This one demanded a long reading for the long writing Lawrence, but repaid.
Shifts not just of tone but of who presents as I, & this book is both sure of itself & just a bit insecure (as is that prince).
Yeah: I like it too
Doug
> On Dec 2, 2015, at 10:25 AM, Patrick McManus <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> L big snap paged out I'm a clay tablet man myself nothing like good jabbings in clay or even at a pinch I can accommodate a scroll -cheers P
>
> -----Original Message----- From: Lawrence Upton
> Sent: Wednesday, December 2, 2015 2:49 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: the bok says
>
> the book says
>
> all pages are mine
>
>
>
> but more than that, the book says
>
> pages take on existence within me
>
>
>
> a page outside
>
> is not a page
>
> but a sheet of paper
>
>
>
> a sheet of paper does not make a page, nor many pages a decent book
>
>
>
> it is what is written, each page, judged as a page...
>
>
>
> the content matters
>
>
>
> the book says
>
> keep pages tiny, hand-sized,
>
> light but not light-headed,
>
> slightly too large for the average pocket --
>
> or your words and illustrations will not seem serious:
>
> be a nuisance and you will be heard
>
>
>
> the book says that binding and pages,
>
> considered as concept, content, object and participant,
>
> are two sides, recto and verso, of one thing,
>
> an eye to the world,
>
> a pulse in the throat,
>
> the subjective and its objective somehow interpenetrating --
>
>
>
> what is a spoke without a wheel? what is a broken wheel?
>
>
>
> until there were books, continua of pages,
>
> writings were individual, devoid *largely* of meaning --
>
> a note would come, perhaps from a great prince to a great prince,
>
> but would not be considered, situated as it was on a scrap of paper --
>
>
>
> and you may make the paper as you wish!
>
> kill the finest strongest animals you have,
>
> do whatever must be done to their skin
>
> to make it pliable and receptive to and retentive of ink,
>
> make the finest ink of the richest earth,
>
> make the smoothest pens with which to write,
>
> and practice your scribes in the art of writing
>
>
>
> but what is a piece of paper to a great prince?
>
>
>
> the *words* of the message are best conveyed by human voice
>
> and so much more easily destroyed --
>
> a tongue is no match for a knife
>
> and will not grow back
>
>
>
> for it seems to me that the message written is not the message
>
> but a copy thereof which may be thrown away and even forgotten
>
> but is not destroyed,
>
> whereas the severed tongue will be eaten by vermin,
>
> and the voice with which it spoke is itself a portion of the tongue, you
> see?
>
> although now it is reduced to grunts by the power of my army –
>
>
>
> well, I am peaceful: if due credibility is given to my power in deed as in
> word,
>
> and reparations paid for my distress in this matter and so on --
>
> make the usual threats
>
>
>
> the book says
>
> a prince who is not recorded is not a prince for long
>
> better he learn to cope with books than he eschew them
>
>
>
> and we all turn and listen to the book
>
>
>
> but what of the binding?
>
>
>
> the binding strengthens
>
> it is indispensable, but it lacks a separate existence;
>
>
>
> and the writing on the spine, and the book mark,
>
> and the index and the foreword, and the preface --
>
>
>
> I am not a thing to be so analysed! a book?
>
> these things are thin reads
>
> without the breath of the book entire
>
>
>
> so says the book
>
> as if a little foxed
>
> not quite as cogent as it might be
>
>
>
> on another page the book says see how I am arranged
>
>
>
> I have my defences
>
> where only those literary marks
>
> which are consonant with my aims and objectives
>
> are allowed to stand -- my guards
>
>
>
> each page is isolated from the next,
>
> and converses with its fellows through my structures;
>
> thus are they ruled, thus are their lives made sensible
>
>
>
> my territory is subdivided and each subdivision will structure itself
>
> according to conventions
>
>
>
> if I were to act, for instance, a certain space would be allocated to
> personae,
>
> those labels we allow the threads which make up the fabric of a plot,
>
> to assert themselves, like roots, in so far as it is necessary --
>
> I have my doubts --
>
> there are more modern and technological approaches
>
>
>
> I would rather it were done with colour,
>
> I need a little tone, and some pictures,
>
> than to divide off from my narrative
>
> an element which is a part of me and it
>
> and yet is not.
>
>
>
> I cannot measure it.
>
>
>
> Directions to the actor, some reader who is not a reader,
>
> a fool who would commit to memory what I have written here available,
>
> are integrated in the words I have;
>
> and yet, the naming of the character itself, the transformational naming,
>
> is constrained, not quite inside, not quite without my jurisdiction,
>
> like some goods in bond
>
> or a rogue upon a diplomatic passport.
>
>
>
> I have similar concern as to acknowledgements.
>
> They seem to me like coded messages.
>
> I do not like them.
Douglas Barbour
[log in to unmask]
https://eclecticruckus.wordpress.com/
Recent publications: (With Sheila E Murphy) Continuations & Continuation 2 (UofAPress).
Recording Dates (Rubicon Press).
Done in by creation itself.
I mean the gods. Not us. Well us too.
The gods moved into books. Who wrote the books?
We wrote the books. In whose dream, then are we dreaming?
Robert Kroetsch.
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