturer with 25 samples of perfumes all different
Door
Evening in the Park ( a copper etching but I can’t remember the artist, he lives in Seattle.)
Door to bathroom
Sculpture for wall that holds candles
Bookcase
-on top book with all The New Yorker cartoons, my stuffed sheep named Babaee(sp?),which is Farsi for sheep.
-next down are books from past classes, several other books by Edward Gorey, poetry by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Ovid, Capote, Betty Smith, Chopin, Tom Robbins, Mildred Walker and more.
-All other shelves books from past classes and collections of poetry and famous love letters between authors and those they love (poetry includes the Romantics, Langston Hughes, ect.)
Copy of Andrew Wyeth’s Master Bedroom hangs over my bed
So I know it’s long, but once I start I can’t stop. So enjoy if you have the patience!
Ever since I was little I have loved making lists, from everything from my daily schedule, to chores to accomplish and even my “life plan.” I know you can’t really have a plan, but I have had one starting in eighth grade that details everything I want to accomplish in the future, especially my career. I won’t go into details, but you should know that it is VERY specific, and why yes I am slightly OCD as well. I think being OC and making lists kind of go hand in hand. So when Dr. Sexson gave us the assignment to make a list of everything in one room of our house I was thrilled!
The following list goes counter clockwise around my room when you are in the bed.
Side table
-journal
-lamp
-picture of small Portuguese girl I took in Lisbon and love!
-candles
-decorative boxes
-record player
-about 250 albums
-about 100 CDs
-too many movies to count (VHS and DVD. I refuse to part with my VHS player!)
Basket on floor
-Bon Appetite
-The New Yorker
-The only two magazines I have subscriptions to since I was 15. So there’s a lot of them!
Desk
-Edward Gorey Christmas cards
-bowl of candy (All bought at the Phillipsburg candy store!)
-laptop
-printer
-bills
-file
-CLEP exam review materials
-GRE materials
-printer paper
-information on grad school(s) applying to
Lamp
Cat scratching post
Copy of Caravaggio’s, The Calling of Saint. Matthew (One of my favorite painters! Especially his Biblical paintings. Renaissance painters capture the human hand magnificently.)
Stack of books for classes this semester
Bookcase
-top shelf contains Clive Barker, Persepolis, Kundera, Nabokov, Dickens, James Baldwin, Scottish Short Stories, Proust, Jhumpa Lahiri, Bronte, Vonnegut and more.
-next shelf contains Dreiser, Gogol, Wells, Marlowe, Edward Gorey, Tim Burton and more.
-third shelf contains Proust, C.S. Lewis, Goethe, Byatt, Oates, Ballard, Plath, Maugham, Camus, Roth, Joyce, Potok, Folwes, Orwell, Machiavelli and more.
-forth shelf contains Flannery O’Connor, Thomas Mann, Rand, Helprin, Gibran, Stoker, Lawrence, Goethe and more.
Chest of Drawers (on top The Flowers of Evil by Baudelaire and Picnic, Lightning by Collins)
Hanging on wall two antique French posters
Old Italian perfume box from manufacturer with 25 samples of perfumes all different
Door
Evening in the Park ( a copper etching but I can’t remember the artist, he lives in Seattle.)
Door to bathroom
Sculpture for wall that holds candles
Bookcase
-on top book with all The New Yorker cartoons, my stuffed sheep named Babaee(sp?),which is Farsi for sheep.
-next down are books from past classes, several other books by Edward Gorey, poetry by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Ovid, Capote, Betty Smith, Chopin, Tom Robbins, Mildred Walker and more.
-All other shelves books from past classes and collections of poetry and famous love letters between authors and those they love (poetry includes the Romantics, Langston Hughes, ect.)
Copy of Andrew Wyeth’s Master Bedroom hangs over my bed
So I know it’s long, but once I start I can’t stop. So enjoy if you have the patience!
Groundhog Day
So not much happened on my Groundhog Day because I was home sick, very exciting I know. I am grateful that that will not be the day that I get to live over and over again. Mostly I slept and watched movies. The movies were the high point of my day and consisted mostly of Bridget Jones (both of them), Woody Allen films (Annie Hall, Scoop and Match Point) and the series called The Power of Art (artists watched included Caravaggio, Bernini, Van Gogh and Turner, but there are more then that).
