Yours is an interesting paragraph, Richard. ...
I would find it pretty amazing, of course, if anyone
were seriously to suggest that Pound's use of
discontinuities stemmed from a "biological predisposition,"
i.e., mental illness. Almost all of Modernism would
then be subject to similar analysis (and dismissal).
One could say, however, that the non-linear style-
preference of the whole Modernist period drew to
itself certain predisposed, pre-cracked minds that
found in it a new ecological niche, temperaments
that could never have crawled out of the woodwork
in a bourgeois "logical" period. This idea gets
us into the need for an even more abstract metacritical
perspective, namely, the need to see art-periodization
itself in Darwinian terms as the effect produced on
a culture by Natural Selection when a culture needs
to cope with changing habitat, the changed habitat
offering sudden opportunities to previously suppressed,
marginal mentalities. This last idea I take at least
half seriously myself.
I won't go on, since I don't wish to rival the paragraph
to which I'm responding.
==Dan P
At 08:57 AM 10/29/98 +0800, you wrote:
>I sympathize with Tim Redman's plea to wait until publication, thank him
>for flying the kite and wish him the best with finishing the biography. In
>a sense the abstract discussion of approaches to the author's mental
>condition is unsatisfying without the closely argued evidence and case.
>There's not enough to go on. However, I would also want to take Daniel
>Pearlman's points concerning the vexed relations of lives and works. It
>might be an issue - if the bi-polar diagnosis turns out to be convincing -
>of whether the condition found the poetry or the poetry the condition. If
>one thinks of what William Empson, for one, said about the vatic state (I
>can't remember where), then mental imbalance is a hazard of the occupation
>- 'goes with the territory' - and whether there is biological
>predisposition or not, may wilfully be triggered, or at least not
>sufficiently avoided. One could also think of 'traditions' of melancholia
>accompanying the creative act (vide in visul art Margot and Rudolph
>Wittkower, Born Under Saturn, or Beckett's preoccupation with Burton's
>Melancholia) - 'traditions' that do not operate on creative artists in all
>other cultures - and in view of the fragmentary aspect of visual Cubism
>(perhaps also of the 'Modern condition') perhaps one would not want, or
>only want, to associate the discontinuities (or obsessive continuities) of
>the Cantos with the individual author's mental condition. Genetically,
>there are said to be many more schizophrenics than those who manifest
>symptoms, though I'm told the jury is still out on that one.
>
>Richard Read
>
>>Dan,
>>
>> Let's wait until I finish the biography before we discuss
>>what I'm doing -- I won't entirely know myself until I finish.
>>
>> Tim
>>
>>On Tue, 27 Oct 1998 18:02:46 -0500 Daniel Pearlman
>><[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>
>>> Tim,
>>>
>>> In an earlier posting you seemed to indicate that you were
>>> confining your study of the effects of this disorder to the
>>> life, rather than using your psychological conclusions to
>>> try to cast light on the work. I wonder if it is logically
>>> possible to walk this fine line. If, for example, someone
>>> were to prove pretty conclusively that Pound was clinically
>>> insane from, let's say, 1935 to 1945, wouldn't that necessitate
>>> a re-reading of all he wrote during that period?
>>>
>>> Thanks,
>>>
>>> ==Dan P
>>>
>>> At 01:28 PM 10/27/98 -0600, you wrote:
>>> >I see clear indications of it starting in the '30s, and some signs as
>>> >early as the 'teens, though that is more difficult to document.
>>> >
>>> > Tim
>>> >
>>> >On Mon, 26 Oct 1998 11:42:47 -0500 Daniel Pearlman
>>> ><[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>> >
>>> >> Tim,
>>> >>
>>> >> Are you referring to a disorder that shaped Pound's behavior
>>> >> all through his life or only for a certain period?
>>> >>
>>> >> ==Dan P
>>> >>
>>> >> At 10:11 AM 10/26/98 -0600, you wrote:
>>> >> >It shaped his behavior.
>>> >> >
>>> >> >On Mon, 26 Oct 1998 10:42:52 -0500 Tim Romano <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>>> >> >
>>> >> >> Tim Redman,
>>> >> >>
>>> >> >> Let's assume, arguendo, that the diagnosis of 'bipolar disorder'
>>> >> >> is on the money. Is it your contention that the mental aberration
>>> >> >> shaped Pound's art? His behavior? If the former, are there other
>>> >> >> artists from whose texts one can reach similar diagnoses? And is
>>> >> >> their art in any way like Pound's? I'm wondering where you have
>>> >> >> taken or intend to take the diagnosis. I'm curious also if you
>>> >> >> pass Pound's use of multiple "voices" through this filter.
>>> >> >>
>>> >> >> Tim Romano
>>> >> >
>>> >> >Tim Redman
>>> >> >School of Arts and Humanities, JO 31
>>> >> >University of Texas at Dallas
>>> >> >P.O. Box 830688
>>> >> >Richardson, TX 75083-0688
>>> >> >
>>> >> >(972) 883-2775 (o)
>>> >> >(972) 883-2989 (fax)
>>> >> >
>>> >> Dan Pearlman Office: Department of English
>>> >> 102 Blackstone Blvd. #5 University of Rhode Island
>>> >> Providence, RI 02906 Kingston, RI 02881
>>> >> Tel.: 401 453-3027 Tel.: 401 874-4659
>>> >> email: [log in to unmask] Fax: 401 874-2580
>>> >
>>> >Tim Redman
>>> >School of Arts and Humanities, JO 31
>>> >University of Texas at Dallas
>>> >P.O. Box 830688
>>> >Richardson, TX 75083-0688
>>> >
>>> >(972) 883-2775 (o)
>>> >(972) 883-2989 (fax)
>>> >
>>> Dan Pearlman Office: Department of English
>>> 102 Blackstone Blvd. #5 University of Rhode Island
>>> Providence, RI 02906 Kingston, RI 02881
>>> Tel.: 401 453-3027 Tel.: 401 874-4659
>>> email: [log in to unmask] Fax: 401 874-2580
>>
>>Tim Redman
>>School of Arts and Humanities, JO 31
>>University of Texas at Dallas
>>P.O. Box 830688
>>Richardson, TX 75083-0688
>>
>>(972) 883-2775 (o)
>>(972) 883-2989 (fax)
>
>
>
>------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>Dr Richard Read Email [log in to unmask]
>Senior Lecturer
>School of Architecture and Fine Arts
>The University of Western Australia
>Nedlands WA 6009 Tel +61 8 9380 2140
>Australia Fax 8 9380 1082
>
Dan Pearlman Office: Department of English
102 Blackstone Blvd. #5 University of Rhode Island
Providence, RI 02906 Kingston, RI 02881
Tel.: 401 453-3027 Tel.: 401 874-4659
email: [log in to unmask] Fax: 401 874-2580
|
