Don't Show Them This
Jim Futrell
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
You knew that you were different
from about the time you made the turn,
and lifted yourself out of childhood --
took that first walk all alone,
drew the first thing that you didn't
want the rest of them to see,
began to feel uncomfortable
talking to your self - what you said,
what your self was saying back.
After a long time of thinking
these were simply episodes,
strange times when the darkness
or great blazing lights appeared,
you began to be even more suspicious,
but you never said, more than maybe
that one time talking with your cousin,
who just looked at you. Just looked.
Then, amazing, after one humiliation
and another only you were witness to,
you find yourself sitting next to someone
talking about things that make no sense
at all outside the air that connects you two.
Once, it was a night on a swing in a yard
in a small town just a little after supper.
Now you can't remember if it was in the fall
or late one summer before school began,
but still you feel the vastness of the universe
that welled up out of nowhere, loomed
and warped and woofed and weft the two of you
and bound you up so tight that even now
when one thinks of the other it's an insight
and no memory. How could one remember
such a night -- no longer just a crazy kid
but a member of a new race dispossessed
before it even knew that it was gifted.
But it's too complicated, too intense,
and besides, everybody else is doing fine.
Forget that things (see how precise we are)
exist between the particles of atoms,
and that in those places awful truths
devour people (more precision) left alone
without the protection from the stupid that's
afforded only to the ultimately intimate.
So you move on and forget the other one.
Then, after years of nothing much but days
you catch a glimpse of a drawing or a poem
and you comment. There's a moment,
one split second, of an opening, a smile,
perhaps, or a question that not just anyone
would pick up on. You do. Same sex or
different, doesn't matter. That has never,
never been a thing of much importance.
Shams and Rumi knew. Maybe forty
million others, who has time to guess?
So you think that it is possible, perhaps.
A tribe? A family of people like you.
So, early in your life, this new two of you
set out to collect some others. But looking
blinds, and what you seek you repel
by seeking. (Now you think this - then
you thought you found them everywhere
and they thought they'd found you too.)
And so you came together and then fell --
so far, so fast that now you flail at shadows
when you try to remember names or faces.
They had none anyway, but the ones you
pasted on them. Now they are just mirrors
when you stand inside your head
and pose for them. But they see you.
You load your things and drive back
to the place you sat in that swing,
or walked and sat and turned your head
to see the profile of your other self
staring straight ahead and smiling slightly.
But the lurking-between-atom-particles
devour every thing and every person
left behind. So, no one is in this place.
No one.
Only you.
cythera
This is so good. Thanks for posting it.
cythera.
tota...@bellsouth.net (Jim Futrell) wrote in article
<3a9f9a45....@news.sdf.bellsouth.net> :
_______________________________________________
Submitted via WebNewsReader of http://www.interbulletin.com
Tiniap
'lines', does not a poem make.
Andrew
------------------------------------------------------------
"What did you say? You know it will take me some time
to understand everything you say.
The way you West Indians speak!"
"What wrong with it?" Galahad ask.
"Is English we speaking!" - Samuel Selvon
Kenny Chaffin
Some people apparently think it does. Have you seen what is being
published recently in the name of poetry by well known/respected poets.
KAC
--
Kenny A. Chaffin
KAC Website Design - http://www.kacweb.com
Poetry Page: http://www.kacweb.com/poems/poetryindex.html
Jim Futrell
> 'lines', does not a poem make.
>
> Andrew
>
> >Don't Show Them This
> >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> >
> >
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------
> "What did you say? You know it will take me some time
> to understand everything you say.
>>>Some people apparently think it does. Have you seen what is being
>>>published recently in the name of poetry by well known/respected poets.
>>>Kenny
>>>KAC
I love to have pronouncements made on my poetry from people like
Andrew and Kenny (who "publishs" poems like:
"God I was embarrassed.
I thought that I would die.
When you looked down
and saw my open fly.")
It is so refreshing to be in the presence of such intellect and
critical expertise. I guess I will go over to Kenny's website and
humble myself in his light.
Jeez.
Jim
Tiniap
>> Writing out some prose, then pressing the enter key to break it up into
>> 'lines', does not a poem make.
>>
>> Andrew
>>
>> >Don't Show Them This
>> >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>> >
>> >snip
>> >
>>
>
>>>published recently in the name of poetry by well known/respected poets.
>
>>>Kenny
>
>>>KAC
>
>I love to have pronouncements made on my poetry from people like
>Andrew
You know Jim, I was under the mistaken assumption that this group encouraged
people to read the poems posted here, and then comment on it - give the
writer
their impressions. I still hold to mine - that your poem was overly prosey
with line breaks just to 'break' the pattern of what would otherwise be a
regular paragraph.
You as the writer, had the great liberty of ignoring that comment if you
read
over your work and found that you were still happy with it. However, because
I
have not given you your pat on the back, you call my intellect into
question!?
You arrogant twit.
and Kenny (who "publishs" poems like:
>
>"God I was embarrassed.
>I thought that I would die.
>When you looked down
>and saw my open fly.")
I've made a few postings to this group; I'm sure they are quite the mine of
embarassing lines. You could have picked from them if you really wanted to
sting me harder.
>
>It is so refreshing to be in the presence of such intellect and
>critical expertise.
I will endeavor my very best to make my critique more fawning and positive
the
next time you post.
>
>Jeez.
>
>Jim
Jeeeez
Andrew
------------------------------------------------------------
"What did you say? You know it will take me some time
to understand everything you say.
gga...@excite.com
wrote:
>Don't Show Them This
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Not the kind of thing I can nitpick at after only a few reads.
I think I'll read it a few dozen more times and try to get pictures
out of my head. Or not. Thanks for posting this, Jim.
gg
"I've always thought that the primary goal of poetry
is to convey experience."
Joshua P. Hill
wrote:
>Some people apparently think it does. Have you seen what is being
>published recently in the name of poetry by well known/respected poets.
Poems?
Josh
Lynda
Jim Futrell wrote:
>
> > Writing out some prose, then pressing the enter key to break it up into
> > 'lines', does not a poem make.
> >
> > Andrew
> >
> > >Don't Show Them This
> > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
> > >
> > >snip
> > >
> >
> > ------------------------------------------------------------
> > "What did you say? You know it will take me some time
> > to understand everything you say.
>
> >>>Some people apparently think it does. Have you seen what is being
> >>>published recently in the name of poetry by well known/respected poets.
>
> >>>Kenny
>
> >>>KAC
>
> I love to have pronouncements made on my poetry from people like
> Andrew and Kenny (who "publishs" poems like:
>
> "God I was embarrassed.
> I thought that I would die.
> When you looked down
> and saw my open fly.")
this is KAC-a-POO's, not Andrew's.
>
> It is so refreshing to be in the presence of such intellect and
> critical expertise. I guess I will go over to Kenny's website and
> humble myself in his light.
>
> Jeez.
>
> Jim
how could you even place Andrew in this argument? I agree it holds for
Kenny, but go find something comparable from Andrew's posts to validate your
inclusion of him in this post's statement.
Lynda
(who also found your poem too prosy)
Joshua P. Hill
I confess I was ambivalent the first time I first read this. I found
it engaging, moving, and a good read. But I had the feeling that it
was an excerpt from a story.
Second time around, no such impression, or rather the impression was
one of intent. Bang-up job!
Josh
On Fri, 02 Mar 2001 13:07:11 GMT, tota...@bellsouth.net (Jim Futrell)
wrote:
>Don't Show Them This
Josh
tom
with its excessive generalizations. But when you got to the swing, I
realized that something in here reminds me of honesty of the short
fiction of Philip K. Dick. Dick was always on the human/poetic side of
science fiction, and I've been an admirer of his work for many years.
Your own prose is jut one leeward, temporal shift away from being
counterbalanced to such a disposition. It doesn't talk about the world
that is, but the world that might be. You strike a great balance
between your idea and diction. Thanks for posting this.
Tom
tom
> how could you even place Andrew in this argument? I agree it holds for
> Kenny, but go find something comparable from Andrew's posts to validate your
> inclusion of him in this post's statement.
>
> Lynda
> (who also found your poem too prosy)
>
> --
> http://prominence.com/java/poetry/
Andrew's several notches above Kenny, but in my opinion he's just as wrong, at
least here. In fact, Kenny didn't directly disagree with Jim's poem, but only
gave Andrew a friendly nod of agreement. Jim probably assumed this meant Kenny
and Andrew were friends, so to speak, with similar writing disabilities.
Hey Jim! Kenny sucks up to everyone; he has no friends! Andrew's ok, but he
doesn't like your poem much.
Tom
Jim Futrell
wrote:
>>> Writing out some prose, then pressing the enter key to break it up into
>>> 'lines', does not a poem make.
>>>
>>> Andrew
>>>
Trotting out some dismissive, unsupported, bullshit aphorism and
labeling it comment or criticism is detrimental to any forum and
should be named when it occurs. I don't come here for reinforcement
(fawning, positive or otherwise) but to post poems and receive what is
offered.
Fortunately, though, even beggars have a right to refuse to eat slop.
When you have something honest to say, say it. This childish posing
is unimpressive and wastes everyone's time.
Jim
skye
Jim's post;)
Heyia Jim:
WoW!; A powerfully compelling, dynamic read; Quite saturated and potent,
very very nicely done; A LoT here to sift and savor; Rather haunting AND
lyrical, encapsulated layers of meaning like a quantumly-vibrating onion;
Crisp and crunchy, but strangely brooding and reflective too; Esp. luvved
"But looking blinds, // and what you seek you repel // by seeking." ; (Very
electromagnetic!! Whew!)
DAMN-but-Damngoodamnjob!
AND a fine read too!
skye
"The ways of human progress are inscrutable, which is why action is
consolatory and the friend of flattering illusions." --Joseph Conrad
Lynda
tom wrote:
>
> Lynda wrote:
>
> > how could you even place Andrew in this argument? I agree it holds for
> > Kenny, but go find something comparable from Andrew's posts to validate your
> > inclusion of him in this post's statement.
> >
> > Lynda
> > (who also found your poem too prosy)
> >
> > --
> > http://prominence.com/java/poetry/
>
> Andrew's several notches above Kenny, but in my opinion he's just as wrong, at
> least here. In fact, Kenny didn't directly disagree with Jim's poem, but only
> gave Andrew a friendly nod of agreement. Jim probably assumed this meant Kenny
> and Andrew were friends, so to speak, with similar writing disabilities.
wrong or not, he stated his opinion only to be thrown in class with kenny
who does no more than create shit-lists, offer useless critique, and insist
gg write a poem.
dat ain't right.
>
> Hey Jim! Kenny sucks up to everyone; he has no friends! Andrew's ok, but he
> doesn't like your poem much.
>
> Tom
Lynda
tom
> wrong or not, he stated his opinion only to be thrown in class with kenny
> who does no more than create shit-lists, offer useless critique, and insist
> gg write a poem.
>
> dat ain't right.
I meant the opinion was wrong, not the person. I know Kenny's "person wrong" but I
in no way am implying that Andrew is flawed on the same genetic level. In short, I
couldn't agree more.
Tom
Morfydd Turberville
face it the critique he gave Jim was neither informed nor informative.
It did read as posturing whether it was meant that way or not.
Mop
>===== Original Message From tom <tomwo...@usa.net> =====
------------------------------------------------------------
One ought, everyday, to hear a song, read a fine poem, and, if possible, to
speak a few reasonable words.
Goethe
Janice
I couldn't agree more!
Always,
Janice
>From: tota...@bellsouth.net (Jim Futrell)
>Subject: Re: Don't Show Them This
Lynda
Kenny Chaffin
says...
Oh man this is getting bad, you guys should get a room.
Written anymore wcw poems lately tom? What level would you place that on
on a scale of andrew to kenny since you write poems so well ROTFL!
Dale Houstman
"Kenny Chaffin" <ke...@kacweb.com> wrote in message
news:MPG.150b51e3a...@news.dimensional.com...
> In article <3AA17C9F...@hotmail.com>, omg_she...@hotmail.com
> says...
> >
> >
> > tom wrote:
> > >
> > > Lynda wrote:
> > >
> > > > wrong or not, he stated his opinion only to be thrown in class with
kenny
> > > > who does no more than create shit-lists, offer useless critique, and
insist
> > > > gg write a poem.
> > > >
> > > > dat ain't right.
> > >
> > > I meant the opinion was wrong, not the person. I know Kenny's "person
wrong" but I
> > > in no way am implying that Andrew is flawed on the same genetic level.
In short, I
> > > couldn't agree more.
> > >
> > > Tom
> >
> > oh.
> >
> > okay then.
> >
> > L.
> >
> >
>
> Oh man this is getting bad, you guys should get a room.
>
> Written anymore wcw poems lately tom? What level would you place that on
> on a scale of andrew to kenny since you write poems so well ROTFL!
>
little. Congratulations!
dmh
Peter J Ross
news:3AA14929...@usa.net...
> Hey Jim! Kenny sucks up to everyone; he has no friends!
A good, concise statement for the FAQ.
PJR :-)
--
"I have no standards. You should be point that out to me."
Kenny A. Chaffin
Cynthia (cynm1788) Moyer
Howdy, dmh -
Dale Houstman wrote:
>
<snipKACtomwrote:Lynda>
>
> It's bad to be boring.
"You're pissing me off, and it's boring... ." - god
> It's bad to be little.
<hee>.</hee>
> It's terrible to be boring AND little.
{smink: general classification of psychological virii @%^}
> Congratulations!
<*smink*>
> dmh
};8)
\\//_ - cyn
--
Hell suffered overflow,
so it added a smink.
Jim Futrell
wrote:
>Don't Show Them This
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Just a brief note to thank all who posted comments (good , bad,
indifferent) directed to this piece. Your feedback is always
interesting.
This need some of us exhibit (I include myself because I was once less
adventurous as well) to "de-classify" and thereby decertify some work
as poetry simply because it uses simple and accessible language is a
most negative tendency, I think, and one which limits our art
unnecessarily. The idea that a poem must be packed with "poem-worthy"
verbiage (subjugating or eliminating effective emotional/intellectual
content in favor of exposition and vocabulary) to be poetry is
self-absorbed and will ultimately result in sterility for both the art
and the artist.
I would urge some of our newer (and particularly our younger) poets to
experiment more, even attempting to write a poem which uses the
simplest language possible to express the most complex and ineffable
idea they can generate. You might be surprised at the result, which
is one damn good reason to write.
One of the things you may find is that the line breaks are there for a
good reason: they're required.
Again, thanks.
Jim
gga...@excite.com
wrote:
http://www.kacweb.com/poems/heartsongs.html
It says it all, really.
gg
"Sorry, but this poem means absolutely nothing to me."
Robert Barcus, referring to "Poem in October"
Lynda
Peter J Ross wrote:
one word Peter,
>
> "Kenny Chaffin" <ke...@kacweb.com> wrote in message
> news:MPG.150bd2ddf...@news.dimensional.com...
>
> > Yeah,
>
> This means that you understood and agreed with what was being said? I see.
>
> > this whole newsgroup is 80% trite and boring.
>
> But it would be so much worse without your exciting contributions.
>
> > Once in a blue moon
> > something (even a poem sometimes) is posted that is actually interesting.
>
> Don't be bashful, Ken. You post more often than that!
>
> > I guess that's the reason I stick around, but seriously I'm beginning to
> > doubt it's worth.
>
> You may be right. Time for fresh woods and pastures new, eh? <*hoping*>
>
> > When people like PJR get added to the regulars and the
> > only thing he seems to post is negative trolling comments
>
> All with the AMAZING POWERS of his MIND! (copyright C Keelan)
>
> > and gg is the
> > most inciteful and never posts any of his poetry.
>
> Try at least to be consistent. Gary *can't write poetry*, remember?
>
> And you can't spell "insightful".
>
> > Julie at least posts
> > poems and discusses and stimulates positive threads (in most cases). Tom
> > has his bouts. Mike B too is on and off (more on recently)
>
> Lukewarm approval from you must give them all a happy tingling feeling.
>
> > but at least
> > he introduced me to the Alsop Review which has some incredible poetry
> > posted on the site and provides a wonderful discussion/workshop area
> > without the likes of the negative people here. Lynda might be able to
> > come around, but she really needs to get a life,
>
> SEE the spoon BEND!
>
> > stop incitint
>
> "Incitint"? Is that the latest new troll? If so I agree. Lynda must stop
> him.
>
> > and not
> > take all this so seriously (probably the same might be said of me).
>
> Never mind, Ken. You may be too serious, but at least you provoke laughter
> in others: http://www.kacweb.com/poems/poetryindex.html <*chortle*>
>
> > Nothing good seems to come from JR, ever. And DMH is another on and off
> > (I guess with many of these/us it's the old tie between creativity and
> > bipolar <grin>)
>
> The old school tie, you mean? Is that where you get your colours from? "I
> guess I think of myself as ochre or maybe a deep forest green...." - Kenny A
> Chaffin
>
> > Ah well, guess I'm in a reflective mood after attending the Rocky
> > Mountain Book Festival poetry sessions yesterday and looking forward to
> > them today - real poets in the real world.
>
> I trust you sold plenty of autographed copies of your famous chapbooks.
>
> As always, it's been a pleasure chatting with you.
>
> PJR :-)
tights.
Lynda
>
> --
> "I have no standards. You should be point that out to me."
> Kenny A. Chaffin
Kenny Chaffin
p...@britishlibrary.net says...> news:MPG.150bd2ddf...@news.dimensional.com...
> And you can't spell "insightful".
>
and apparently you can't understand english.
But I guess we all already knew that.
Best,
Peter J Ross
<snip>
> Poetry Page: http://www.kacweb.com/poems/poetryindex.html
PJR :-D
--
"This site is incredable!" [sic]
from the PostPoems guestbook
Dale Houstman
<gga...@excite.com> wrote in message
news:3aa36de4...@news.supernews.com...
> On Sun, 4 Mar 2001 04:20:15 -0700, Kenny Chaffin <ke...@kacweb.com>
> wrote:
>
>
>
>
> http://www.kacweb.com/poems/heartsongs.html
> It says it all, really.
>
to resurrect the dead body of "ships that passed in the night" as if it were
interesting.
A Kenny Poem
We were the roses
in the bower of our love
my dreams like a thorn
and your kisses a garden glove.
Urp.
________
dmh
Michael
Lynda <omg_she...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:3AA288D3...@hotmail.com...
been meaning to ask you for ages,
who is Ben Harper?
know I should know
muddled with Ben Watt
so left with Ben Who.
Ben Watt
BTW
wrote a lovely book
about his illness
and near death
never thought could be so interesting
and, since you ask,
Everything But The Girl
"and I miss you
like the deserts miss the rain"
etc.
Ps an earlier thread
confirms
this qualifies as poetry
(these days)
Tiniap
>It did read as posturing whether it was meant that way or not.
>
ok. I can see with that. my apologies.
Jim: it is the format of my response I say sorry for. I see that other
comments did echo me, (even if only on the first read) the poem felt a
little
too prosaic.
I hope that's acceptable.. it is meant sincerely.