I am a movie fiend and never get tried of laying on my couch and watching them for hours on end. I am sure that I could have found something in these movies to apply to class, or something that reminded me of class, but my fevered delirium was taking over and I was not able to focus that day.
So while Dr. Sexson did not think any of the other blogs captured what he was looking for in our Groundhogs Day, mine surely was the worst of them all. At least others in class did something. I just was playing dead for most of the day and trying to recover from some weird 24 hour flu like thing.
Well at least that day is over, and if I am lucky I will never have to spend all of eternity reliving the Groundhogs Day I was sick again and again! I will pick some other day to pay extra close attention to later this semester, just to make up for being sick.
I am a movie fiend and never get tried of laying on my couch and watching them for hours on end. I am sure that I could have found something in these movies to apply to class, or something that reminded me of class, but my fevered delirium was taking over and I was not able to focus that day.
So while Dr. Sexson did not think any of the other blogs captured what he was looking for in our Groundhogs Day, mine surely was the worst of them all. At least others in class did something. I just was playing dead for most of the day and trying to recover from some weird 24 hour flu like thing.
Well at least that day is over, and if I am lucky I will never have to spend all of eternity reliving the Groundhogs Day I was sick again and again! I will pick some other day to pay extra close attention to later this semester, just to make up for being sick.
Wednesday 3 February 2010
Finnegans Wake and The Skin of Our Teeth
So I was going to do this blog after reading The Skin of Our Teeth for the second time, but had been sick all day and just decided to go to sleep last night. I enjoyed The Skin of Our Teeth the second time around and took more from it then I did the first time. But like Dr. Sexson said in his article, reading Joyce, and perhaps even this play by Wilder, is not about the destination or any particular discoveries it is about the journey itself.
The three connections that I wanted to blog about between Finnegans Wake and The Skin of Our Teeth are as follows:
1. Obviously the Myth of the Eternal Return is in both. From the last line in Finnegans Wake returning to begin the first, and Sabina's last line matching her first. Also the theme of destruction and rebirth that continues throughout the work including, the iceberg, flood and impending war.
2. Throughout both works there is a mixing of reality and fantasy. In Joyce it is the dream-like state that his Book of the Night takes place in, and Wilder's continually changing ideas of time and place throughout the work the audience is never quite sure where they are.
3. Lastly the families in both works in a sense mirror each other. Mother, Father, Daughter and the two sons (Well that is before Cain killed Abel!).
The above poster is one of the original productions directed by Elia Kazan.
Wednesday 27 January 2010
My Page of Joy-ce
The page I have chosen to focus on from Finnegans Wake is page 425. I decided that if I was going to “open” to some random page I could not do that. I would then just spend my time endlessly trying to find that “perfect” page, and ultimately coming to the realization that they are all perfect in their own individual flow of language. Basically I chose 425 because it is my birthday, 04-25, which seems as good a reason as any to focus in on that particular number.
Also the “~30 words” I chose from that page are as follows:
“I’d pisel it with immenuensoes as easy as I’d perorate a chickerow of beans for the price of two maricles and my trifolium librotto, the authordux Book of Lief, would, if give to daylight, (I hold a most incredible faith about it) far exceed what that bogus bolshy of a sham, my soamheis brother…”
We shall see! I may have to find something a little shorter!
Also the “~30 words” I chose from that page are as follows:
“I’d pisel it with immenuensoes as easy as I’d perorate a chickerow of beans for the price of two maricles and my trifolium librotto, the authordux Book of Lief, would, if give to daylight, (I hold a most incredible faith about it) far exceed what that bogus bolshy of a sham, my soamheis brother…”
We shall see! I may have to find something a little shorter!
Re-membering Finnegan
So I finished Dr. Sexson’s article yesterday that was posted on Sam’s blog, and I must say that I enjoyed it quite a bit. It is another wonderful way for us to look at and approach Joyce without being as intimidated as we started off. Or at least that is a nice thought. I am still rather intimidated, but I am excited to discuss it and at least begin to be altered by the book itself rather than the other way around. Dr. Sexson wrote in the article that the journey itself through Joyce is itself the goal and not the ultimate goal is not to understand every minute detail.
I decided after reading this article I would just list some of my favorite quotes from it. I will blog about Finnegans Wake by Friday I promise. I am slowly making my way through it and I am finally working up to my first blog on this book of knowledge.
“…only in sleep do we begin to awaken to all we have forgotten.”
