Dear Dr. Korg,

If peace isn't going to come about through language(s), then how will it?

As for Joyce having 'surpassed' Pound, in the Wake, I am not quite sure what you mean. At least typographically (i.e. Chinese Written Character as Medium for Poetry, etc) Pound certainly 'one ups' both.

I look forward to your article on Joyce and Rabelais. I made the connection too, but in a different vein: their common use of scatology as moral argument.

tony.




-----Original Message-----

> Date: Sun Jan 26 11:03:50 PST 2003
> From: Jacob Korg <[log in to unmask]>
> Subject: Re: Politics & Macaronics
> To: [log in to unmask]
>
> Dear Antony Adolf:
>         An interesting posting on macaronic or hybrid language. While I am
> afraid that the the mingling of languages is not going ot bring world
> peace, as you suggest, it certainly shows that the modern writers who so
> often employ it demonstrate the benefits of crossing cultural limits.
> Joyce surpassed Pound in this exercise by employing dozens of languages in
> Finnegans Wake, and wrote in a medium consisting largely of multilingual
> splicings.  He did not invent this, but owed a certain debt to Rabelais.
> One of these days the Journal of Modern Literature will publish my article
> on the hybrid language connection between the two
>         With best wishes,
>                                         Jacob Korg
>
> On Sat, 25 Jan 2003, Antony Adolf wrote:
>
> > Regarding the possibility of a "Social Solution" in Pound, I agree that the poet provides little if any advice. However, I do not shre the pessimism that has been circulating on the list.
> >
> > Maybe we are not looking up the most fruitful tree; maybe the "solution" is not a "formula" which we can apply to fix the world's problems; maybe it is IN THE LANGUAGE of the poem, or rather in its languageS- with a capital "S" at the end (at least 20 in the Cantos alone).
> >
> > What I mean is this: Pound is without a doubt seriously experimenting with what is called "macaronic poetry," or in other words, polyglossic poetics. Could it be that the harmony he finds between langauges could be somehow adapted to social and/or economic systems? Use interlingualism as interculturalism as peaceful conflict resolution as "beauty and justice"? Macaronic=Different monetary systems, their coordinations=social well-being, "order"?
> >
> > I am currently writing a thesis on the subject, and would appreciate any thoughts/references/rebuttals.
> >
> > tony.
> >