Cheers
Andrew
>
>Mop
>
>
>
>>===== Original Message From tom <tomwo...@usa.net> =====
>>Lynda wrote:
>>
>>> wrong or not, he stated his opinion only to be thrown in class with kenny
>>> who does no more than create shit-lists, offer useless critique, and
insist
>>> gg write a poem.
>>>
>>> dat ain't right.
>>
>>I meant the opinion was wrong, not the person. I know Kenny's "person
wrong"
>but I
>>in no way am implying that Andrew is flawed on the same genetic level. In
>short, I
>>couldn't agree more.
>>
>>Tom
>
>------------------------------------------------------------
>
>One ought, everyday, to hear a song, read a fine poem, and, if possible, to
>speak a few reasonable words.
> Goethe
------------------------------------------------------------
"What did you say? You know it will take me some time
to understand everything you say.
Lynda
Michael wrote:
>
> Lynda <omg_she...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> news:3AA288D3...@hotmail.com...
>
> been meaning to ask you for ages,
> who is Ben Harper?
check hmv.com
L.
> know I should know
> muddled with Ben Watt
> so left with Ben Who.
> Ben Watt
> BTW
> wrote a lovely book
> about his illness
> and near death
> never thought could be so interesting
> and, since you ask,
> Everything But The Girl
> "and I miss you
> like the deserts miss the rain"
> etc.
> Ps an earlier thread
> confirms
> this qualifies as poetry
> (these days)
cythera
>wrote:
>
>>Don't Show Them This
>>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>Just a brief note to thank all who posted comments (good , bad,
>indifferent) directed to this piece. Your feedback is always
>interesting.
>
>This need some of us exhibit (I include myself because I was once less
>adventurous as well) to "de-classify" and thereby decertify some work
>as poetry simply because it uses simple and accessible language is a
>most negative tendency, I think, and one which limits our art
>unnecessarily.
>The idea that a poem must be packed with "poem-worthy"
>verbiage (subjugating or eliminating effective emotional/intellectual
>content in favor of exposition and vocabulary) to be poetry is
>self-absorbed and will ultimately result in sterility for both the art and
>the artist.
This starts in elementary school. And now when I think of going back to graduate school for more English, my mind simply balks, because conformity is encouraged over free thinking. Well of course you can see that everywhere.
>I would urge some of our newer (and particularly our younger) poets to
>experiment more,
I know that for me, since I began enthusiastically trying to write poems 917 days ago :), I've probably spent most of that in trying to undo what I learned about poetry in school, and through my own study of "approved" poets. Once you've acquired a certain amount of knowledge you desire more, while at the
same time wanting to move past it. Any suggestions?
>even attempting to write a poem which uses the simplest language possible
>to express the most complex and ineffable idea they can generate. You might >be surprised at the result, which is one damn good reason to write.
>
>One of the things you may find is that the line breaks are there for a
>good reason: they're required.
The folks who thought or think that your poem is too prosaic would do well to study your line breaks.
>
>Again, thanks.
>
>Jim
>
>
cythera.
Catalephsis
cythera <donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote in message
news:3AA41C6A...@interbulletin.com...
> I know that for me, since I began enthusiastically trying to write poems
917 days ago :), I've probably spent most of that in trying to undo what I
learned about poetry in school, and through my own study of "approved"
poets. Once you've acquired a certain amount of knowledge you desire more,
while at the
> same time wanting to move past it. Any suggestions?
(Slightly tangential response:) Peter Scupham, last living poet on the
Oxford University Press (kicked off this or end of last year, so his books
are temporarily out of print till Arven do the reprints) said that he spent
a lot of his efforts in writing poetry in trying not to be 'so damn
literary'. He deliberately attempts to remove all intertextual references
and the rest of that trendy stuff the modernists did so well (something I'm
totally guilty of). Of course, he can't do it...
On another note, it's been said to me that every so often in your writing
progression you suddenly hit this upwards bound, like climbing up a steep
cliff at mach 2. Then you sit on a plateau for a while, until you climb
again. The process never stops. For me this is like a slash and burn
process - eventually you'll grow tired of the way you're writing and
eventually find some way to climb to the next level, at which point
everything you've written feels 'not as good' or ready for the fire.
I've felt the 'trigger' twice in the course of a writing program - once at
the start and once near the end - but I've been on the plateau for almost a
year. I don't expect it to change for a long while now. Can't suggest much
more than that. I'd appreciate an answer as much as you.
Joshua P. Hill
<donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote:
>This starts in elementary school. And now when I think of going back to graduate school for more English, my mind simply balks, because conformity is encouraged over free thinking. Well of course you can see that everywhere.
Oh yeah -- I've heard horror stories!
Josh
cythera
<2c8batoo222mrr4hi...@4ax.com> :
Oh please tell me some, I love horror stories!
cythera
who is afraid of Virginia Wolff.
cythera
"Catalephsis" <catal...@ukonline.co.uk> wrote in article
<jnep6.116494$Dd3.2...@monolith.news.easynet.net> :
>
>cythera <cyt...@my-deja.com> wrote in message
>news:3AA41C6A...@interbulletin.com...
>
>> I know that for me, since I began enthusiastically trying to write poems
>917 days ago :), I've probably spent most of that in trying to undo what I
>learned about poetry in school, and through my own study of "approved"
>poets. Once you've acquired a certain amount of knowledge you desire more,
>while at the same time wanting to move past it. Any suggestions?
>
>(Slightly tangential response:) Peter Scupham, last living poet on the
>Oxford University Press (kicked off this or end of last year, so his books
>are temporarily out of print till Arven do the reprints) said that he spent
>a lot of his efforts in writing poetry in trying not to be 'so damn
>literary'.
>He deliberately attempts to remove all intertextual references and the rest
>of that trendy stuff the modernists did so well
Would you mind elaborating here, please?
>(something I'm totally guilty of).
>Of course, he can't do it...
Lately I'm finding that the harder I try to write ___ and not ___, the harder
it is to write, period -- even in my notes.
Yesterday I caught myself not wanting to write something down because it
wasn't "good enough", and they're only _notes_! I felt strange realizing I might have been doing this for months and months.
>On another note, it's been said to me that every so often in your writing
>progression you suddenly hit this upwards bound, like climbing up a steep
>cliff at mach 2. Then you sit on a plateau for a while, until you climb
>again. The process never stops. For me this is like a slash and burn
>process - eventually you'll grow tired of the way you're writing and
>eventually find some way to climb to the next level, at which point
>everything you've written feels 'not as good' or ready for the fire.
>
>I've felt the 'trigger' twice in the course of a writing program - once at
>the start and once near the end - but I've been on the plateau for almost a
>year.
There's a quote by Ted Hughes (I think) on the subject of "ascending" the
plateaus; he speaks briefly about what -- unrecognized by the writer -- is going on in the interims. Maybe someone knows this quote and will post it?
>I don't expect it to change for a long while now.
Do you ever do automatic writing?
>Can't suggest much more than that. I'd appreciate an answer as much as you.
Yes, maybe some other people have ideas and experiences they wouldn't mind putting down here? :).
skye
>Thanks Cat for this intelligent response.:)
>"Catalephsis" <catal...@ukonline.co.uk> wrote in article
<jnep6.116494$Dd3.2...@monolith.news.easynet.net> :
>
>>cythera <cyt...@my-deja.com> wrote in message
>news:3AA41C6A...@interbulletin.com...
>
>>> I know that for me, since I began enthusiastically trying to write poems
>>>917 days ago :), I've probably spent most of that in trying to undo what
I
>>learned about poetry in school, and through my own study of "approved"
>>poets. Once you've acquired a certain amount of knowledge you desire
more,
>>while at the same time wanting to move past it. Any suggestions?
>
>>(Slightly tangential response:) Peter Scupham, last living poet on the
>>Oxford University Press (kicked off this or end of last year, so his books
>>are temporarily out of print till Arven do the reprints) said that he
spent
>>a lot of his efforts in writing poetry in trying not to be 'so damn
>>literary'.
>>He deliberately attempts to remove all intertextual references and the
rest
>>of that trendy stuff the modernists did so well
>Would you mind elaborating here, please?
Heyia Cythera;
I "think" what is implied here Re: overt/suggested references/allusions to
"other" works/artists, periods, styles, iconographic pop-derivative
images/vernacular, hypertense first-person narration (ie., "confessional"),
literarily-affected quotation, etc;
>>(something I'm totally guilty of).
I don't necessarily agree that strategy might be useful/effective for
everyone, or all the time; I try to include topical and quotational
references as/when required in a multiplicity of non-specific *styles*;
>>Of course, he can't do it...
>Lately I'm finding that the harder I try to write ___ and not ___, the
harder
>it is to write, period -- even in my notes.
>Yesterday I caught myself not wanting to write something down because it
>wasn't "good enough", and they're only _notes_! I felt strange realizing I
might have >been doing this for months and months.
To a considerable extent, perhaps, you ought *not* to consider the relative
efficiency/"cost" of your writing, don't even -try- to anticipate whether
something is "worth" doing, whether it has "value", significance, immediate
impact/relevance, just what it IS or what "use" it is; That all gets in the
way of a direct mode of apperception/relation-expression; DIG DEEP and try
to understand WHY you are putting up roadblocks to taking notes, so
(perhaps) you can get back into the rhythm of jotting down immediate
impressions/understandings (enrolling in demanding college course work
requiring in-class note-taking MIGHT be an effective strategy for pushing
yourself/inspiring self to do so, as it has an in-sight pay-back); OR: As an
"exercise": How about sitting in front of the idiot-box with a
preferably-good (interesting) program and "take notes" on the fly, don't
even THINK about what's being said, just jot down as-fast-as-you-can what
the narrator/speaker is saying, or describe the scene/details in clipped
precise sketches, in order to re-access the mode of thinking AS you write;
You are evidently over-analyzing and over-criticizing yourself by expecting
everything to be "polished", and so it deflects your real-time on-going
engagement/practice; SO, don't *think* about it so much, as in being overly
self-conscious, but discover/invent techniques to propell your
rolling-up-the-sleeves and getting down-n-dirty poking around in the
nitty-gritty guts-N-bones of the real-deal "writing"; NG
correspondence/critical commentary is a v. good technique to connect/provoke
yr own mind/head/"hand" exercise, with SOME kinda real-time peer-review
feedback/dialogue (used by a lotta folks here ~n~ elsewhere/when, I bet!);
>>On another note, it's been said to me that every so often in your writing
>>progression you suddenly hit this upwards bound, like climbing up a steep
>>cliff at mach 2. Then you sit on a plateau for a while, until you climb
>>again. The process never stops. For me this is like a slash and burn
>>process - eventually you'll grow tired of the way you're writing and
>>eventually find some way to climb to the next level, at which point
>>everything you've written feels 'not as good' or ready for the fire.
>
>>I've felt the 'trigger' twice in the course of a writing program - once at
>>the start and once near the end - but I've been on the plateau for almost
a
>>year.
>
>There's a quote by Ted Hughes (I think) on the subject of "ascending" the
>plateaus; he speaks briefly about what -- unrecognized by the writer -- is
going on in >the interims. Maybe someone knows this quote and will post it?
>
>>I don't expect it to change for a long while now.
>
>Do you ever do automatic writing?
Like babble-speak; Some folks *think* that's all I DO do; <g>;
>>Can't suggest much more than that. I'd appreciate an answer as much as
you.
>Yes, maybe some other people have ideas and experiences they wouldn't mind
>putting down here? :).
Wahll, I find it's real useful for ME to occasionally take ongoing and brief
(or longer) hiatus/sabbaticals from writing, and do something(s) completely
different, alternative "other" practice/experiences THAN "just" writing
(after all, you should ALWAYS be trying to develop the whole person
mind/psyche, eh?), like white-water rafting, photography, rock-climbing,
motorcycling, camping-out, fishing, back-packing, painting, music-making,
performative/conceptual art-making, collaborative projects, shapeshifting,
blue-water sailing, whatever; I'd recommend you give yourself some
occasional respite/breathing room/perspective/R&R "downtime"; Develop OTHER
and novel participations, interests in order to expand your creative
horizons, remove some of this imagined performative-pressure/anxiety you
seem to be placing on yourself; (Lighten-up WHILE attaining focused vision,
quite a trick, eh?)
During the last several years, I have roughly spent six-months
heavily-engaged with writing on a daily basis (8-12 or more hours) and THEN
mostly curtailing it for the next six-month period (to follow other
pursuits, gainful employment, travels, projects, etc.; It allows me to
"build" a keen appetite for the intense day-to-day experience of being "on"
and plugged-in to/with the writing-thinking enterprise;
And of course, notetaking for ME is very important, even JUST the act of
scribbling/filling many many notebooks, EVEN ~if~ I never refer to them
again, it's the experiential event reflection/resonance thang of echoing
thoughts off the page (or cathode-screen) and back into the head that I get
as much value from as actually USING the notes sometime later; I suppose at
least 2/3 of my notebook "writings" never go further than their
place-on-page, the other 1/3 serves as a working studio/scrapbook of
ideas/insights/datum for further development into pieces/stories/poems
whatevah;
And TOO, I always seem-to-have a dozen-or-so (what I ambitiously term:)
works-in-progress in various stages of development that are handily-THERE
(right nearby) to challenge/inspire my efforts to push them along, ever
further to some terminus;
Hope this gives you some of your OWN ideas/strategies;
And Oh, I almost forgot to mention, since I tend to think it too obvious to
every writer-in-training/fellowship/vocation, and so I take it for granted,
Reading Reading Reading, after all, you want to carry-on a rich
(overflowing!) inner-dialogue/engagement with the ACT of reading/writing,
eh? (Imagine a painter who never looked at other artists' work, or a
musician who only listened to her/his own compositions, what an artificially
circumscribed narrow world-view they would tend to develop, let ALONE how
stilted/stifled their own growth/development of craft would be);
AND: The daily journal can HARDLY be improved upon, think of it as
equivalent to the painter's sketchbook, never to be exhibited but CRUCIAL to
the canvas works-in-progress, eh?
Best Regrdz etc. etc.
skye
>cythera.
Catalephsis
> Thanks Cat for this intelligent response.:)
Welcome.
> >He deliberately attempts to remove all intertextual references and the
rest
> >of that trendy stuff the modernists did so well
>
> Would you mind elaborating here, please?
Skye's post was a bit dense for me, but that's the gist of it. To reiterate,
making reference to someone else's poetry, prose, etc. is sometimes quite
difficult for the unintellectual reader. Modernists, e.g. Eliot, 'stole'
from other works - The Waste Land being the greatest example of this,
probably - used about 8 different languages, 5 religions, etc. etc. which
essentially meant the reader who wanted to understand the poetry in depth
was up shit creek. Eliot said he wanted a 'dumb' reader - someone who knew
nothing about any other text - but if you know about what is being referred
to then you can sometimes learn more about the poem. The meaning changes.
A good modern example is Vicky Feaver's 'Judith'. It uses the Apocryphal
story of Judith and reworks it into a modern feminist environment.
In contrast, Scupham and a lot of other poets I've met feel that clarity is
the most important thing about poetry. Most poets just aren't good enough to
create a poem, with references to other works, which stands on its own feet
without knowledge of what references are being made. Scupham uses
Shakespeare in some of his sequences and apologised for it at the reading,
as many people might not know what he's doing.
> >(something I'm totally guilty of).
> >Of course, he can't do it...
>
> Lately I'm finding that the harder I try to write ___ and not ___, the
harder
> it is to write, period -- even in my notes.
> Yesterday I caught myself not wanting to write something down because it
> wasn't "good enough", and they're only _notes_! I felt strange realizing
I might have been doing this for months and months.
Two things:
When you have something to say, always put it down in some shape or form.
You might lose it. I always carry a notepad - like skye's scrapbooks - for
first drafting. The process is similar to automatic writing for me - most of
my poetry is drafted in under 5 minutes, often under 2 minutes for the
shorter pieces. It can then sit there for a while.
Secondly, incubate. Once you've got it on paper, I need time for things to
hit me so I can shape the poem. You can put yourself in an environment where
this is forced, as skye says, such as by going off on some holiday, doing
some weird activity, whatever - get some experiences. Alternatively read -
don't write anything for 3 months, just read lots of GOOD poetry. I know a
few published poets that have admitted that they never write anything
without reading specific poets who are in their minds 'great' (but I won't
go off on one about that... :) ). Music helps as well sometimes.
An example of this is that poem I posted, Expatriation. It started as a
bland analysis of the body in feminist readings of literature. I found the
sea imagery coming naturally and turned to the Greek poets who I am obsessed
with (and also use lots of sea imagery). Seferis' 'King of Asine' has a cool
introductory essay which I stole a few lines from and slotted into the poem.
Then the Virginia Woolf suicide story fell into place. At some stage it had
to go out for second opinions - Jim, Julie and Daimon were all very helpful.
This process took about a week, but I have a triple sestina that was
produced after the merging of poems I'd written while I was a teenager, that
had been incubating for between 1 and 5 years.
> Do you ever do automatic writing?
Sort of. As I've said, I write all my stuff in a few minutes at most. A lot
of what comes out is automatic and must be chopped. As an exercise I don't
think it's that useful for me, because all I'll end up with is one or two
lines out of every fifty that I like, but nowhere to use them. I don't
really want a scrap book of single lines to work from, though I know someone
who did this effectively - he built a 200 line poem out of the extracts of
loads old poems and automatic writings.
One thing I seemed to have picked up on with you is that you start with an
idea before you write - you said you had something you wanted to write but
it didn't feel it would come out doing justice to the idea. I work in
reverse, with a phrase that suddenly sticks in my mind - 'The body is all',
for example - that torments me for a few days. Eventually I'll write a
stanza or two my head, feel the flow and the mood of the poem, its pace,
until I am ready to spit it out. That happens as a sort of automatic
writing, with phrases and words filling in the body of the poem. I don't
think it's possible to write anything longer than, say 50 lines this way
without descending into gibberish. For longer poems you really need a strict
form and then a huge amount of source material - your own poetry, automatic
writing, other people's work, textbooks (scientific or non-) history books,
mythology books, encyclopaedias, ANYTHING with words in it.
Hope this helps.
Catalephsis
skye <sk...@echoweb.net> wrote in message
news:98acj4$iio$1...@quark.scn.rain.com...
> >>(something I'm totally guilty of).
> I don't necessarily agree that strategy might be useful/effective for
> everyone, or all the time; I try to include topical and quotational
> references as/when required in a multiplicity of non-specific *styles*;
Good point. I sometimes find that a writer 'hits' me when I've written
something that connects to it. I don't always reference what I've done
though. Stylistically I'm in a modernist rut at the moment.
> And Oh, I almost forgot to mention, since I tend to think it too obvious
to
> every writer-in-training/fellowship/vocation, and so I take it for
granted,
> Reading Reading Reading,
HEAR! HEAR!!!!
*fades into the distance taking up the chant of 'Reading, Reading, Reading'*
Cat.
cythera
<98acj4$iio$1...@quark.scn.rain.com> :
Thanks.
