Children's Demand:
"Let us eat cake!"
Friday, May 28, 2004
Wednesday, May 26, 2004
SEVEN STARS
Regard this star
At the end of the day
Regard this star
at the beginning of the night
this star has no personal regard
except perhaps for the shepherds
this star which all the world forgets to regard
and which reflects
like a diamond in a mirror
all the beauty of the world
your star
your eyes
your hands
your light
This star reproaches me for living
As I have always lived
destroying the earth
as millions of beings live
I call them my brothers
they who bear no similarity to me
And yet I have never ceased for a single evening
to remember this star that resembles you
And yet I have never ceased for a single evening
to accept its recriminations its cries its light
It shines and throws messages
that I can barely read
but which wound me
and which are destined for me
and are my destiny alone
Philippe Soupault (trans. Kirby Olson)
Regard this star
At the end of the day
Regard this star
at the beginning of the night
this star has no personal regard
except perhaps for the shepherds
this star which all the world forgets to regard
and which reflects
like a diamond in a mirror
all the beauty of the world
your star
your eyes
your hands
your light
This star reproaches me for living
As I have always lived
destroying the earth
as millions of beings live
I call them my brothers
they who bear no similarity to me
And yet I have never ceased for a single evening
to remember this star that resembles you
And yet I have never ceased for a single evening
to accept its recriminations its cries its light
It shines and throws messages
that I can barely read
but which wound me
and which are destined for me
and are my destiny alone
Philippe Soupault (trans. Kirby Olson)
Tuesday, May 25, 2004
Thursday, May 20, 2004
What follows is a historic event comparable to the signing of the Declaration of Independence. It is the first sketch for a Lutheran Surrealist Manifesto, but it is positioned as a prolegomena to the third because Lutheran surrealism is a backwards movement that begins where it ends, and ends when it begins. When we finally publish the First Manifesto -- perhaps weeks hence -- or maybe decades later -- the early heroic part of Lutheran surrealist theory will have been built, a foundation upon which all of humanity will one day be proud to stand upon, and wonder why nobody ever thought of this before.
A Prolegomena to the Third Manifesto of Any Lutheran Surrealism Whatsoever
> >
Lutheran surrealism is today a mere phrase -- tomorrow it will be a way of life.
> >
How can this idiotic phrase leave the people of today quite cold, and yet tomorrow inspire millions towards a lunatic stability, a revolutionary passivity?
> >
Modernism believed in progress as Stalinists killed millions that were in the way of their bright ideas, and Hitlerians destroyed millions who didn't embody their Aryan ideal, and surrealists got mad at each other because they didn't smoke the same brand of cigarettes.
With Lutheran surrealism we invoke a different tradition altogether --
that in which everyone is accepted, no one is truly looked up to, and we indulge in the scurrilous scribbling of poetry without any hope of bettering either ourselves or helping our neighbors.
> >
We do not believe in yesterday, today or tomorrow, while realizing that only a mental patient can believe in eternity. We believe in all reasonableness that the conception of the New Jerusalem (we never permit ourselves to joke about a Nude Jerusalem)offers the critical
dimension -- one that is not of our making but which stands beside us in such a manner that we have almost as much hope of ever seeing it as we have of seeing our own ears without the aid of a mirror.
> >
Although we can never truly glimpse Lutheran surrealism we can see it in others -- like a doctor looking into an elderly gerbil's eyes we can see the sorrow of an eventual awakening in humanity -- an awakening like that of the gerbil who refuses any further to run upon her wheel, or to hope that with effort will come a new tomorrow.
> >
Lutheran surrealism denounces the Protestant work ethic as a fascinating fraud, and yet accepts that hard work is often less effort than lounging before a TV. We denounce the spirit of capitalism and yet accept that it's better to have too much money than none. We
denounce books, the arts, and yet we indulge in them and hope to win many prizes.
