Serendipity

Searching for kafka+gogol+nose+metamorphosis (inspired by Todorov’s likening of Kafka’s The Metamorphosis to Gogol’s The Nose) I re-find Alan Gullete. And via Alan I find Danill Kharms whose photograph below is striking to say the least.

Daniil Kharms, photo credit unidentified

Daniil Kharms (1905 – 1942) was an early Soviet-era surrealist and absurdist poet, writer and dramatist. Kharms lived in debt and hunger for several years until his final arrest on suspicion of treason in the summer of 1941. He was imprisoned in the psychiatric ward at Leningrad Prison No. 1. and died in his cell in February, 1942 — most likely, from starvation. —http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daniil_Kharms [Nov 2006]

Via Alan Gullette http://alangullette.com/lit/absurd/ who I’ve mentioned before here. His literary entry page features pages supernatural, surreal, absurd, et al literature.

There is now only one fantastic object: man

Quoting from Todorov’s book on the fantastic, page 173, Todorov seems to hold that Sartre has a similar view on fantastic literature to his own:

“According to Sartre, Blanchot and Kafka no longer try to depict extraordinary beings; for them,

there is now only one fantastic object: man. Not the man of religions and spiritualisms, only half committed to the world of the body, but man-as-given, man-as-nature, man-as-society, the man who takes of his hat when a hearse passes, who kneels in churches, who marches behind a flag.

The quote by Sartre is taken from his article on Blanchot’s récit Aminadab, published in Situations.

There’s no English equivalent of the French récit, which names a literary genre which tells of a single event. A few dense notes on what this word comes to mean for Blanchot in The Book to Come and elsewhere. —http://spurious.typepad.com/spurious/2006/06/what_is_the_rel.html

[Nov 2006]

Tolkien

Although I recently stated that I only want to do appreciative criticism, I want to investigate why I don’t like Tolkien and Lord of the Rings. I do like the fantastique and fantastic literature as defined by Todorov.

On a sidenote I’ve noticed that people who like Tolkien also like Harry Potter for which I have very little enthusiasm. Again, why?

Googling for Todorov (who is the leading authority on the fantastique) in combination with Tolkien brings up this:

Key critics such as Rosemary Jackson, Christine Brooke-Rose, and Tzvetan Todorov all see Tolkien as beyond their parameters. Jackson’s work is largely concerned with fantasy elements within realist literature, while Todorov and Brooke-Rose see Tolkien as a creator of secondary worlds, no longer a fantasy writer, but a creator of the marvellous, placing him outside their studies. –Sara Upstone via http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0OON/is_4_23/ai_99848429

The keyword is marvelous, which according to Todorov does not belong in the fantastic/que category.

And googling for Tolkien and irrealism brings the Cafe Irreal:

[J].R.R. Tolkien, who not only had to create a whole new world from scratch, but one which he could only visit in his imagination. And yet Tolkien (and the various other genre fantasy and science-fiction writers) are not irreal writers. For, having imagined a new world, a Tolkien proceeds to make it so real and concrete for us (by giving it laws, mythologies and governments) that we could visit it, if it existed, like we would visit an exotic island — surprised by the customs of the people and the creatures that inhabit its jungles, but feeling very much as if we were in the category of the real. Like the realist writer, he tries to concretize the unreal. –G.S. Evans in IRREALISM AND THE DREAM-STATE via http://home.sprynet.com/~awhit/tirr_dre.htm [Nov 2006]

The key phrase in this little investigation is “Having imagined a new world, Tolkien proceeds to make it so real and concrete for us, … making it very much as if we were in the category of the real. Like the realist writer, he tries to concretize the unreal.” By doing so he takes out all the ambiguity, ambivalence, unresolvedness, unreliability and uncertainty that makes the fantastique what I find so attractive in it.

In the words of Jan Beardsly commenting on Todorov:

Todorov distinguishes the fantastic from two other modes, the uncanny and the marvelous. While these modes have some of the ambiguity of the fantastic, they ultimately offer a resolution governed by natural laws (the uncanny) or the supernatural (the marvelous). –Jan Bardsley via http://www.unc.edu/~bardsley/ghosts/todorov.html

A final quote on uncertainty by Todorov:

“The fantastic occupies the duration of this uncertainty….The fantastic is that hesitation experienced by a person who knows only the laws of nature, confronting an apparently supernatural event” (p. 25).

See also: realism – reality

The weekend

Friday evening the weekend started at the Scheld’apen, from where I went to Petrol to see Simon Vinkenoog (see the poem, a poem makes a visit to a poet and says “from now on you have to wear a mask”) performing backed by Spinvis.

Saturday went for some psychogeographical biking with my friend, and later that evening to dinner to my brother’s new digs. Finished the evening/night at Bartillia and Fake Bar where Factor 44 was holding a group exhibition and a party afterwards.

Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp, Belgium
Sunday: Gorge(l), a show at the KMSKA themed around the sense of oppression and relief in art, curated by Sofie Van Loo. Most impressed by the work of Merlin Spie and dancer/performar Erna Omarsdo’ttir.

Feeling like blah-feme:

I am lonely.

There I said it. —blah-feme

Disco Circus (1978) – Martin Circus

Related: 1978 music – François Kevorkian – Euro disco – French music

CD availability: Jumpin’ vol.2

Disco Circus (1978) – Martin Circus

Released as an album and a twelve inch single on the New York Prelude record label, Disco Circus by French outfit Martin Circus which first came to my attention as a favourite of the Detroit techno artists such as Juan Atkins and Derrick May (who listed it as his top 5 record in the late eighties). It is an example of the cross-fertilization of the European and North American disco markets of the late 1970s. Other examples of which are Orlando Riva Sound‘s Moon Boots single which was released on the American imprint Salsoul records

Jack Palance (1919 – 2006)

Jack Palance (Vladimir Palanuik/Walter Jack Palance), one of my favorite actors, died today at the age of 87. All Jess Franco watchers will immediately recall his off the wall meanderings as Brother Antonin in Justine (1968), a role Franco said Palance played while under the influence. Given his lack of respect for his own European career, he fiercely denied his numerous Spaghetti western appearances when confronted about them in his later years, he was a steadfast professional. The Oscar and Emmy award winning actor was one of the great screen “heavies” in George Stevens’ SHANE, among others. He recently auctioned off his movie memorabilia. Offscreen he was a landscape painter, who inscribed his canvases with poetry. Palance claimed he never watched the films he appeared in. — I’M IN A JESS FRANCO STATE OF MIND

Palance came to the attention of many arthouse fans in 1988 with the film Bagdad Cafe in which he shines as an artist who wants to capture on canvas the beauty he perceives in the rotund Sägebrecht.

Baudelaire’s World (2002) – Rosemary Lloyd

Baudelaire’s World (2002) – Rosemary Lloyd
[Amazon.com] [FR] [DE] [UK]

Charles Baudelaire is often regarded as the founder of modernist poetry. Written with clarity and verve, Baudelaire’s World provides English – language readers with the biographical, historical, and cultural contexts that will lead to a fuller understanding and enjoyment of the great French poet’s work. –from the publisher

Though it is often said Charles Baudelaire published only a single volume of poetry, The Flowers of Evil, this is untrue if you count his published prose poetry such as Spleen de Paris.

See also: Charles Baudelaire – modernist poetry