Today's Topics:
Re: invoking spirits---Bert
introduction
WEIRD BLAKE SIGHTINGS: SOL FUNAROFF
Re: invoking spirits---Bert
Annotations
Re: Annotations
Re: Annotations
Re: What Blake does each of us see at the PArty?
Re: Annotations
Re: Annotations
The Daily Flame
Opportunity is knocking?
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1998 09:36:07 -0400
From: bert@kvvi.net (Bert Stern)
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: invoking spirits---Bert
Message-Id:
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
Ralph's questions leave me spinning, and I won't even attempt to
respond to them methodically. His observation that "Blake jumps levels
completely and shows his indifference to what he
calls the natural world" finds some support in Katherine's own complaint
that she didn't see much of him. Yet Blake's insistence on the fourfold
seems to me a willingness to give the devil his due. As to the dizzying
series of questions with which Ralph ends, again I'll leave it to the
evolving voice of the list to take them up. They're too hard for me
(though I suppose that he who sketched the soul of a flea might have have
been able to take on a virus as well, if they'd been available.)
My own starting point on such matters is different from Ralph's.
Blake's uneasiness with nature as confined to perception is that it is
"bound." "The bounded," he goes on, "is loathed by its possessor. The
same dull round even of a universe would soon become a mill with
complicated wheels." Here, as I see it, he anticipates (with dread) the
naturalism of a Hardy or Conrad,a Hemingway, or a Flaubert. He
anticipates, that is, the reading of nature that leaves us encased in
material determinism, with all its Conradian despair.
The alternative he took is essentially Adorno's--viz.:
"The only philosophy which can be responsibly practiced in the face of
despair is the attempt to contemplate all things as they would present
themselves from the standpoint of redemption. Knowledge has no light but
that shed on the world by redemption: all else is reconstruction, mere
technique. Perspectives must be fashioned that displace and estrange the
world, reveal it to be with its rifts and crevices as indulgent and
distorted as it will appear one day in the messianic light. To gain such
perspectives without velleity or violence, entirely from felt contact with
its objects--this alone is the task of thought. It is the simplest of all
things, because the situation calls imperatively for such knowldge, indeed
because consummate negativity, once squarely faced, delineates the mirror
image of the opposite. But it is also the utterly impossible thing,
because it presupposes a standpoint removed, even though by a hair's
breadth, from the scope fo existence, whereas we well know that any
possible knowledge must not only first be wrested from what is, if it
shall hold good, but is also marked, for this very reason, by the same
distortion and indulgence which it seeks to escape. The more passionately
thought denies its conditionality for the sake of the unconditional, the
more unconsciously, and so calamitously, it is delivered up to the world.
Even its own impossibility it must at last comprehend for the sake of the
possible. But beside the demand thus placed on thought, the question of
the reality or unreality of redemption itself hardly matters."
The agenda Adorno lays out here, even in its near or absolute
impossibility, has much affinity with Blake's--and absolute affinity in
the urgency of the enterprise.
The displacement of the ordinary (even through fresh observation of
it), the uprooting of the fixed, has always been the the artist's way of
disentangling himself from "The same dull round even of a universe[,
which] would soon become a mill with complicated wheels."
As to how Blake got through the day, it appears, no matter and no
worse than other human beings for whom their work is the most urgent
element of their lives.
Bert Stern
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1998 09:57:21 -0500
From: Keith Geekie
To: "'blake@albion.com'"
Subject: introduction
Message-Id: <41791EFD4E88D111A79C00805FE62D0C459666@po.jccc.net>
Content-Type: text/plain
Dear List,
I'm a new member of the Blake list. I have a doctorate in 19th century
studies and teach writing and literature at Johnson County Community College
in Overland Park, Kansas. I teach an introduction to literature class and
have at other universities as well. I've always been surprised at how moved
the students are by the songs of innocence and experience. I've read quite a
bit about them but never took any seminars in Blake studies and I know I
need to read and learn much more. I'm looking forward to the discussions on
this list. Also I lately underwent several religious experiences, quite out
of the blue, that make me feel a little more affinity with Blake than
heretofore. Hope all is well with the list members this fine Monday. In my
neighborhood, the power was out. Always an interesting start to any day.
Keith Geekie
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1998 09:53:19 -0700 (PDT)
From: Ralph Dumain
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: WEIRD BLAKE SIGHTINGS: SOL FUNAROFF
Message-Id: <2.2.16.19980928125351.0e076e36@pop.igc.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
FYI of the scholarly sort, no endorsement implied:
Sol Funaroff, "Dnieprostroy", NEW MASSES 8 (November 1932), p. 20.