> >
Lutheran surrealism is in fact not so much an invention as it is the
discovery of a way of life that already exists or is in process of unfolding in the universal spirit. It is the discovery of a paradoxically cynical feeling that history is an error,
and that time is a waste, but that inside of time is an indescribable essence felt by all living creatures -- from the ant's antennae tapping a crumb to the lobster waltzing sideways on the ocean floor--
that something ordinary hides a reality show so tragic and so comic, so obvious & yet so hidden -- that all of our efforts amount to nothing beside it. We recognize that we cannot hurry it and cannot seduce it, but that it is coming to awaken us into a new spirit as old as the first atom (Adam).
> >
Lutheran surrealism is thus not well understood. It requires better
staffing. Presently the movement of a greying middle-aged man (even his daughter shows no interest!) it will nevertheless cow Marxists (it already has!) and open the hearts of disciples from the most unexpected quarters and become a world-wide phenomenon at least as
important as sleeping.
> >
April 1- May 1, 2004
> >
Kirby Olson
Delhi, New York >>
A Prolegomena to the Third Manifesto of Any Lutheran Surrealism Whatsoever
> >
Lutheran surrealism is today a mere phrase -- tomorrow it will be a way of life.
> >
How can this idiotic phrase leave the people of today quite cold, and yet tomorrow inspire millions towards a lunatic stability, a revolutionary passivity?
> >
Modernism believed in progress as Stalinists killed millions that were in the way of their bright ideas, and Hitlerians destroyed millions who didn't embody their Aryan ideal, and surrealists got mad at each other because they didn't smoke the same brand of cigarettes.
With Lutheran surrealism we invoke a different tradition altogether --
that in which everyone is accepted, no one is truly looked up to, and we indulge in the scurrilous scribbling of poetry without any hope of bettering either ourselves or helping our neighbors.
> >
We do not believe in yesterday, today or tomorrow, while realizing that only a mental patient can believe in eternity. We believe in all reasonableness that the conception of the New Jerusalem (we never permit ourselves to joke about a Nude Jerusalem)offers the critical
dimension -- one that is not of our making but which stands beside us in such a manner that we have almost as much hope of ever seeing it as we have of seeing our own ears without the aid of a mirror.
> >
Although we can never truly glimpse Lutheran surrealism we can see it in others -- like a doctor looking into an elderly gerbil's eyes we can see the sorrow of an eventual awakening in humanity -- an awakening like that of the gerbil who refuses any further to run upon her wheel, or to hope that with effort will come a new tomorrow.
> >
Lutheran surrealism denounces the Protestant work ethic as a fascinating fraud, and yet accepts that hard work is often less effort than lounging before a TV. We denounce the spirit of capitalism and yet accept that it's better to have too much money than none. We
denounce books, the arts, and yet we indulge in them and hope to win many prizes.
> >
Lutheran surrealism is in fact not so much an invention as it is the
discovery of a way of life that already exists or is in process of unfolding in the universal spirit. It is the discovery of a paradoxically cynical feeling that history is an error,
and that time is a waste, but that inside of time is an indescribable essence felt by all living creatures -- from the ant's antennae tapping a crumb to the lobster waltzing sideways on the ocean floor--
that something ordinary hides a reality show so tragic and so comic, so obvious & yet so hidden -- that all of our efforts amount to nothing beside it. We recognize that we cannot hurry it and cannot seduce it, but that it is coming to awaken us into a new spirit as old as the first atom (Adam).
> >
Lutheran surrealism is thus not well understood. It requires better
staffing. Presently the movement of a greying middle-aged man (even his daughter shows no interest!) it will nevertheless cow Marxists (it already has!) and open the hearts of disciples from the most unexpected quarters and become a world-wide phenomenon at least as
important as sleeping.
> >
April 1- May 1, 2004
> >
Kirby Olson
Delhi, New York >>
Monday, May 17, 2004
I owe to Ron Silliman the inspiration for starting a blog. He makes it look easy -- dashing off provocative but smart messages on a daily basis. For this he has gotten some 130,000 hits.