>
>>>(something I'm totally guilty of).
>I don't necessarily agree that strategy might be useful/effective for
>everyone, or all the time; I try to include topical and quotational
>references as/when required in a multiplicity of non-specific *styles*;
>>>Of course, he can't do it...
>
>>Lately I'm finding that the harder I try to write ___ and not ___, the
>harder
>>it is to write, period -- even in my notes.
>>Yesterday I caught myself not wanting to write something down because it
>>wasn't "good enough", and they're only _notes_! I felt strange realizing I
>might have >been doing this for months and months.
>
>To a considerable extent, perhaps, you ought *not* to consider the relative
>efficiency/"cost" of your writing, don't even -try- to anticipate whether
>something is "worth" doing, whether it has "value", significance, immediate
>impact/relevance, just what it IS or what "use" it is;
Yeah, thanks skye. I'm probably more upset by my father's death than I had thought -- there is still so much to "process", and so much stress that can come out of the blue--
It's funny that you mentioned taking classes for the note-taking; I was thinking last night that would be a good reason right there: I used to have
a photographic memory for my own notes and could remember them during tests
and "copy" off them.
I remembered this because a few times a week now I dream poems that I, (and once, another person), have "written" (but actually they are brand new):
in the dreams I'm reading a poem in a book, but the dreams change or blur before I can memorize them, so I wake up with maybe a sentence, lately its
been up to two, and the remembrance of its place in the poem. On Wednesday/Thursday night I dreamt a poem with this as its first line:
When you think of skin think of the back of skin
and so from these dreams I can see that _am_ still writing
I'll finish this later; my cat wants me to play him.
Thanks skye,
cythera.
>That all gets in the
>way of a direct mode of apperception/relation-expression; DIG DEEP and try
>to understand WHY you are putting up roadblocks to taking notes, so
>(perhaps) you can get back into the rhythm of jotting down immediate
>impressions/understandings (enrolling in demanding college course work
>requiring in-class note-taking MIGHT be an effective strategy for pushing
>yourself/inspiring self to do so, as it has an in-sight pay-back);
[...]
Dale Houstman
"cythera" <donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote in message
>On Wednesday/Thursday night I dreamt a poem with this as its first line:
>
> When you think of skin think of the back of skin
>
> and so from these dreams I can see that _am_ still writing
>
I think everyone dreams in poetry, and I rarely see much difference between
the two. By this (I think you know) I am not applauding those dismal
workshop "dream transcriptions" that are invariably lunky and willfully
Freudian, but the process of free-association. For myself, it has always
seemed that writing poetry was as much like dreaming while awake as
possible. And it is this ability to free-associate and make linguistic
connections of some surprising quality that I admire in poetry. No doubt
poetry will involve more "willed" labor (usually after the seductive act
itself) but that has a different charm one must learn to fall in love with.
And just as it is said that a melodic "talent" can not be learned, this
tendency to dream while awake, and to be open to the casual accident without
succumbing to either intellectual or sentimental failures is difficult to
imagine teaching. I think this process is a natural ecology to the child,
and it is usually trained out of them rather than the reverse, no doubt for
the welfare of the "greater good" which demands its dreams in a more
utilitarian mode. The ones that survive this - it seems - form some sort of
early defense against intrusion and exploitation and blatant robbery.
dmh
cythera
>cythera <luk...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
>news:3AA817D9...@interbulletin.com...
>> Thanks Cat for this intelligent response.:)
>
>Welcome.
>
>> >He deliberately attempts to remove all intertextual references and the
>> >rest of that trendy stuff the modernists did so well
>>
>> Would you mind elaborating here, please?
>
>Skye's post was a bit dense for me, but that's the gist of it. To reiterate,
>making reference to someone else's poetry, prose, etc. is sometimes quite
>difficult for the unintellectual reader. Modernists, e.g. Eliot, 'stole'
>from other works - The Waste Land being the greatest example of this,
>probably - used about 8 different languages, 5 religions, etc. etc. which
>essentially meant the reader who wanted to understand the poetry in depth
>was up shit creek. Eliot said he wanted a 'dumb' reader - someone who knew
>nothing about any other text - but if you know about what is being referred
>to then you can sometimes learn more about the poem. The meaning changes.
>
>A good modern example is Vicky Feaver's 'Judith'. It uses the Apocryphal
>story of Judith and reworks it into a modern feminist environment.
>
>In contrast, Scupham and a lot of other poets I've met feel that clarity is
>the most important thing about poetry.
Well, I think it's a balance... my two-cents worth is that people who read poetry probably have the education to catch most references, and know who
they can ask or where to look for most others (or will sort it out later through more reading etc.).
Re "The Waste Land" I've never felt that the notes at the end were
particularly helpful, and would love to read an annotated Eliot -- and I
think you are the person who loves "Paradise Lost"? I do too, because I was lucky enough to find Isaac Asimov's annotated version.
>Most poets just aren't good enough to create a poem, with references to other >works, which stands on its own feet without knowledge of what references are >being made.
Without explaining the references, you mean?
>Scupham uses Shakespeare in some of his sequences and apologised for it at
>the reading, as many people might not know what he's doing.
>> >(something I'm totally guilty of).
>> >Of course, he can't do it...
>>
>> Lately I'm finding that the harder I try to write ___ and not ___, the
>harder
>> it is to write, period -- even in my notes.
>> Yesterday I caught myself not wanting to write something down because it
>> wasn't "good enough", and they're only _notes_! I felt strange realizing
>I might have been doing this for months and months.
>
>Two things:
>
>When you have something to say, always put it down in some shape or form.
>You might lose it.
Absolutely. This is excellent advice; I've just been lapsing of late, but I began by doing this, and I recommend it for everyone too.
>I always carry a notepad - like skye's scrapbooks - for
>first drafting. The process is similar to automatic writing for me - most of
>my poetry is drafted in under 5 minutes, often under 2 minutes for the
>shorter pieces. It can then sit there for a while.
>
>Secondly, incubate. Once you've got it on paper, I need time for things to
>hit me so I can shape the poem. You can put yourself in an environment where
>this is forced, as skye says, such as by going off on some holiday, doing
>some weird activity, whatever - get some experiences.
>Alternatively read - don't write anything for 3 months, just read lots of
>GOOD poetry. I know a few published poets that have admitted that they never >write anything without reading specific poets who are in their minds 'great'
Oh, you mean read them before they begin writing? This is what I did with
my last two pieces here; they emerged from a sort of reverie.:)
>(but I won't go off on one about that... :) ). Music helps as well
>sometimes.
Yeah, everything like that helps, doesn't it? I enjoy aquariums (especially the manta rays) and museums, but hate the crowds (and all the traffic there
and back.). Symphonies... yum.
>
>An example of this is that poem I posted, Expatriation. It started as a
>bland analysis of the body in feminist readings of literature. I found the
>sea imagery coming naturally and turned to the Greek poets who I am obsessed
>with (and also use lots of sea imagery). Seferis' 'King of Asine' has a cool
>introductory essay which I stole a few lines from and slotted into the poem.
>Then the Virginia Woolf suicide story fell into place. At some stage it had
>to go out for second opinions - Jim, Julie and Daimon were all very helpful.
>This process took about a week, but I have a triple sestina that was
>produced after the merging of poems I'd written while I was a teenager, that
>had been incubating for between 1 and 5 years.
Okay, thanks.:). I remember thinking that "Expatriation" reminded me a lot
of Plath's late work, but I didn't want to say so then.
>
>
>> Do you ever do automatic writing?
>
>Sort of. As I've said, I write all my stuff in a few minutes at most. A lot
>of what comes out is automatic and must be chopped. As an exercise I don't
>think it's that useful for me, because all I'll end up with is one or two
>lines out of every fifty that I like, but nowhere to use them.
>I don't really want a scrap book of single lines to work from,
>though I know someone who did this effectively - he built a 200 line poem out >of the extracts of loads old poems and automatic writings.
You can collage them all kinds of ways, or find something in, or through, a
sound or the combinations of words that the eye picks up randomly: so many
ways to use those lines but I have *rules* about my note book as well, which was probably why I was (somewhat unfairly) complaining about academics. It's
the work for a carrot stuff that I can't stand.
>
>One thing I seemed to have picked up on with you is that you start with an
>idea before you write - you said you had something you wanted to write but
>it didn't feel it would come out doing justice to the idea.
No, actually I write in reverse from that too, though earlier (about a year ago) I thought I was doing something with Ideas (heh). Really it was images and analogies. I'm something of a frustrated painter I guess (I probably
need to take that up again soon :), so I would imagine, say, an empty
swimming pool with a backdrop of slender trees (at my grandfather's),
and then put a Doric column in the deep end, and then replace it with a
burning tree, then a fish, etc. Then I'd just go from there, much like you describe below, but I rarely incubate (once Gary .sig filed me his poetchic quote, ha ha, much deserved and appreciated!!).
>I work in
>reverse, with a phrase that suddenly sticks in my mind - 'The body is all',
>for example - that torments me for a few days. Eventually I'll write a
>stanza or two my head, feel the flow and the mood of the poem, its pace,
>until I am ready to spit it out. That happens as a sort of automatic
>writing, with phrases and words filling in the body of the poem. I don't
>think it's possible to write anything longer than, say 50 lines this way
>without descending into gibberish. For longer poems you really need a strict
>form and then a huge amount of source material - your own poetry, automatic
>writing, other people's work, textbooks (scientific or non-) history books,
>mythology books, encyclopaedias, ANYTHING with words in it.
>
>Hope this helps.
>
Very very much indeed; it was _so_ nice to talk with you.
Catalephsis
cythera <donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote in message
> Well, I think it's a balance... my two-cents worth is that people who read
poetry probably have the education to catch most references, and know who
> they can ask or where to look for most others (or will sort it out later
through more reading etc.).
Perhaps, but this can lead to accusations of elitism, which everyone hates
to be accused of (unless you're a fascist, like the editor of Prospect
Magazine - see? Use of a reference that almost no one will get, but it's
relevant when I explain it.)
> Re "The Waste Land" I've never felt that the notes at the end were
> particularly helpful, and would love to read an annotated Eliot -- and I
> think you are the person who loves "Paradise Lost"? I do too, because I
was lucky enough to find Isaac Asimov's annotated version.
The notes, I believe, are part of the poem. Which is quite funny when you
think about it. The trouble with annotating Eliot is that he was so damn
intelligent, you'd need to know as much as him to understand the poem -
several languages, a classics education along with having spent a good 20
years of solid reading. The point though, is that The Waste Land stands as a
poem without all the annotations and commentaries alongside it; the
alienation of the reader through a lack of knowledge actually contributes to
the reading. However, where he becomes brilliant is his use of
intertextuality: every reference he makes will transmute your understanding
of the poem, in the same way that the Holocaust changed everyone's opinion
of The Merchant of Venice.
Asimov annotated Paradise Lost!?! Right! I'm zipping down the shops... (Or
onto Amazon.)
> >Most poets just aren't good enough to create a poem, with references to
other >works, which stands on its own feet without knowledge of what
references are >being made.
>
> Without explaining the references, you mean?
Yes. If you can use references without the need to understand them, then
great. If the references then change your reading of the poem, (I
deliberately didn't say 'enhance' or increase because the interpretations
should all be as valid as each other) even better. ON the other hand, I'm of
the opinion that all published poetry should have a Bibliography or
Acknowledgements to guide the reader into each poem's influences. This would
make people read more and understand poetry more.
> Okay, thanks.:). I remember thinking that "Expatriation" reminded me a
lot
> of Plath's late work, but I didn't want to say so then.
'Sblood, you must be joking?!? She does my head in. Still, I tend to deal
with issues of feminism and failures of masculinity in my poetry sometimes
because I don't know how to talk about it factually without bordering on
offensive.
> Very very much indeed; it was _so_ nice to talk with you.
Ditto!
Peter J Ross
> Do you ever do automatic writing?
I don't quite understand what you mean, outside a (necessarily fraudulent)
"Spiritualist" context, by "automatic writing", but I'd be pleased if you
were willing to elaborate. I've been searching for months for a way around
the "block", and this might be a strw worth grsping t.
(See? I'm so blocked I've lost the first letter of the lphbet!)
PJR :-)
--
"'It has been said,' he began at length, withdrawing his eyes reluctantly
from an unusually large insect upon the ceiling and addressing himself to
the maiden, 'that there are few situations in life that cannot honourably be
settled, and without loss of time, either by suicide, a bag of gold, or by
thrusting a despised antagonist over the edge of a precipice on a dark
night.'"
Ernest Bramah (from "The Wallet of Kai Lung")
Peter J Ross
> Re "The Waste Land" I've never felt that the notes at the end were
> particularly helpful, and would love to read an annotated Eliot [...]
B. C. Southam
A student's guide to the selected poems of T. S. Eliot
Faber & Faber, 1968
It explains most of the references, and may even be still in print.
Catalephsis
Peter J Ross <p...@britishlibrary.net> wrote in message
news:98e4m3$1iqkn$1...@ID-76477.news.dfncis.de...
> "cythera" <donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote in message
> news:3AA817D9...@interbulletin.com...
>
> > Do you ever do automatic writing?
>
> I don't quite understand what you mean, outside a (necessarily fraudulent)
> "Spiritualist" context, by "automatic writing", but I'd be pleased if you
> were willing to elaborate. I've been searching for months for a way around
> the "block", and this might be a strw worth grsping t.
Automatic writing, or what the French blokes who started it called 'free
association' - I'm sure you've tried it once or twice anyway:
Take a starting line, e.g. "She was standing by the window' and then write
continuously for maybe two minutes, without taking your pen off the page
(except for word breaks, and even that is unnecessary, depending on your
speed) writing the first things that come into your head as they come into
your head.
What's really good with this idea is if you get someone else to give you a
starting line, then after two minutes get them to read out a second line,
which you write down and then continue to follow for another minute or two.
Aw, sod it. I'm going to give you a workshop I did that worked like a charm.
I did a free association workshop, where a group of about 12 were given a
starting line and wrote for two minutes. After this time we were given
another line and had to write for another two minutes. Then 'time' took its
toll on the pieces. The organiser took the pages out (in order) and set them
on fire/stamped them into the mud. He then handed them back, passing them on
two stages, so you had someone's automatic writing pieces from two stages to
the right. Then you had to recopy as much of what you had left, filling in
blanks/destroyed words as you saw fit, within 30 seconds (even if you didn't
finish). Then we passed them on again, two to the left and had to
'reinterpret' what you received as you would have thought the original
author would have written it, not the person who had just recopied the
damaged piece would have done. That stage works best if you are given a
persona for the person who originally wrote the poem - in our case it was a
Russian poetess who had been killed under Stalinist Russia and then
translated by a man. The final stage involved finding out that the previous
stage was invalid and the poetess was in fact a man who had escaped
Stalinist Russia and moved West. That meant you could rework the poem into
something totally your own piece, however you saw fit.
Here's the piece I came out with, which I dedicated to my girlfriend of the
time:
Phoenicised
For K. L. A.
Some people say maturity is
What the snow sings in your ears.
That's all I hear sometimes,
Mumbled through breath-frosted lips.
The snow melts under your feet
Whenever my eyes turn to you,
Like Moses crossing a Siberian sea,
Or my heart looking for a valve.
Let's be wooden marionettes
And dance down the flames while
Branches flip disapproving fingers
At our warmth-waltzed swirl.
You can blush and whirlwind
Snowflakes with your sunshine hair,
And I'll paint icicles with
The molten auburn of your kisses.
So next time you're wintered in
And miss our fire-flecked gaze,
Try hunting my golden dusk like a
Blazoned phoenix returning to the womb.
I bloody satisfactory poem coming out of other people's work. I've posted
this as an example of how automatic writing can be employed. Running this
workshop produced a series of very highly polished poems with little effort.
Just remember to concede all copyrights before you start, else someone might
start a ruck.
Buit yeah, other people use automatic writing more as a way to force lines
out. The most important thing is to not stop writing - even if you can't
think of anything to say, just write that down: 'I can't write, I can't
write, I can't write....' until something hits you. The most useful way to
employ the result is to pick a line or two out of what you get that sounds
like an 'original thought'. A sentence that associates something you haven't
thought of before.
Not a lot of people publish their free association stuff, though it's been
brought to my attention that Leonard Nimoy (yes, Dr. Spock) writes totally
spontaneously using this method. I hadn't heard that he wrote poetry before
and I doubt anyone else has, which kind of goes to show....
cythera
<98e4m3$1iqkn$1...@ID-76477.news.dfncis.de> :
>news:3AA817D9...@interbulletin.com...
>
>> Do you ever do automatic writing?
>
>I don't quite understand what you mean, outside a (necessarily fraudulent)
>"Spiritualist" context, by "automatic writing", but I'd be pleased if you
>were willing to elaborate. I've been searching for months for a way around
>the "block", and this might be a strw worth grsping t.
>
>(See? I'm so blocked I've lost the first letter of the lphbet!)
:)
I like Cat's advice, and I'll see what I can find for you.
cythera.
And thank you for the tip about B.C. Southam.
>
>PJR :-)
>
>--
>"'It has been said,' he began at length, withdrawing his eyes reluctantly
>from an unusually large insect upon the ceiling and addressing himself to
>the maiden, 'that there are few situations in life that cannot honourably be
>settled, and without loss of time, either by suicide, a bag of gold, or by
>thrusting a despised antagonist over the edge of a precipice on a dark
>night.'"
> Ernest Bramah (from "The Wallet of Kai Lung")
>
>
>
_______________________________________________
cythera
<3aa99fe0$0$388$65a9...@news.citilink.com> :
>"cythera" <donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote in message
>news:3AA9774B...@interbulletin.com...
>
>>On Wednesday/Thursday night I dreamt a poem with this as its first line:
>>
>> When you think of skin think of the back of skin
>>
>> and so from these dreams I can see that _am_ still writing
>>
>I think everyone dreams in poetry, and I rarely see much difference between
>the two.
Have you ever seen your own poetry or art in a dream, and if so, would you
describe your experience? And of course this is for anyone else who would
like to answer too.
>By this (I think you know) I am not applauding those dismal
>workshop "dream transcriptions" that are invariably lunky and willfully
>Freudian, but the process of free-association. For myself, it has always
>seemed that writing poetry was as much like dreaming while awake as
>possible. And it is this ability to free-associate and make linguistic
>connections of some surprising quality that I admire in poetry. No doubt
>poetry will involve more "willed" labor (usually after the seductive act
>itself) but that has a different charm one must learn to fall in love with.
>And just as it is said that a melodic "talent" can not be learned, this
>tendency to dream while awake, and to be open to the casual accident without
>succumbing to either intellectual or sentimental failures is difficult to
>imagine teaching.
It seems to involve "unlearning": learning to remove the conditioning from the response. This should be easy enough to teach oneself I think, once the
right tools and attitude etc. are present. How to do all this I don't know.
>I think this process is a natural ecology to the child, and it is usually >trained out of them rather than the reverse, no doubt for the welfare of
>the "greater good" which demands its dreams in a more utilitarian mode. The >ones that survive this - it seems - form some sort of early defense against >intrusion and exploitation and blatant robbery.