Funaroff was an American leftist poet of the 1930s. Here is how his take on
Blake is described:
"... Funaroff's 1932 poem 'Dnieprostroy' takes as its epigraph William
Blake's opening stanza of 'The Tyger.' Funaroff's proletcult verse offers a
dialogic response to Blake's rhetorical question--'What immortal hand or eye
/ Could frame thy fearful symmetry?'--blending the rhetoric of visionary
romanticism with agitprop celebrations of Soviet industry ..."
in: Kalaidjian, Walter; AMERICAN CULTURE BETWEEN THE WARS: REVISIONARY
MODERNISM AND POSTMODERN CRITIQUE; New York: Columbia University Press,
1993; p. 155.
Only part of the poem is reproduced. I'll just give four lines here so as
not to provoke the copyright police:
We perfect new and more vital symmetries,
Burning oceans of motion,
Tigers of our passion concrete lashed
To expend no energy on parliamentary coquettes.
(I'm not sure I would want to read any more anyway.)
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1998 11:31:53 -0700 (PDT)
From: Ralph Dumain
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: invoking spirits---Bert
Message-Id: <2.2.16.19980928143226.4567243a@pop.igc.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
At 09:36 AM 9/28/98 -0400, Bert Stern wrote:
>My own starting point on such matters is different from Ralph's.
>Blake's uneasiness with nature as confined to perception is that it is
>"bound." "The bounded," he goes on, "is loathed by its possessor. The
>same dull round even of a universe would soon become a mill with
>complicated wheels." Here, as I see it, he anticipates (with dread) the
>naturalism of a Hardy or Conrad,a Hemingway, or a Flaubert. He
>anticipates, that is, the reading of nature that leaves us encased in
>material determinism, with all its Conradian despair.
I don't know much about Conrad etc., but Bert could be onto something here.
Certainly Blake's objection to "naturalism" was its imposition on the human
imagination and on humanity's self-concept. That's all Blake cared about.
Worshipping incomprehensible mysteries or indulging in feudalistic nostalgia
and obscurantism was not Blake's bag.
>The alternative he took is essentially Adorno's--viz.:
Bert is the only person I know to positively link Blake to Adorno (at least
until I get back to work on Adorno's negative dialectic). Not that I
object, but I am amazed. Adorno's quote on redemption seems to me to show a
rare side of Adorno, that all of his grumpy pessimism, defeatism, ascetic
self-mortification and withdrawal was still motivated by a redemptive vision.
>"........... The more passionately
>thought denies its conditionality for the sake of the unconditional, the
>more unconsciously, and so calamitously, it is delivered up to the world.
>Even its own impossibility it must at last comprehend for the sake of the
>possible. But beside the demand thus placed on thought, the question of
>the reality or unreality of redemption itself hardly matters."
This shows up Adorno's greatest virtue, as well as his difference from
Blake. Adorno knew the emancipatory value of thought and wasn't about to
let the unrestrained exercise of intellect be censored or restrained by
adaptation to the contingencies of mere circumstance. Because of the
excruciating honesty of his self-placement in history and the division of
labor, Adorno negates his own snobbish elitism as the bearer of European
bourgeois culture and takes up the position of everyman naked in the world.
Paradoxically enough, Adorno as a philosopher, whose writing is more obscure
and inaccessible to the average person than Blake's even, has more to say to
the average person than all of the rest of the German intellectual heritage
put together.
However, there are differences, both theoretically and practically. The
reality or unreality of redemption to Adorno is a more secular take on the
notion than Blake would ever allow. Practically, the mournful asceticism
and gloominess of Adorno's entire being is antithetical to Blake, who hated
scarce smiles and loved laughing. This pompous crapola about no poetry
after Auschwitz would be an absurdity to Blake. The distancing of self from
aesthetic pleasure so characteristic of Adorno is antithetical to Blake's
own orgiastic approach to aesthetics. Look at what Adorno hated--jazz, and
what he loved--the ghastly necrophilic catatonia of Beckett and Schoenberg.
Blake was too black for the likes of Adorno. Blake is closer to John
Coltrane: if art does not create a spiritual explosion and bring you to
orgasm after orgasm, it's a complete waste of time. What Blake possesses
and the other people you cite lack is the refusal to mortify one's capacity
for joy just because life is hard.