On the other hand I started a few weeks ago, and some days I only get one hit from my own checking the site-meter, although the average is 12.
We comfort ourselves with the idea that Le Comte de Lautreamont was hardly well-known when he died. That Rimbaud was similarly an unknown. That the Marquis de Sade died with only one published book. That Emily Dickinson's poetry was known to only a few people during her lifetime. That even Melville's great Moby Dick only sold 300 copies.
While poetry is surely social, and meant to be read, it is often written by asocial or anti-social individuals whose work is only discovered by a clique after the author's death. The wonderful account of Soupault's discovery of Lautreamont's single surviving manuscript in the Biblioteque Nationale, and its consequent copying out by hand, and subsequent republication gives us courage. There is also the account of how the surrealists sifted through a burned library to rescue the single surviving copy of Fourier's The New World of Love. These works are now widely regarded as foundational to surrealism.
Lutheran surrealism is a message in a bottle which may wait three or four hundred years to be rediscovered. But we know that finally its time will come if only we can discover for ourselves what it means. At present, we are as baffled as the next reader by this radiant discovery with which we have been entrusted by the odd hunch to yoke two words together and watch with awe as they formed legs, grew a beak, and began to dance to a tune unlike any we've ever heard outside of the listening booth at the Tacoma Aquarium where we once wept while listening to the songs of whales.
On the other hand I started a few weeks ago, and some days I only get one hit from my own checking the site-meter, although the average is 12.
We comfort ourselves with the idea that Le Comte de Lautreamont was hardly well-known when he died. That Rimbaud was similarly an unknown. That the Marquis de Sade died with only one published book. That Emily Dickinson's poetry was known to only a few people during her lifetime. That even Melville's great Moby Dick only sold 300 copies.
While poetry is surely social, and meant to be read, it is often written by asocial or anti-social individuals whose work is only discovered by a clique after the author's death. The wonderful account of Soupault's discovery of Lautreamont's single surviving manuscript in the Biblioteque Nationale, and its consequent copying out by hand, and subsequent republication gives us courage. There is also the account of how the surrealists sifted through a burned library to rescue the single surviving copy of Fourier's The New World of Love. These works are now widely regarded as foundational to surrealism.
Lutheran surrealism is a message in a bottle which may wait three or four hundred years to be rediscovered. But we know that finally its time will come if only we can discover for ourselves what it means. At present, we are as baffled as the next reader by this radiant discovery with which we have been entrusted by the odd hunch to yoke two words together and watch with awe as they formed legs, grew a beak, and began to dance to a tune unlike any we've ever heard outside of the listening booth at the Tacoma Aquarium where we once wept while listening to the songs of whales.
Sunday, May 16, 2004
Are Whales Lutheran Surrealists?
Behold the whale! -- a living cathedral of Lutheran surrealist hope. If fellowship in song is the end-point of evolution -- then these Leviathans gliding through the glassy deeps represent the perfection of nature. According to Norwegian researchers -- their songs closely imitate the structure of a Bach chorale. Unlike a Lutheran congregation, which may spend only one to six hours per week in song, congregations of whales are united in permanent harmony.
When congregations of whales meet -- their songs adjust, become more intricate, they articulate new notions. When celestial congregations concur, we Lutherans call it a synod.
With nothing to do but sing, whale congregations are not distracted by having to pay the rent, or get to some crummy job --their lives, their enormous souls, are spent in worship of Our Creator.
Melville knew this.
In Moby Dick, the Leviathan is a prophecy of the Second Coming. Either whales and man will join in a synod, or we will be seen, correctly I believe, as a collective anti-Christ and our ships, our worlds, shall be smote asunder by the mightiest of whales, a supernatural force returned to earth to protect these heavenly animals in the way that Luther raised his whale-like stout and massive form to rail before the anti-Christ at Rome.