Yes, I know what you mean.:)
cythera.
"In Mexico . . . there is no art: things are made for use. And the world is
in perpetual exaltation."
-- Antonin Artaud, Preface to _The Theater and its Double_.
skye
>"cythera" <donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote in message
news:3AA9774B...@interbulletin.com...
>>On Wednesday/Thursday night I dreamt a poem with this as its first line:
>
>> When you think of skin think of the back of skin
>
>> and so from these dreams I can see that _am_ still writing
>
>I think everyone dreams in poetry, and I rarely see much difference between
>the two.
Kind of an intersting take, as it suggests a type of meta- or hyper-
(active) experiential/cognitive processing, like another "mode" of *reality;
>By this (I think you know) I am not applauding those dismal
>workshop "dream transcriptions" that are invariably lunky and willfully
>
"lunky"? Hmmmm; (quick-flip -pause- to webster's 2nd college to jog (flog?)
memory-cells); somekindathing between big-fish and dumb, dunder-headed-ness;
Ah, Yayess;
>Freudian, but the process of free-association. For myself, it has always
>seemed that writing poetry was as much like dreaming while awake as
>possible.
Nice distillation/explication of the dialogic/experiential
"creative-participatory" process, very much in-tune with poetry as the
surreal-sense of "The Marvelous", which reflects & reifies my own
kinda-romanticized-idealized notion of poetry as something that (among a
lotta OTHER things) exploits the potential-differential of transverbal
slippage;
>And it is this ability to free-associate and make linguistic
>connections of some surprising quality that I admire in poetry.
Which I too find greatly enlightening and take delight in; It is like an
alternate route to "other" understandings, quite often non-linear and
unpredictable, highly subjective and so intensely personal, like "private"
knowledge;
>No doubt
>poetry will involve more "willed" labor (usually after the seductive act
>itself) but that has a different charm one must learn to fall in love with.
Too true; It CAN become quite addicting; (In the temporary absence of
reading-material at-hand, I sometimes find myself "reading"
list-of-ingedients, recomposing in my head another -revealed and revealing-
sense of what *it* means);
>And just as it is said that a melodic "talent" can not be learned, this
>tendency to dream while awake, and to be open to the casual accident
without
>succumbing to either intellectual or sentimental failures is difficult to
>imagine teaching. I think this process is a natural ecology to the child,
>and it is usually trained out of them rather than the reverse, no doubt for
>the welfare of the "greater good" which demands its dreams in a more
>utilitarian mode. The ones that survive this - it seems - form some sort of
>early defense against intrusion and exploitation and blatant robbery.
>
>dmh
Well and goodly-said; It recalls that, as a "child", my third (or fourth,
whatever) -grade teacher roundly criticized me (often!) for looking out the
classroom windows, daydreaming; She said that while Einstein was a
consummate daydreamer, HE had had to pay attention in class and do his
coursework as a child, and in any event, he was one genius out of several
hundred million quite-ordinary non-geniuses; I GUESS the point was, that
while I MIGHT one day grow up to converse with the likes of OR build on the
ideas of great-thinkers like Herr Einstein, I probably wouldn't; BUT: I
never quite abandoned the notion of Albert as role-model which this teacher
unwittingly provided me (Across the miles and years, <g> *Thanks!*), and so
I've always since tended to be fascinated with the
non-mainstream/interstitial margins and void-threshold ponderings,
cosmic/fantastical/off-the-edge reveries and imaginations; Of COURSE I
learned all I could about Einstein, and read/self-taught (repeated readings
until they began to *sink-in*) myself general/special theories of relativity
while in my early teens (and *stumbled* across Descartes *"I doubt,
therefore I think; I Think, therefore I *am*") etc.; My "life" (as *they*
say, has never since been the same, although HOW it may be different, or
diff. to WHAT, now THAT is... another dumb question, prob'bly);
BUT: to get back: (again);
>The ones that survive this - it seems - form some sort of
>early defense against intrusion and exploitation and blatant robbery.
I guess it could be termed a kind-of self-sufficiency, maybe degrees of
introversion, an aloof non-integration into the dominant-mainstream
collective-paradigm, a "resistance
against co-optive manipulations", healthy dose of skepticism, a tendency to
ask infuriating "WHY NOT?" questions, alliance with the subversive forces of
rebellion and alternative visions, etc., eh?
Regrdz etc. etc.
skye
Peter J Ross
news:Z6Cq6.188932$Dd3.2...@monolith.news.easynet.net...
> Automatic writing, or what the French blokes who started it called 'free
> association' - I'm sure you've tried it once or twice anyway:
Very interesting. I'll be saving your post for future reference. Thanks!
PJR :-)
--
"There must be no clichés, set phrases, stereotyped journalese. The only
escape from such is by precision, a result of concentrated attention to what
one is writing."
Ezra Pound (from a letter to Harriet Monroe)
Peter J Ross
> I like Cat's advice, and I'll see what I can find for you.
>
> cythera.
Thanks in advance.
> And thank you for the tip about B.C. Southam.
No trouble.
Dale Houstman
> "Catalephsis" <catal...@ukonline.co.uk> wrote in message
> news:Z6Cq6.188932$Dd3.2...@monolith.news.easynet.net...
>
> > Automatic writing, or what the French blokes who started it called 'free
> > association' - I'm sure you've tried it once or twice anyway:
>
> Very interesting. I'll be saving your post for future reference. Thanks!
>
French of course) automatic writing, but they also thought it meant nothing
(except as a mere technique) without a deeper understanding of automatism,
which is the same process that produces the free flow of dream imagery. It
isn't enough to write wildly and to expect the result will produce
marketable poetry. In fact, the very idea of producing poetry as being the
end-all and be-all of automatic writing was anathema to the Surrealist, who
were literally searching for life that was both richer than and integral to
daily experience. Used as a technique (as witnessed in several writing
classes by moi) it produces pretty dismal crap.
dmh
Dale Houstman
"cythera" <donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote in message
> "Dale Houstman" <dm...@citilink.com> wrote in article
> <3aa99fe0$0$388$65a9...@news.citilink.com> :
> >
> >"cythera" <donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote in message
> >news:3AA9774B...@interbulletin.com...
> >
> >>On Wednesday/Thursday night I dreamt a poem with this as its first line:
> >>
> >> When you think of skin think of the back of skin
> >>
> >> and so from these dreams I can see that _am_ still writing
> >>
> >I think everyone dreams in poetry, and I rarely see much difference
between
> >the two.
>
> Have you ever seen your own poetry or art in a dream, and if so, would you
> describe your experience? And of course this is for anyone else who would
> like to answer too.
Actually I rarely dream, or - rather - I rarely recall that I have dreamt.
But I don't particularly recall ever seeing my own art in a dream, although
I am almost certain some image must have - at one time or another - appeared
as a fleeting moment in one of them.
>
> >By this (I think you know) I am not applauding those dismal
> >workshop "dream transcriptions" that are invariably lunky and willfully
> >Freudian, but the process of free-association. For myself, it has always
> >seemed that writing poetry was as much like dreaming while awake as
> >possible. And it is this ability to free-associate and make linguistic
> >connections of some surprising quality that I admire in poetry. No doubt
> >poetry will involve more "willed" labor (usually after the seductive act
> >itself) but that has a different charm one must learn to fall in love
with.
>
> >And just as it is said that a melodic "talent" can not be learned, this
> >tendency to dream while awake, and to be open to the casual accident
without
> >succumbing to either intellectual or sentimental failures is difficult to
> >imagine teaching.
>
> It seems to involve "unlearning": learning to remove the conditioning from
the response. This should be easy enough to teach oneself I think, once the
> right tools and attitude etc. are present. How to do all this I don't
know.
From my observation it can take very little: it relates to the idea of
epiphany. I've seen (and experienced myself) such events, when some event or
series of events or even just the right words or images suddenly unlock
potential, or turn the boat around. Honestly, I don't think it takes much,
and I think most people are in a constant state of desire to break their
monied routine, so the impetus is there. But many people spend an inordinate
amount of time attempting to suppress any real desire on their part that it
doesn't occur as much as it might.
>
> >I think this process is a natural ecology to the child, and it is usually
>trained out of them rather than the reverse, no doubt for the welfare of
> >the "greater good" which demands its dreams in a more utilitarian mode.
The >ones that survive this - it seems - form some sort of early defense
against >intrusion and exploitation and blatant robbery.
>
> Yes, I know what you mean.:)
>
And - strangely enough - so do I!
dmh
cythera
>
>"cythera" <cyt...@my-deja.com> wrote in message
>news:3AAB699A...@interbulletin.com...
>> "Dale Houstman" <dm...@citilink.com> wrote in article
>> <3aa99fe0$0$388$65a9...@news.citilink.com> :
>> >
>> >
>> >>On Wednesday/Thursday night I dreamt a poem with this as its first line:
>> >>
>> >> When you think of skin think of the back of skin
>> >>
>> >> and so from these dreams I can see that _am_ still writing
>> >>
>> >I think everyone dreams in poetry, and I rarely see much difference
>> >between the two.
>>
>> Have you ever seen your own poetry or art in a dream, and if so, would you
>> describe your experience? And of course this is for anyone else who would
>> like to answer too.
>
>Actually I rarely dream, or - rather - I rarely recall that I have dreamt.
>But I don't particularly recall ever seeing my own art in a dream, although
>I am almost certain some image must have - at one time or another - appeared
>as a fleeting moment in one of them.
Do you know if Coleridge ever said how he came upon "Kubla Khan" in his
dream, i.e. did he see himself writing it or reading it silently (or aloud), etc.? Incidentally, I have no problem accepting that he could have written it just as he claimed, especially as he was an opium user.
>>
>> >By this (I think you know) I am not applauding those dismal
>> >workshop "dream transcriptions" that are invariably lunky and willfully
>> >Freudian, but the process of free-association. For myself, it has always
>> >seemed that writing poetry was as much like dreaming while awake as
>> >possible. And it is this ability to free-associate and make linguistic
>> >connections of some surprising quality that I admire in poetry. No doubt
>> >poetry will involve more "willed" labor (usually after the seductive act
>> >itself) but that has a different charm one must learn to fall in love
>> >with.
>>
>> >And just as it is said that a melodic "talent" can not be learned, this
>> >tendency to dream while awake, and to be open to the casual accident
>without
>> >succumbing to either intellectual or sentimental failures is difficult to
>> >imagine teaching.
>>
>> It seems to involve "unlearning": learning to remove the conditioning from
>the response. This should be easy enough to teach oneself I think, once the
>> right tools and attitude etc. are present. How to do all this I don't
>know.
>
>From my observation it can take very little: it relates to the idea of
>epiphany. I've seen (and experienced myself) such events, when some event or
>series of events or even just the right words or images suddenly unlock
>potential, or turn the boat around.
How though do you keep the door fully open? It is very easy to slip back
into habits (programming.).
How does a person _fully_ liberate the imagination?
cythera.
Dale Houstman
"cythera" <donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote in message
>
> Do you know if Coleridge ever said how he came upon "Kubla Khan" in his
> dream, i.e. did he see himself writing it or reading it silently (or
aloud), etc.? Incidentally, I have no problem accepting that he could have
written it just as he claimed, especially as he was an opium user.
I think I recall he heard (or saw) the actual phrases as well as images. I
have no difficulty believing that he might have written it as he claimed he
did, but I don't know that it's true.
> >>
I wrote:
> >From my observation it can take very little: it relates to the idea of
> >epiphany. I've seen (and experienced myself) such events, when some event
or
> >series of events or even just the right words or images suddenly unlock
> >potential, or turn the boat around.
> How though do you keep the door fully open? It is very easy to slip back
> into habits (programming.).
> How does a person _fully_ liberate the imagination?
>
Good question. Personally I don't know how other people do it - or even if I
have - but I suppose it involves constant re-immersion in the various
aspects of automatism. For instance, it is easy for me to slip into
regurtigating old images, poetic approaches, etc. So - once in a blue moon -
I engage in writing activites and such that manifestly do not have a
"point." In writing class I used to keep something I called an X-file
(before the show's existence!) and I would write for it, accepting it as a
zone of non-aesthetics. In writing I have used various aleatory processes:
word games, random numbers, etc. But I have settled into a particular
process utilizing other texts and rapid scanning to pick phrases and words.
But that's all just writing. In the larger sense one must attempt to view
even the most banal events and places and things as if they were unknown. In
the 60s I had a game where I would walk about looking at advertisements and
the like as if they were alien artifacts, as if they were in code, and the
like. There are larger social processes involving using humor (at work and
other gatherings) to offset any attempt to label you as "purchased," and in
view all information and statistics as potential lies. It keeps me sane, and
forms the basis for a continuing ethics of sorts. The cynics of ancient
Greece - of course - beat me to this posture vis a vis the world's
manipulations.
So - in effect - one must make a habit of being non-habitual.
But then again - as I age - I am finding some comfort in the "rut" of
seemingly identical days and events. So maybe I'm not the right person, - or
the right age - to ask anymore.
dmh
Catalephsis
> > How though do you keep the door fully open? It is very easy to slip
back
> > into habits (programming.).
> > How does a person _fully_ liberate the imagination?
>
> Good question. Personally I don't know how other people do it - or even if
I
> have - but I suppose it involves constant re-immersion in the various
> aspects of automatism. For instance, it is easy for me to slip into
> regurtigating old images, poetic approaches, etc. So - once in a blue
moon -
> I engage in writing activites and such that manifestly do not have a
> "point."
One thing that works for me (sometimes) is reading text books on a subject I
know nothing about. That way, when a phrase pops up that is 'poetical' in
your opinion you can read it/spot it as such and then steal it. Two or three
lines from a critical essay, a book on something scientific if you're not in
scientific fields, biology, philosophy, etc. always seem handy, in
particular in introductions/prefaces which are often written by people who
are passionate about the field they are working on.
By drawing on a few lines like this you'll find a platform for imagery and
then you might find your imagination engages with the material in
spontaneous ways.
> So - in effect - one must make a habit of being non-habitual.
Definitely. I'll come back to the incubation thing I mentioned - don't make
a habit of sitting at the same desk trying to write. Alien environments work
for me.
> But then again - as I age - I am finding some comfort in the "rut" of
> seemingly identical days and events. So maybe I'm not the right person, -
or
> the right age - to ask anymore.
Heh, OK Dale, I'll give it a perspective from someone who wasn't even born
in the 60s.
Will Self uses mushrooms and pot mainly. The Romantics flitted between
laudanum, opium, snuff and so on. I've tried absinth and vodka. I've a
friend who mainly composes on skunk. Personally the drugs don't work too
well for me. I end up with bad surrealism. So don't do, mmkay?
Going to performances is a massive help for me. Hearing the right poets
reading in the right kind of voice has sparked off several poems. Also
lectures, intellectual stuff - when they're boring I'll find a sentence or
some concept springs out that is being said which manifests as a few simple
doodles, which sometimes work, sometimes don't.
I think the hardest thing to do is to force yourself to write. You're
practically closing the door on yourself by doing that. I don't like
recommending people to go into workshops and groups like that because unless
you are totally off-the-wall with your interpretations of exercises, you'll
find everyone in the room will have a poem based on the same kind of
form/theme/imagery/etc. ready to send off to the same magazines, or
whatever.
Then again, you need a lot of time to think and write, so keeping busy isn't
the best way to inspire yourself. Perhaps a balance of specific events, like
readings, travelling, physical exercise/manual labour coupled with
meditation? Who knows? As Dale has pointed out, it's what works for you.
Dale Houstman
>
>
> One thing that works for me (sometimes) is reading text books on a subject
I
> know nothing about. That way, when a phrase pops up that is 'poetical' in
> your opinion you can read it/spot it as such and then steal it. Two or
three
> lines from a critical essay, a book on something scientific if you're not
in
> scientific fields, biology, philosophy, etc. always seem handy, in
> particular in introductions/prefaces which are often written by people who
> are passionate about the field they are working on.
I use the same method often enough, although I don't find that I have to
fully read each text, a dutiful scan works pretty well. For the same reason,
I have endless reference books in different disciplines: physics, math,
earth sciences, etc. One also comes across such phrases on a day to day
basis, particularly in my job, where I sit all day reading newspapers for a
(bare) living.
>
> By drawing on a few lines like this you'll find a platform for imagery and
> then you might find your imagination engages with the material in
> spontaneous ways.
>
>
> > So - in effect - one must make a habit of being non-habitual.
>
> Definitely. I'll come back to the incubation thing I mentioned - don't
make
> a habit of sitting at the same desk trying to write. Alien environments
work
> for me.
>
> > But then again - as I age - I am finding some comfort in the "rut" of
> > seemingly identical days and events. So maybe I'm not the right
person, -
> or
> > the right age - to ask anymore.
>
> Heh, OK Dale, I'll give it a perspective from someone who wasn't even born
> in the 60s.
>
> Will Self uses mushrooms and pot mainly.
I use pot mainly.
>I've tried absinth and vodka.
I actually grew and made some absinthe. Truly odious crap.
Then there's people like Guillaume Apollinaire who composed while in the
trenches. That wouldn't work for me I think.
dmh
cythera
>
>"cythera" <cyt...@my-deja.com> wrote in message
>news:3AAC2CCE...@interbulletin.com...
>>
>> Do you know if Coleridge ever said how he came upon "Kubla Khan" in his
>> dream, i.e. did he see himself writing it or reading it silently (or
>> aloud), etc.? Incidentally, I have no problem accepting that he could
>> have written it just as he claimed, especially as he was an opium user.
>
>I think I recall he heard (or saw) the actual phrases as well as images. I
>have no difficulty believing that he might have written it as he claimed he
>did, but I don't know that it's true.
It brings up (for me anyway) the fascinating question of just _how_ a poet "writes" -- by this I mean, how much has been formed "behind by the scenes" as
it were, by the subconscious (here I use the term metaphorically, for lack of
a better one) -- before he or she sits down to "begin" the process.
>> >>
>I wrote:
>
>> >From my observation it can take very little: it relates to the idea of
>> >epiphany. I've seen (and experienced myself) such events, when some event
>> >or series of events or even just the right words or images suddenly
>> >unlock potential, or turn the boat around.
>
>> How though do you keep the door fully open? It is very easy to slip back
>> into habits (programming.).
>> How does a person _fully_ liberate the imagination?
>>
>Good question. Personally I don't know how other people do it - or even if I
>have -
I'm not sure exactly what is meant by phrase "the fully liberated imagination", as I've seen it used elsewhere. Could you explain, please?
>but I suppose it involves constant re-immersion in the various
>aspects of automatism. For instance, it is easy for me to slip into
>regurtigating old images, poetic approaches, etc. So - once in a blue moon -
>I engage in writing activites and such that manifestly do not have a
>"point." In writing class I used to keep something I called an X-file
>(before the show's existence!) and I would write for it, accepting it as a
>zone of non-aesthetics. In writing I have used various aleatory processes:
>word games, random numbers, etc. But I have settled into a particular
>process utilizing other texts and rapid scanning to pick phrases and words.
