Baldessari sings LeWitt
February 5, 2010 6:44 PM | Comments (0)
Foot Rests
Ran across this little artifact while sorting through some pictures, and it reminded me of an entry from 2003.
January 11, 2010 6:32 PM | Comments (0)
You're either with it or you're not.
January 8, 2010 8:12 PM | Comments (0)
Cock Soup
January 6, 2010 4:30 PM | Comments (0)
The Rhetoric of Douchebags
The rhetoric of stags is a display of raw physical and psychological energy conveyed by the simplest possible techniques and thus illustrates my contention that rhetoric, in essence, can be viewed as a form of energy that results from reaction to a situation and is transmitted by a code. Though costly in energy, since it can go on for as much as an hour, it is less costly and dangerous than an actual fight. From this and from similar evidence it seems clear that nature has encouraged the evolution of rhetorical communication as a substitute for physical encounters. The rhetorical energy a stag can exhibit is directly proportional to his physical strength and potential as the best mate for a female. This is tested by debate. The evolutionary function of the display is to determine who is the fittest to survive and transmit his genes to future generations of the species. The social function is to secure authority, territory, and mating rights.
In terms of the traditional Western concept of the five parts of rhetoric, the confrontation of the stags seems to contain elements of invention, arrangement, style, memory, and delivery, though these are natural attributes and not conscious “art.” The inventional elements, the code by which the stag’s energy is transmitted, are of the simplest sort: repetition of the same utterance, with increasing volume, for as long as possible up to an hour. Here, as in all animal communication and to a considerable extent in human communication, overstatement and redundancy are the means of overcoming distracting noise in the environment, securing attention, and expressing confidence and resolve to prevail.
George Kennedy, Comparative Rhetoric 14.
Following up on my earlier puzzlement about Kennedy’s contention that “rhetoric is an energy,” it seems that this is his formulation rather than something with a solid source. I think that his observations have merit, though I am not at all convinced that rhetoric is entirely “transmitted by a code.” Code implies articulation of the elements into discrete “packets” or symbols—this is the part that I struggle with. I don’t think that visual experiences can be summarized that neatly.
Nonetheless, Kennedy’s articulation of the role of overstatement and redundancy seems particularly key in analyzing the rhetoric of the health care debate—on both sides. Few people seem to have actually read the legislation and insist on repeating hearsay evidence from dubious sources until it secures attention, expresses confidence and cements their resolve to prevail.
December 26, 2009 8:41 AM | Comments (0)
Froth and scum
Aut insanit Homo, aut versus facit—
[The man is either raving or composing. Hor. Sat. 7. lib. 2.]
Composing and Raving must necessarily, we see, bear a resemblance. And for those Composers who deal in Systems, and airy Speculations, they have vulgarly pass’d for a sort of Prose-Poets. Their secret Practice and Habit has been as frequently noted:
Murmura cùm secum & rabiosa silentia rodunt.
[They chew over mumbles with themselves and rabid silences. Pers. Sat. 3.]
Both these sorts are happily indulg’d in this Method of Evacuation. They are thought to act naturally, and in their proper way, when they assume these odd Manners. But of other Authors ’tis expected they shou’d be better bred. They are oblig’d to preserve a more conversible Habit; which is no small misfortune to ’em. For if their Meditation and Resvery be obstructed by the fear of a nonconforming Mein in Conversation, they may happen to be so much the worse Authors for being finer Gentlemen. Their Fervency of Imagination may possibly be as strong as either the Philosopher’s or the Poet’s. But being deny’d an equal Benefit of Discharge, and with-held from the wholesom manner of Relief in private; ’tis no wonder if they appear with so much Froth and Scum in publick.