Whales are our Lutheran surrealist brothers.
Like the surrealists and the Lutherans, they are a team devoted to the interrogation of the marvelous.
Unlike the communists, whose hypocrisy is seen in their secret hierarchy and lack of good fellowship based on their utter and dire materialism, whales and surrealists and Lutherans are united by the sheer, sudden beauty and mystery of our Universe.
When a whale dies upon our shores, alone, haggard, in apparent suicide, he is giving himself, in imitation of Christ, in order to save his brother and sister fish. Like Gandhi, the whales practice non-violent resistance, counting on our better nature to recognize them in their time of need.
As Lutherans, and as Lutheran surrealists, we should recognize these cathedrals of blubbery hope, these mounds of butter, these enlightened Falstaffs of the sea, as our deepest brothers and sisters, as our family, as indeed a synod of celestial mammal-hood, whose council we should countenance and revere.
I'm not sure about Spotted Owls.
Are they Christian in nature? Are they entitled to my aid? Their music is not as startling, their night habits mysterious, and yet I sense in my heart some strange inkling of a flaming neighborliness in these birds.
Hail whale! Hello owl!
I am proud to call myself your friend.
Behold the whale! -- a living cathedral of Lutheran surrealist hope. If fellowship in song is the end-point of evolution -- then these Leviathans gliding through the glassy deeps represent the perfection of nature. According to Norwegian researchers -- their songs closely imitate the structure of a Bach chorale. Unlike a Lutheran congregation, which may spend only one to six hours per week in song, congregations of whales are united in permanent harmony.
When congregations of whales meet -- their songs adjust, become more intricate, they articulate new notions. When celestial congregations concur, we Lutherans call it a synod.
With nothing to do but sing, whale congregations are not distracted by having to pay the rent, or get to some crummy job --their lives, their enormous souls, are spent in worship of Our Creator.
Melville knew this.
In Moby Dick, the Leviathan is a prophecy of the Second Coming. Either whales and man will join in a synod, or we will be seen, correctly I believe, as a collective anti-Christ and our ships, our worlds, shall be smote asunder by the mightiest of whales, a supernatural force returned to earth to protect these heavenly animals in the way that Luther raised his whale-like stout and massive form to rail before the anti-Christ at Rome.
Whales are our Lutheran surrealist brothers.
Like the surrealists and the Lutherans, they are a team devoted to the interrogation of the marvelous.
Unlike the communists, whose hypocrisy is seen in their secret hierarchy and lack of good fellowship based on their utter and dire materialism, whales and surrealists and Lutherans are united by the sheer, sudden beauty and mystery of our Universe.
When a whale dies upon our shores, alone, haggard, in apparent suicide, he is giving himself, in imitation of Christ, in order to save his brother and sister fish. Like Gandhi, the whales practice non-violent resistance, counting on our better nature to recognize them in their time of need.
As Lutherans, and as Lutheran surrealists, we should recognize these cathedrals of blubbery hope, these mounds of butter, these enlightened Falstaffs of the sea, as our deepest brothers and sisters, as our family, as indeed a synod of celestial mammal-hood, whose council we should countenance and revere.
I'm not sure about Spotted Owls.
Are they Christian in nature? Are they entitled to my aid? Their music is not as startling, their night habits mysterious, and yet I sense in my heart some strange inkling of a flaming neighborliness in these birds.
Hail whale! Hello owl!
I am proud to call myself your friend.
Friday, May 14, 2004
Lutheran surrealism is itself the kind of disjunctive coupling called for by Breton in the First Surrealist Manifesto. Taking up from Pierre Reverdy, Breton argues that the surrealist image is a composite of opposites, in which the "beaute de l'etincelle" that leaps between the two images is what matters. You'll have to pardon the lack of an accent here -- I have a monocultural keyboard.
