Is Tom PoMo?
Dale Kirby
Do youse guys think that Tom is a post-modernis?
Dale, curiously ignorant.
Robert Stubblefield
On Fri, 12 Jul 1996, Dale Kirby <da...@RAIN.ORG> wrote:
>Do youse guys think that Tom is a post-modernis?
>
>Dale, curiously ignorant.
>
>
bobby
Verdant
>Do youse guys think that Tom is a post-modernis?
>
>Dale, curiously ignorant.
>
>
Verdant
Ken Booker
In article <v01540b00ae0c97092526@[198.68.144.142]>, Dale Kirby
<da...@RAIN.ORG> wrote:
> Do youse guys think that Tom is a post-modernis?
>
> Dale, curiously ignorant.
I don't think so...but, then again, who *would* be considered
post-modernist? I guess Joyce and Beckett would be "modernist" authors,
like Pollock and Rothco were "modernist" painters and Stockhausen & Cage
were "modernist" composers...
I guess Robbins is really, in many ways, pretty traditional as far as form.
Can anyone identify a post-modernist writer? or define post-modernist
writing? I'm pretty ignorant.
--
Ken Booker - UT Austin
All day and night, music,
a quiet, bright
reedsong. If it
fades, we fade.
-- Rumi
Kent Nichols
In article <kbooker-1307...@slip-6-2.ots.utexas.edu>,
Ken Booker <kbo...@mail.utexas.edu> wrote:
>In article <v01540b00ae0c97092526@[198.68.144.142]>, Dale Kirby
><da...@RAIN.ORG> wrote:
>
>> Do youse guys think that Tom is a post-modernis?
>>
>> Dale, curiously ignorant.
>
>I don't think so...but, then again, who *would* be considered
>post-modernist? I guess Joyce and Beckett would be "modernist" authors,
>like Pollock and Rothco were "modernist" painters and Stockhausen & Cage
>were "modernist" composers...
>
>I guess Robbins is really, in many ways, pretty traditional as far as form.
>
>Can anyone identify a post-modernist writer? or define post-modernist
>writing? I'm pretty ignorant.
Delillo writing style is fairly PoMo, but his motives are definately
modernist. It's hard to be a PoMo novelist because the novel is such
an anti-PoMo medium. I think Coupland comes close, especially with
his short stories.
From HAIFP and the beginning of Jitterbug Perfume I would say that
Tom is not PoMo because he believews that there is an underlying theme
tying everything together.
In a post-modern world the bottomline is that nobody knows -- so sure
Tom is PoMo. And yes Tom is not PoMo.
-K
--
Kent Nichols | gri...@ecst.csuchico.edu | Media Monster
Keith
>On Wed, 17 Jul 1996, Barb Karman wrote:
>
>> >In article <v01540b00ae0c97092526@[198.68.144.142]>, Dale Kirby
>> ><da...@RAIN.ORG> wrote:
>> >
>> >> Do youse guys think that Tom is a post-modernis?
>> >>
>> >> Dale, curiously ignorant.
>> >
>> >I don't think so...but, then again, who *would* be considered
>> >post-modernist? I guess Joyce and Beckett would be "modernist" authors,
>> >like Pollock and Rothco were "modernist" painters and Stockhausen & Cage
>> >were "modernist" composers...
>> >
>> >I guess Robbins is really, in many ways, pretty traditional as far as form.
>> >
>> >Can anyone identify a post-modernist writer? or define post-modernist
>> >writing? I'm pretty ignorant.
>> >
>> >
>> >
>> >Ken Booker - UT Austin
>> >
>> >All day and night, music,
>> >a quiet, bright
>> >reedsong. If it
>> >fades, we fade.
>> >
>> > -- Rumi
>>
>>
>> uniformity, alienation, everythings gone to shit and i know it and I'll
>> show you attitiude. It can also be absurdist, caricuturist,satire, stark,
>> unflinching realism,riddled with pop culture, seething with angst et cetra.
>> In short postmodern is a catch all phrase for the literature that appeared
>> on the scene after modernist movement which ended about 1941, i believe.
>>
>> Tom as a post modern. Why Ken. . .how can you say Tom is a traditionalist
>> regarding form?? A writer who boldly stops the action and tells the reader
>> its time for a celebration,so grab some champagne and we'll toast??
>>
>> A writer who erupts into long poetic passages at will? The passage on Pan
>> in Jitterbug perfume is an apt description. That is not a traditionalist
>> writer-- John Irving is a satirist who adheres pretty much to
>> traditionalist form. Tom does not.
>>
>> barb
>>
>Could somebody clarify how modern, postmodern, and contemporary fit in
>together? Would it be correct to say that the contemporary period of
>american literture could be broken into the modern and then postmodern
>subperiods? I'm taking contemporary am. lit. at the moment, which is
>covering a pretty varied bunch of writers: Barth, Kerouac, Irving,
>Updike, Pynchon. Does contemporary define the timeperiod and modern or
>postmodern define degree of experimentalism?