“…such material is tantamount not only to rebirth of wonder but an apotheosis, a translation of the human into the divine, of the mortal into the immortal…”
“…we all become artists when we sleep…”
“A reader of Finnegans Wake is more like a navigator moving experientially through simulacra, not with the intention of understanding what’s going to happen at the end, or of getting the “point,” but with the aim of experiencing a hallucinatory ride, “hanging out,” getting lost in fortuitous forks in the labyrinth, taking an ecstatic flight through the infinite caverns of memory in which the journey itself becomes the goal.”
“Knowledge, for example, should no longer be a commodity but closer to what Plato thought it was, an eroticized expression of the soul, a transformation.”
“It is here in, in this place that is not a place, at this moment of religious miracle and revelation when the phenomenal world metamorphoses into what Joyce calls the “funanimal” world, that we begin to learn how to read the unread and unreadable book.”
So thank you once again for this enlightening article. Similar to a Dr. Sexson lecture in all the information packed into a short period of time, and thoroughly enjoyable (missing the best part of lecture though, being there in person!). Informative and entertaining. The surefire way to lead your students to a successful semester and I thank you for that!
I decided after reading this article I would just list some of my favorite quotes from it. I will blog about Finnegans Wake by Friday I promise. I am slowly making my way through it and I am finally working up to my first blog on this book of knowledge.
“…only in sleep do we begin to awaken to all we have forgotten.”
“…such material is tantamount not only to rebirth of wonder but an apotheosis, a translation of the human into the divine, of the mortal into the immortal…”
“…we all become artists when we sleep…”
“A reader of Finnegans Wake is more like a navigator moving experientially through simulacra, not with the intention of understanding what’s going to happen at the end, or of getting the “point,” but with the aim of experiencing a hallucinatory ride, “hanging out,” getting lost in fortuitous forks in the labyrinth, taking an ecstatic flight through the infinite caverns of memory in which the journey itself becomes the goal.”
“Knowledge, for example, should no longer be a commodity but closer to what Plato thought it was, an eroticized expression of the soul, a transformation.”
“It is here in, in this place that is not a place, at this moment of religious miracle and revelation when the phenomenal world metamorphoses into what Joyce calls the “funanimal” world, that we begin to learn how to read the unread and unreadable book.”
So thank you once again for this enlightening article. Similar to a Dr. Sexson lecture in all the information packed into a short period of time, and thoroughly enjoyable (missing the best part of lecture though, being there in person!). Informative and entertaining. The surefire way to lead your students to a successful semester and I thank you for that!
Monday 25 January 2010
My Waking Reality
So Dr. Sexson wanted us to do an inventory of our room and what we see when we wake up. So here it goes!
I wake up to the blaring sound of my alarm clock at 6am, and force myself to get out of bed. I go to move and feel that I am barricaded in by my two cats, Oskar and Lola (no not the Barry Manilow Lola, but Humbert’s Lola, her full name is Dolores) they are brother and sister. I carefully remove myself from the layers of sheets, down comforter and family heirloom quilt, with deep green Celtic knots linked together across a cream backing, brought from Ireland by my Great-grandmother, my prized possession. I throw my legs over the side of my queen sized bed, and slowly begin to look around.
Right next to my knees is my side table, found at a yard sale for $5 but worth about $150. Piled on top are my books for class and the notebook I write in in the middle of the night when I wake up with ideas. Next to the books is my little lamp my Mother made me with the hand cut roses in the shade through which the light shines in red and green tissue paper, I have woken up to this lamp since I was four. In the shelves of the side table are all my movies, the CDs I have from before iTunes, and my massive album collection from my Uncle and Mother. In the collection is mostly Jazz and Classical (there’s even a Lionel Richie album signed by Quincy Jones when my Mother placed him and his entourage in L.A. in 1976 for a corporate event, another possession I prize and will never part with).
As I make my way to the bathroom I pass my desk drowning in papers, things I am working on, applications to grad schools and on and on and on. I can’t even see my laptop under all of it. As I walk around my bed I survey my room and realize I have four, six foot talk bookcases jam packed with books and more just spilling onto the floor! Even as I look at this I don’t think I have too many, I only think of all the books I have not found and bought yet! I make mental note to visit Francis at Vargo’s later in the week!
