Think its a good idea to get involved with a 20 year old?

[redbreegull]

[Eric Blair]

Originally Posted by FoolofaTook

"The only people who think Freud was right about anything are English professors and people like Lacan who were even worse. Honestly, English departments are where bad theories go to die."

-Philosophy teacher Eric Blair

I wasn't dismissing the study of literature. I actually love the study of literature. I am just talking about the way English departments are very quick to pick up worthless theories.

[Eric Blair]

Originally Posted by Eulogy

i don't see how that equates to "the study of literature is always worthless"

Yes exactly

[Eric Blair]

Originally Posted by FoolofaTook

yeah, you're right.

i was just concerned with his generalizations pertaining to English professors and departments.

To be fair, I only mean the branches of English departments that pick up odd theories and justify them with incredibly vague thinking.

[Eric Blair]

Originally Posted by cocksure

now, with people like foucault, it has been said again and again that they're "obscurantist" etc. and this is true to some extent i think. but what's also true is that you can't really understand foucault without at least knowing the basics of levi-strauss and of saussure.

effort is required in order to understand anything.

Absolutely. However, you know how everybody talks about Foucault's scholarship? I always thought that that was just stuffy Oxford dons nit picking. But I had to write a paper on pre Revolution France and I relied on Foucault a bit, and his citing is really shoddy and draws a lot of odd conclusions that don't really seem justified.

All the same, I can usually get to the bottom of what he says, unlike a lot of other post whatever French theorists.

[FoolofaTook]

aw, look at us all getting along!

reading all that foundational critical stuff in grad school was interesting because it was so challenging (to a dunce like myself at least). but yeah, for the most part none of it enhanced my reading experiences or added to my appreciate for literature.

[Eric Blair]

Incidentally, Hermann Hesse basically outlines the problems I have a lot more eloquently in this awesome essay on Kafka. It is pretty short too, so give it a go:

http://everything2.com/user/st.augus...nterpretations

[Toby]

i'm getting my own store on monday...looks like i missed my opportunity.

[Eric Blair]

Toby can you stay on topic please.

[Toby]

i am

[Eric Blair]

"Hey, I'm changing stores. Want to have a farewell drink with me?"

Make sure drink turns into drinks and then you can go back to her new apartment.

[Toby]

she's 20...drinks anywhere is out of the question.

[Eric Blair]

Oh that's right, I forgot about the crazy American drinking age.

[Luke de Spa]

Originally Posted by Toby

she's 20...drinks anywhere is out of the question.

take her bowling

[FoolofaTook]

Ha, bowling. Get it? Bowling.































































































As in WEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED.

[duovamp]

Miniature golf. Horse race. Greyhound race. Baseball game. Museum.

[duovamp]

Get pics btw.

[Toby]

i don't have time for any of that nonsense.

[duovamp]

Roofie, fuck her in the back of a pickup truck, toss her out in an alley, leave town.

[FoolofaTook]

To Eric Blair: Thank you! That was a great read. This is my favorite part, right at the very end.

"[Kafka] gives us the dreams and visions of his solitary, difficult life, analogies for his experiences, needs and gratifications, and these dreams and visions are all that we can take from him, not the "meanings" which these works can acquire through clever interpretation.

This "interpreting" is a game of the intellect, often a very pleasant game, suitable for clever people without artistic sensibility, who can read and write books about African art and twelve-tone music, but never find their way into the core of a work of art, because they stand before the gate, trying the lock with a hundred keys, never noticing that the gate is, in fact, open."

[FoolofaTook]

Everyone who loves reading for itself should check out that link. It's really short, but masterfully written and provides much food for thought. In celebration, I'm going to continue reading Irving, one of those venerable authors who wrote just to tell stories.

[cocksure]

Originally Posted by Eric Blair

Incidentally, Hermann Hesse basically outlines the problems I have a lot more eloquently in this awesome essay on Kafka. It is pretty short too, so give it a go:

http://everything2.com/user/st.augus...nterpretations

that is beautiful, and in fact exactly the way i think about art in general. what makes art exciting to me is what cannot be analysed theoretically; i read novels, watch films, listen to music etc. for their intuitive, perhaps "spiritual" qualities.

however, i do think literary theory can play a role in the academic world, as long as it's not used to squeeze enjoyment out of the unexplainable, but, for example, track the development of themes and styles, much like art history.

[Eric Blair]

I completely agree with this. Unfortunately, there is a strong tendency to make things as obscure (difference for example) or as incoherent as possible (the theory of relativity is a gendered equation and somehow tying this into literary theory).

But yeah, this intuitive quality is really important for me too, which is why I love Hesse so much.

[Luke de Spa]

Originally Posted by Eric Blair

(the theory of relativity is a gendered equation and somehow tying this into literary theory).

whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa no way

[Eric Blair]

yes way

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luce_Irigaray

[Eric Blair]

Actually strike that. Not theory of relativity. She referred to mass–energy equivalence as being gendered.

[cocksure]

i love hesse so much, it's a shame people always act like he's the my chemical romance of german literature

[Eric Blair]

I think Thomas Mann has that reputation too.

[Luke de Spa]

Originally Posted by http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luce_Irigaray#Criticism

Alan Sokal and Jean Bricmont, in their book critiquing postmodern thought (Fashionable Nonsense: Postmodern Intellectuals' Abuse of Science), criticize Irigaray on several grounds. In their view, Irigaray wrongly regards E=mc2 as a "sexed equation" because "it privileges the speed of light over other speeds that are vitally necessary to us". They also take issue with the assertion that fluid mechanics is unfairly neglected because it deals with "feminine" fluids in contrast to "masculine" rigid mechanics.

this is hilarious

[cocksure]

Originally Posted by Eric Blair

I think Thomas Mann has that reputation too.

not here! probably still stands as the greatest novelist of all time in our canon. and he certainly speaks to me, even if i can understand why youngsters these days don't see much in him. youth