>
>Thanks, Amy
>
>
Well, in an earlier post I alluded to postmodernism finding its beginning in
1914, but actually, the numbers are turned around. 1914 was the beginning
of modernism . . . Barb's right, 1941 really began the serious postmodern
backlash to modernism. 1914 was the beginning of WWI, and typically, as
with most wars, it sparked a new generation of artists. The high emotions
that were running at the time due to the war seemed to spur new methods of
writing . . . "modernism."
And 1941 would be in the midst of WWII, of course.
By 1965 (Viet Nam?) we had moved completely into the postmodernism period,
in which I think many works can still be classified today. As far as
contemporary goes, I guess I'd just have to say that *I* think it's a
reference to current works, and more specifically, I think they relate to
the times. But this is one thing I've found with English Lit., that it's so
nebulous. When I read a novel, I get something totally different from it
than you will. I may hate it; you may think it's wonderful. When you
submit an essay, it's totally graded subjectively. It's entirely up to the
professor's opinion. That's why when I share my thoughts with you on
modernism, postmodernism, and contemporary lit., it may be different than
what someone else will say. Whaddayasay, Barbarian?
I'd say that Jay McInerny (spell?) is certainly contemporary (also full of
crap, oops, sorry). Yes, John Irving (bless his wonderful, talented soul)
is contemporary. I think Jane Smiley is contemporary; so is John Updike (my
personal favorite) and even the whore John Grisham. Sorry to put those two
Johns in the same sentence.
As far as modernist writers, I think of Wilfred Owen, T.S. Eliot, Yeats,
Aldous Huxley, Evelyn Waugh, Dylan Thomas. I've listed some postmoderns (my
opinion) in the other post. I still do think postmodernism came about
because of the RC Church rejecting modernism. I just had my dates twisted .
. . dyslexia, I guess. :-/
The Twisted,
Julie
wow, now you've got me anxious to start another semester, A.me!!
Amy Littlefield
Robert Stubblefield
On Wed, 17 Jul 1996, Dale Kirby <da...@RAIN.ORG> wrote:
>>In article <v01540b00ae0c97092526@[198.68.144.142]>, Dale Kirby
>><da...@RAIN.ORG> wrote:
>>
>>> Do youse guys think that Tom is a post-modernis?
>>>
>>> Dale, curiously ignorant.
>>
>>I don't think so...but, then again, who *would* be considered
>>post-modernist? I guess Joyce and Beckett would be "modernist" authors,
>>like Pollock and Rothco were "modernist" painters and Stockhausen & Cage
>>were "modernist" composers...
>>
>>I guess Robbins is really, in many ways, pretty traditional as far as form.
>>
>>Can anyone identify a post-modernist writer? or define post-modernist
>>writing? I'm pretty ignorant.
>
>
>Aren't Pynchon and Burroughs considered post-modern? But they seem more
>absurdist than Tom. I think Tom uses absurdity to illuminate meaning rather
>than just allude to it. Does that make sense?
>
>Dale
>
>
>oh yeah, and to my list, add Burroughs. so obvious i missed it.
bobby
Robert Stubblefield
On Wed, 17 Jul 1996, Keith <kev...@IX.NETCOM.COM> wrote:
>>In article <v01540b00ae0c97092526@[198.68.144.142]>, Dale Kirby
>><da...@RAIN.ORG> wrote:
>>
>>> Do youse guys think that Tom is a post-modernis?
>>>
>>> Dale, curiously ignorant.
>>
>>I don't think so...but, then again, who *would* be considered
>>post-modernist? I guess Joyce and Beckett would be "modernist" authors,
>>like Pollock and Rothco were "modernist" painters and Stockhausen & Cage
>>were "modernist" composers...
>>
>>I guess Robbins is really, in many ways, pretty traditional as far as form.
>>
>>Can anyone identify a post-modernist writer? or define post-modernist
>>writing? I'm pretty ignorant.
>>
>>
>>
>>Ken Booker - UT Austin
>>
>
>speaking of contemporary novels. The origin of it is that the Roman
>Catholic church disliked (to put it mildly) "modernism," and when this was
>made known, many people began referring to new works as "postmodernism,"
>just to differentiate from that which the church had condemned. This began
>around 1914 or so. However, I feel that more accurately "postmodern"
>applies to works that are experimental in nature. I've been talking to you,
>Ken, about Virginia Woolf's _The Waves_. I would certainly consider it to
>be postmodern. It's a novel that is not a novel. It is written in a form
>of dialogue, however, as the reader is exposed only to what the speaker is
>thinking. The dialogue is all one-sided. As children, Woolf shares the
>thoughts of her characters this way:
>
>"Now we march, two by two," said Louis, "orderly, processional, into chapel."
>
>"Now I will lean sideways as if to scratch my thigh," said Neville, "so I
>shall see Percival. There he sits, upright among the smaller fry. He
>breathes through his straight nose rather heavily."
>
>"The boasting boys," said Louis, "have gone now in a vast team to play
>cricket. They have driven off in their great brake, singing in chorus. All
>their heads turn simultaneously at the corner by the laurelbushes. Now they
>are boasting."