I pass my dresser and look at the 1920s French Posters I found in a strange antique shop in London. They are massive and the graphics are beautiful in their infinite details. I finally make it to the bathroom door and trip over Oskar as I go to the sink to splash cold water on my face to wake up. I am instantly jolted awake and look at the calendar to realize that I am about to begin another week, and I haven’t blogged yet!
My room is small but it is jammed pack full of my life and things. I never really thought about it until Dr. Sexson had us do this blog. I sure have accumulated a lot of things, but each has a fond memory attached, and each time I step into my own reality in the morning I am reminded of my past.
I wake up to the blaring sound of my alarm clock at 6am, and force myself to get out of bed. I go to move and feel that I am barricaded in by my two cats, Oskar and Lola (no not the Barry Manilow Lola, but Humbert’s Lola, her full name is Dolores) they are brother and sister. I carefully remove myself from the layers of sheets, down comforter and family heirloom quilt, with deep green Celtic knots linked together across a cream backing, brought from Ireland by my Great-grandmother, my prized possession. I throw my legs over the side of my queen sized bed, and slowly begin to look around.
Right next to my knees is my side table, found at a yard sale for $5 but worth about $150. Piled on top are my books for class and the notebook I write in in the middle of the night when I wake up with ideas. Next to the books is my little lamp my Mother made me with the hand cut roses in the shade through which the light shines in red and green tissue paper, I have woken up to this lamp since I was four. In the shelves of the side table are all my movies, the CDs I have from before iTunes, and my massive album collection from my Uncle and Mother. In the collection is mostly Jazz and Classical (there’s even a Lionel Richie album signed by Quincy Jones when my Mother placed him and his entourage in L.A. in 1976 for a corporate event, another possession I prize and will never part with).
As I make my way to the bathroom I pass my desk drowning in papers, things I am working on, applications to grad schools and on and on and on. I can’t even see my laptop under all of it. As I walk around my bed I survey my room and realize I have four, six foot talk bookcases jam packed with books and more just spilling onto the floor! Even as I look at this I don’t think I have too many, I only think of all the books I have not found and bought yet! I make mental note to visit Francis at Vargo’s later in the week!
I pass my dresser and look at the 1920s French Posters I found in a strange antique shop in London. They are massive and the graphics are beautiful in their infinite details. I finally make it to the bathroom door and trip over Oskar as I go to the sink to splash cold water on my face to wake up. I am instantly jolted awake and look at the calendar to realize that I am about to begin another week, and I haven’t blogged yet!
My room is small but it is jammed pack full of my life and things. I never really thought about it until Dr. Sexson had us do this blog. I sure have accumulated a lot of things, but each has a fond memory attached, and each time I step into my own reality in the morning I am reminded of my past.
The Water Genie Speaks
So this paragraph is going to be repetitive, redundant, wordy and verbose. It could even get annoying, obnoxious, irritating, exasperating and aggravating at times. But isn’t that how he speaks, why use one word when twenty would do? Writing like this difficult, challenging, arduous, knotty and cryptic at times. It could drive any one crazy, loony, insane, bonkers, cuckoo. But that is what happened when I dove into the waters of Finnegans Wake. Joyce is perhaps a water genie himself, they way he strings lines together and writes in a fluid motion, even focusing on the fluidity of water at times. Perhaps the Water Genie in Haroun and the Sea of Stories is not so crazy after all, perhaps he is a savant, a genius, a gifted student in the realm of the English language. We mere mortals will never know unless we dive in, jump into, plunge into the depths and immerse ourselves in the language of the Water Genie and James Joyce.
Friday 22 January 2010
Life as a Parabola
While reading the introduction to Finnegans Wake I was struck by the idea of the structure of the story on page xix. Bishop writes, "The book follows the course of a downward-plunging parabola, in this view, descending from the fall into sleep at its beginning into a darkest center and then reascending toward dawn, light, and reawakening as it nears its end...."
I was intrigued by this because of last semesters biblical lit. class with Dr. Sexson. In that class we read a work by Northrope Frye on the Bible as literature, and Frye describes much of the bible, and even life, as following a u-shaped curve, or parabola.
Perhaps Bishop has read Frye's work even as a literary critic, but there is no footnote suggesting such a possibility. If he had read Frye he would see that this is the path many tales take, especially the religious. There is a period of success and happiness that is then lost and we are in the bottom of the curve and then God redeems us and we return to our original place, perhaps even better off. Frye believed that right now in human history we are in the bottom of the curve, waiting to be redeemed.