"The beauty of the spark" is determined not just by the distance between the two given images.
Breton then gives the famous example of sewing machine and an umbrella on a cadaver table from Lautreamont. He also gives about ten other examples. He argues that they must arise from the unconscious, as nothing that is deliberately invented can be nearly as powerful as that which arises unbidden from the unconscious.
Lutheran surrealism began as a blague in the Exquisite Corpse cafe in Spring 2000, and it continues as a blog in the spring of 2004.
Shortly I will begin to pen my own manifestoes. I want to start with a Prolegomena to a Third, and work backwards to a cardinal or primary manifesto. At that point perhaps this project will be finished.
The leap between Lutheranism and Surrealism does, at least for me, create a beautiful spark. In the space between these two visions is the only possibility for human happiness that I can envisage. The fact that one in a sense cancels or criticizes the other, or even negates the other, is a part of this spark. It is a spark before a spontaneous combustion, an illumination. The same spark that occurs before laughter or before poetry -- a leap from one part of the mind to another -- from the limbic (surrealism) to the neo-cortex (Lutheranism), to follow the work of Robert Bly in his book on Leaping Poetry.
We hope to build a royal road between our village of Delhi, NY and the Nude Jerusalem.
"The beauty of the spark" is determined not just by the distance between the two given images.
Breton then gives the famous example of sewing machine and an umbrella on a cadaver table from Lautreamont. He also gives about ten other examples. He argues that they must arise from the unconscious, as nothing that is deliberately invented can be nearly as powerful as that which arises unbidden from the unconscious.
Lutheran surrealism began as a blague in the Exquisite Corpse cafe in Spring 2000, and it continues as a blog in the spring of 2004.
Shortly I will begin to pen my own manifestoes. I want to start with a Prolegomena to a Third, and work backwards to a cardinal or primary manifesto. At that point perhaps this project will be finished.
The leap between Lutheranism and Surrealism does, at least for me, create a beautiful spark. In the space between these two visions is the only possibility for human happiness that I can envisage. The fact that one in a sense cancels or criticizes the other, or even negates the other, is a part of this spark. It is a spark before a spontaneous combustion, an illumination. The same spark that occurs before laughter or before poetry -- a leap from one part of the mind to another -- from the limbic (surrealism) to the neo-cortex (Lutheranism), to follow the work of Robert Bly in his book on Leaping Poetry.
We hope to build a royal road between our village of Delhi, NY and the Nude Jerusalem.
Tuesday, May 11, 2004
Haiti from the Lutheran Surrealist Perspective
From the surrealist perspective Haiti has always been held in the highest esteem. Andre Breton praised the poet Magloire-St.-Aude with the highest compliments -- linking him to Mallarme, Apollinaire, and Nerval as among the most important poets of all time -- and Breton says that like the Sphinx -- Magloire St. Aude succeeds in arresting the passerby by touching on ecstacy in a higher manner than any of the French poets he names (La cle des champs 171-172, 10/18).
Breton's fascination with Haiti went deep. In the 1940's Pierre Mabille, an important member of the surrealist entourage was appointed as a diplomat to the island. Breton visited and in 1946 gave a speech that ignited a revolution that led to the ouster of President Elie Lescot. The extreme instability that this caused may have led indirectly to the rise of Papa Doc Duvalier. A brief account in English is in Helena Lewis' The Politics of Surrealism 163-164. In his Interviews Breton plays down his cardinal importance, saying that in Haiti at the time a solid day of work in the cane fields earned the worker less than one penny as a wage.
Breton praised Hector Hyppolite as one of the finest painters of the age. A self-taught Haitian painter -- Hyppolite's canvasses have steadily risen in value. Breton himself purchased five canvasses.
For a small island with a population of 7 million, and an annual income of $1300 per capita, Haiti has had more than its share of great poets and writers. They remain in obscurity.
