[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by Glice

You always talk about art in terms of power, control and orthodoxy. That's all I was getting at; you always argue in terms of empirical sciences. Neither are appropriate here. You're a smart chap, but you're frustratingly dismissive of interpretations falling outside of your ken. That's all I'm saying.

always always never always. ok so power/control/orthodoxy? in which way? the orthodoxy, if anything, is to apply interpretations.

we can all hold hands and sing kumbaya, but you can't make me believe that each buendia represents a latin american nation without some sort of textual proof. besides, such correspondences would make the characters very stiff and restricted in their possiblities. "this guy is argentina, he must be a boastful loudmouth" "this one is honduras, nobody gives a shit about him".

i don't deny people the pleasure of their fantasies but i do not agree that said fantasies are the meaning of the text or are even in the text.

Originally Posted by Glice

Above, for instance, you've apparently absolutely negated the act of interpretation because sometimes people get it wrong, or say something a bit silly. I don't read books for arid austerity - I actually read them to avoid that. Do books have no erotic value for you?

that's precisely what my books have the most for me: erotic value. the ability to give pleasure. do you ever fuck saying "this is the suspended congress position" "here we are doing the dirty sanchez, it's meaning conjugates anal and phallic aggression"? perhaps you do, but i can't concieve of a more boring way to fuck than to do a play-by-play description and analysis of the act.

interpretation is fine when it is called for-- in translation, diplomacy, a bit of hermeneutics to aid reading. but interpretation is the lowest form of reading pleasure i can think of. it's almost a denial of reading itself. it says that the pleasure is elsewhere--not in the reading, but in the interpretation itself. which is, granted, what eggheads love to do-- not read books, but write papers about them.

[ilduclo]

Since we're on the subject of Latin American authors, what think you about Bolano? I've read a couple of his things, he was an interesting cat and too bad he won't be around for as long as GGM. Here's a speech published in the latest Nation Magazine on Literature and Exile for a New Directions title:Between Parentheses: Essays, Articles, and Speeches (1998-2003) to the Austrian Soc for Lit.

http://www.thenation.com/article/157...ture-and-exile

[Glice]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

always always never always. ok so power/control/orthodoxy? in which way? the orthodoxy, if anything, is to apply interpretations.

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

we can all hold hands and sing kumbaya, but you can't make me believe that each buendia represents a latin american nation without some sort of textual proof.

See, it's this kind of aggressive return to the vernacular of orthodoxy ('proof') that makes me not want to engage. I've not read Marquez (well, I have, but I thought it was shit and disregarded it) but you've essentially asked for a proof without interpretation; I can't seriously engage in literature that way, and I don't see how anyone can. Verification in suchfriends... case of his interpretation would require the sort of academic footnoting that renders academia un-readable to most; you've both read the book, he has this take, you have the other, but you've been excessively aggressive in asking him to qualify that. You're asking him to bore you so you can say it's boring.

interpretation is fine when it is called for-- in translation, diplomacy, a bit of hermeneutics to aid reading. but interpretation is the lowest form of reading pleasure i can think of. it's almost a denial of reading itself.

'The book should be a flat surface, empirical, read and never questioned'. How do we enjoy books? Not by a hegemony of experience, but by interpretation. Ok, interpreting Hardy as proto-Zapitista would be well off-mark, but there's a necessity for ambiguity (and thus interpretation) in any given engagement with a text.

it says that the pleasure is elsewhere--not in the reading, but in the interpretation itself. which is, granted, what eggheads love to do-- not read books, but write papers about them.

Reading comes first, but how do we share books? In silence? In stolid regurgitation? How to we discuss them? I don't see how you're leaving any space whatsoever for discussion of literature.

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by Glice

See, it's this kind of aggressive return to the vernacular of orthodoxy ('proof') that makes me not want to engage. I've not read Marquez (well, I have, but I thought it was shit and disregarded it) but you've essentially asked for a proof without interpretation; I can't seriously engage in literature that way, and I don't see how anyone can. Verification in suchfriends... case of his interpretation would require the sort of academic footnoting that renders academia un-readable to most; you've both read the book, he has this take, you have the other, but you've been excessively aggressive in asking him to qualify that. You're asking him to bore you so you can say it's boring.



'The book should be a flat surface, empirical, read and never questioned'. How do we enjoy books? Not by a hegemony of experience, but by interpretation. Ok, interpreting Hardy as proto-Zapitista would be well off-mark, but there's a necessity for ambiguity (and thus interpretation) in any given engagement with a text.




