Croc Meat.
JL, 2010.
Nov 19, 2010
A Question / Of Language.
Not transparency. Is not work. Work is shoe. Is not work. Is thing.
Thing is not language.
Is shoe.
Shoe is language.
The dapper art of trying to see through words (see-through words) is not on the
rise.
On the rinse.
To make language more
Texture/Transparent
Is not is.
Is not red.
- Harald M. Reed (1983-86)
Would it make sense to see this poem as enacting the dichotomy of two impossible idealisms in regard to language? On the one hand the old idea about the transparency of language – the dream to see the world through the words. The hope of attaining a style of writing so perfectly neutral and objective as to form a direct, but invisible, link to the object(s) described. On the other hand the notion that (in the opposite manner), the work to perform would be the gradual thickening of language, the endowing of more texture, so as to make obvious the inevitable opacity of the sign. Thus creating a richer and more inclusive and more detailed and interactive map, making possible (i.e., creating) new roads, leading to new places (thusly created). The map creating the territory.
A.F. Bytt (red). Taxonomy of Forgotten Poets of the 20th Century (volume 2). Buffalo; University of West Seneca. 1997. p. 137.
Not transparency. Is not work. Work is shoe. Is not work. Is thing.
Thing is not language.
Is shoe.
Shoe is language.
The dapper art of trying to see through words (see-through words) is not on the
rise.
On the rinse.
To make language more
Texture/Transparent
Is not is.
Is not red.
- Harald M. Reed (1983-86)
Would it make sense to see this poem as enacting the dichotomy of two impossible idealisms in regard to language? On the one hand the old idea about the transparency of language – the dream to see the world through the words. The hope of attaining a style of writing so perfectly neutral and objective as to form a direct, but invisible, link to the object(s) described. On the other hand the notion that (in the opposite manner), the work to perform would be the gradual thickening of language, the endowing of more texture, so as to make obvious the inevitable opacity of the sign. Thus creating a richer and more inclusive and more detailed and interactive map, making possible (i.e., creating) new roads, leading to new places (thusly created). The map creating the territory.
A.F. Bytt (red). Taxonomy of Forgotten Poets of the 20th Century (volume 2). Buffalo; University of West Seneca. 1997. p. 137.
Nov 13, 2010
"Once one has a certain kind of academic status, any statement that you make, if it is couched in the language of your discipline, no matter how critical, how searching, is seen only as an embellishment, another layer of crystalline accretion to the stalactite. To break it off at the root, one's language would have to be brutal, uncompromising, emotional, non-technical."
-Will Self. The Quantity Theory of Insanity. (1991)
-Will Self. The Quantity Theory of Insanity. (1991)
Nov 11, 2010
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