’Tis observable, that the Writers of Memoirs and Essays are chiefly subject to this frothy Distemper. Nor can it be doubted that this is the true Reason why these Gentlemen entertain the World so lavishly with what relates to themselves. For having had no opportunity of privately conversing with themselves, or exercising their own Genius, so as to make Acquaintance with it, or prove its Strength; they immediately fall to work in a wrong place, and exhibit on the Stage of the World that Practice, which they shou’d have kept to themselves; if they design’d that either they, or the World, shou’d be the better for their Moralitys. Who indeed can endure to hear an Empirick talk of his own Constitution, how he governs and manages it, what Diet agrees best with it, and what his Practice is with himself? The Proverb, no doubt, is very just, Physician cure thy-self. Yet methinks one shou’d have but an ill time, to be present at these bodily Operations. Nor is the Reader in truth any better entertain’d, when he is oblig’d to assist at the experimental Discussions of his practising Author, who all the while is in reality doing no better, than taking his Physick in publick.
Anthony Ashley Cooper, Earl of Shaftesbury, "Soliloquy: or, Advice to an Author," Characteristicks of Men, Manners, Opinions, Times, vol. 1 [1737]
December 13, 2009 1:16 PM | Comments (0)
Highway 31
Rhetoric/Anger is an Energy
Rhetoric, in the most general sense, is the energy in emotion and thought, transmitted through a system of signs, including language, to others to influence their decisions or actions.
George Kennedy, “Introduction,” Aristotle On Rhetoric
Your time has come, your second skin.
You climb so high and gain so low.
Walk through the valley.
The written word is a lie.
May the road rise with you. (4x)
I could be wrong. I could be right. (3x)
I could be black, I could be white,
I could be right, I could be wrong,
I could be black, I could be white.
They put a hotwire to my head
'cuz of the things I did and said.
They made these feelings go away,
but those feelings get in every way.
May the road rise with you. (4x)
Anger is an energy. (4x)
Rise (Public Image Ltd. song)
There was a time that I would have agreed with Kennedy that rhetoric is systematic and symbolic (semiotic). I am not so sure any more. But I wish I knew where he was drawing (in the classical world) the idea that rhetoric is an energy, and that this energy is inherent in thought and emotion.
God Bless America
Read it four times
INTERVIEWER
How much of your writing is based on personal experience?
FAULKNER
I can’t say. I never counted up. Because “how much” is not important. A writer needs three things, experience, observation, and imagination—any two of which, at times any one of which— can supply the lack of the others. With me, a story usually begins with a single idea or memory or mental picture. The writing of the story is simply a matter of working up to that moment, to explain why it happened or what it caused to follow. A writer is trying to create believable people in credible moving situations in the most moving way he can. Obviously he must use as one of his tools the environment which he knows. I would say that music is the easiest means in which to express, since it came first in man’s experience and history. But since words are my talent, I must try to express clumsily in words what the pure music would have done better. That is, music would express better and simpler, but I prefer to use words, as I prefer to read rather than listen. I prefer silence to sound, and the image produced by words occurs in silence. That is, the thunder and the music of the prose take place in silence.
INTERVIEWER
Some people say they can’t understand your writing, even after they read it two or three times. What approach would you suggest for them?
FAULKNER
Read it four times.
INTERVIEWER
You mentioned experience, observation, and imagination as being important for the writer. Would you include inspiration?
FAULKNER
I don’t know anything about inspiration because I don’t know what inspiration is —I’ve heard about it, but I never saw it.
…
INTERVIEWER
What were the kinds of work you were doing to earn that “little money now and then”?
FAULKNER
Whatever came up. I could do a little of almost anything—run boats, paint houses, fly airplanes. I never needed much money because living was cheap in New Orleans then, and all I wanted was a place to sleep, a little food, tobacco, and whiskey. There were many things I could do for two or three days and earn enough money to live on for the rest of the month. By temperament I’m a vagabond and a tramp. I don’t want money badly enough to work for it. In my opinion it’s a shame that there is so much work in the world. One of the saddest things is that the only thing a man can do for eight hours a day, day after day, is work. You can’t eat eight hours a day nor drink for eight hours a day nor make love for eight hours—all you can do for eight hours is work. Which is the reason why man makes himself and everybody else so miserable and unhappy.
The Paris Review - The Art of Fiction No. 12