>
>And on it goes throughout the entire novel, just the thoughts of these
>"characters," their honest, unobstructed impressions. It's how we get to
>know them without the trappings of relationships, lies, and other
>accoutrements to interfere. We see them as children, as young adults, and
>finally as adults in this same fashion. It's unlike any other novel I've
>ever read. Extremely difficult to grasp at the beginning; torture,
>actually. But when I'd finished it I was utterly amazed. It was a work of
>beauty; it was unique. It was positively postmodern.
>
>Contemporary writing and postmodern writing are often linked. I think
>existentialism permeates much of the postmodern works. TR's writing often
>does fit in here, Dale, I think.
>
>Some good examples of postmodern authors: Fowles, Pynchon, Barthelme,
>Pinter. Here's a good quote about them, "they carry modernist assumptions
>about the world into the very realm of art itself."
>
>Sounds like TR to me.
>
>Julie
>
you said it better than i could have. to your list i would add Jim Dodge,
Jonathan Carroll and J.G. Ballard.
bobby
Dale Kirby
Hi Amy,
Is it possible that Contemporary, Modern and ??? are floating terms that
move up as time passes. E.g. what was Contemporary 50 years ago is Modern
now.
And that PoMo is a "school" of literature bound less by time than by
literary mindset?
Actually, I reread an earlier post of yours and you said essentially the
same thing. So we agree!
When I think of the writer's that congeal into a type-ing pool in my mind,
I think of McGuane, Vonnegut, Terry Southern, Tom Robbins, Bruce Jay
Friedman, Brautigan, Doug Coupland. They all have a comic tone with strong
subtext of meaning, but I think Tom is the only one that states and
summarizes the meaning in beautifully quoteable words.
What writers cluster in your mind around Tom Robbins?
Dale
Barb Karman
>>On Wed, 17 Jul 1996, Keith wrote:
>>
>>> By 1965 (Viet Nam?) we had moved completely into the postmodernism period,
>>> in which I think many works can still be classified today. As far as
>>> contemporary goes, I guess I'd just have to say that *I* think it's a
>>> reference to current works, and more specifically, I think they relate to
>>> the times. But this is one thing I've found with English Lit., that it's so
>>> nebulous. When I read a novel, I get something totally different from it
>>> than you will. I may hate it; you may think it's wonderful. When you
>>> submit an essay, it's totally graded subjectively. It's entirely up to the
>>> professor's opinion. That's why when I share my thoughts with you on
>>> modernism, postmodernism, and contemporary lit., it may be different than
>>> what someone else will say. Whaddayasay, Barbarian?
>>>
agendas,emotional experiences, cultural conditioning to the work. That's
reader response criticism:) The school of Fish, aside from historical and
biographical the only valid criticism in my book. Any of the other forms
are busywork for academics. . . you should have seen my lit crit teacher
pale and clutch her desk when i lobbed that flyball in class. i, ahem don't
even consider feminist criticism to be particularly valid. i mean it
doesn't take a sheenius to figure out the western canon was constructed by
males to educate males. . .
And how valid an exercise is it to dissect anything written by Henry James
and pronounce him phallocentrist?
Well no kidding, Alice(James,that is).
And how much value was it to me to have a feminist professor for American
Lit who took up an inordinate amount of time studying early american
"captivity" narratives written by women. . . when what i and the other
students in our class needed was thorough grounding in the classics of
American Literature in order to score really well on the GRE subject test.
. .
one stinking short story by Fitzgerald! Nothing by Dorothy Parker, Eudora
Welty,One play by O'Neill, one two page Hemingway, nothing by Flannery
O'Connor, lord I could rant on and on about the shoddy job that professor
did. . . .
Terrible class.
And what do the GRE tests focus on?
The classical western canon.
Post modern Side rant finished . . .and now back to the narrative
Oh and yes the terms contemporary and postmodern are pretty interchangable. . .
barb
>>Well, in my contemporary am. lit. course, they (text/instructor) have
>>lumped everything from 1945 on into the contemporary category. I think I
>>recall that the period immediately before that was referred to as
>>modern, so maybe this school of thought replaces what some call
>>postmodern with contemporary.
>>
>
>
>I'm thinking postmodern and contemporary can both be used to describe the
>same work. They're not mutually exclusive.
>
>Julie
>
>>At any rate, whether it's p.m. or c., Tom Robbins fits! In addition to the
>>other examples of this that have been posted,
>>the one that comes to my mind is the tribute to the Remington typewriter
>>at the beginning of SLWW. Has anyone ever seen anything by TR included in
>>anthologies or academic reading lists? Come to think of it, has he done
>>any short stories, etc.?
>>
>>Amy
Barb Karman
Argh!! Jules, A.Me--LOOK--the fiend is attempting to revise the canon
Oh woe to the pundits of parallel construction and paragraphs.
Lets Diagram him!!!
OR better yet. . . deconstruct him:)
barbarian at the gate,munching on an oreo cookie with an evil glint in her eyes.
Keith
Julie
"Their quarreling chewed through the curtains, pierced the casements, and
rattled over the cobblestones outside. How strange it must have sounded,
this quarrelng about dematerialization, voluntary aging, goat gods, and
immortality, to a city that was primed for the Age of Reason, a populace
that was beginning to put Descartes before des horse." - JP
Barb Karman
>In article <v01540b00ae0c97092526@[198.68.144.142]>, Dale Kirby
><da...@RAIN.ORG> wrote:
>
>> Do youse guys think that Tom is a post-modernis?