Reading comes first, but how do we share books? In silence? In stolid regurgitation? How to we discuss them? I don't see how you're leaving any space whatsoever for discussion of literature.

interesting points but misleading, especially when you question my motives ("You're asking him to bore you so you can say it's boring. "). wrong.

the other misleading misreading is about my verbal conduct, my alleged aggression-- i'm not singling him out and i am making no personal attacks, though i tend to favor the polemic style of argumentation.

by the way, speaking of misleading/misreading, i really like suchfriends, and just because i argue in a certain way it does not mean i do not have good will towards him-- actually, i argue with him like i argue with my best friends-- bluntly and without fear and calling it like i see it, because there's trust that there is an attempt to understand, in both parts. he doesn't need me to pat him in the back and prop his self-esteem. and i also wish to do a good deed by sparing him the purgatory of interpretative reading, that fucking lead chain around literature's throat.

i will answer your more technical points later because i need time to write a response, and to compile a short catalog of the non-interpretational pleasures of reading (which are infinite) as a part of that response, but i have a motherfucking deadline with a video edit and i can't engage fully in this discussion because i need all my powers for the other thing, and i was reading that bolaño letter which was brilliant so that took the time. but later, i promise.

[flashlight69]

charles bukowski, irvine welsh, pahliniuk, john nieven

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by ilduclo

Since we're on the subject of Latin American authors, what think you about Bolano? I've read a couple of his things, he was an interesting cat and too bad he won't be around for as long as GGM. Here's a speech published in the latest Nation Magazine on Literature and Exile for a New Directions title:Between Parentheses: Essays, Articles, and Speeches (1998-2003) to the Austrian Soc for Lit.

http://www.thenation.com/article/157...ture-and-exile

that was fucking brilliant. many many thanks.

i've only read los detective salvajes by the way.

[Glice]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

i will answer your more technical points...

There aren't any technical points. I'm just amusing myself. It's a bit like the mastubatory habits of salmon.

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by Glice

There aren't any technical points. I'm just amusing myself. It's a bit like the mastubatory habits of salmon.

no worries. i'll fist you good.

[SuchFriendsAreDangerous]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

interpretation assigns an external meaning to the text, it says "what the text is is not really the text, it's what i make of it", which usually tends to be some sort of normative discourse (psychoanalisis, marxism, feminism, frenchwankerianism, etc). sure, humpty dumpty could make the words mean what he wanted, but my point, ultimately, is that it is much more fun and enjoyable to read novels as novels, not as allegories that refer to some other "true" reality.

interpretation is fine when it is called for-- in translation, diplomacy, a bit of hermeneutics to aid reading. but interpretation is the lowest form of reading pleasure i can think of. it's almost a denial of reading itself. it says that the pleasure is elsewhere--not in the reading, but in the interpretation itself. which is, granted, what eggheads love to do--

Actually I quite enjoy reading novels and stories in an allegorical way, it allows me to find more depth and substance and in the end give the narratives that much more a personal sense of meaning and impact, rather than be just another means to an end, just another few hours to kill. But my bias is that I am an academic historian, and not only have I been trained to look at everything in the world in terms of meaning, symbolism, and causality, but I thoroughly enjoy it to the core of my being. I wouldn't read a novel anyother way, just look at my analysis of Sacrament, the novel I am currently engaged in.

taught in literature departments everywhere. can't the text exist for itself?

yes, but you should not be so constrictive in your art, so compartmental and orderly. Art is a language of personal expression, never forget that. People use art to express feelings and thoughts which perhaps may have otherwise been inexpressible. Language is deeply individualistic, you can't even try to limit it with legalism, that shit doesn't fly, and no artist would want to you be so Papist about things..

and maybe i misspoke when i said that is not what the author intended, because yes, the author puts a lot of things there completely unaware, but that doesn't mean that everything goes. like this: <<i see the blue color of this screen and i am reminded that chabib, coming from a people of the desert, must be fascinated by the ocean and wanted to give us the impression of being submerged underwater when we post in this here forum.... although this is more of a dark cerulean, which adds the vision of the "other" to this virtual batysphere where we delve into the abyss of the human mind>>

Regardless of is chabib had any such intentions about the color scheme, if individuals naturally feel and interpret that out of it, how are they wrong? Again, individual interpretation is not necessarily about trying to always find the author's intentions so much as to describe the individual reception and sincere feelings about a work of art. Art is democratic. Even Kurt Cobain rightfully said, "Its whatever you want it to mean."

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

always always never always. ok so power/control/orthodoxy? in which way? the orthodoxy, if anything, is to apply interpretations.

i don't deny people the pleasure of their fantasies but i do not agree that said fantasies are the meaning of the text or are even in the text.

I notice you keep criticizing only one of my interpretations, but have on several instances neglected any comments on my other interpretation of Rebecca and other characters representing the clash of the indigenous mind set and experience with that of the "modern", "Latin American" should i take it then that you don't disagree or shall I footnote some more for ya

Originally Posted by Glice

You're asking him to bore you so you can say it's boring.

Reading comes first, but how do we share books? In silence? In stolid regurgitation?

my point exactly.

