Mark,
Thanks for that. Morrison's words stuck with me and they did seem to chime
with Doug's quote. The reality you describe is not so attractive as the erm
sentimental? version described by her but seems much more truthful.
Apologies for the use of at least two problematic words.
Tina
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>From: Anny Ballardini <[log in to unmask]>
>Reply-To: "Poetryetc: poetry and poetics" <[log in to unmask]>
>To: [log in to unmask]
>Subject: Re: The loss of memory/remembering
>Date: Thu, 7 Jun 2007 17:45:05 +0200
>
>I appreciate your pedantry. When I read Morrison's interpretation of the
>Mississippi it sort of stuck with me like an occult truth and I probably
>needed your elucidation to get rid of it. I agree on the mutable and
>inscrutable possibilities of rivers as of memory.
>
>On 6/7/07, Mark Weiss <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>
>>I'm not sure whether I agree with Ms. Morrison about the artistic
>>process, but I know that her river analogy is wrong. Left to its own
>>devices,the Mississippi, like all rivers that flow through
>>sedimentary deltas of their own creation, shifts its bed frequently
>>into former courses or brand new ones as its current bed fills with
>>sediment. What Morrison thinks of as its original course is the one
>>living humans remember, a recent course. Not being sentient, the
>>river's not remembering anything. Stretches of lowland river have a
>>tendency to straighten themselves--when the bed of the channel rises
>>a new channel often forms across the necks of oxbows. But the new
>>channels are as unstable as the old ones. The human channelling of
>>the Mississippi was partly to shorten the journey down its length but
>>largely to control this shifting, which inevitably has disastrous
>>economic effects, given the fixity of human, as opposed to riverine,
>>boundaries. The result has also been disastrous, causing fewer but
>>more disastrous floods, as the corseted river, dropping less sediment
>>because of its increased speed but nonetheless still dropping lots of
>>sediment, often flows above the level of the land beyond the levees.
>>Downstream, the lessened flow of sediment leads to Katrina and its like.
>>
>>Analogies are tricky things. Maybe hydrology is like memory, but if
>>so memory is a lot more complex and a lot less comforting.
>>
>>Mark, resident pedant.
>>
>>At 10:18 AM 6/7/2007, you wrote:
>> >Neat. It sure does connect, Tina...
>> >
>> >Doug
>> >On 6-Jun-07, at 1:09 PM, Tina Bass wrote:
>> >
>> >>Salt, Slavery and Other Hauntings: Deborah Jack's Shore (2004)
>> >>
>> >>The act of imagination is bound up with memory. You know, they
>> >>straightened out the Mississippi River in places, to make room for
>> >>houses and livable acreage. Occasionally the river floods these
>> >>places. 'Floods' is the word they use, but in fact it is not
>> >>flooding; it is remembering. Remembering where it used to be. All
>> >>water has a perfect memory and is forever trying to get back to
>> >>where it was. [Artists] are like that: Remembering where we were,
>> >>what valley we ran through, what the banks were like, the light
>> >>that was there and the route back to our original place. It is
>> >>emotional memory -- what the nerves and the skin remember as well
>> >>as how it appeared. And a rush of imagination is our 'flooding'
>> >>(Morrison, T. 1995).
>> >Douglas Barbour
>> >11655 - 72 Avenue NW
>> >Edmonton Ab T6G 0B9
>> >(780) 436 3320
>> >http://www.ualberta.ca/~dbarbour/
>> >
>> >Latest book: Continuations (with Sheila E Murphy)
>> >http://www.uap.ualberta.ca/UAP.asp?LID=41&bookID=664
>> >
>> >
>> >Art has to be forgotten: Beauty must be realized.
>> >
>> > Piet Mondrian
>>
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