>>
>> Dale, curiously ignorant.
>
>I don't think so...but, then again, who *would* be considered
>post-modernist? I guess Joyce and Beckett would be "modernist" authors,
>like Pollock and Rothco were "modernist" painters and Stockhausen & Cage
>were "modernist" composers...
>
>I guess Robbins is really, in many ways, pretty traditional as far as form.
>
>Can anyone identify a post-modernist writer? or define post-modernist
>writing? I'm pretty ignorant.
>
>--
>
>
>Ken Booker - UT Austin
>
Barb Karman
hmm, i just looked up the dates in my Yeats book. Yeats was a modernist
according to my undergrad prof(god it felt soooo good to say that, so lofty
,so profound--like i'm supposed to know what the hell i'm talking about:)
okay here's the scoop:Modernism approximately 1914-1950 easy to place Joyce
and Eliot at the beginning. . . Auden considered last modernist poet.
Jackson Pollack occurred at the end of modernism so around fifty. . .
things just really went to postmodern hell, didn't they?
Good job adding further illumination, jelly baby
Reviving an ancient whovian doctrinal affectation
barb(see you affective JohnPaulist prose posters--nah nah I can do it too!)
Amy Littlefield
On Wed, 17 Jul 1996, Keith wrote:
> By 1965 (Viet Nam?) we had moved completely into the postmodernism period,
> in which I think many works can still be classified today. As far as
> contemporary goes, I guess I'd just have to say that *I* think it's a
> reference to current works, and more specifically, I think they relate to
> the times. But this is one thing I've found with English Lit., that it's so
> nebulous. When I read a novel, I get something totally different from it
> than you will. I may hate it; you may think it's wonderful. When you
> submit an essay, it's totally graded subjectively. It's entirely up to the
> professor's opinion. That's why when I share my thoughts with you on
> modernism, postmodernism, and contemporary lit., it may be different than
> what someone else will say. Whaddayasay, Barbarian?
>
Well, in my contemporary am. lit. course, they (text/instructor) have
lumped everything from 1945 on into the contemporary category. I think I
recall that the period immediately before that was referred to as
modern, so maybe this school of thought replaces what some call
postmodern with contemporary.
At any rate, whether it's p.m. or c., Tom Robbins fits! In addition to the
John Harris
At 01:44 PM 7/17/96 -0700, you wrote:
>>In article <v01540b00ae0c97092526@[198.68.144.142]>, Dale Kirby
>><da...@RAIN.ORG> wrote:
>>
>>> Do youse guys think that Tom is a post-modernis?
>>>
>>> Dale, curiously ignorant.
>>
>>I don't think so...but, then again, who *would* be considered
>>post-modernist? I guess Joyce and Beckett would be "modernist" authors,
>>like Pollock and Rothco were "modernist" painters and Stockhausen & Cage
>>were "modernist" composers...
>>
>>I guess Robbins is really, in many ways, pretty traditional as far as form.
>>
>>Can anyone identify a post-modernist writer? or define post-modernist
>>writing? I'm pretty ignorant.
>
>
>Aren't Pynchon and Burroughs considered post-modern? But they seem more
>absurdist than Tom. I think Tom uses absurdity to illuminate meaning rather
>than just allude to it. Does that make sense?
>
>Dale
>
Not being a Lit major, could someone explain to me, much in the same way Ken
did so well with classical music, just what it is you are all discussing? I
am familiar with all the authors but not with the different schools and what
they represent. You will, of course, get extra credit and not have to stay
after school all semester.
Thanks,
John
Dale Kirby
Keith
>On Wed, 17 Jul 1996, Keith wrote:
>
>> By 1965 (Viet Nam?) we had moved completely into the postmodernism period,
>> in which I think many works can still be classified today. As far as
>> contemporary goes, I guess I'd just have to say that *I* think it's a
>> reference to current works, and more specifically, I think they relate to
>> the times. But this is one thing I've found with English Lit., that it's so
>> nebulous. When I read a novel, I get something totally different from it
>> than you will. I may hate it; you may think it's wonderful. When you
>> submit an essay, it's totally graded subjectively. It's entirely up to the
>> professor's opinion. That's why when I share my thoughts with you on
>> modernism, postmodernism, and contemporary lit., it may be different than
>> what someone else will say. Whaddayasay, Barbarian?
>>
>Well, in my contemporary am. lit. course, they (text/instructor) have
>lumped everything from 1945 on into the contemporary category. I think I
>recall that the period immediately before that was referred to as
>modern, so maybe this school of thought replaces what some call
>postmodern with contemporary.
>
I'm thinking postmodern and contemporary can both be used to describe the
same work. They're not mutually exclusive.
Julie
>At any rate, whether it's p.m. or c., Tom Robbins fits! In addition to the
Dale Kirby
>
>For some reason I don't place TR in my category-in-the-head belonging to
>"classic" writers (meaning, sure to end up in college texts and
>anthologies if they're not already). What do you think??