Breton's brief essay on Magloire St. Aude quotes an entire poem "Silence," whose opening lines could be roughly translated --
Le tuf aux dents, aux chances, aux chocs auburns
Sur neuf villes.
[The fanged bedrock, chances, auburn shocks,
On nine cities.]
The rest is about as obscure. This poet's single volume remains in print in French. He often spent 24 hours walking about, to come up with two lines.
This brief encounter with Haiti's link to surrealism is the tip of an enormous history.
Another history is the Lutheran connection to Haiti. At present there are 14,000 Lutherans in Haiti. 143 congregations. 2 clinics and 61 schools.
Most of Haiti is either Catholic or Voodoo.
The population is due to double by the year 2025. The top soil is eroding at a massive rate due to poor agricultural practices. Sugar and tourism are the top sources of income. Tourism is down due to the instability on the island at present. The state department of the US counsels against any visits. Sugar cane is developed all over the island but since it is not a source of food most food has to be brought in, while coffee and sugar are export commodities.
If anything could create a lasting improvement in Haitian conditions it remains a mystery. Colin Powell has doubled the amount of Aid the country will receive this year. Most development money is siphoned off by corruption and every possible "order" -- family, education, religious life, government, is failing.
What Haiti needs short of the Second Coming is a Martin Luther. The conditions in Haiti are similar to the conditions of Wittenberg before Luther's rise (Haiti is at least 500 years behind the west). Other than that, the only real hope a Haitian has is the open sea -- to try to get to a place with a functioning superstructure. Brooklyn and Miami house the two largest Haitian communities in America.
What is not needed in Haiti is the endless revolution of surrealism. What is needed is a strengthening of existing institutions and a moral clarification on the part of the leaders having to do with their responsibility to the country as a whole rather than to their own faction. The idea of a loyal opposition and a dynamic politics of tension, an honest and secure police force. But in Haiti almost every attempt at an improvement causes further erosion. The only thing that's right in Haiti is the surrealistic imagination.
From the surrealist perspective Haiti has always been held in the highest esteem. Andre Breton praised the poet Magloire-St.-Aude with the highest compliments -- linking him to Mallarme, Apollinaire, and Nerval as among the most important poets of all time -- and Breton says that like the Sphinx -- Magloire St. Aude succeeds in arresting the passerby by touching on ecstacy in a higher manner than any of the French poets he names (La cle des champs 171-172, 10/18).
Breton's fascination with Haiti went deep. In the 1940's Pierre Mabille, an important member of the surrealist entourage was appointed as a diplomat to the island. Breton visited and in 1946 gave a speech that ignited a revolution that led to the ouster of President Elie Lescot. The extreme instability that this caused may have led indirectly to the rise of Papa Doc Duvalier. A brief account in English is in Helena Lewis' The Politics of Surrealism 163-164. In his Interviews Breton plays down his cardinal importance, saying that in Haiti at the time a solid day of work in the cane fields earned the worker less than one penny as a wage.
Breton praised Hector Hyppolite as one of the finest painters of the age. A self-taught Haitian painter -- Hyppolite's canvasses have steadily risen in value. Breton himself purchased five canvasses.
For a small island with a population of 7 million, and an annual income of $1300 per capita, Haiti has had more than its share of great poets and writers. They remain in obscurity.
Breton's brief essay on Magloire St. Aude quotes an entire poem "Silence," whose opening lines could be roughly translated --
Le tuf aux dents, aux chances, aux chocs auburns
Sur neuf villes.
[The fanged bedrock, chances, auburn shocks,
On nine cities.]
The rest is about as obscure. This poet's single volume remains in print in French. He often spent 24 hours walking about, to come up with two lines.
This brief encounter with Haiti's link to surrealism is the tip of an enormous history.
Another history is the Lutheran connection to Haiti. At present there are 14,000 Lutherans in Haiti. 143 congregations. 2 clinics and 61 schools.