[ilduclo]

Originally Posted by !@#$%!

that was fucking brilliant. many many thanks.

i've only read los detective salvajes by the way.

next up should be Nazi Literature in the Americas, pretty much has it all

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by ilduclo

next up should be Nazi Literature in the Americas, pretty much has it all

yes, it's hard to find in spanish in the USA-- i don't wanna read the translation (blech). i've got it in some kind of interlibrary loan waitlist or something.

----

glice and suchfriends: there are a bazillion ways to talk about literature other than interpretation, just like it is possible to talk about abstract art without asking "what does it mean"? music has no meaning and yet gets discussed here all the time.

as for the idea of interpretation as a pleasure: similar to the enjoyment of taxidermists. the pleasures of literature include things like the beauty (or horror) of a well chosen word, the amazement of creative syntax (which does not exclude things like jarring syntax when called for), the joy of a fortunate image, the enjoyment of evasion (literature as escape), and the immersion in an alternate reality (which, if the writer is good, it will be more fascinating than your own dull reality), the awe at the construction of intricate plots, the fleshing out of memorable characters, the emotional rollercoaster of a good story, the display of virtuosity from the part of the writer (like we get from watching a good musician perform), the pleasure of new knowledge, the delight of an expanded imagination, the poetic rhythm of good prose, so on and so forth, all of these elements compounded and played against each other, in an infinite combination of delights. none of which has anything to do with the question "what does this represent/symbolize/'really'mean?"

i'll skip the additional perorations & refer you directly to the holy saint sontag-- bless her delicious mind.

http://www.coldbacon.com/writing/son...pretation.html

She ends by saying-- "In place of a hermeneutics we need an erotics of art. "

[Glice]

But that's interpretation. You seem to just not want to use the word interpretation when interpreting literature.

[!@#$%!]

Originally Posted by Glice

But that's interpretation. You seem to just not want to use the word interpretation when interpreting literature.

ha ha ha-- you lying sack of shit-- the lenghts that you go to jerk other people's chains. well played though, i did fall for it for a second or two and then i recovered. any reader with 3 interconnected neurons can see that i was speaking of immediate pleasures rather than the transposition of meaning to an external referent in order to "explain". of course you knew that too, being sufficiently intelligent, but it's this salmon masturbation that you practice that makes one confused and i was ready to accuse you of sophistry, you interweb imp.

anyway, go read sontag and enjoy.

you'll find beauties like these:

Today is such a time, when the project of interpretation is largely reactionary, stifling. Like the fumes of the automobile and of heavy industry which befoul the urban atmosphere, the effusion of interpretations of art today poisons our sensibilities. In a culture whose already classical dilemma is the hypertrophy of the intellect at the expense of energy and sensual capability, interpretation is the revenge of the intellect upon art.


Even more. It is the revenge of the intellect upon the world. To interpret is to impoverish, to deplete the world - in order to set up a shadow world of “meanings.” It is to turn the world into this world. (“This world”! As if there were any other.)


The world, our world, is depleted, impoverished enough. Away with all duplicates of it, until we again experience more immediately what we have.

i'm sure others have said similar things before her, but i like how (and when) she said it. & fuck plato!

[Mortte Jousimo]

Originally Posted by SuchFriendsAreDangerous

No one wants to discuss Gabriel Garcia Marquez? That man is a beast of psychedelic satire, he is like a story telling Carl Jung with the passion and emotive adeptness of a true Latin American. Also, anyone else read any Patrick Suskind?

I´ve just read Parfyme and I have to say I liked it quite a lot. It´s quite a long time since I before enjoyed someone previous unfamiliar writer to me. I´m going to read "the Pigeon" next.

[evollove]

Anyone read AFTER THE QUAKE by Haruki Murakami, a set of stories revolving around the aftermath of the Kobe earthquake?

Do you think any survivors got any relief or better understood their lives?

Do you think anyone was fortified by the book and better prepared for the most recent quake?

Is literature, like all art, quite useless?


I'm not saying. I'm asking. Tell me.

[Mortte Jousimo]

Originally Posted by evollove

Anyone read AFTER THE QUAKE by Haruki Murakami, a set of stories revolving around the aftermath of the Kobe earthquake?

Do you think any survivors got any relief or better understood their lives?

Do you think anyone was fortified by the book and better prepared for the most recent quake?

Is literature, like all art, quite useless?


I'm not saying. I'm asking. Tell me.

My opinion is that art is quite a good way to cope with all kinds of difficulties life´s bring to you. That´s because with art there is always symbolic distance and it in most cases moves also your feelings. In talking there can happen you never have to affect your feelings, you can talk just rationally. I think art and specially music is the most important think in my life if I think my growing, it could be that I will not here writing if I hadn´t got music. Someone else might need some other art form.