On 8/4/05 12:41 PM, "Frank Parker" <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> My bent is more esoteric, "In the beginning was the word...", that naming
> one's world is an act of divination, bringing into being, acknowledging that
> the conscious stones and our own consciousness is entwined. I also think of
> Jacob wrestling the angel who would not let him go until Jacob could name
> him (the angel). The power of language is not just in order to grasp things
> better, it is to know them and ourselves inter-related in the dance (that
> dancing sitting down even).
Yes, I see what you're saying Hal... Handke's (and Sebald's) take on
language is rather darker. And despite the beauty of St John's logos, I
tend to gravitate towards the feeling that description is a form of
ownership; the Victorians with their relentless imperial categorisations of
nature come to mind... How is knowing _not_ grasping? I'm not suggesting
that one shouldn't know or name; just saying that that seems to me one of
the dilemmas of consciousness.
> Over the years I've heard the word opaque used in connection with poetry and
> it grates on me. Why would I want an opaque literature, "impenetrable by
> light; neither transparent nor translucent, not reflecting light; having no
> luster"?
Sebald's idea of opacity as a rebellion probably bears a little explication,
as I've done it no justice. He is wondering whether language can, in any
sense, be an adequate expression of experience; and he is thinking of
Kaspar's pre-speech existence, which he retrieves through a series of images
("candles and bloodsuckers; horses and pus; hoarfrost and rats..." which
seem to him, nevertheless, to be "authentic documents of his being. Thanks
to them he can say, 'I still experienced myself"."
Sebald goes on to remark: ""The training to which he (Kaspar) has been
subjected could not entirely obliterate his memory of his beginnings. He can
still go back behind what he has learned. The wild metaphors he brings back
from such excursions are, in their disparate nature, like what have been
called 'metaphors of a paranoia...a poetic protest against the invasion of
others'. The crystallisation point of this sign of intended rejection comes
at those moments when... 'the utmost need to communicate comes together with
the ultimate speechlessness'. However, where images escape that paralytic
confrontation they feature, being impenetrable ciphers, as examples of
broken rebellion."
So a failed freedom as a radical alienation, rather than a finally releasing
wrestle with the named angel... I must say that the former seems truer to
me.
Best
A
Alison Croggon
Blog: http://theatrenotes.blogspot.com
Editor, Masthead: http://masthead.net.au
Home page: http://alisoncroggon.com
|