I was intrigued that Bishop thought of Joyce's work as following this path as well, not just because he mentioned it, but because Joyce often refers to the religious and biblical as well. The parabola that his story follows is one of a descending and rebirth, whether through death or sleeping, the wake itself.
While Finnegans Wake the story itself is cyclical in form, ending where it began, following the theme in class of the myth of the eternal return. Joyce's writing follows the parabola perfectly. This is not just seen in his character that we are witnessing this dreamworld through, but through the very act of sleeping itself that we all experience. According to Joyce's form we all follow this path at least once a day. We descend into that darkness and unknown that is sleep and enter another world, and then we are awaken again to another day. Most often we do not experience the same day over and over again, as in Groundhog's day, but we awaken to a strangely familiar world.
Joyce's writing style is unusual in that he creates and draws from many languages making it strange to the human eye and ear, but then the language of sleep is strange and yet familiar all at once. It is the structure that is recognizable in this dreamland though, something that we all can identify with. That all to familiar descent into sleep and another world, and the awaking to one we are more familiar with. The story itself many be cyclical, but the path it follows is u-shaped.
I was intrigued by this because of last semesters biblical lit. class with Dr. Sexson. In that class we read a work by Northrope Frye on the Bible as literature, and Frye describes much of the bible, and even life, as following a u-shaped curve, or parabola.
Perhaps Bishop has read Frye's work even as a literary critic, but there is no footnote suggesting such a possibility. If he had read Frye he would see that this is the path many tales take, especially the religious. There is a period of success and happiness that is then lost and we are in the bottom of the curve and then God redeems us and we return to our original place, perhaps even better off. Frye believed that right now in human history we are in the bottom of the curve, waiting to be redeemed.
I was intrigued that Bishop thought of Joyce's work as following this path as well, not just because he mentioned it, but because Joyce often refers to the religious and biblical as well. The parabola that his story follows is one of a descending and rebirth, whether through death or sleeping, the wake itself.
While Finnegans Wake the story itself is cyclical in form, ending where it began, following the theme in class of the myth of the eternal return. Joyce's writing follows the parabola perfectly. This is not just seen in his character that we are witnessing this dreamworld through, but through the very act of sleeping itself that we all experience. According to Joyce's form we all follow this path at least once a day. We descend into that darkness and unknown that is sleep and enter another world, and then we are awaken again to another day. Most often we do not experience the same day over and over again, as in Groundhog's day, but we awaken to a strangely familiar world.
Joyce's writing style is unusual in that he creates and draws from many languages making it strange to the human eye and ear, but then the language of sleep is strange and yet familiar all at once. It is the structure that is recognizable in this dreamland though, something that we all can identify with. That all to familiar descent into sleep and another world, and the awaking to one we are more familiar with. The story itself many be cyclical, but the path it follows is u-shaped.
Wednesday 20 January 2010
Confused? Why Yes Thank You.
(Sorry for all the blogs at once. No internet at home and I am trying to catch up!)
So over the weekend I decided to read Wilder's play before I began Finnegan's Wake. IT sounded like a good idea, and I did finish it, but I am rather confused.
I get the obvious connection with the myth of the eternal return, because the play ends where it began with Sabina. But all the stuff in the middle just left me dizzy! Dinosaurs and mammoths, approaching ice, people living underground, beauty queens in red stockings, all the biblical and Greek allusions, OY!
I thought this would help with Joyce, but perhaps Joyce will help with Wilder. This blog is short because let's just say I am unsure of what to write about. Maybe in the end Joyce will clear up Wilder. Who knows! I just know I will have to reread it after diving into Joyce. Enjoy all!
I must say though that I was excited to see that Elia Kazan directed the first performance! He directed two of the best movies ever, A Streetcar Named Desire and Baby Doll, both by Williams. If you haven't you should, it's Marlon Brando at his most gorgeous!
But anyway let's just say I am confused and hoping to understand it all in the end, after much discussion and rereading!
So over the weekend I decided to read Wilder's play before I began Finnegan's Wake. IT sounded like a good idea, and I did finish it, but I am rather confused.
I get the obvious connection with the myth of the eternal return, because the play ends where it began with Sabina. But all the stuff in the middle just left me dizzy! Dinosaurs and mammoths, approaching ice, people living underground, beauty queens in red stockings, all the biblical and Greek allusions, OY!