>
>Amy :')
I think Robbins is in some ways a throw-back to the time when novelists
took a leisurely approach with philosophical asides and long descriptive
passages a la Tristam Shanty, Gulliver's Travels etc. Also, he is in
somewhat of a Southern tradition of story telling with wry comments by the
author and a disingenuous tone a la Mark Twain, William Price Fox, and even
Walker Percy. Does that makes sense?
Dale
MAY THOMAS JOSEPH
In article <1.5.4.32.1996071...@earthlink.net>,
>did so well with classical music, just what it is you are all discussing? I
>am familiar with all the authors but not with the different schools and what
>they represent. You will, of course, get extra credit and not have to stay
>after school all semester.
>
>Thanks,
>John
I second that emotion. Of course, I am not so humble as to not have an
opinion about something I know absolutely nothing about (what the hell
kind of sentence is that?). Maybe TR is postmodern simply for placing
himself in the novel, having inanimate objects for characters, etc. but
innovative form and structure are not where his talent lies. I guess I
agree with Dale, although I have a problem with TR's tendency to
occasionally beat the reader over the head to illuminate his meaning,
rather than just using absurdist images. TR is one of my favorite authors
because of his infinitely quotable, hilariously appropriate similies and
metaphors, and his comicly meaningful characters. I just don't think that
it is appropriate to lump him into a category with someone like William S.
Burroughs.
What about John Barth as postmodern?
I guess that I should go back and read some more Virginia Woolfe. That
chick had some crazy stuff going on in her novels. I just wonder how many
Woolfe fans cringe at her being called a "chick"...hee,hee.
Shit, the more I think about it the less the term postmodern makes any
sense to me. Is it subject matter, form, technique, or simply the
chronological era? It probably is a combination, which makes the term all
the more meaningless. Forget everything that I said and I'll get back to
my paper about silicalite-1 gel synthesis...bleaah.
tom
Keith
Barb sez:
> All literature is subjective, and intimate. We bring our own
>agendas,emotional experiences, cultural conditioning to the work. That's
>reader response criticism:) The school of Fish, aside from historical and
>biographical the only valid criticism in my book. Any of the other forms
>are busywork for academics. . . you should have seen my lit crit teacher
>pale and clutch her desk when i lobbed that flyball in class. i, ahem don't
>even consider feminist criticism to be particularly valid. i mean it
>doesn't take a sheenius to figure out the western canon was constructed by
>males to educate males. . .
>And how valid an exercise is it to dissect anything written by Henry James
>and pronounce him phallocentrist?
>
>Well no kidding, Alice(James,that is).
>
>And how much value was it to me to have a feminist professor for American
>Lit who took up an inordinate amount of time studying early american
>"captivity" narratives written by women. . . when what i and the other
>students in our class needed was thorough grounding in the classics of
>American Literature in order to score really well on the GRE subject test.
>. .
>one stinking short story by Fitzgerald! Nothing by Dorothy Parker, Eudora
>Welty,One play by O'Neill, one two page Hemingway, nothing by Flannery
>O'Connor, lord I could rant on and on about the shoddy job that professor
>did. . . .
>Terrible class.
I've had this American Lit. class taught by this same teacher, Barbarian!!!
We read every damned Puritan woman's slave narrative and totally left behind
the little-known (tongue in cheek here, of course) Edgar A. Poe!!! She said
she "didn't like him." I don't care who you like, I need him for my GRE.
I know what it is, I've decided. These teachers don't *want* the GRE to
focus on the classics. They want the classics to be different . . . the
female slave writings. I'll say that I thought they were interesting . . .
somewhat. It was no Walden's, which we skipped in its entirety. No
Hawthorne at all. He's one of the DWEM's, you know. (Dead White European
Males) And we don't like DWEMs anymore. Nothing from Fitzgerald either.
Had to read him on my own last summer.
The first time I heard that we don't like DWEM's from her I was baffled.
Oh, we don't like these famous authors anymore? Benjamin Franklin didn't
have anything intelligent to say? I considered it for a semester. After
the prof. finished presenting the material that she deemed worthy of a
"classic," I realized she was totally full of shit. Harriet Beecher Stowe.
Now there's a female writer worthy of study. It's not that they're not
available, I don't think, it's just that we should be selective, not study
*every* female writer from that time; it's just not worth it.
I know what my Mom would say; it's an old adage. We've thrown out the baby
with the bathwater.
I do consider my future, however. I would like to be in that English
prof.'s shoes some day. Will I tire of reading/teaching the DWEM's? Will I
stretch out to find other material as well? Is that what's going on? The
canon is boring when read and reread semester after semester? Can't we read
it each time with new insights? Is that too difficult to maintain over the
years?
And as far as feminist lit. goes, I'm not so sure I agree oh barbed one. I
think there's a place for it. I'm glad there's a genre in this
classification. I know, I know, it's all based on a male-centered western
canon constructed by males for males. I agree wholeheartedly. But is there
something else upon which to build? Just because that's where the roots
are, does that mean the tree can't branch out into something more beautiful
than it was?
I think we've discussed here the need for a new language. Because this
language was constructed by men; women are borrowing it, in a way. ell,
okay, we've reclaimed it, excelled at it. But to truly begin a new
frontier, we'd need a new way of communicating. Something that was
constructed by women. What could that be?