>But that's all just writing.
>In the larger sense one must attempt to view even the most banal events
>and places and things as if they were unknown. In the 60s I had a game where
>I would walk about looking at advertisements and the like as if they were >alien artifacts, as if they were in code, and the like.
Photography is great for this sort of game! Lately in San Francisco I've seen some very unusual trees: smallish ones that look like the offspring of a
person and a tree; a huge one that resembles a ferris wheel, etc. And then there are the found-objects that you can bring home. :).
>There are larger social processes involving using humor (at work and other >gatherings) to offset any attempt to label you as "purchased," and in view
>all information and statistics as potential lies.
>It keeps me sane, and forms the basis for a continuing ethics of sorts.
>The cynics of ancient Greece - of course - beat me to this posture vis a vis >the world's manipulations.
Earplugs are a big help too (I'm serious.).
>
>So - in effect - one must make a habit of being non-habitual.
Thanks, yes this is my feeling as well.
>
>But then again - as I age - I am finding some comfort in the "rut" of
>seemingly identical days and events. So maybe I'm not the right person, -
>the right age - to ask anymore.
>
>dmh
>
>
Dale Houstman
"cythera" <donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote in message
>
> I'm not sure exactly what is meant by phrase "the fully liberated
imagination", as I've seen it used elsewhere. Could you explain, please?
I wish I could: I consider myself a surrealist - as you are aware - but I'm
not really a scholar of it, or a theoretician. It's all an intuitive process
for me, like the rest of my random life! I imagine it means that imagination
freed from the restraints of socialization and artificially induced
"desires" (such as commodities and "celebrities" and employer expectations,
the like). As such I can only consider it an ideal/asymptote/strange
attractor as concepts go: something to "shoot for."
>
> >but I suppose it involves constant re-immersion in the various
> >aspects of automatism. For instance, it is easy for me to slip into
> >regurtigating old images, poetic approaches, etc. So - once in a blue
moon -
> >I engage in writing activites and such that manifestly do not have a
> >"point." In writing class I used to keep something I called an X-file
> >(before the show's existence!) and I would write for it, accepting it as
a
> >zone of non-aesthetics. In writing I have used various aleatory
processes:
> >word games, random numbers, etc. But I have settled into a particular
> >process utilizing other texts and rapid scanning to pick phrases and
words.
> >But that's all just writing.
>
> >In the larger sense one must attempt to view even the most banal events
> >and places and things as if they were unknown. In the 60s I had a game
where
> >I would walk about looking at advertisements and the like as if they were
>alien artifacts, as if they were in code, and the like.
>
> Photography is great for this sort of game! Lately in San Francisco I've
seen some very unusual trees: smallish ones that look like the offspring of
a
> person and a tree; a huge one that resembles a ferris wheel, etc. And
then there are the found-objects that you can bring home.
Exactly. If I ever left my house I'd be indulging in such things too!
>
> >There are larger social processes involving using humor (at work and
other >gatherings) to offset any attempt to label you as "purchased," and in
view
> >all information and statistics as potential lies.
>
> >It keeps me sane, and forms the basis for a continuing ethics of sorts.
> >The cynics of ancient Greece - of course - beat me to this posture vis a
vis >the world's manipulations.
>
> Earplugs are a big help too (I'm serious.).
I just let the wax build up myself. It's "all natural."
> >
> >So - in effect - one must make a habit of being non-habitual.
>
> Thanks, yes this is my feeling as well.
> >
It's so nice to agree once in awhile, isn't it?
dmh
cythera
>
>"cythera" <luk...@earthlink.net> wrote in message
>news:3AAD811A...@interbulletin.com...
>>
>> I'm not sure exactly what is meant by phrase "the fully liberated
>imagination", as I've seen it used elsewhere. Could you explain, please?
>
>I wish I could: I consider myself a surrealist - as you are aware - but I'm
>not really a scholar of it, or a theoretician. It's all an intuitive process
>for me, like the rest of my random life! I imagine it means that imagination
>freed from the restraints of socialization and artificially induced
>"desires" (such as commodities and "celebrities" and employer expectations,
>the like). As such I can only consider it an ideal/asymptote/strange
>attractor as concepts go: something to "shoot for."
Yes I have to consider it an ideal as well. At this point my thought is that the fully liberated imagination could be glimpsed in the utterances of certain insane persons, people on hallucinogens, people in hypnotic trances, and
people dreaming. Unfortunately in none of these states does it seem possible for these people to write a lucid transcription of their actual experience,
so there is the necessity of a transcriber, as in the case of Robert Desnos.
As for automatism, I would like to see someone at alt.surrealism (you or someone else who knows what he's doing!) began a surrealist game, and perhaps anyone reading this newsgroup, who would be interested, would join it.
[...]
>> >So - in effect - one must make a habit of being non-habitual.
>>
>> Thanks, yes this is my feeling as well.
>> >
>It's so nice to agree once in awhile, isn't it?
Sure is.
cythera.
>
>dmh
Martijn Benders
Dale Houstman wrote:
> I wish I could: I consider myself a surrealist - as you are aware - but I'm
> not really a scholar of it, or a theoretician. It's all an intuitive process
> for me, like the rest of my random life!
Surrealism doesn't exist in writing, at least not officially. Magic
Realism is a writing catagory, but surrealism never was one. I
personally find Magic Realism a lot more intruiging than surrealism -
at any rate it is hard to use the 'surrealistic' stick on poetry since
the basic structure of all poetry is somewhat surrealist.
The translation of art disciplines unto writing is a bumpy road though.
Magic Realism (like Marquez or Grass) or Absurdism (like Kharms or
Kafka) leave little space for the surrealist concept.
The difference between the catagories being that in surrealism reality
is being distorted, whereas in magic realism it is much more natural and
in absurdism it's the supernatural that's distorted instead or together
with reality.
Martijn
Dale Houstman
"Martijn Benders" <interga...@brabant.nl> wrote in message
news:3AAE0DBB...@brabant.nl...
>
>
>
> Surrealism doesn't exist in writing, at least not officially. Magic
> Realism is a writing catagory, but surrealism never was one. I
> personally find Magic Realism a lot more intruiging than surrealism -
> at any rate it is hard to use the 'surrealistic' stick on poetry since
> the basic structure of all poetry is somewhat surrealist.
> The translation of art disciplines unto writing is a bumpy road though.
> Magic Realism (like Marquez or Grass) or Absurdism (like Kharms or
> Kafka) leave little space for the surrealist concept.
> The difference between the catagories being that in surrealism reality
> is being distorted, whereas in magic realism it is much more natural and
> in absurdism it's the supernatural that's distorted instead or together
> with reality.
>
consider) surrealism as an aesthetic or literary movement. More a philosophy
of sensations I would think. But they did (and I do) write surrealist works,
and there are several whom I admire greatly just for this aspect: Breton
himself (both as a polemicist and a writer: I think his Nadja is one of the
finest texts of the century), Arp (who wrote marvelously funny poems),
Desnos the great lyric poet of ghostly love, and so on. The surrealist
"novels" (as such: most of them weren't thrilled with the genre) are
unbearably dull for the most part, although Aragon's "Peasant of Paris" is
very good as a depiction of the surrealisty habit of walking the streets and
reimagining the world. But mainly I think their value lies in a
philosophical approach to daily life that still informs the world view to a
great extent, both in "pure" and corrupted forms. But surrealism was - at
first - a gathering of writers, and only secondly (and with some
trrepidation) was it a cadre of painters. So I don't judge the "value" of
surrealism by its virtues as literature. It has informed my life deeply, and
that is my main interest.
dmh
cythera
<3AAE0DBB...@brabant.nl> :
>[...] in surrealism reality is being distorted, whereas in magic realism
>it is much more natural
Could you go into more detail here please, Martijn, perhaps citing a few examples from texts? I am specifically interested in what ways magical
realism is much more natural than surrealism (thematically, imagistically,
etc.?). I think I know what you mean because I've read some Marquez and
Angela Carter, and the Borges short story about a man in front of a firing squad (can't remember the name, but it is like Ambrose Bierce's "An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge", if memory serves.)
http://www.unb.ca/coned/wss/1145demo/owl2.htm
I've searched for a definition of magical realism for the past 30 minutes and this is about all I got:
"Jorge Luis Borges gave the definition of magical realism when he said, 'I imagine a labyrinth of labyrinths, one sinuous spreading labyrinth that would encompass the past and the future and in some way involve the stars' (Martin 3)."
Thanks.
:)
cythera.
>and in absurdism it's the supernatural that's distorted instead or together
>with reality.
>
>Martijn
_______________________________________________
Martijn Benders
Dale Houstman wrote:
> Agree/Disagree: I don't consider (as the original surrealists didn't
> consider) surrealism as an aesthetic or literary movement. More a philosophy
> of sensations I would think. But they did (and I do) write surrealist works,
But it seems to me your work has much more in common with the absurdists
than the surrealists. And in those parts where no conflict is present it
(so it seems to me) bends over to magic realism. Then again I might have
some subconscious dislike of the term 'surrealism' since it's the flag
that often covers the most crappy art nowadays, or at least the art I
dislike most since it's influences are often so obvious. And pure
philosophically it seems to me that absurdism is a more mature form of
surrealism, and magic realism (if performed adequately) the annihilation
of both.
Surrealism is somewhat the 'new age' of art movements, it easily gets on
ones nerves. This is clear by investigating the (somewhat arbitrary)
definitions of the three art catagories I've used:
SURREALISM: A literary, artistic, and philosophical movement, founded in
France in 1924. Surrealism sought a reality above or within the
surface reality, usually through efforts to suspend the discipline of
conscious or logical reason, aesthetics, or morality in order to allow
for the expression of subconscious thought and feeling.
ABSURDISM: A philosophy based on the belief that humans exist in an
irrational and meaningless universe and that the search for order
brings one into conflict with that universe.
As for Magic Realism, it's a bit harder to define. Marquez isn't a bad
example of it, since the term 'magic realism' derived from Alejo
Carpentier in his prologue to El reino de este mundo (The Kingdom of
This World). The Cuban novelist was searching for a concept broad enough
to accommodate both the events of everyday life and the fabulous nature
of Latin American geography and history.
'Magic Realism can be defined as a preoccupation or interest in showing
something common or daily into something unreal or strange. Angel Flores
explains that in magic realism, time flows without the restriction of
"time", and what can be unreal
appears as real.1 The writer confronts reality and tries to reveal it by
looking for what can be mysterious in life, objects, and even human
actions. A magic realist narrator creates the illusion of "unreality",
faking the escape from the natural, and tells an action that even if
appears as explainable it comes across as strange. In the strange
narrations, the writer instead of presenting something as real, the
reality becomes magical. The strategy the writer consist in suggesting a
supernatural atmosphere without denying the natural, and the tactic is
deforming the reality. Characters, things, and events are recognizable
and reasonable, but because the
narrator's intentions are to provoke strange feeling, the explanations
are not clear nor logical. Also, there is no ambiguity or psychological
analysis of the characters,
instead they are well defined almost in opposition, and they never
appear confused or surprised about the supernatural.'
------
Above definitions make it clear that, since magic realism is almost
entirely without conflict, it creates disorder. Surrealism, on the other
hand, is entirely focused on bringing order to the known universe and
thus it's easily classified as rather appolonian.
Lorca's complaints about Dali where usually focussed on Dali's 'hiegenic
nature' which expressed itself as an almost obsessive urge to want to
see birds in the air, and fish in the sea, and wanting to see grass
green and air blue but all with as much conflict as possible.
> and there are several whom I admire greatly just for this aspect: Breton
> himself (both as a polemicist and a writer: I think his Nadja is one of the
> finest texts of the century), Arp (who wrote marvelously funny poems),
> Desnos the great lyric poet of ghostly love, and so on.
Maybe you just love things that have curtains in them :)
'That shadow at the window is you--no, it's not a shadow, it's really
you! But don't open that window behind whose curtains you're pacing back
and forth. Instead, close your eyes.
I'd like to shut them myself--with my lips.'
Robert Desnos
So I don't judge the "value" of
> surrealism by its virtues as literature. It has informed my life deeply, and
> that is my main interest.
Would you, by above definitions, describe your attitude towards the
universe as 'surrealist'?
Martijn
¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤
De Zeekannibaal online:
http://members.brabant.chello.nl/~m.benders/sea/zeekannibaal.htm
DE nederlandsche CACAOFABRIEK
http://www.cacaofabriek.com/
"Nu mag beugeltje zelf zijn druppeltjes praatolie in de koffie doen"
Uit 'Wipneus en Pim op de Kleiberg'
¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤
Brandon Freels
"Martijn Benders" wrote
>And pure philosophically it seems to me that absurdism is a more mature
form of
> surrealism, and magic realism (if performed adequately) the annihilation
> of both.
How can this be? Surrealism is the freedom of the mind. The "philosophy" of
Absurdism, as you present it (Camus influenced?) relies on the ir/rational
dychotomy which is a repressive force against the mind. If anything
Absurdism is regression. And magic realism is simply a boring artist's
"trick" and not really comparable with the other two.
[snip definitions]
> Above definitions make it clear that, since magic realism is almost
> entirely without conflict, it creates disorder. Surrealism, on the other
> hand, is entirely focused on bringing order to the known universe and
> thus it's easily classified as rather appolonian.
I'm not sure how you got to this conclusion that surrealism is about "bring
order". Rather it is about stipping artificial (man-made) order, and getting
back to the natural order. As I wrote in the FAQ, it is "the primary and
natural condition of the mind and all its faculties free from the
interference of external constraints such as rationalism, aestheticism,
utilitarianism, and religious superstition. This autonomy is achieved only
when the socially constructed apparatuses of repression are dismantled and
those ostracized characteristics of the mind (innovative imagination,
uncompromised desire, and so on) are reintegrated into everyday life,
delivering the mind to a state of free development and spontaneity. It is in
this state, where the individual has regained the primeval senses, that the
mind can move forward to an untainted awareness of existence, which is the
most complete experience of reality---a surreality."
Jim Futrell
<donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote:
>I've searched for a definition of magical realism for the past 30 minutes and this is about all I got:
>
>"Jorge Luis Borges gave the definition of magical realism when he said, 'I imagine a labyrinth of labyrinths, one sinuous spreading labyrinth that would encompass the past and the future and in some way involve the stars' (Martin 3)."
>
>Thanks.
>:)
>
>cythera.
This would be an example of magic realism:
Lesson in Green
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Two great birds thunder skyward. They lift this:
skins, bags, reverse astronomers, sleeping children.
Restless in their dreams, the children fondle shapes:
"How can we call into the past for our red clay roots?"
Should we say this?:
"Let go! Let go! Let go! Forget the aunts, Charles,
girl-cousins skin touched quietly (the olive-smooth
cousins with laughter girl-secret-scented) in private."
Their fathers had driven through brass checkpoints,
paid off guards with mangoes and leather cups,
buying time. Time to fondle gently necks beneath
green velvet chokers, the necks of four dark sisters,
the necks of three wives and one stern, unkempt girl.
These fathers were pearl-hard, no fools among them.
But now, the two birds thunder, stuffed skin-tight,
searching the insubstantial sky for their own sisters.
The steward woke (with his last curse of the day)
at three A.M. to practice his smile of good fortune.
By four the damp-warm babies had begun to tumble,
seeking throbbing heartbeats they have half-forgotten.
Should we say this?:
"No child dreams. No child-dreams! No lullabies. Don't fall!
Let the two great birds loosen their hollow wing-bones!
All our dreams not yet dreamed still rest in their bellies,
and they are anxious to drop them on the red clay fields!"
Somewhere far below, a brazen cousin will today confess,
and break the spell of the bird which carries her dream.
Unlatched, the green velvet choker and the aching dawn
must plummet earthward, bringing back the balance
of secrets to the red clay fields. Careful, the shapes say.
Careful! You will wake the children!
Jim
Joshua P. Hill
<donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote:
>Joshua P. Hill <XXjos...@mindspring.com> wrote in article
><gln0btgrj23m68gju...@4ax.com> :
>>On Sun, 11 Mar 2001 12:03:38 +0000, cythera
>><cyt...@my-deja.com> wrote:
>>
>>>Have you ever seen your own poetry or art in a dream, and if so, would you
>>>describe your experience? And of course this is for anyone else who would
>>>like to answer too.
>>
>>In a symbolic representation(!)
>>
>>I was walking up a staircase with landings on it
>>
>>Josh
>
>Now I wish I knew what you meant! This is beautifully mysterious; I got goosebumps reading it.
>
>cythera.
Heh
I didn't mention all of the details -- don't remember all of the
details -- but there was a house at the top of the stair, with a door,
and I wanted to look in the door; but at some point there was no
railing any more, and I was too scared to go further.
Josh
Martijn Benders
Dale Houstman wrote:
> > I like almost all art forms, in the sense that in each discipline people
> > work who are really
> > good at what they are doing. I do not really understand why some people
> > only seem to fanatically
> > appreciate one sort of thing, however.
>
> This strikes me as irrelevant: surrealism is not an art form, ( you seem
> unable to cope with this fact)
True. I find it an outraguously ridiculous claim, which is made by most
art forms and movements. Symbolism is a lifestyle. Conceptualism is a
philosophy. Onthological anarchism is a fashion brand. To me it all
sounds like they are trying to sell something, and I don't think
surrealism deserves some special place amongst them.
and an appreciation of surrealism does not
> limit one's parameters of appreciation. There is very little outside the
> scope of surrealist interest, and - as is obvious from the work of the
> surrealists (which includes what we would call abstraction) surrealism is
> not a genre of painting.
Then why does my dictionairy suggest otherwise?
I think surrealism is an artistic genre that tries to present itself
as some sort of all-compassing philosophy while it's pretty obvious that
it doesn't have the consistency and broadness required to account for
such. Anything can be a 'lifestyle' and most art genres do make claims
in the same directions. Impressionists like Freud and gardens, Dadaists
are good with newspapers and whatnot.
> > Just observe how much emphasis new age music puts on mind exploration,
> > and
> > the analogy should be rather obvious.
>
> Silly fake parallelism. An analogy based on one characteristic is entirely
> specious.
New age music makes use of natural elements and distorts them, just like
the surrealists do. Those two have a lot in common. Why do you think Max
Ernst married Luise Strauss? ('The Queen of hearts', from the operette
with the same name) - Strauss can be considered to be the 'father' of
new age, since New Age veterans like Robert Stolz pay hommage to this
guy:
http://www.jpc-tipp.de/8717416.htm
And ofcourse, the Donau is the most surrealist river in Europe.
>
> Okay, then if observing is ordering, and we all observe, then why are you so
> upset about ordering? It's inevitable isn't it?
Just some disciplines seem to be more preoccupied with it than others.
If it's so inevitable, why build some gloomy philosophies around it?
> One cannot deal with the unknowable.
That's not true. Read the sixth book of Carlos Casteneda.
> It is very odd that you think merely
> perring into a darkened room is bringing order, but that organizing and
> composing a book isn't.
The brain is more reliable than the mind.