I thought this would help with Joyce, but perhaps Joyce will help with Wilder. This blog is short because let's just say I am unsure of what to write about. Maybe in the end Joyce will clear up Wilder. Who knows! I just know I will have to reread it after diving into Joyce. Enjoy all!
I must say though that I was excited to see that Elia Kazan directed the first performance! He directed two of the best movies ever, A Streetcar Named Desire and Baby Doll, both by Williams. If you haven't you should, it's Marlon Brando at his most gorgeous!
But anyway let's just say I am confused and hoping to understand it all in the end, after much discussion and rereading!
Nooteboom and Nabokov
I LOVE THE FOLLOWING STORY! I read it in 2 hours this past weekend and can't wait to read it again. Thus far this semester this is my favorite work, but then again I have only read three of our six novels fully.
One thing about this novel that I love in particular is the connection it has with Nabokov's Transpart Things. Obviously there is the connection with the qoute that begins part two, but I was thinking about Nabokvo while I read this even before that point. There are also more connections then that alone throughout the work, and Nooteboom's writing refelcts the fact that he has read a lot of Nabokov himself.
The Following Story to me emerges fully out of Transparent Things and Nabokov's writing style. Nooteboom seems to question and strive to understand the other worldly as Nabokv does. The buring question of life after death, or what coms when we finally cross to the other side. "This is, I believe, it: not the crude anguish of physical death but the incomparable pangs of the mysterious mental maneuver needed to pass from one state of being to another."
Nooteboom also uses literary allusions to guide his readers as Nabokov does. His are not so much clues as Nabokov's were, guiding us through the maze of his tales, but details that add to the aesthetic of the tale. What really intrigued me though in Nooteboom is that like Nabokov's Transparent Things we are in all three tenses. Both his characters and readers are always in past, present and future all at once. Using Herman's flahbacks and dreams gives us, as readers, a chance to see where Herman was and perhaps where he is going.
Nooteboom also blatantly has his narrator talk directly to his reader. Noabokov was more subtle using Hugh->You, but in the end Nooteboom just comes out and says "You." Leaving no ending punctuation so that the story hangs in the air waiting to be completed. Then there is of course the supernatural element to be explored and discussed as well, OY!
I have not looked into this connection as completely as I would like, but that will come as we discuss the novel more in class. Another favorite from Dr. Sexson to add to the list. Perhaps a paper topic?!
One thing about this novel that I love in particular is the connection it has with Nabokov's Transpart Things. Obviously there is the connection with the qoute that begins part two, but I was thinking about Nabokvo while I read this even before that point. There are also more connections then that alone throughout the work, and Nooteboom's writing refelcts the fact that he has read a lot of Nabokov himself.
The Following Story to me emerges fully out of Transparent Things and Nabokov's writing style. Nooteboom seems to question and strive to understand the other worldly as Nabokv does. The buring question of life after death, or what coms when we finally cross to the other side. "This is, I believe, it: not the crude anguish of physical death but the incomparable pangs of the mysterious mental maneuver needed to pass from one state of being to another."
Nooteboom also uses literary allusions to guide his readers as Nabokov does. His are not so much clues as Nabokov's were, guiding us through the maze of his tales, but details that add to the aesthetic of the tale. What really intrigued me though in Nooteboom is that like Nabokov's Transparent Things we are in all three tenses. Both his characters and readers are always in past, present and future all at once. Using Herman's flahbacks and dreams gives us, as readers, a chance to see where Herman was and perhaps where he is going.
Nooteboom also blatantly has his narrator talk directly to his reader. Noabokov was more subtle using Hugh->You, but in the end Nooteboom just comes out and says "You." Leaving no ending punctuation so that the story hangs in the air waiting to be completed. Then there is of course the supernatural element to be explored and discussed as well, OY!
I have not looked into this connection as completely as I would like, but that will come as we discuss the novel more in class. Another favorite from Dr. Sexson to add to the list. Perhaps a paper topic?!
Haroun: A River Runs Through It
I really enjoyed Haroun and the Sea of Stories as the initial reading for this class. Dr. Sexson brought up in class the connection between water and the creation of stories that continuously flow throughout Rushdie's work. Also the idea was brought up that when we don't read this flow of water becomes polluted and the subject matter of the stories is changed forever. This idea of the relation between water and stories, and even language, really intrigued me while I was reading Haroun.