I love this question. I love to ponder it. I have yet to come up with an
answer. We're so entrenched in the language it would be very difficult to
break out from it into something totally new. But we can dream. We can
conjure.
Julie
<snip, snip, snip good stuff . . .>
Amy Littlefield
I've been thinking about this all morning and can't think of anyone else
that I group Tom Robbins with. I don't really see him in the groping you
placed him with above (or the grouping, either ;) ], in fact. I think he
definitely has elements in common with the ones I'm familiar with--the
absurdity and humor of McGuane (nice to meet another T.McG. fan,
btw!); the fanatasy of Vonnegut and Brautigan. In this vein, I'd have to
add another favorite author-John Irving-because of their shared ability to
make characters come so much to life and just to write a damned good and
engrossing story.
I just can't come up with anyone who, like Robbins, puts in so much
philosophical editorializing and pontificating--or,
like I believe Tom said, beats the reader over the head to make his point
and at the same time tells a story that is still readable (for me).
He weaves great storytelling and characterization together with a very
unusual, fantastical, and addicting use of english language, all to make a
point that he rubs our noses in just in case we miss it. And to top it
all off, he makes sure we're laughing out loud so we don't become offended
if we disagree!
MAY THOMAS JOSEPH
In article <Pine.SUN.3.94.960718...@tophat.stetson.edu>,
I agree that there aren't any other writers who I group together with TR,
although that guy who wrote Coyote Blue (Christopher Moore?) seemed kind
of like a watered-down TR. I could seem him (TR) hanging out at the same
parties as Robert Anton Wilson though.
tom
Barb Karman
I'm with your mom on this one, Jules. The baby and the bath water have
rolled down the hill. Here's the conundrum. We set up standardized testing
for admission to grad schools. . .testing that primarily focuses on the
classics of literature and theory in british and American Literature. . .
but we are oh so outre all inclusive in our universities now that we give
our professors free rein to design curriculum. And if the prof wants us to
experience "forgotten" texts. . .
Courses such as you and experienced such be electives-- not the major.
I mean if you're going to throw the canon to hell. . .than toss out the
antiquated test too.
I didn't mean to imply that all feminist theory is "ka-ka":) I merely think
that gender exclusionists such as the profs we both seem to have
experienced tend to be dismissive of DWEM, DWAM(american) and for that
matter AWM:)any white male-- or PUWF(possibly unenlightened white female).
I've seen young fellows castigated in class-- because they are the
"oppressor" men asked to leave because they dared to disagree. The
atmosphere in the classroom is stifling, confrontational(feminist theorists
like bell hooks espouse this type of learning atmosphere) Well its reverse
discrimination imho-- and blatant at that.
And the worst part is administrations are accomodating.
There is a really good book out called "Who Stole Feminism?"that details
the rise of this class of gender exclusionist feminist on campuses
nationwide-- and the problems such attitudes can foster.
I understand what you are saying Jules, yes i too am glad that feminists
Kate Millet, NOW, Gloria Steinem, Betty Friedan had to the courage to
speak, to write to stand up. i also think there is a place for this type of
criticism.
But I honestly don't think the authors of the Scum Manifesto had this
exclusionist slant in mind way back when it was penned.
African-American literature is an elective, Native American literature,
Spanish lit, is an elective. . . yet why is the feminist agenda purported
as classics in literature in a standard lit class. . .
Your point about a new language is interesting, extremely interesting, but
I guess the way i see it that these are the words used to communicate. Do
we communicate in a vastly different way than males?? Nope; therefore the
mode and expression are virtually identical.
We can be just as bloodthirsty, just as cavegirl, just as willing to power
broker as males-- nad yes we were subjucated. . .historically we as a
people have spend thousands of years subjucating each other. The bottom
line is that men hunted for food, they were stronger. The strong tend to
subjucate the weaker of a species. There's the facts, and you are right, we
do have to start somehere, but this extreme form of exclusionism seems like
a flip-flop of this same cave-dweller mentality--and does nothing to solve
the real issues. Issues like poverty, pregnancy, abuse and assault.
Animosity is not the best path to enlightened discourse.
Just a few thoughts
barb
Ken Booker
In article <v01540b0eae144db072b8@[199.165.213.45]>, Dale Kirby
<da...@RAIN.ORG> wrote:
> >
> >For some reason I don't place TR in my category-in-the-head belonging to
> >"classic" writers (meaning, sure to end up in college texts and
> >anthologies if they're not already). What do you think??
> >
> >Amy :')
>
> I think Robbins is in some ways a throw-back to the time when novelists
> took a leisurely approach with philosophical asides and long descriptive
> passages a la Tristam Shanty, Gulliver's Travels etc. Also, he is in
> somewhat of a Southern tradition of story telling with wry comments by the
> author and a disingenuous tone a la Mark Twain, William Price Fox, and even
> Walker Percy. Does that makes sense?
> Dale
Very much so...in fact, when the TR "asides" were brought up earlier, I
thought of Swift...he did almost the same thing, and it was just as
abrupt...
for that matter, the comic interludes found in Shakespeare are just
completely out of the blue sometimes...
