Yes, well, David and Isaiah don't exactly say that, I know. Reminds me of
the mad teaparty in Alice, of course, with its play on
reversed sentneces. Nevertheless, I treasure the thought
that when RCK is poured out in looseness on the grass that there's a hint
of fleshliness--a fleshliness that is in turn, I assume, meant to carry a
theological overtone (oh those worldlings, they do get tempted by the
Mass with what a priest friend of mine happily calls smells and
bells). There's a neat emblmem, by the way, in George Wither that I assume
Harry knows because he knows everything; it quotes the bit about flesh
being grass and shows a large bundle of what to my eye looks like
hay--dried grass, perhaps, like what some of us have. Anne.

On Fri, 19 Jul 2002, Harry Berger, Jr. wrote:

> Only, Anne, if all grass is flesh.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> >Just as a ps: yes, "wonder" may well be the point (see the work of my
> >colleague, Peter Platt--and that of Jim Biester). Morally speaking, I'm
> >not sure if dreams really count. As Bill Clinton might say, it isn't
> >really sex. Of course RCK does get upset over *his* dream, but that's part
> >of his problem. Two perhaps frivolous thoughts: the same ambiguity (just
> >what did happen?) applies to the real Elizabeth and the real Leicester--I
> >go for heavy petting, myself, whatever the movie says--to the fascination
> >of my students. And if "all flesh is grass" does pressed grass mean
> >pressed flesh? Anne.
> >
> >On Thu, 18 Jul 2002, Genevieve Guenther wrote:
> >
> >  > OK, folks, perhaps I should plead a terminal case of over-intertexuality,
> >  > or perhaps I should just admit to an extremely blurry bookshelf in my
> >  > Spenser memory-room, but in any case, what I had in my head was in fact
> >  > Bert Hamilton paraphrasing the Lewis passage that David forwarded on to
> >  > the list. Here's the quotation, which occurs in the note to 1.9.14:
> >  >
> >  > "The double obscurity of the *concubitus* is commented on by Lewis (1966)
> >  > 158-9: either the experience was a dream or it took place; either the
> >  > fairy rose with her virginity intact or she did not."
> >  >
> >  > What this paraphrase captures so brilliantly, I think (and with such pith,
> >  > which is what I was looking for) is the way that Lewis emphasizes the
> >  > *doubt* that this episode inspires in the reader. As far as I'm concerned
> >  > it's a particular kind of doubt, first cultivated by Spenserian aesthetics
> >  > and later codified by Decartes, in which the character, or even the very
> >  > ontological status, of the images that visit our minds is constantly
> >  > questioned or left unresolved, exactly so that we may develop the proper,
> >  > or most effective, psychological attitude to the passions that motivate
> >  > our behavior. That is to say, if Arthurian heroic behavior (or Elizabethan
> >  > imperial politics) is inspired by a cathexis on certain transcendant (or
> >  > cultural) ideals, a cathexis whose phenomonology is certainly erotic, it
> >  > is also maintained by a constancy, a "cast mind," that requires not only
> >  > the deferment of erotic fulfilment but a containment of erotic energies.
> >  > This containment involves the abjection of a feminine other who is yet
> >  > necessary to male self-definition (as Harry Berger reads the relationship
> >  > between Guyon and Acrasia), but it also seems to me that the poem thinks
> >  > it involves (and I"m not sure this is the right formulation) a stance
> >  > towards one's inner life that will at once cultivate the vision of
> >  > "transcendant" images and enable commentary on and control over their
> >  > effects. And perhaps that's why Spenser tries to cultivate doubt here --
> >  > if you have doubt about the things that move you, you can't dismiss the
> >  > power of the imaginative experience, but you can't give yourself over to
> >  > erotic absorbtion either. Now, if this were true, it would be an effect of
> >  > Spenserian aesthetics, of their ability (epitomized, for one, in the fairy
> >  > queen's visit to Arthur) to inspire *wonder*, which Puttenham insists is
> >  > the figure of paradox, next of kin to aporia, made when the author makes
> >  > "doubt of things when by a plaine manner of speech wee might affirme or
> >  > deny him." Indeed, I think the new critics were quite right to seize upon
> >  > the unresolvable suspension of opposites as the goal of many Renaissance
> >  > aesthetic strategies, but it also seems to me that Spenser would have
> >  > thought of wonder as an *ethical* stance -- as something that created a
> >  > subject position that would allow for ideologically-minded action -- not
> >  > as something without use that remained within the frame of his text to no
> >  > end.
> >  >
> >  > Anyhow -- perhaps you can all see why I was looking for pith! Thanks to
> >  > everyone who addressed the question, and thanks to the list for helping me
> >  > begin to work this through...
> >  >
> >  > Genevieve
> >  >
> >  > On Thu, 18 Jul 2002, J.B. Lethbridge wrote:
> >  >
> >  > > The passage in question is in Lewis: Studies in Medieval and Renaissance
> >  > > Literature, 158-159. Hamilton's report in FQ first ed. ad loc, to which
> >  > > you seem to refer, is perhaps a little misleading?
> >  > >
> >  > > J.B. Lethbridge
> >  > > T¸bingen University
> >  > >
> >  >
>