you want depthlessness?

I'll show you depthlessness.

http://garfieldminusgarfield.tumblr.com/page/1

What a difference simply editing out Garfield makes. Suddenly there's whole other levels to this comic.

Help me out here...

I had a horribly underdeveloped thought while writing a paper for Beat Lit.

I'd love to see if we can get a discussion going on it, disagreeing is fine, but I'd love to further this argument as well.

So here goes... right from the paper itself. (wank)

As I was reading Samuel Beckett’s Molloy recently, the narrator–Molloy–rambled on and on in a 124 page paragraph. I could begin to hear the Kerouac voice in Molloy’s. I was reading these books side by side and always believed On The Road was this wonderfully happy discovery narrative, but as I kept on with both books I found them both to be utterly similar with the narrators losing themselves in their attempts to discover who they were. Similarly however, both Molloy and Sal Paradise never really made any mention of actively seeking to find out who they were, but the "hero goes on a journey" theme is certainly there in both of them. By the time each of them reach an end, I feel that they are both exhausted and when Molloy finally cannot walk any longer and takes to crawling, I somehow feel that Sal Paradise reaches a similar end when he finally lets Dean Moriarty go. Two different vehicles of movement that they struggle to hold on to, Molloy and his two bad legs, and Paradise trying to keep up with an insane creature [Dean Moriarty] for as long as he possibly could.

Molloy, Moran, and my new friend, Lacan

Ok, so I know this is a bit of cross-pollination of classes on my part, but bear with me. Saurou's previous post about Molloy and Moran possibly being one and the same person got the hamster-wheels in my brain spinning around. If Moran is, in fact, an earlier version of Molloy, who slowly, as part 2 progresses, becomes Molloy (as exemplified in the decomposition of his leg, the acquisition of a bicycle, the slow descent into hobo-ness, and the acknowledgment that he doesn't know as much as he thought ["Then I went back into the house and wrote, It is midnight. The rain is beating on the windows. It was not midnight. It was not raining." (p.241)], which then loops around to the beginning of part 1, in which Molloy is writing about something he doesn't know), then I can see a pattern of regression back to Lacan's mirror stage. The character develops backwards, slowly un-learning meaning. Moran is steeped in language - he is a greater lack than Molloy: he seeks reaffirmation of what he is through the studying of those unlike him. The ways in which we, as readers, find out what Moran is like is, most often, through the judgment and belittlement of others. He is constantly saying things like "If there is one thing I hate..." using other people's shortcomings to define for us what he is not. This is characteristic of the fall one goes through when one enters language. Molloy, while displaying many of these characteristics (it would be impossible not to - he may be moving backwards to "before the fall" but he is still stuck in language), doesn't seem so much a lack as Moran does. Molloy doesn't know anything enough to be able to define himself one way or the other, and because of this, he feels a little more whole. The development of the character is a backwards one - it just doesn't seem it at first, because of the way in which the novel is set up. Since we are introduced to Molloy first, Beckett manages to deconstruct characterization is multiple ways, from how we are introduced, the chronology and timeline of the character's life, to the fact that the character's chronology itself is a backwards development.

I sure hope that wasn't too far-fetched.

molloy as an example of derrida's solution to the 'nature/culture opposition'

take molloy as a combination of modernism and postmodernism.

consider: the novel borrows characteristics from both movements. combine these pieces and call it bricolage; mix literary genres into a commentary and call it pastiche.

now say: modernism can include, but is not limited to --

dealing with the mundane
discontinuous narrative; stream of consciousness
tradition, style, form
unconventional use of metaphor
metanarrative
classical allusions
using language to influence what a piece of literature can do or be
the intention to change the reader's 'understanding' of what language is and does

say: postmodernism can include, but is not limited to --

rejecting western cultures, beliefs, values, norms, etc. as only a small part of the human experience
not necessarily concerned with being 'profound'
irony, playfulness
metafiction
a focus on the exterior image
fragmented, unfinished, indeterminate; "jagged"
allowing the reader to draw one's own connections
struggle to express the meaningless of a world filled with meaning-heavy words

(remember: both are reactions to a previous movement. both are break-away-from's.)