Owen Dulmage
Barb sez:
[a lot of good stuff before this, but this line cynched it for me...]
> Animosity is not the best path to enlightened discourse.
Yes indeed! Given that any rational being would agree that this
is, of course, so - why is it that animosity should fire the blood to HAVE
this discourse!
Ahh, humanity! Gotta love it!
Speaking of humanity (and all this) there's a WONDERFUL piece I
just read by Barbara Kingsolver. It's the first essay in her book, "High
Tide in Tucson."
I can't recommend it (or her) enough. This book (or, at the very
least, this essay) is a MUST-read.
Owen
Ken Booker
In article <v01510101ae12b5a68c6e@[206.183.22.62]>, Barb Karman
<bka...@CANNET.COM> wrote:
> Tom as a post modern. Why Ken. . .how can you say Tom is a traditionalist
> regarding form?? A writer who boldly stops the action and tells the reader
> its time for a celebration,so grab some champagne and we'll toast??
That type of thing I would view as "post-modern," at least in the way I
understand the term. I understand post-modernism, in all art, to be a
reaction to modernism. In post-modern art, architecture and music,
classical and modern elements are juxtaposed right up against one another
to create a whole that is somehow cohesive. The best and most obvious
example I can think of is the architecture building at the University of
Houston...I can't think of the name of the architect. basically, it's a
very traditional looking overall design, rather mundane actually, with the
exception that the Parthenon is sitting on top of it. Blatant, stark
juxtapositin...some think it's ugly...I find it refreshingly cool.
John Corigliano's opera "The Ghosts of Versailles," in which dramatic and
dense 20th century musical textures exist side-by-side with almost
Mozartian lightness is (for me) the definitive musical example. Plurality.
>
> A writer who erupts into long poetic passages at will? The passage on Pan
> in Jitterbug perfume is an apt description. That is not a traditionalist
> writer-- John Irving is a satirist who adheres pretty much to
> traditionalist form. Tom does not.
In that light, I think you're right, Barb...because, all in all, he does
cohere to classical forms, but he tends to juxtapose these poetic
eruptions which are part of what makes his work so quirky. Despite that,
there's always a cohesion to his work...making it eminently more readable
than someone I would consider ultra-modernist, like Joyce...it also is
nothing like "absurdist" writing, like Samuel Beckett's "Waiting for
Godot." I feel that that is deconstructivism...also, Julie, the Virginia
Wolf book you mentioned sounds more "modernist" to me than "post modern."
Just trying to understand for myself...
Ken
Dale Kirby
Julie wrote:
>I think we've discussed here the need for a new language. Because this
>language was constructed by men; women are borrowing it, in a way. ell,
>okay, we've reclaimed it, excelled at it. But to truly begin a new
>frontier, we'd need a new way of communicating. Something that was
>constructed by women. What could that be?
>
>I love this question. I love to ponder it. I have yet to come up with an
>answer. We're so entrenched in the language it would be very difficult to
>break out from it into something totally new. But we can dream. We can
>conjure.
>
>Julie
I agree and disagree with you Julie. (As it ever was.) It has been my
experience that most women have a better command of language than most men.
I suspect that back when men were still using 4 basic grunts to coordinate
their bison attacks that womyn were back at the camp chatting away about
among other things the fact that their men were uncommunicative and
wouldn't share any but their most basic feeling (lust, hunger and the urge
to play team sports.) So as far as language (maingly verbal language) is
concerned I suspect that womyn constructed it more than men did. But where
I agree is that men took over written language and I think that's probably
because they controlled religion and religion was the source of shared
written communication up to and including good old Gutenberg. What's the
first thing they printed? I believe it was a good old DWEM manifesto called
the bible.
That's why I think that PoMo and Avant Pop (hi Lance) and all forms of
satirical use of language liberates our manly stranglehold on it. Words
are meta-stized into a maleable form that can be de- re- and, well there
aren't any other good prefixes for -constructed.
So maybe we should just evolve the language we're all already so good at.
I've spent a lot of time beating myself up for not mastering a second
language and wasted a lot of time trying to acquire one. Recently I decided
that since English (with the Internet) is becoming the closest thing there
is to a Whole World Language that maybe my time would be best spent getting
better at it, rather than learning to say inanities in some other language.
Hey, it ain'tlike I'm ever going to be able to read One Hundred Years of
Solitude in its original language. At best, I might be able to translate at
garage sales.
Or we could use Vonnegut's aliens' method of communicating--tap dancing and
farting.
Dale
Keith
I agree with you more than you might think. I was just thinking aloud about
the possibilities of language and its evolution. And I think it's wonderful
fun to think about constructing a new form of communication. Not just
constructed by women, necessarily, and certainly not used exclusively by
women. But something both sexes acquire. I think our current form of
communication is capable of such evolution. . . it might be centuries,
however, before it occurs.
