PS: We agreed that we will continue to meet at the Collective for class.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Readings for Week 3
For those who were not in class at the Collective Cafe on Wed, Jan 21, I've made copies of the Heidegger's "Origin of the Work of Art" and a selection of experimental poems from the past 150 years available in the English Department office, Zink 365. Please do not take one if you already have one!
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ReplyDeleteWell, don't really know what to say except that Oppen and Zukofsky are almost as good as it gets, and it is all about page 164 in Heidegger.
ReplyDeletefor reals? nobody else yet?
ReplyDeleteOk, Russ, I'll give it a shot, though my confidence when working with this stuff is pretty low. I actually found Heidegger really interesting. His discussion about how "works themselves stand and hang in collections and exhibitions" strongly reminded me of Benjamin's "The Work of Art in the Age of Mechanical Reproduction" with its themes of transience and the "displacement" of art due to "world-decay". His illustrations, using Van Gogh's peasant shoes and the Greek temple, resonated with my sense of what "great" art does in that it lifts us out of our own experience and opens up a world. He talks about the sense of space created by art in which things can step forward and shine in their being. On a small scale, this helped me appreciate a little more the use of white space in contemporary poetry as perhaps a gesture toward the space generated by art in which the truth of the art can resonate.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the experimental poetry, it was curious to me that so many of the authors were not English-speaking. The commentary in some cases felt rather forced to me, I have to admit, as though someone were thumping me over the head with their own particular interpretation of these poems again and again and not making room for any other perspectives.
i definitely agree that the commentary did seem a bit ridiculous at points. did it really surprise you that so many of these poets were foreign? i mean the u.s. doesnt have a large history of poetry until this century really. sure we have some great writers from before that, just not that many compared to worldwide. i will say that i was surprised by the range of the nationalities/languages spoken. i expected the amount of french, but was surprised by the good deal of spanish, and i was super surprised by the navajo. stellar.
ReplyDeletefor me, the most interesting and useful part of heidegger is the talk of the work as equipment. here is a massive quote minus capitalization because i am lazy.
"the equipmental quality of equipment was discovered. but how? not by a description and explanation of a pair of shoes actually present; not by a report about the process of making shoes; and also not by the observation of the actual use of shoes occurring here and there; but only by bringing ourselves before van goghs painting. this painting spoke. in the nearness of the work we were suddenly somewhere else than we usually tend to be...
what happens here? what is at work in the work? van goghs painting is the disclosure of what the equipment, the pair of peasant shoes, IS in truth. this being emerges into the unconcealedness of its being. the greeks called the unconcealedness of beings aletheia. we say "truth" and think little enough in using this word. if there occurs in the work a disclosure of a particular being, disclosing what and how it is, then there is here an occurring, a happening of truth at work"
right on the money baby, right on the money. i dont know how to possibly comment on that except to give it a hell yeah.
This going to sound lame, but I liked Levinas better. Both because of and despite my shortcomings in understanding him. Reading Heidegger, I felt similarly to when I read Mills (John Stuart, not C. Wright. Something like feeling like there's something missing.
ReplyDeletebut mills is a good read!!!!!!!
ReplyDeleteRuss, that is a great quote. But how do you think being and truth are related in a painting of shoes? What about the word brings those two together, and is this true for a poetic work? Does it have to be Van Gogh-quality poetry?
ReplyDelete