> But actually the Apollonian/Dionysian dichotomy isn't this simple. Children
> are often depicted as Dionysian in their chaotic energies.
Not by far. Apollo is always depicted as a youth, and Dionysus very
rarely is, and when he is it's usually in context of his cultus where
young victims where eaten to his name by the congregation.
> To declare that
> Apollo (a symbol of rationalism) is somehow less "mature" than Dionysis is
> incorrect.
As a psychological phase, apollonism is naive and less mature than
dionysm.
> > I don't see why Dali should not be considered a surrealist.
> >
> >
> I didn't say he wasn't a surrealist (at some point), but his pursuit of
> sensationalism, publicity, money, fascism, and catholicism are at odds with
> what passes for surrealism.
He thought surrealism was boring, so he took a few hobbies aside them.
Can anyone in their right state of mind blame him?
Martijn Benders
cythera wrote:
> >I have a hard time thinking of three surrealist artists i like, though.
>
> What is your opinion of these artists' work?
>
> Giorgio di Chirico (his proto-surrealist, or metaphysical, period, e.g.
> "Song of Love.")
That just must be Chicoro's most awful work. Chicoro was only a
surrealist for a very short time and I can't say that I like his
surrealist works more than his futuristic or more traditional style
paintings. Breton called him a 'lost genius' when he decided to quit the
surrealist movement after just one year of membership and later Chicoro
became a notorious anti-surrealist.
> Rene Magritte.
I dislike almost anything that man ever made.
> Leonora Carrington (her newer painting in particular.)
The older ones are particulary fit for New Age postcards, but
her later work improved quite a lot. She became more like a naive
iconographer rather than a surrealist, though.
I like Mark Kostabi, though he is working more futuristically than
surrealistically. There are some of his works here:
Martijn
cythera
Which of these was your poetry, your art (or craft, sullen or otherwise? :).
cythera.
also from the House of the Rising Dream.
Martijn Benders
Brandon Freels wrote:
> How can this be? Surrealism is the freedom of the mind.
No it isn't.
Not any more than communism, despotism or pope-of-the-day'ism represent
the 'freedom of the mind'; I find this tendency of presenting itself as
the single solution to be utterly irritating of any ideology.
The "philosophy" of
> Absurdism, as you present it (Camus influenced?) relies on the ir/rational
> dychotomy which is a repressive force against the mind.
The mind, in absurdism, is the great enemy. Surrealism collaborates with
it on basis of nothing but blind faith.
If anything
> Absurdism is regression. And magic realism is simply a boring artist's
> "trick" and not really comparable with the other two.
That's simply untrue as magic realism is both an art movement and a
literary movement. I could just as well call surrealism an 'artist
trick', or even a trick of art collectors, which seems a bit more to the
point.
> I'm not sure how you got to this conclusion that surrealism is about "bring
> order". Rather it is about stipping artificial (man-made) order, and getting
> back to the natural order.
As such it's entirely an offspring of romanticism and naturalism; it
presents itself as 'freedom' and it's aims are to show that the naked
man behind the bushes is the model for our liberation, instead of Jesus
Christ. The evangelic factor has always been large with the surrealists
and it's pretentious claims of having the power to strip
anything back to naturalism is often more apologist material.
> It is in
> this state, where the individual has regained the primeval senses, that the
> mind can move forward to an untainted awareness of existence, which is the
> most complete experience of reality---a surreality."
You seem unaware of what the prefix 'sur' actually means.
Hint: it does not mean 'most complete'...
Can you explain why Malevitches Suprematism isn't leading
to the 'most complete experience of reality'?
(which sounds an awful lot like advertising, if you ask me)
Brandon Freels
another asshole around here. How's that for brevity?
"Martijn Benders" wrote
[snip]
***
Surrealism FAQ
Version 1.1 (February 2001)
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Table of Contents
Introduction
What is Surrealism?
1.1 Pure Psychic Automatism
1.2 A Short Introduction to the Surrealist Movement
The Surrealist Revolution
2.1 Politics
2.2 Art and Literature
Surrealist Explorations: Play and Creativity
3.1 Automatism
3.2 Forced Inspiration
3.3 The Surrealist Collage
3.4 The Surrealist Object
3.5 Games
Some Surrealist Concepts
4.1 Black Humor
4.2 The Marvelous
4.3 Mad Love
4.4 Miserablism
The Periphery: Precursors, Fellow Travelers, et al.
5.1 George Bataille
5.2 Dada
5.3 Salvador Dali (Avida Dollars)
5.4 The Occult
5.5 Oulipo
5.6 Pataphysics
5.7 Psychoanalysis
5.8 Situationist International
Appendix
6.1 Further Reading in English
6.2 Online Documents
6.3 Online Surrealist Groups
6.4 Online Surrealist Resources
6.5 FAQ Acknowledgements
INTRODUCTION
Thanks to the common misrepresentations spread throughout the Internet and
academia by individuals hoping to reorient its focus Surrealism is often
misunderstood as an artistic style, a literary movement, a form of mystical
escapism into a world of illusions, convenient weirdness, and a variety of
other banalities. This Frequently Asked Questions was produced to combat the
onslaught of such disinformation. It will be regularly posted to
alt.surrealism, an open forum for discussion and a dumping ground for
anything that falls within the scope of Surrealist interest.
"Perhaps the greatest danger threatening Surrealism today is the fact that
because of its spread throughout the world, which was very sudden and rapid,
the word found favor much faster than the idea." ---André Breton, Surrealist
Situation of the Object
"Surrealism has declared, in every authentic manifestation, its commitment
to revolution; the displacement of the real import of the word by
inhibitions in the writings of college teachers does not alter that
commitment in the slightest. It merely means that there is promulgated the
illusion that critics have something to add." ---The Chicago Surrealist
Group, reply to The New York Review of Books
WHAT IS SURREALISM?
1.1 Pure Psychic Automatism
Pure Psychic Automatism is the primary and natural condition of the mind and
all its faculties free from the interference of external constraints such as
rationalism, aestheticism, utilitarianism, and religious superstition. This
autonomy is achieved only when the socially constructed apparatuses of
repression are dismantled and those ostracized characteristics of the mind
(innovative imagination, uncompromised desire, and so on) are reintegrated
into everyday life, delivering the mind to a state of free development and
spontaneity. It is in this state, where the individual has regained the
primeval senses, that the mind can move forward to an untainted awareness of
existence, which is the most complete experience of reality---a surreality.
Pure Psychic Automatism is synonymous with Surrealism.
"SURREALISM, n. Psychic automatism in its pure state, by which one proposes
to express---verbally, by means of the written word, or in any other
manner---the actual functioning of thought. Dictated by thought, in the
absence of any control exercised by reason, exempt from any aesthetic or
moral concern." ---André Breton, Manifesto of Surrealism
"Surrealism is not a new means of expression, or an easier one, nor even a
metaphysics of poetry. It is a means of total liberation of the mind and of
all that resembles it ... Surrealism is not a poetic form. It is a cry of
the mind turning back on itself, and it is determined to break apart its
fetters, even if it must be by material hammers!" ---Declaration of January
27, 1925
"Surrealism, a unitary project of total revolution, is above all a method of
knowledge and a way of life; it is lived far more than it is written, or
written about, or drawn. Surrealism is the most exhilarating adventure of
the mind, an unparalleled means of pursuing the fervent quest for freedom
and true life beyond the veil of ideological appearances." ---Franklin
Rosemont, Andre Breton and the First Principles of Surrealism
1.2 A Short Introduction to the Surrealist Movement
The Surrealist Movement was founded in Paris in 1924 for the sole purpose of
changing reality through the dissolving of orthodoxy, the liberation of the
mind, and the reintegration of the inner necessities with the exterior life.
Opening the Bureau of Surrealist Research and eventually publishing two
journals (The Surrealist Revolution and Surrealism in the Service of the
Revolution) the original group's initial focus was on uncovering and
exploring the techniques that capture the real functioning of thought. In
their program these investigations (from sleeping trances to automatic
writing) were adjoined to scalding critiques of both the repressive art and
literature of the time and the culture of rationalism in general.
Through the 1930s the movement continued to grow in infamy and influence
with groups appearing in the United Kingdom, Japan, Yugoslavia,
Czechoslovakia, Romania, Belgium, Portugal, Egypt, and a variety of other
countries. This fecund period ended with the Second World War, when the
Paris surrealists were dispersed or detained. Following the war the movement
found itself fragmented. André Breton could only partially reconstitute the
Paris group, as its former members were no longer on a common course.
Opposition to Breton's increasing interest in esotericism led to splinter
groups and competitors, such as Isadore Isou's Lettrist Movement and CoBrA.
In 1966, with the approval of Breton, the first indigenous surrealist group
in the United States was formed in Chicago by Paul Garon and Franklin and
Penelope Rosemont, which has remained the most visible group writing in
English, printing a variety of publications such as their journal Arsenal:
Surrealist Subversion. In September of 1966 Breton died and in March of 1969
the Paris group officially disbanded. However, the majority of the group
reemerged in 1970 with the Bulletin de Liaison Surrealiste.
Today the movement is a decentralized and international constellation of
groups and individuals committed to Surrealism's resilient principles. It
remains a work in progress, and along with the older collectives (in Paris,
Chicago, and Prague), smaller groups of surrealists continue to form around
the globe to work in the margins. Among recent groups are those in
Stockholm, Leeds, Madrid, Argentina, Wisconsin and Minnesota. Whether these
groups will only change the individuals involved or if they can have a
broader impact is a question of little importance. Rather, they are certain
that the drive for liberty is unstoppable, and that a revolution that
redresses the human condition will necessarily be surrealist.
THE SURREALIST REVOLUTION
The two principle expressions of the movement's thrust for complete freedom
are its political nature and its creative output: the first of which
criticizes culture for repressing the internal necessities, and the second
of which seeks to release them.
2.1 Politics
The movement's political stance, which developed out of Dada's spirit of
revolt and vague anarchism, hardened in 1925 as a response to the resurgence
in French patriotism and militarism when France sent an army to put down an
independence movement in Morocco. Resolving that a revolution in
consciousness cannot transpire independent of a revolution in man's material
condition the Paris surrealists began an association with the Communist
Party. During their brief alliance with associates of the hard line Clarté
periodical, who were uniquely sympathetic to surrealist stands and who
shared a common goal in working to subvert bourgeois culture, efforts by the
surrealists to demonstrate their Party loyalty were repaid with belittlement
and interrogations. To the Communist Party their synthesis of Marx and Freud
was an obstacle to total commitment to the Party.
In addition, there was a conflict over the direction of revolutionary art.
The Communist International had developed the concept of "proletarian
literature," which reduced art to the role of propaganda, and later the
Soviet Writers Congress officially adopted the doctrine of "socialist
realism," which the surrealists denounced as an attempt to enclose art's
revolutionary message in the conservative forms of 19th century bourgeois
aesthetics, entirely antithetical to creativity. The surrealists argued that
art's revolutionary value cannot be reduced to its obvious manifest message.
The artist requires absolute freedom to create new means of expression and
deal with such fundamental matters as psychology and sexual freedom,
concerns the Communist Party considered decadent. Through the 1930s the
surrealists grew more distant from the French Left and from Moscow, and in
1935 they broke away from the Communist Party altogether.
By the late 1930s, fascism had risen in Germany, Italy and Spain with the
complicity of the western democracies, themselves having become increasingly
oppressive. The surrealists continued to issue statements denouncing French
policy on the Spanish Civil War, the Moscow trials of the Stalinist purge,
and the Munich talks. In 1938, Breton and Leon Trotsky proposed the creation
of F.I.A.R.I. (Fédération internationale de l'art révolutionnaire
indépendant), an international association of Marxists and anarchists to
pursue a revolutionary art opposed to the decree of fascist dictatorship,
bourgeois democracy, capitalism (art for art's sake), and Stalinism (social
realism). Though hopelessness was setting in among anti-war activists,
F.I.A.R.I. groups were organized in France, Mexico, Argentina, England and
the U.S. The Paris group started a review, Clé, which lasted but two issues,
just long enough to record the deteriorating political climate.
Since the 1940s surrealism has remained non-aligned, often affiliating with
and supporting a variety of revolutionary movements that oppose the existing
conditions of the social, political, and cultural order, and issuing
opinions on contemporary political matters (such as advocating for world
disarmament, denouncing French colonialism in Indochina and Algeria,
protesting the Soviet intervention in Hungary, applauding the outset of the
Cuban Revolution before it was aligned with Russia, and, more recently,
siding with those responsible for the Los Angeles Rebellion of 1992). In its
modern development the political position of Surrealism can be summed up by
the finale of the Chicago Group's Declaration of War (1971):
"Let us speak plainly. Until the last convict is out of prison and the last
'madman' out of the asylum; until the last army has been disbanded and the
last government overthrown; until the last church has been burned and the
last bank pulverized; until the last capitalist and the last cop have been
hanged to death with the guts of the last politician and the last priest;
that is, until men and women are truly free, surrealism will continue
relentlessly to provide miraculous weapons with which to struggle for this
freedom."
2.2 Art and Literature
For the surrealist the use of art and literature is unconditionally directed
at the unleashing and exploring of the imagination, free from such retarding
devices as premeditation and aesthetics, so that the work can be ruled by
desire alone and cover, as Breton stated in Surrealism and Painting, "the
whole psychophysical field (in which consciousness constitutes only a very
small segment)." The surrealist use of art and literature stands opposed to
the notion of talent and the domination of so-called specialists. Following
in the footsteps of Lautréamont's famous maxim that "poetry must be made by
all," surrealists appreciate art and literature for their ability to
manifest the individual's internal and emotional order, and believe that
everyone has the capacity and necessity to create.
"... surrealist painters, who are poets, always think of something else. The
unprecedented is familiar to them, premeditation unknown. They are aware
that the relationships between things fade as soon as they are established,
to give place to other relationships just as fugitive. They know that no
description is adequate, that nothing can be reproduced literally. They are
all animated by the same striving to liberate the vision, to unite
imagination and nature, to consider all possibilities a reality, to prove to
us that no dualism exists between the imagination and reality, that
everything the human spirit can conceive and create springs from the same
vein, is made of the same matter as his flesh and blood, and the world
around him." ---Paul Éluard, Poetic Evidence
"The art of painting, as I conceive of it, consists in representing through
pictorial technique the unforeseen images that might appear to me at certain
moments, whether my eyes are open or shut." ---Rene Magritte, from a letter
to Mr. and Mrs. Barnet Hodes
"Centuries from now, any art that takes new paths toward a greater
emancipation of the mind will be Surrealist." ---Andre Breton, from an
interview with Jose M. Valverde
SURREALIST EXPLORATIONS
3.1 Automatism
Automatism is a behavior of the body whereby subverting the restraint of
consciousness an individual is compelled to perform involuntary motor or
verbal activities. It can be achieved through a variety of techniques, the
best known being the practice of automatic writing which Freud advocated as
a way of getting around self-censorship. This technique originated with the
Spiritualists who were the source of the trance sessions and other devices
employed by the surrealists. The surrealist use of these devices, it is
worth remembering, is not one of Freudian therapy or absurdities like
communicating with the dead, but for liberating the imagination. The results
of automatism can be found in the paintings of Joan Miro and André Masson,
in André Breton and Philippe Soupault's The Magnetic Fields, and in the
sleeping trances of Robert Desnos. It is a common misconception that
surrealists object to any revision of a text that has been written
automatically. In fact, after the initial experiment of The Magnetic Fields
automatic texts have been habitually edited.
"The whole point, for Surrealism, was to convince ourselves that we had got
our hands on the 'prime matter' (in the alchemical sense) of language. After
that, we knew where to get it, and it goes without saying that we had no
interest in reproducing it to the point of satiety; this is said for the
benefit of those who are surprised that among us the practice of automatic
writing was abandoned so quickly." ---André Breton, On Surrealism and Its
Living Works
"I resolved to obtain from myself ... a monologue spoken as rapidly as
possible without any intervention on the part of the critical faculties, a
monologue unencumbered by the slightest inhibition and which was, as closely
as possible, akin to spoken thought." ---André Breton, Manifesto of
Surrealism
3.2 Forced Inspiration
Forced Inspiration is the liberation of imaginative associations through the
suggestive quality of a particular perception that gives way to the
dictation of the internal and emotional order, revealing the veiled-erotic.
This method of creative interpretation, which has been utilized in the
teachings of Leonardo da Vinci, in the everyday activity of cloud watching,
and in psychoanalysis through the Rorschach Ink-Blot Test, was first used
within the realm of Surrealism by Max Ernst who theorized in his Beyond
Painting a technique called Frottage, whereby crayon or graphite is rubbed
on paper which as been placed over an object or texture with the hopes of
revealing or inspiring an image. Since then a number of similar techniques
all focused on revealing or inspiring previously unforeseen images out of
ambiguity have developed, such as: Decalcomania (pressing paper on a
non-absorbent surface of which gouache, ink, or oil paints have been spread,
originated by Oscar Dominquez), Fumage (passing paper over a smoking candle,
originated by Wolfgang Paalen), and Grottage (scrapping paint from the
surface of a painting, originated by Ernst). Salvador Dali's
Paranoiac-Critical Method is also an example of Forced Inspiration, but its
imaginative associations do not come from an ambiguous source, instead they
come from a more defined perception, creating a double image or even a chain
of images. Forced Inspiration is synonymous with Interpretive Delirium.
3.3 The Surrealist Collage
The Surrealist Collage is a method of gluing together the displaced bits and
pieces of originally unrelated images onto a flat surface to create a new
unforeseen image, most notably seen in the works of Max Ernst. This
principle of displacement can also be used with language and other forms of
creativity, such as with Lautréamont's famous line from Maldoror: "As
beautiful as the chance encounter of a sewing machine and an umbrella on a
dissecting table."
"The value of the image depends upon the beauty of the spark obtained ...
the two terms of the image are not deduced from the other by the mind for
the specific purpose of producing the spark, [but rather] they are the
simultaneous products of the activity I call Surrealist, reason's role being
limited to taking note of, and appreciating, the luminous
phenomenon." ---André Breton, Manifesto of Surrealism
3.4 The Surrealist Object
The Surrealist Object is an object, real or imaginary, that has been removed
from its original utilitarian role within the confinement of everyday life
by the dictation of the internal and emotional order. The earliest known
collector of these objects was the German writer Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
who, in 1798, completed a list of imaginary instruments, the most popular
being "a bladeless knife with the handle missing." Since the first group
exhibition of Surrealist Objects in 1936 numerous types of objects have been
invented or theorized, such as: the Found Object, the Natural Object (such
as stones or shells), and the Perturbed Object (deformations), all of which
rely on how the object interacts with the finder's interior necessities.
Other objects include the Interpretive Object (an object physically or
interpretively transformed by the finder) and the Poem-Object (a poem in
which several of the words are replaced with physical objects).