"Grown old in love from seven till seven times seven,
I oft have wished for hell for ease from heaven."
Imagine that! I'm listening to Coltrane soloing on "Mr. P.C." as I write
this and that's just the way I feel. Excess of sorrow laughs! Excess of
joy weeps! Sometimes the beauty is so intense I can't stand it ....
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 28 Sep 1998 21:17:23 -0800
From: ndeeter
To: timli@controls.eurotherm.co.uk, blake@albion.com
Subject: Annotations
Message-Id: <36106D62.6C12@concentric.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
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On the 10th of September, Tim Linnell wrote:
> Anyway, I'll take my chances in the natural world, thanks: I like it here.
> We'll both know who was right in 100 years or so, so let's agree to meet and
> compare notes then.
Well, Tim, this little gem of yours has been sitting in the back of my
mind for a while and today I happened across my old weathered Russell
Noyes anthology "English Romantic Poetry and Poetics." Near the end of
the Blake section is something called "Annotations to 'Poems' by William
Wordsworth."
He says a few things, quite antagonistically, about Wordsworth and the
Natural World.
"I see in Wordsworth the Natural Man rising up against the Spiritual
Man Continually, & then he is No Poet but a Heathen Philosopher at
Enmity against all true Poetry or Inspiration."
But the one that got my attention (and brought to mind your comment
about the natural world) was this:
"Natural Objects always did & now do weaken, deaden & obliterate
Imagination in Me. Wordsworth must know that what he Writes Valuable is
Not to be found in Nature."
Now I don't know what lines or poems of Wordsworth's these annotations
are being written for. But it seems clear that Blake is at odds with you
and Wordsworth. I tend to agree with you; I derive, discover my
spirituality out of my experience in the natural world. I like it here
too, but I wonder how you answer Blake's inconsiderate casting aside of
your System. Have you come across these notes before or something
similar? As a Blakean and a scholar and a caretaker of his legacy, has
this ever troubled you? Have you reconciled in some manner with Blake on
this subject?
I understand if you find these questions about your System too personal;
I often wish people would just keep their nose out of my private
beliefs. So I will not be at all put out by a quick and painless "no
comment" from you.
Thank you,
Nathan Deeter
ndeeter@concentric.net
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1998 07:38:10 +0100
From: timli@controls.eurotherm.co.uk (Tim Linnell)
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: Annotations
Message-Id: <199809290636.HAA25799@merlot.controls.eurotherm.co.uk>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>too, but I wonder how you answer Blake's inconsiderate casting aside of
>your System. Have you come across these notes before or something
>similar? As a Blakean and a scholar and a caretaker of his legacy, has
>this ever troubled you? Have you reconciled in some manner with Blake on
>this subject?
I've read I think all of Blake's annotations and so forth, and I am well
aware we don't agree - indeed this was why I ironically chose the 'he's a
blockhead who calls me mad' quote in a previous post.
There's no reason why my self-evident divergence in opinion with Blake
should trouble me, nor do I require any sort of reconciliation with him.
Neither, by the way, would I describe myself a Blakean, a scholar, nor a
caretaker of his legacy - I'm principally a family historian, and spend as
much time searching for the musical work of my great aunt Olive Linnell, for
example, as I do investigating Blake.
I do love Blake's work though, from which apart from the glorious quality of
his writing and art, his basic decency and humanity shine forth clearly. I'm
very fond of the man himself too. Fan worship apart, it really isn't
necessary to have to agree with every aspect of someone's beliefs in order
to appreciate who they are and what they do.
Regards
Tim
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1998 12:26:55 -0700 (PDT)
From: Ralph Dumain
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: Annotations
Message-Id: <2.2.16.19980929152720.0e471cb4@pop.igc.org>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
I was hoping someone would take up this passage, as it's come to my mind
lately, but I'm disappointed that nobody has bothered to analyze it.
At 09:17 PM 9/28/98 -0800, ndeeter wrote:
>He says a few things, quite antagonistically, about Wordsworth and the
>Natural World.
>
> "I see in Wordsworth the Natural Man rising up against the Spiritual
>Man Continually, & then he is No Poet but a Heathen Philosopher at
>Enmity against all true Poetry or Inspiration."
>
>But the one that got my attention (and brought to mind your comment
>about the natural world) was this:
>
> "Natural Objects always did & now do weaken, deaden & obliterate
>Imagination in Me. Wordsworth must know that what he Writes Valuable is
>Not to be found in Nature."