Most of Haiti is either Catholic or Voodoo.
The population is due to double by the year 2025. The top soil is eroding at a massive rate due to poor agricultural practices. Sugar and tourism are the top sources of income. Tourism is down due to the instability on the island at present. The state department of the US counsels against any visits. Sugar cane is developed all over the island but since it is not a source of food most food has to be brought in, while coffee and sugar are export commodities.
If anything could create a lasting improvement in Haitian conditions it remains a mystery. Colin Powell has doubled the amount of Aid the country will receive this year. Most development money is siphoned off by corruption and every possible "order" -- family, education, religious life, government, is failing.
What Haiti needs short of the Second Coming is a Martin Luther. The conditions in Haiti are similar to the conditions of Wittenberg before Luther's rise (Haiti is at least 500 years behind the west). Other than that, the only real hope a Haitian has is the open sea -- to try to get to a place with a functioning superstructure. Brooklyn and Miami house the two largest Haitian communities in America.
What is not needed in Haiti is the endless revolution of surrealism. What is needed is a strengthening of existing institutions and a moral clarification on the part of the leaders having to do with their responsibility to the country as a whole rather than to their own faction. The idea of a loyal opposition and a dynamic politics of tension, an honest and secure police force. But in Haiti almost every attempt at an improvement causes further erosion. The only thing that's right in Haiti is the surrealistic imagination.
Sunday, May 09, 2004
From our own perspective, others always appear to be cases of arrested development, since to ourselves, we always seem to be the apex of Creation.
Thus for Monsieur Breton, the leader of surrealism, Herr Luther, the leader of the Protestant Reformation, would seem to be a throwback to a time when the volk believed in the irrelevancy of a transcendent God. On the other hand, to Luther, Breton would appear to be mired in impiety, perversion, and bad taste.
They were both friends of great painters. Luther's close friends included Albrecht Durer and Lucas Cranach. Breton's close friends included Wilfredo Lam, Max Ernst, and Salvador Dali and Juan Miro.
To us they both seem admirable.
Compare contemporary American academia which is based on doubt rather than faith. I wonder to what extent our art can compare.
I think of the academic satires that have sprouted at the expense of the stunted development that the American higher education system fosters.
It begins or reaches it nadir (also its apex) in the personage of Nabokov's Humbert Humbert? What other novels delineate the American academy?
Some other novels about American education that we've enjoyed --
Straight Man, by Richard Russo.
Home, by Hazard Adams.
I haven't read Murder at the MLA, but should. I feel certain that there are a huge number of novels in this category welling in the minds of the masses of TA's, Assistant Profs, and so on who populate our approximately 4000 colleges and universities across this great land.
Among those 4000 universities are 42 Lutheran colleges, most of which have no longer any genuine relationship to Lutheranism whatsoever.
Insofar as I know there are no surrealist colleges in this country.
The Lutheran surrealist universities of the future -- what will they be like? What satires will be written of them?
Thus for Monsieur Breton, the leader of surrealism, Herr Luther, the leader of the Protestant Reformation, would seem to be a throwback to a time when the volk believed in the irrelevancy of a transcendent God. On the other hand, to Luther, Breton would appear to be mired in impiety, perversion, and bad taste.
They were both friends of great painters. Luther's close friends included Albrecht Durer and Lucas Cranach. Breton's close friends included Wilfredo Lam, Max Ernst, and Salvador Dali and Juan Miro.
To us they both seem admirable.
Compare contemporary American academia which is based on doubt rather than faith. I wonder to what extent our art can compare.
I think of the academic satires that have sprouted at the expense of the stunted development that the American higher education system fosters.
It begins or reaches it nadir (also its apex) in the personage of Nabokov's Humbert Humbert? What other novels delineate the American academy?
Some other novels about American education that we've enjoyed --
Straight Man, by Richard Russo.
Home, by Hazard Adams.