3.5 Games
The surrealist use of games, like that of art and literature, is primarily
focused on the subversion of premeditation and rational constraints, but in
addition it is also a subversion of the artist's ego with the potential for
revealing the Marvelous heavily relying on the release of collective
creativity. The most famous of these games is the Exquisite Corpse, a game
of paper folding whereby each player creates an incomplete image or phrase
that is unseen by the other players who will then complete the image or
phrase. Specific rules are required for the linguistic version of the game:
player one writes a definite or indefinite article and an adjective, player
two writes a noun, player three writes a verb, player four writes another
definite or indefinite article and an adjective, and player five writes
another noun. The first sentence obtained from this method was "The
exquisite corpse shall drink the new wine." Another game is the game of
Question and Answer (also known as the Game of Definitions), whereby a
question or word is provided by one player, and an answer or definition is
provided by another player who has no knowledge of the question or word
provided by the first player. The question and answer (or word and
definition) are put together to reveal the results, such as:
What is the desert? A dove alighting on a flame.
What is evolution? A calligraphic box of anatomical forms.
SOME SURREALIST CONCEPTS
4.1 Black Humor
Black Humor is a type of humor, often ironic and macabre, where the drive
for pleasure surmounts the trauma of the exterior world. An example taken
from Freud would be that of a man sentenced to be executed on a Monday who
exclaims, "What a wonderful way to start the week!" Exemplary in the works
of Jacques Vaché, Jonathan Swift, and the Marquis de Sade.
4.2 The Marvelous
In its central characterization the Marvelous is a revolt against and an
overturning of common sensibility that is guided by desire and governed by
pleasure. In Mad Love Breton recognized three distinct manifestations of the
Marvelous: fixed-explosive (the juxtaposition or unification of two distant
features), magic-circumstantial (a coincidence manipulated by desire;
synonymous with Objective Chance), and veiled-erotic (the alternating
between two or more coherent perceptions). All of these manifestations rely
heavily on the freeing of the individuals own subjectivity and imagination,
and a reorientation to the inner necessities. The Marvelous is synonymous
with Convulsive Beauty.
4.3 Mad Love
Mad Love is an overwhelming and excessive pursuit of love driven by an
irrational momentum that is often compulsive and spontaneous, and has little
to do with choice and more to do with internal necessity.
"Only love in the sense that I understand it---mysterious, improbable,
unique, bewildering, and certain love that can only be foolproof, might have
permitted the fulfillment of a miracle." ---André Breton, Nadja
"The act of love, just as with a painting or a poem, is discredited if he
who surrenders to it does not do so in a trance." ---André Breton, Apertures
4.4 Miserablism
Miserablism is an inurement to misery, occurring when the deficiencies of
existence are accepted as normal or unavoidable. Defined by Breton as "the
depreciation of reality in place of its exaltation" and further elaborated
by the Chicago Surrealist Group as "the rationalization of the unlivable,"
Miserablism is one of the main enemies of Surrealism, cultivated by economic
rationalism and religion.
THE PERIPHERY: Precursors, Fellow Travelers, et al.
This is not an exhaustive list of the periphery, but rather a short list of
groups and individuals from the periphery who have, at times, been relative
to the discussions at alt.surrealism. Further suggestions and participation
within this section is encouraged.
5.1 Georges Bataille
Under construction
5.2 Dada
Under construction
5.3 Salvador Dali (Avida Dollars)
Under construction
5.4 The Occult
Under construction
5.5 Oulipo
Under construction
5.6 Pataphysics
Under construction
5.7 Psychoanalysis
Under construction
5.8 Situationist International
In 1956 two para-surrealist groups, the International Movement for an
Imaginist Bauhaus and the Lettrist International, met at the First World
Congress of Liberated Artists and soon after unified (along with the
fictional London Psychogeographical Association) to form the Situationist
International.
Instead of passively accepting what the commodity system has made of living
(a boring mess of alienation and separation) the Situationist International
chose as their basic premise the construction of a new way of life. Their
social critique of capitalism, as theorized in Guy Debord's Society of the
Spectacle, began with their identification of the spectacle, a web of images
and representations (such as advertisements, television, sports events,
newscasts) that develops from the perspective of those in power. The
spectacle is collectively viewed and constantly renewed, turning the
individual into a passive receptor by replacing leisure (what do I want to
do today?) with entertainment (what do I want to see today?). The individual
is no longer active, but exists in a petrified state of buying and selling
experiences.
For the Situationist International the spectacle could be subverted and a
new way of life could be discovered by the individual's management and
construction of situations, those temporary settings of life that are
characterized by a superior emotional quality. The construction of
situations would be based on the theory of Unitary Urbanism, defined as the
use of an ensemble of arts and techniques that would contribute to an
integral composition of the urban space or environment, recovering that
space from the manipulation of the spectacle. Unitary Urbanism would rely on
the method of detournment, whereby a preexisting artistic element is reused
in a new ensemble, and the field study of Psychogeography, defined as the
gathering of information on how the environment influences the psychology of
the individuals. This information can be discovered through the method of
the dérive, a transient passage through a variety of ambiances, and once the
proper information is obtained it would be applied to the construction of
situations.
The Situationist International remained somewhat obscure until 1966 when
they published Mustapha Khayati's On the Poverty of Student Life at the
request of and funded by the student union of the University of Strasbourg.
The pamphlet, which lambasted universities for institutionalizing ignorance
and ridiculed modern culture and its officials, was denounced as a
misappropriation of public funds. The result was a public scandal and the
closure of the student union. Khayati's highly distributed pamphlet
eventually found its way to the University of Paris at Nanterre in early
1968, and inspired a group known as the Enragés to graffiti the walls of the
campus with Situationist slogans and to sabotage lectures. A general protest
followed in May where students engaged in political discourse and even
questioned the idea of the university itself, which eventually lead to the
closure of the college on May 2nd. Action committees set up by the
Situationist International and the Enragés were struck to spread the protest
to schools and factories throughout France, and by May 21st Paris was
paralyzed by a general strike. For this brief period France appeared to be
on the brink of revolution, but de Gaulle regained power with the assistance
of the military and dissolved the situation.
Despite the growth of interest in their ideas following this period the
Situationist International disbanded in 1972.
APPENDIX
6.1 Further Reading in English
Surrealist Authors: Louis Aragon ("Paris Peasant," "Treatise on Style");
André Breton ("What is Surrealism? Selected Writings [ed. Franklin
Rosemont]," "Manifestoes of Surrealism," "Surrealism and Painting," "Nadja,"
"The Communicating Vessels," "Mad Love," "Arcanum 17," "The Lost Steps,"
"Break of Day," "Free Rein," "Anthology of Black Humor," "Conversations: The
Autobiography of Surrealism," "The Magnetic Fields [with Philippe
Soupault]," "The Immaculate Conception [with Paul Eluard]"); Leonora
Carrington ("Down Below," "The Hearing Trumpet"); Robert Desnos ("Liberty or
Love," "Mourning for Mourning," "Selected Poems"); Max Ernst ("The Hundred
Headless Woman," "A Little Girl Dreams of Taking the Veil"); Michel Leiris
("Aurora," "Brisees: Broken Branches"); Pierre Mabille ("Mirror of the
Marvelous"); Benjamin Péret ("Death to the Pigs," "A Marvelous World").
Anthologies: "The Poetry of Surrealism" (ed. Michael Benedikt), "A Book of
Surrealist Games" (ed. Mel Gooding), "The Shadow and Its Shadow: Surrealist
Writing on the Cinema" (ed. Paul Hammond), "The Autobiography of Surrealism"
(ed. Marcel Jean), "The Custom-House of Desire" (ed. JH Matthews),
"Investigating Sex: Surrealist Discussions 1928-32" (ed. Jose Pierre),
"Surrealism" (ed. Herbert Read), "Refusal of the Shadow: Surrealism and the
Caribbean" (ed. Michael Richardson), "Arsenal: Surrealist Subversion 4" (ed.
Franklin Rosemont), "The Forecast is Hot!" (ed. Franklin Rosemont),
"Surrealism and Its Popular Accomplices" (ed. Franklin Rosemont),
"Surrealist Women" (ed. Penelope Rosemont).
While the best critical overviews of and introductions to Surrealism are
Franklin Rosemont's introduction to "What is Surrealism? Selected Writings
of André Breton," Penelope Rosemont's "Surrealist Women," and the many books
of JH Matthews, the following books merit attention as they were used as
sources for this FAQ: Sarane Alexanderian, "Surrealist Art"; Jacqueline
Chénieux-Gendron, "Surrealism"; David Gascoyne, "A Short Survey of
Surrealism"; Helena Lewis, "The Politics of Surrealism"; Maurice Nadeau,
"The History of Surrealism"; Rene Passeron, "The Concise Encyclopedia of
Surrealism"; Jose Pierre, "An Illustrated Dictionary of Surrealism."
6.2 Online Documents
What is Surrealism? by Andre Breton:
http://pers-www.wlv.ac.uk/~fa1871/whatsurr.html
What is Surrealism? by Andre Breton (alternative link):
http://www-e815.fnal.gov/~romosan/surrealism.html
Declaration of January 27, 1925:
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/mod/1925surrealism.html
Murderous Humanitarianism:
http://www.postfun.com/racetraitor/features/murderous.html
6.3 Online Surrealist Groups
The Chicago Group: http://www.surrealism-usa.org/
The Czech & Slovak Group: http://home.ti.cz/~surreal/surrealindex.html
The Netherlands Group: http://www.geocities.com/surrealisme_in_nederland/
The Paris Group: http://ourworld.compuserve.com/homepages/jjmeric/
The Portugal Group: http://members.tripod.co.uk/surrealismo/
The Stockholm Group: http://www.users.wineasy.se/vertsurr/
Surrealists in Minnesota: http://www.magneticfields.org/
The Wisconsin Group: http://www.execpc.com/~bogartte/Counterclockwise.html
6.4 Online Surrealist Resources
The Library: http://www.kalin.lm.com/author.html
No More Words:
http://www-personal.umich.edu/~rmutt/dictionary/NoMoreWords.html
Surrealist Writers: http://www.creative.net/~alang/lit/surreal/writers.sht
6.5 FAQ Acknowledgements
Brandon Freels (brandon...@netzero.net): principal author, editor.
Parry Harnden (ame...@norlink.net): contributing author.
February 10, 2001
Parry
>
> Brandon Freels wrote:
>
> > How can this be? Surrealism is the freedom of the mind.
>
> No it isn't.
> Not any more than communism, despotism or pope-of-the-day'ism represent
> the 'freedom of the mind'; I find this tendency of presenting itself as
> the single solution to be utterly irritating of any ideology.
Brandon is suggesting that “freedom of the mind” is the definition of
surrealism, not that surrealism promises the path to freedom as if were
some Dianetics con.
> The "philosophy" of
> > Absurdism, as you present it (Camus influenced?) relies on the ir/rational
> > dychotomy which is a repressive force against the mind.
>
> The mind, in absurdism, is the great enemy. Surrealism collaborates with
> it on basis of nothing but blind faith.
>
> If anything
> > Absurdism is regression. And magic realism is simply a boring artist's
> > "trick" and not really comparable with the other two.
>
> That's simply untrue as magic realism is both an art movement and a
> literary movement. I could just as well call surrealism an 'artist
> trick', or even a trick of art collectors, which seems a bit more to the
> point.
>
> > I'm not sure how you got to this conclusion that surrealism is about "bring
> > order". Rather it is about stipping artificial (man-made) order, and getting
> > back to the natural order.
>
> As such it's entirely an offspring of romanticism and naturalism; it
> presents itself as 'freedom' and it's aims are to show that the naked
> man behind the bushes is the model for our liberation,
Yes, surrealism is the offspring of romanticism; everything else in this
paragraph was pulled from a hat.
> instead of Jesus
> Christ. The evangelic factor has always been large with the surrealists
This notion of surrealist “evangelism” is nonsense, on a par with
calling Breton “the Black Pope.” The surrealists have been known for
their unwillingness to dumb-down and for a lack of duplicity -- rather
the opposite of evangelism.
> and it's pretentious claims of having the power to strip
> anything back to naturalism is often more apologist material.
What you call pretentious others call ambitious. And probably what you
call unpretentious others call trivial. Further, I’m not even sure you
know what you’re talking about. Please provide an example from
surrealist writings of “claims of having power,” which you say happen
“often.”
-- Parry
> > It is in
> > this state, where the individual has regained the primeval senses, that the
> > mind can move forward to an untainted awareness of existence, which is the
> > most complete experience of reality---a surreality."
>
> You seem unaware of what the prefix 'sur' actually means.
> Hint: it does not mean 'most complete'...
> Can you explain why Malevitches Suprematism isn't leading
> to the 'most complete experience of reality'?
> (which sounds an awful lot like advertising, if you ask me)
>
> Martijn
>
> ¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤
> De Zeekannibaal online:
> http://members.brabant.chello.nl/~m.benders/sea/zeekannibaal.htm
> DE nederlandsche CACAOFABRIEK
> http://www.cacaofabriek.com/
>
> "Nu mag beugeltje zelf zijn druppeltjes praatolie in de koffie doen"
> Uit 'Wipneus en Pim op de Kleiberg'
>
> ¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤¤
-----= Posted via Newsfeeds.Com, Uncensored Usenet News =-----
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Martijn Benders
Dale Houstman wrote:
> > But it seems to me your work has much more in common with the absurdists
> > than the surrealists.
>
> This is all just subjective aesthetics. My work may or may not have much to
> do (superficially) with absurdism, but the fact is I am rather immersed in
> surrealism, active in a local group and so on.
Picasso was a member of some communist party. Does that make his work
communist?
>
> >And in those parts where no conflict is present it
> > (so it seems to me) bends over to magic realism. Then again I might have
> > some subconscious dislike of the term 'surrealism' since it's the flag
> > that often covers the most crappy art nowadays, or at least the art I
> > dislike most since it's influences are often so obvious.
>
> Yes, but part of the surrealist struggle is to reclaim the very term
> "surrealism" from all the crud that's built up about it over the years; its
> reduction to a synonym for "merely strange" for instance.
To tell the truth, I don't really have a clue what should be considered
surrealist or not,
and the faq that was posted here doesn't make it any better. I do not
personally consider Lautremont
to be very surrealist, which makes it even worse since things pretty
much started with that guy.
I like almost all art forms, in the sense that in each discipline people
work who are really
good at what they are doing. I do not really understand why some people
only seem to fanatically
appreciate one sort of thing, however. Surrealism seems to me a rather
psychologically biased, in the
sense that its supposed 'mind exploring' qualities are often much more
unclear and escher-like than
the same qualities I see in the symbolists or conceptualists. It too
often presents itself as the only
ideology that stretches in those directions, which i think is very
false.
>
> > philosophically it seems to me that absurdism is a more mature form of
> > surrealism, and magic realism (if performed adequately) the annihilation
> > of both.
>
> This makes little sense to me, since absurdity is rather more nihilist turn
> of mind, and surrealism is not about nihilism.
Why does the Universe in the surrealist option have to make sense?
The artistic possibilities of a nonsensic cosmos are infinitly larger.
I am not certain that
> "maturity" (whatever that term might mean) must inevitably bring nihilism
> and discouragement, leaving only smothered black laughter.
Why is nonsense always associated with depression?
As for magic
> realism, to me it seems a vastly bloated "utilization" of the more
> superficial qualities of surrealism as a sort of "image bank." I am not
> passing literary judgement here, having enjoyed both absurdist and magic
> realist work, but I don't find that either borders on being as "extensive"
> in either their activites or points of investigation: both are - in fact -
> mainly literary movements, as surrealism is demonstrably not.
I have a hard time thinking of three surrealist artists i like, though.
I like Ernst, but he was a bit on the absurdist side too, for me.
A good example of a 'magic realism' work is this painting of Filonov:
http://www.rollins.edu/Foreign_Lang/Russian/filon1.jpg
I disagree about your observations on magic realism, which
can be turned around easily. Lorca was a magic realist, and
he was pretty early on the scene.
> >
> > Surrealism is somewhat the 'new age' of art movements, it easily gets on
> > ones nerves. This is clear by investigating the (somewhat arbitrary)
> > definitions of the three art catagories I've used:
>
> New Ageism is strictly mystical and self-important. There is no cross-over
> with Surrealism in the least as far as I can see, except in the level of
> your aggravation with both.
Just observe how much emphasis new age music puts on mind exploration,
and
the analogy should be rather obvious.
> >
> >
> > Above definitions make it clear that, since magic realism is almost
> > entirely without conflict, it creates disorder. Surrealism, on the other
> > hand, is entirely focused on bringing order to the known universe and
> > thus it's easily classified as rather appolonian.
>
> I don't see how attempting to see what is "there" - in all its aspects, is
> necessarily a matter of bringing order, but merely one of noticing.
That seems silly to me. Observing things is ordering them, as molecular
theories show aptly. If I try to see more far into a dark room, I bring
more order into the room
since the unknown parts of it get structured. Both absurdism and magic
realism
deal more with the unknowable instead of the unknown, and are therefore
not that much concerned with bringing order.
> At any
> rate, even if it were Apollonian as opposed to the Dionysian, I still don't
> see how this pertains to any continuum of maturity.
The exploration stage of a human being usually takes place in its early
years.
> > Lorca's complaints about Dali where usually focussed on Dali's 'hiegenic
> > nature' which expressed itself as an almost obsessive urge to want to
> > see birds in the air, and fish in the sea, and wanting to see grass
> > green and air blue but all with as much conflict as possible.
>
> Well, who cares about Dali at any rate?
I don't see why Dali should not be considered a surrealist.
Dale Houstman
>
>
> > > But it seems to me your work has much more in common with the
absurdists
> > > than the surrealists.
> >
> > This is all just subjective aesthetics. My work may or may not have much
to
> > do (superficially) with absurdism, but the fact is I am rather immersed
in
> > surrealism, active in a local group and so on.
>
> Picasso was a member of some communist party. Does that make his work
> communist?
If you can't see the difference, I may have difficult explaining it to you.
Communism doesn't make great claims about being an exploration of the
imagination, so surrealism and communism (despite the presence of the
"isms") are not equivalent in regard to art: in other words, it is different
than saying "Monet was a member of the Impressionists. Does that make his
work Impressionist?" Yet, IF Picasso said his work was communist, it might
be different. I am saying my work is surrealist, that it is informed by
surrealiist attitudes, and - frankly - I know my personal history a trifle
better than you do. >
> >
>
> To tell the truth, I don't really have a clue what should be considered
> surrealist or not,
> and the faq that was posted here doesn't make it any better. I do not
> personally consider Lautremont
> to be very surrealist, which makes it even worse since things pretty
> much started with that guy.
Why do you not consider Lautremont to be "very surrealist"? Of course, he
predates the movement. But he is admired by the surrealists for his
dedication (like De Sade) to a liberation from current sexual and religious
constrictions, and for the violence of his imagination. Since all the early
surrealists admired him, and I admire those qualities in him, why do you
think your opinion as to his "mantle of surrealist interest" is particularly
relevant?
> I like almost all art forms, in the sense that in each discipline people
> work who are really
> good at what they are doing. I do not really understand why some people
> only seem to fanatically
> appreciate one sort of thing, however.