and then remember that in response to the 'nature/culture opposition,' what derrida says we should be doing is: "conserving...all these old concepts, while at the same time exposing here and there their limits, treating them as tools which can still be of use." no more truth-value, no more grand meaning, no more limitations. just a lot of moving forward and expanding not only what we think but the way it's thought.

now consider: this is beckett's intent. instead of the "end of the novel," beckett wants to bring about a deconstruction of conventional ideas of meaning-- dispense with traditional ways of telling a story, stripped down, the antithesis of elements what traditionally 'make up' a novel. modernism alone can't accomplish this and neither can postmodernism, but certain aspects taken from each, combined into something much more useful for beckett's purpose, can be "exploited...employed to destroy the old machinery to which they belong and of which they themselves are pieces" (derrida).

Ana Ng and I are Getting Old.

So, when I got to thinking about "depthlessness" as a quality of Postmodernism, I couldn't help but think of the band They Might Be Giants. Now, I know not everyone loves them, but I think as far as Postmodern bands go they're one example that I think deserves note.

Let's get this thing started, okay?



Here're the lyrics, for those who are interested.

"Ana Ng" by They Might Be Giants

The song's depthlessness is apparent on two separate levels: the initial reaction and the secondary reaction to the music. When you first hear the song, something in you tells you that the song is just a load of silliness, completely devoid of meaning and purpose.

Further in, however, you start to wonder if there really is something beyond the top layer. You start to gain some sort of unexplainable grasp of the song, an understanding of what its saying without understanding what it says. You may begin to think the meaning may lie in the lyrics.

That's when it falls apart again. The lyrics are garbled nonsense, strings of words that sound okay, but when you read them they make no sense. The thread is loosened, and what grasp you had on meaning is gone, completely flushed away. You had thought sense was about to happen, but it flew away like a frightened bird the second you even looked at it. The song has just deconstructed itself, right before your eyes. You are lost, grasping for rationality that no longer exists.

"They don't need me here, and I know you're there
Where the world goes by like the humid air
And it sticks like a broken record
Everything sticks like a broken record
Everything sticks until it goes away
And the truth is, we don't know anything"

Linguistics and Their Uses

(I'm not tech-savvy enough to post an actual video)

http://youtube.com/watch?v=hHQ2756cyD8

I am in love with Hugh Laurie. He’s my Old Man Crush.



Linguistic elasticity: Spoken and defined by the originators

Sustaining demagoguery:

If Hitler had been British…
Would hearing his passionately delivered speeches in a different tongue give them a tonality that detracts from their effectiveness?

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Is language a function of what it means to be part of a given culture? Or are qualities of the culture applied to it through the language?

Language v speech
Chess v game of chess

Philosophical ramblings: I can tell you anything I want to tell you and because I am prepared to defend my opinions with different dimensions of the mind, and of space or lack there of, and with absolute Truths v perception. I will win, or at least last longer and win by default. In any art form, the lesson lays in learning how to do it well before you’re allowed to experiment and play. Otherwise you’re Van Gogh who was a cheater.


So, based on this, Hitler would have had to find his own niche (not pronounced nietzsche) within the linguistics of the British language to have been as effective with their people as he was with his own.

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More than a means of communication:

My checkout girl
Complimentary moist lemon square
Half forgotten book of erotic memoirs

After Class Thoughts

So, I got to thinking a little bit today after class today is that the scariest thing about all this Derrida "the center is not the center" thing is that it actually kind of makes sense. Lets take Molloy for example.

Molloy is not only on the fringe of society but practically is the fringe, yet he is the most honest character in the anti-novel. He recognizes his faults and states them unapologetically as they are in fact the truth and he is not hiding from that.

Now, if we use the tower analogy as the tower being the center, we can imagine that those closest to the tower all their lives would end up seeing very little of it. They claim to know it best because they've lived under it for as long they can remember but they would not have the same view of it that someone on the fringe, say Molloy, would.

Could it be said then, that those on the fringe are the only ones that can see the true center, or truth? Because then, the Truth with a capital "T" would be outside the center and since Truth is the center, then the center would be outside the center.

Maybe I'm taking too much cold medicine... Oh well! Have a comic: Postmodernity