More down to earth, I think you're right about the second language, Dale. I
happen to be in the middle of second language hell, but it's for the English
degree. The net is certainly (if not becoming) the world wide stage and
we're all English speakers here. ;^>
Bueno,
Julie
Dale Kirby
I'm forwarding this message from the newsgroup manually cause I've noticed
that not all of them make the trip over to The List: Dale
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Hiya, everybody! I'm new to the newsgroup and all, but Dale asked me to
drop by and shed my two-cents (okay, one-cent) worth on pomo, since
I'm really into that sort of thing, and cuz I really really really love the
Tomster.
Well, "contemporary" is simply a chronological label that just means
"now." So all lit written today is contemporary.
"Premodern," "modern," and "postmodern," though, are modes of
thinking that have little to do with time. That is, Rabelais was a
postmodern thinker, though he lived at the launch of the Renaissance, and
ditto Melville in the nineteenth century, and, as we all well know, Newt
Gingrich is premodern as they come.
Premodern thought believes in an over-arching narrative that gives shape
and meaning to our lives--humanism in the Renaissance, let's say, or
rationalism in neo-classicism. Modern thought *wants* to believe in an
over-arching narrative, but senses there's not one to believe in, and so gets
desperate and often gloomy and fragmented in its expression--THE
WASTE LAND by Eliot, for instance, or Yeats' poetry. Postmodern
thought assumes there's no over-arching narrative to our lives and revels
in its absence, making fun of just about everything, including itself--and
hence you get writers like Burroughs, Pynchon, and beloved TR.
Now it sounds like these are three distinct categories, but in fact they exist
along some sort of moebius-strip continuum, and each has all manner of
subsets and so forth.
Among the subsets of the postmodern, people have begun talking about
something called the avant-pop over the last year or two...a mode that
embraces the avant-garde's delight in pushing the expressive envelope
along with pop art's ambivalence with media-reality...and it's in this
corner of heaven where I'd and many other lit types would especially
place Tom Robbins.
Thanks for letting me jabber. --Lance
--
***********************************
L*A*N*C*E***O*L*S*E*N
http://www.uidaho.edu/~lolsen
C*A*F*E***Z*E*I*T*G*E*I*S*T
***********************************
Ken Booker
In article <Pine.SUN.3.94.960719...@access1.digex.net>,
Owen Dulmage <zal...@access.digex.net> wrote:
>
> Ahh, humanity! Gotta love it!
i know what you mean...
>
> Speaking of humanity (and all this) there's a WONDERFUL piece I
> just read by Barbara Kingsolver. It's the first essay in her book, "High
> Tide in Tucson."
>
> I can't recommend it (or her) enough. This book (or, at the very
> least, this essay) is a MUST-read.
Coincidentally, I just read Kingsolver's "Animal Dreams" and was also
blown away...I absolutely loved it...
Barb Karman
Thanks Lance, your jabberwocky was much appreciated, shed light and defined
the essence of our "Is Tom postmodern/ modernist/ contemporary debate.
Return to our friendly fray with your illuminations anytime. Yes, self
conscious parody is certainly one of the more deliciously wicked aspects.
One of my favorites:)
Re: Cafe zeitgist. Wonderful pages. . .I just graduated from a college
that I swear thought postmodernism was a disease to be crushed,any
proponents of such heinous theories possibly burnt at the stake:)
Web pages in our English department?? Hah, trivial pursuits.
I didn't dare breathe I was a TR fan aloud there.
And thanks Dale for passing this along,I rarely check the newsgroup anymore
barbed
Tim Keene
In article <v01540b05ae13035bcf90@[198.68.144.146]>, Dale Kirby
<da...@RAIN.ORG> writes:
>When I think of the writer's that congeal into a type-ing pool in my
mind,
>I think of McGuane, Vonnegut, Terry Southern, Tom Robbins, Bruce Jay
>Friedman, Brautigan, Doug Coupland. They all have a comic tone with
strong
>subtext of meaning, but I think Tom is the only one that states and
>summarizes the meaning in beautifully quoteable words.
>
>What writers cluster in your mind around Tom Robbins?
>
>Dale
Kurt Vonnegut, Thomas Pynchon, Douglas Adams and Robert Anton Wilson.
Hail Eris!
Count Cagliostro
Lord High Show Gun,
El-Kabong Cabal, Knights of Malto Dextera (KMD)
Grand Disorient Lodge,
Order of the Rose and Columns (ORC)
Jeremy Patty
I saw a Discovery special last night regarding these liguistic
differences between men & women.
It seems men use only the left side of the brain when processing
languauge, but women use both sides of the brain simultaneously. In
the words of one analyst, parahrasing 'when you ask a woman how she
feels, she has instant access to that information. When you ask a
man, he has to analyze the question, send some impulses all the way
over to the other side, blah, blah, blah. . .
Julie, you do have a valid point in saying that these differences are
genetically based (isn't everything?) And as far as the explanation
goes, you are basically right on the money. . . they said this
increased linguistic development was due to women talking to their
children
Too much discovery channel,
Jeremy
Trent
How about the Tralfamadorian's method- telepathy? Doe that seem invasive
to anyone other than me?
I think I agree with Dale that English is becoming the most widely used
language. I also think it is constantly evolving and changing.
I, too, wish that I were more eloquent in the language I speak. One of
the reasons I admire TR so much is his ability not only to communicate
so well, but to have such fun doing it.
Wendy