This strikes me as irrelevant: surrealism is not an art form, ( you seem
unable to cope with this fact) and an appreciation of surrealism does not
limit one's parameters of appreciation. There is very little outside the
scope of surrealist interest, and - as is obvious from the work of the
surrealists (which includes what we would call abstraction) surrealism is
not a genre of painting.
Surrealism seems to me a rather
> psychologically biased, in the
> sense that its supposed 'mind exploring' qualities are often much more
> unclear and escher-like than
> the same qualities I see in the symbolists or conceptualists. It too
> often presents itself as the only
> ideology that stretches in those directions, which i think is very
> false.
Your statement is false, that's true.
Surrealism does not present itself as some "lone crusader."
>
> >
>
> Why does the Universe in the surrealist option have to make sense?
> The artistic possibilities of a nonsensic cosmos are infinitly larger.
Read Peret and Arp, and tell me the surrealist Universe has to make sense.
>
>
> I am not certain that
> > "maturity" (whatever that term might mean) must inevitably bring
nihilism
> > and discouragement, leaving only smothered black laughter.
>
> Why is nonsense always associated with depression?
Absurdity and nonsense - in literature - are two entirely different
concepts. Nonsense is mainly a humorous pursuit - the surrealists admired
Lear and Carroll, etc. Absurdity can be humorous, but it tends to be
dark-toned and - in your word - psychological.
>
>
>
> Just observe how much emphasis new age music puts on mind exploration,
> and
> the analogy should be rather obvious.
Silly fake parallelism. An analogy based on one characteristic is entirely
specious.
>
>
> > > Above definitions make it clear that, since magic realism is almost
> > > entirely without conflict, it creates disorder. Surrealism, on the
other
> > > hand, is entirely focused on bringing order to the known universe and
> > > thus it's easily classified as rather appolonian.
> >
> > I don't see how attempting to see what is "there" - in all its aspects,
is
> > necessarily a matter of bringing order, but merely one of noticing.
>
> That seems silly to me. Observing things is ordering them, as molecular
> theories show aptly.
Okay, then if observing is ordering, and we all observe, then why are you so
upset about ordering? It's inevitable isn't it?
>Both absurdism and magic
> realism
> deal more with the unknowable instead of the unknown, and are therefore
> not that much concerned with bringing order.
One cannot deal with the unknowable. It is very odd that you think merely
perring into a darkened room is bringing order, but that organizing and
composing a book isn't. Magic realism is thus - in your view - about order.
Where's the beef?
>
> > At any
> > rate, even if it were Apollonian as opposed to the Dionysian, I still
don't
> > see how this pertains to any continuum of maturity.
>
> The exploration stage of a human being usually takes place in its early
> years.
But actually the Apollonian/Dionysian dichotomy isn't this simple. Children
are often depicted as Dionysian in their chaotic energies. To declare that
Apollo (a symbol of rationalism) is somehow less "mature" than Dionysis is
incorrect.
>
>
> >
> > Well, who cares about Dali at any rate?
>
> I don't see why Dali should not be considered a surrealist.
>
>
I didn't say he wasn't a surrealist (at some point), but his pursuit of
sensationalism, publicity, money, fascism, and catholicism are at odds with
what passes for surrealism. If you have read anything about surrealism this
should be obvious.
dmh
cythera
<3ab1849c....@news.sdf.bellsouth.net> :
>
>>
>>[...] surrealist.
>>
>>
>>Martijn
>>
>
>?
>Surrealism?:
>
>Lesson In White
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>Under white the last train bleeds to a halt,
>hot sparks setting off underground fires.
>Unearthed insects flee to the blackened ties --
>the trainmen hurl them to the circling dogs.
>
>Here, no one believes that gravity is gentle,
>no one imagines broken cages signs of freedom.
>Everywhere, the white's exchanged or sold outright.
>It is pulled quickly over the children's bodies
>lest they become corpses, heaped on tonight's train,
>insect shapes, with jutting mandibles, back-twisted limbs,
>under white before another dawn descends.
>
>Carcasses of torpedoed ships fall to the deep trenches.
>In white, factory smokestacks advertise gigantic sales.
>The butcher work-gangs start at one end of the ghetto
>and work in the soft quiet, gently sawing the bones
>with fine-toothed knives to even out the loads.
>They work in white to calm the milling crowds,
>restless to leave and frightened enough of the dogs.
>
>No one resists the falling of the white --
>the loading of the trains. The dogs must be fed,
>they think, logically, and go about their business.
>White covers everything.
>
>
>
>Jim
>?
(Draft 2)
________________________
The Spiral-Finned Rifle
________________________
The words are in love with the spaces around them, like
Akhenaton staring at the sun
It’s blowing the wind from the diaries
the silk sash of kimonos
Below the misted horizon,
a ship,
slowly filling with people
One of them is you in five years
Your heart is a scarab
I’ll form you
an Art
Nouveau key
chain,
embossed with the word,
"ELSA"
Elsa, the wind of a kite has your name on it
Elsa, you left a world by the river
At the foot of the stairs my wrist was broken and
lay in a pool of wine
A car pulled up to my shoulder
Out came a coachman with the face of a doorman
He offered me a house in the country
The word "Now" always stirring the grasses
Always
always
At the moment of remembering
I hear the laughing of bells
---
cythera
<3AB27BFA...@brabant.nl> :
>
>cythera wrote:
>
>> >I have a hard time thinking of three surrealist artists i like, though.
>>
>> What is your opinion of these artists' work?
[...]
>> Rene Magritte.
>
>I dislike almost anything that man ever made.
Hmmm? Is there something that you don't dislike then? And what about "Song
of Love" do you find awful? I love it.
>
>> Leonora Carrington (her newer painting in particular.)
>
>The older ones are particulary fit for New Age postcards, but
>her later work improved quite a lot. She became more like a naive
>iconographer rather than a surrealist, though.
I was thinking if magic realism is also considered a style of painting, her work could be said to fall within it or at least cross over. Agree?
A recent painting, Big Badger Meets the Domino Boys, 1986:
http://www.albany.edu/museum/wwwmuseum/crossing/artist4.htm
A recent lithograph, Cocodrilos, 1974
http://artscenecal.com/ArticlesFile/Archive/Articles1995/Articles1295/Carrington1.html
http://artscenecal.com/ArticlesFile/Archive/Articles1995/Articles1295/Carrington.html
>I like Mark Kostabi, though he is working more futuristically than
>surrealistically. There are some of his works here:
>
>http://www.markkostabi.com/
>
>
>Martijn
Thanks for the url; I'll check it out later.
http://mirror.tvd.be/cjackson/redon/p-redon20.htm
Dale Houstman
>
>
>
>
> > Leonora Carrington (her newer painting in particular.)
>
> The older ones are particulary fit for New Age postcards, but
> her later work improved quite a lot. She became more like a naive
> iconographer rather than a surrealist, though.
Again you seem to confuse surrealism with an style of art. Leonora
Carrington was a surrealist and would have been one if she had quit painting
and writing altogether. There is no doubt her style of painting changed, and
I prefer her later work also, as she remakes medieval motifs. But the
validity of her surrealism doesn't lie in her style of painting, but in her
stance as to a range of subjects. One might easily say that Arp was an
abstract painter also, and not be incorrect, but this has little bearing on
his position as a surrealist.
As for Magritte: he's marvelous.
dmh
Martijn Benders
Dale Houstman wrote:
> > > Leonora Carrington (her newer painting in particular.)
> >
> > The older ones are particulary fit for New Age postcards, but
> > her later work improved quite a lot. She became more like a naive
> > iconographer rather than a surrealist, though.
>
> Again you seem to confuse surrealism with an style of art.
What else would it be? A lifestyle? A philosophy? As i told you, I'm not
bying those arguments.
Leonora
> Carrington was a surrealist and would have been one if she had quit painting
> and writing altogether.
So surrealism is a religion?
>
> As for Magritte: he's marvelous.
Why?
Martijn
cythera
<3AB49DD1...@brabant.nl> :
>
>Dale Houstman wrote:
>
>> > > Leonora Carrington (her newer painting in particular.)
>> >
>> > The older ones are particulary fit for New Age postcards, but
>> > her later work improved quite a lot. She became more like a naive
>> > iconographer rather than a surrealist, though.
>>
>> Again you seem to confuse surrealism with an style of art.
>
>What else would it be? A lifestyle? A philosophy? As i told you, I'm not
>bying those arguments.
Well, it IS a type of visual art encompassing any number of styles: what else is one to call the majority of Magritte's work if not surrealism or
surrealist?
But to limit surrealism to visual art or image is to ignore a body of work in other media, including, for example, Breton's essays. If you want to know
what surrealism is, look at what well-known examples across various media all have in common.
I have never seen a thorough, clear explanation of what that commonality is, but with familiarity it becomes more easy to recognize. Certainly (as I think you already know) it's not rhetoric.
>
> Leonora
>> Carrington was a surrealist and would have been one if she had quit painting
>> and writing altogether.
>
>So surrealism is a religion?
>
>>
>> As for Magritte: he's marvelous.
>
>Why?
Excellent question.
>
>Martijn
Dale Houstman
>
>
> Dale Houstman wrote:
>
> > > > Leonora Carrington (her newer painting in particular.)
> > >
> > > The older ones are particulary fit for New Age postcards, but
> > > her later work improved quite a lot. She became more like a naive
> > > iconographer rather than a surrealist, though.
> >
> > Again you seem to confuse surrealism with an style of art.
>
> What else would it be? A lifestyle? A philosophy? As i told you, I'm not
> bying those arguments.
>
amount of historical evidence to the contrary. Breton and the other original
surrealists wrote political mainfestos, engaged in a plethora of
political/social/psychological activites, and composed a rather large group
of texts dedicated to what is essentially a philosophy of sensations. You
can - as a free human being - believe anything you wish to, just as I can
choose to believe the moon is made of velcro - but that won't make it true.
At this point - since you refuse to drop what is basically a willfully
contrarian stance, there is no further point to talking.
dmh
Martijn Benders
Dale Houstman wrote:
> > What else would it be? A lifestyle? A philosophy? As i told you, I'm not
> > bying those arguments.
> >
> Well - then don't. However you take this opinion in the face of a massive
> amount of historical evidence to the contrary.
That's bullshit. So Breton wrote a few politically inspired essays.
That doesn't make surrealism a political movement, let alone a lifestyle
or a philosophy. 'L'amour fou' and most of the rest are almost entirely
hackneyed from sufi and persian transcripts, and no one who ever studied
philosophy would consider these pamphlets reason enough to lift up a
brow.
Breton and the other original
> surrealists wrote political mainfestos, engaged in a plethora of
> political/social/psychological activites, and composed a rather large group
> of texts dedicated to what is essentially a philosophy of sensations.
A philosophy of sensations? Like that was anything new. Rimbaud had far
more interesting theories with his philosophies of sensory derangements;
in this case the surrealists just took a step backwards toward the
bourgeoisie. Even Dali was far more original with his 'critical
paranoia' than this weak residue of 'amour fou', which is more like a
'Kahlil Gibran tries Nietzsche on the gulf course'.
You
> can - as a free human being - believe anything you wish to, just as I can
> choose to believe the moon is made of velcro - but that won't make it true.
I'm not believing anything, and certainly not any surrealist propaganda
that doesn't make any sense at all viewed in artistic context.
> At this point - since you refuse to drop what is basically a willfully
> contrarian stance, there is no further point to talking.
Whatever.
I bet I'm 'willfully contrarian' too when I say that I don't like
Margritte, right? I'd really like to hear some arguments that account
for the opinion that he was a greater artist than Dali, though.
Compared to Malevitz Breton had little to revolutionize, in 'anything
goes' impressionist Paris and his stance against Chirico, who was far
more talented than he was, leaves me just with a ridiculous impression.
Dale Houstman
>
>
> Dale Houstman wrote:
>
> > > What else would it be? A lifestyle? A philosophy? As i told you, I'm
not
> > > bying those arguments.
> > >
> > Well - then don't. However you take this opinion in the face of a
massive
> > amount of historical evidence to the contrary.
>
> That's bullshit.
No it isn't.
> So Breton wrote a few politically inspired essays.
More than a few. A LOT, and all the surrealists were actively engaged in the
political and social movements of the time. You simply are ignorant on the
subject and cannot admit it.
> That doesn't make surrealism a political movement, let alone a lifestyle
> or a philosophy. 'L'amour fou' and most of the rest are almost entirely
> hackneyed from sufi and persian transcripts, and no one who ever studied
> philosophy would consider these pamphlets reason enough to lift up a
> brow.
You're wrong there there too, but that's par for the course it appears.
>
> Breton and the other original
> > surrealists wrote political mainfestos, engaged in a plethora of
> > political/social/psychological activites, and composed a rather large
group
> > of texts dedicated to what is essentially a philosophy of sensations.
>
> A philosophy of sensations? Like that was anything new.
Even if it weren't "new" (like your profound insights into a subject you
know little about) that wouldn't render it untrue. That's a different
discussion, and one Breton addressed himself.
>Rimbaud had far
> more interesting theories with his philosophies of sensory derangements;
And the surrealists gave him due credit - repeatedly. Again: it is
irrelevant (to the question of the political nature of the surrealists)
whether or not the surrealists' ideas bore you. There are many boring and
derivative political figures: yet they still remain political figures. You
seem to have a difficult time focussing on a point.
> in this case the surrealists just took a step backwards toward the
> bourgeoisie. Even Dali was far more original with his 'critical
> paranoia' than this weak residue of 'amour fou', which is more like a
> 'Kahlil Gibran tries Nietzsche on the gulf course'.
You say so - and I don't agree. "Amour fou" is only one aspect of many. Do
you need to repeatedly narrow the discussion to make your lame points?
>
>
> You
> > can - as a free human being - believe anything you wish to, just as I
can
> > choose to believe the moon is made of velcro - but that won't make it
true.
>
> I'm not believing anything, and certainly not any surrealist propaganda
> that doesn't make any sense at all viewed in artistic context.
Surrealism is not an art movement, junior. And I am not spreading
propaganda. You just don;t like being disagreed with. A common and
unattractive trait.
>
> > At this point - since you refuse to drop what is basically a willfully
> > contrarian stance, there is no further point to talking.
>
> Whatever.
> I bet I'm 'willfully contrarian' too when I say that I don't like
> Margritte, right? I'd really like to hear some arguments that account
> for the opinion that he was a greater artist than Dali, though.
Actually I didn't say he was a "greater artist" than Dali - again you resort
to making up arguments on your own. I do enjoy Magritte more - especially as
he didn't turn into a money and publicity grubbing Catholic. But that's my
opinion. Dali is often - especially for Americans - the first and only
contact with surrealism, yet he hardly consitutes the end all and be all of
the movement. It really makes no difference to me if you insist on repeating
the same arguments as though they were strikingly astute.
>
>...leaves me just with a ridiculous impression.
>
I think you have a lot of ridiculous impressions. It's just one more in a
big pile: why quibble?
dmh
Dale Houstman
"Jonathan" <stu...@alt.net> wrote in message
news:9947b8$i64$0...@dosa.alt.net...
>
> "Dale Houstman" <dm...@citilink.com> wrote in message
> news:3ab52c28$0$48741$65a9...@news.citilink.com...
> >
> > "Martijn Benders" <interga...@brabant.nl> wrote in message
> > news:3AB49DD1...@brabant.nl...
> > >
> > >
>
>
> Yesterday I watched the driver of a brand new, absolutely beautiful,
> fluorescent blue Aston Martin DB 7 pull into a McDonald's drive in window.
>
Not even close.
dmh
skye
Surrealism is a *bit* more than "just" an art movement or "style"; Indeed,
IMO, it is as MUCH an attitude, perspective, and philosophy as a
critical/theoretical aesthetic, and HARDLY requires argumentation to
validate;
BUT, I particularly liked the bit about "willfully contrarian stance", ie.,
argumentation because one CAN rather than as a process of exchanging ideas;
That surely DOES seem to be going around quite a lot lately (actually,
sometimes that seems to be a rather common feature ~here~); Mebbe it has
something to do with Hacienda fever, a latter-day variant of the
seasonal-affect cabin-type ennui-virus?
Anywho, the quip about the moon being made of velcro WAS particularly
amusing since, as practically EVERYBODY knows, although the NOTION of
stickiness as a TYPE of bonding system is an inherant feature of the moon's
composition, its true constitution is a matter of difference of KIND, as of
course the moon is more like Bondo™ in being the basal reactive portion of
an epoxy-like polymer substance, only lacking a suitable reactant in
sufficient quantity to render the moon a hard plastic orb with few surface
features, having a density/mass ratio of 1.653 and a hardness index rating
of 8.326 on the Bessemer Scale;
skye
Joshua P. Hill
The steps were the syllables, the landings the lines . . . and the
house was my Mom <g>
Josh
morfydd
Joshua P. Hill <XXjos...@mindspring.com> wrote in message
news:0c3gbtgh97evduvrg...@4ax.com...
> The steps were the syllables, the landings the lines . . . and the
> house was my Mom <g>
>
> Josh
Aww Josh, that's meltable :-)
The only immediate dream I can relate to writing was one where all of us at
aapc were in a meeting and it started to cloud over and a storm came. My
kids were playing a ball game in a playground and as the lightening started
to come down I realise they were all fenced in, and they couldn't get out.
Now I am absolutely terrified of lightening, but one of you guys (and I'm
not going to say who!) came with me and helped me tear down the fences to
free the kids. It was a delightful, scary kind of dream and I woke up
feeling really focused afterwards :-)
I actually drew from the atmosphere of that dream to write Nain Pines!
Mop
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Joshua P. Hill
<mor...@nospam.aladdinscave.net> wrote:
>Aww Josh, that's meltable :-)
>
>The only immediate dream I can relate to writing was one where all of us at
>aapc were in a meeting and it started to cloud over and a storm came. My
>kids were playing a ball game in a playground and as the lightening started
>to come down I realise they were all fenced in, and they couldn't get out.
>Now I am absolutely terrified of lightening, but one of you guys (and I'm
>not going to say who!) came with me and helped me tear down the fences to
>free the kids. It was a delightful, scary kind of dream and I woke up
>feeling really focused afterwards :-)
>
>I actually drew from the atmosphere of that dream to write Nain Pines!
Now that's what I call inspiring! Me, I have these dreams where I'm in
a subway tunnel, and there are four tracks, and four trains appear on
the four tracks leaving me no place to run . . .
Josh
cythera
That's pretty . . . and the stars were the alphabet? :).
cythera.
Joshua P. Hill
<donot...@interbulletin.bogus> wrote:
Then there's the question of syllables and stanzas . . .
Josh
Dale Houstman
"Joshua P. Hill" <XXjos...@mindspring.com> wrote in message
news:7knlbt89hvt740l12...@4ax.com...
Blank verse (with a dash of bitters).
dmh
matthew lyons
just nothing going on in that head of yours and that's the reason you end up
with crap. jackass.
matthew lyons
"he dreamed he was a bulldozer, he dreamed he was alone in an empty field."
- godspeed you black emperor!