>
>Now I don't know what lines or poems of Wordsworth's these annotations
>are being written for. But it seems clear that Blake is at odds with you
>and Wordsworth. I tend to agree with you; I derive, discover my
>spirituality out of my experience in the natural world.
You have cited Blake's comments on Wordsworth as a way of demonstrating the
opposition between naturalist and supernaturalist viewpoints. Yet the
meaning and motivation of Blake's remarks are not at all self-evident. Is
Blake repudiating his youthful remarks advocating the improvement of sensual
enjoyment? Is this the viewpoint of a dried-up old cogder with one foot in
the grave? What really bugs Blake about Wordsworth? It can't be merely
that Wordsworth likes the woods and trees. There is a philosophical basis
for the enmity, but you have touched on it only superficially.
------------------------------
Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1998 16:38:25 -0500 (EST)
From: Watt James
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: What Blake does each of us see at the PArty?
Message-Id:
Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII
Dear Pam: I am sending this to you directly and by-passing the list
because I am so far "out of it." I have been swamped with all kinds of
"Ulro" duties lately and so have had to avoid the temptation to jump back
in to the Blake list with both feet. But your letter to Seth about the
way so many people confuse love and spirit with mushiness and fuzziness
was so uplifting for me today that I just had to thank you! I agree with
everything you said (no surprise there!). Like you, I am constantly
irritated by the condescending sneerers who wish to put WB into their
stupid little ideological boxes and hope, thereby, to silence the souls of
others as completely as they have stifled their own. WB is for me, like
he is for you, a wonderful prophet and I look forward to meeting and
singing with him even more completely, one day, than I am able to now.
Meanwhile, though, I am able to see him in others --and tell him so-- as I
do so often in you. God bless you again as he has so many times and in so
many lives already! Jim Watt
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Date: Tue, 29 Sep 1998 20:58:20 -0800
From: ndeeter
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: Annotations
Message-Id: <3611BA6C.3E43@concentric.net>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit
Ralph Dumain wrote:
> You have cited Blake's comments on Wordsworth as a way of demonstrating the
> opposition between naturalist and supernaturalist viewpoints. Yet the
> meaning and motivation of Blake's remarks are not at all self-evident. Is
> Blake repudiating his youthful remarks advocating the improvement of sensual
> enjoyment? Is this the viewpoint of a dried-up old cogder with one foot in
> the grave? What really bugs Blake about Wordsworth? It can't be merely
> that Wordsworth likes the woods and trees. There is a philosophical basis
> for the enmity, but you have touched on it only superficially.
I didn't feel at all capable of discussing it more in depth because of
that very reason. His "annotations" are seemingly free-floating thoughts
appended to something related to Wordsworth. The context is a complete
unknown.
Nathan Deeter
ndeeter@concentric.net
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 01 Oct 1998 07:20:12 +0100
From: timli@controls.eurotherm.co.uk (Tim Linnell)
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: Re: Annotations
Message-Id: <199810010618.HAA22163@merlot.controls.eurotherm.co.uk>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"
>I didn't feel at all capable of discussing it more in depth because of
>that very reason. His "annotations" are seemingly free-floating thoughts
>appended to something related to Wordsworth. The context is a complete
>unknown.
Not strictly true - the context is conveniently recorded in the very
useful on-line edition of Blake's work:
http://virtual.park.uga.edu/nhilton/Blake/blaketxt1/
Although I agree that Blake's annotations often record quite complex and
deeply held prejudices rather than reasoned reactions to a specific point.
Tim
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 1 Oct 98 19:04:44 -0700
From: Seth T. Ross
To: blake@albion.com
Subject: The Daily Flame
Message-Id: <9810020204.AA09079@albion.com>
Content-Type: text/plain
Blakeans:
I am preparing to launch a new web site -- The Daily Flame -- that delivers
an Internet news essay each weekday. This will be the first new Albion.com
service for quite some time. The purpose of this message is to invite members
of the Blake List to critique the form and content of my efforts thus far. The
URL is
http://www.dailyflame.com
Any and all feedback will be much appreciated. Thanks for your continuing support.
Yours,
Seth
---
A\ Seth Ross "Create like a god,
A A\ Albion.com command like a king
A A\ 415.752.7666 & work like a slave."
--Guy Kawasaki
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End of blake-d Digest V1998 Issue #73
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