One quote that really perfectly described this idea was on page 72. Rushdie writes of the sea of stories, "...like a liquid tapestry of breathtaking complexity...." I loved that that in Haroun each stream is a story within the sea, and they all run into each other making the stories change and evolve over time. Dr. Sexson also mentioned in class that this describes Joyce's Finnegan's Wake as well.
Joyce's writing flows like water and he focuses on water/streams in his work as well. But each line is part of a greater whole in his writing. Like any story or novel each character, place, event can be its own story but when brought together they all form a more whole and complete tale. Rushdie's work seems to be a novel about the creation of a novel or story. From the army that forms a "book" when set into action, to the streams of stories, Rushdie is writing of creation in all its forms. Writing for Rushdie even leads to the creation of other and new worlds beyond our perception.
Haroun and the Sea of Stories also perfectly encompasses the theme of the myth of the eternal return. The novel itself, like Joyce, ends where it begins with Haroun's father retelling their adventures to the crowd. This is also seen in the act of writing and creating the stories themselves by Rushdie. This novel to me seems to be about the act of creation through language and the written word.
One quote that really perfectly described this idea was on page 72. Rushdie writes of the sea of stories, "...like a liquid tapestry of breathtaking complexity...." I loved that that in Haroun each stream is a story within the sea, and they all run into each other making the stories change and evolve over time. Dr. Sexson also mentioned in class that this describes Joyce's Finnegan's Wake as well.
Joyce's writing flows like water and he focuses on water/streams in his work as well. But each line is part of a greater whole in his writing. Like any story or novel each character, place, event can be its own story but when brought together they all form a more whole and complete tale. Rushdie's work seems to be a novel about the creation of a novel or story. From the army that forms a "book" when set into action, to the streams of stories, Rushdie is writing of creation in all its forms. Writing for Rushdie even leads to the creation of other and new worlds beyond our perception.
Haroun and the Sea of Stories also perfectly encompasses the theme of the myth of the eternal return. The novel itself, like Joyce, ends where it begins with Haroun's father retelling their adventures to the crowd. This is also seen in the act of writing and creating the stories themselves by Rushdie. This novel to me seems to be about the act of creation through language and the written word.
Tuesday 19 January 2010
High Brow/Low Brow
Most of what I think of when I hear high brow and low brow in relation to culture has already been stated by most of my classmates. Once again I get the slightly depressing realization that we are never original in our thoughts and never can be. We are always striving to remember and relearn all that we have forgotten and did not know we already knew. Everything returns to us in one form or another, cyclical time and the myth of the eternal return are always present throughout our everyday lives.
High brow and low brow as terms themselves emerged in the early 20th century in America. Another way to distinguish the culture of the upper classes from the lower. Here we are again as Americans, trying to even put art and culture into categories, when really it all is in the eye of the beholder. I believe art is subjective and is important and understood most completely when held within a context. But with these terms we are able to relate works to each other and have a standard of either high brow or low brow when both are relating to the same theme.
High brow to me though is something that is complex, intellectual and asks more of its reader or observer. Asking us to pay closer attention and fall into that work and its context and time. Low brow on the other hand refers to simpler forms of culture, mass culture in a sense. Culture for all to enjoy. Not culture so much to be learned from, but to be enjoyed and understood by many.
I am looking forward to this class, and reading both high and low brow versions of similar themes. As usual Dr. Sexson's classes are always intellectually stimulating and entertaining, just like our presentations at the end.
High brow and low brow as terms themselves emerged in the early 20th century in America. Another way to distinguish the culture of the upper classes from the lower. Here we are again as Americans, trying to even put art and culture into categories, when really it all is in the eye of the beholder. I believe art is subjective and is important and understood most completely when held within a context. But with these terms we are able to relate works to each other and have a standard of either high brow or low brow when both are relating to the same theme.
High brow to me though is something that is complex, intellectual and asks more of its reader or observer. Asking us to pay closer attention and fall into that work and its context and time. Low brow on the other hand refers to simpler forms of culture, mass culture in a sense. Culture for all to enjoy. Not culture so much to be learned from, but to be enjoyed and understood by many.
I am looking forward to this class, and reading both high and low brow versions of similar themes. As usual Dr. Sexson's classes are always intellectually stimulating and entertaining, just like our presentations at the end.
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