I haven't read Murder at the MLA, but should. I feel certain that there are a huge number of novels in this category welling in the minds of the masses of TA's, Assistant Profs, and so on who populate our approximately 4000 colleges and universities across this great land.
Among those 4000 universities are 42 Lutheran colleges, most of which have no longer any genuine relationship to Lutheranism whatsoever.
Insofar as I know there are no surrealist colleges in this country.
The Lutheran surrealist universities of the future -- what will they be like? What satires will be written of them?
Wednesday, May 05, 2004
So what kind of a program is Lutheran Surrealism? One would assume that it comes out of the avant-gardes of the last five centuries and tries to change the world.
What is it that writing does? One has the assumption with avant-garde writing that it encourages us to improve ourselves in some ways.
So, reading it, encourages us to be more like the writer?
Reading Hemingway or Pound or Marianne Moore, then, I would become more like one of these people? Does the world need everyone to become more like Gertrude Stein, or Ezra Pound, or Marianne Moore? Should people try to be more like Wallace Stevens? Would it be a good thing to have a billion people who thought and acted like Wallace Stevens?
I can't think of anybody that the world really needs two of at this point.
I don't even think the world needs two Jesus Christs. If the world did need two Christs, why then did we only get one?
Many people within Christianity would like to be more like Christ. So they fake it, too often. We are not Christ, so can we be more like him? Really?
Lutheran surrealism comes not to bring joy or good news of some kind. It comes only to remind us of our limits. It says, go ahead and enjoy the colors of the rainbow, but don't think you can add to them. It says, yes, pay your taxes and try to live a long and productive life, but don't try to remake the world in your image.
It is hard to say what Lutheran surrealism does. We are post-Utopian. We are also anti-Utopian. What does take place will take place without our doing anything if it is to take place. Or not.
Unlike our distinguished competitors among the Democrats and Republicans, Lutheran surrealism offers to do absolutely nothing for everybody and anybody. Lutheran surrealism, if you elect our slate of candidates, will stand confused upon all issues, twirling like a top, and finally do nothing whatsoever but talk about Lutheran surrealism.
That's what Lutheran surrealism is: Lutheran surrealism is the discovery of what is Lutheran surrealism. Nothing more, and nothing less.
What is it that writing does? One has the assumption with avant-garde writing that it encourages us to improve ourselves in some ways.
So, reading it, encourages us to be more like the writer?
Reading Hemingway or Pound or Marianne Moore, then, I would become more like one of these people? Does the world need everyone to become more like Gertrude Stein, or Ezra Pound, or Marianne Moore? Should people try to be more like Wallace Stevens? Would it be a good thing to have a billion people who thought and acted like Wallace Stevens?
I can't think of anybody that the world really needs two of at this point.
I don't even think the world needs two Jesus Christs. If the world did need two Christs, why then did we only get one?
Many people within Christianity would like to be more like Christ. So they fake it, too often. We are not Christ, so can we be more like him? Really?
Lutheran surrealism comes not to bring joy or good news of some kind. It comes only to remind us of our limits. It says, go ahead and enjoy the colors of the rainbow, but don't think you can add to them. It says, yes, pay your taxes and try to live a long and productive life, but don't try to remake the world in your image.
It is hard to say what Lutheran surrealism does. We are post-Utopian. We are also anti-Utopian. What does take place will take place without our doing anything if it is to take place. Or not.
Unlike our distinguished competitors among the Democrats and Republicans, Lutheran surrealism offers to do absolutely nothing for everybody and anybody. Lutheran surrealism, if you elect our slate of candidates, will stand confused upon all issues, twirling like a top, and finally do nothing whatsoever but talk about Lutheran surrealism.
That's what Lutheran surrealism is: Lutheran surrealism is the discovery of what is Lutheran surrealism. Nothing more, and nothing less.
Monday, May 03, 2004
Several readers have suggested that if I am going to go on and on about the Lutheran symbol, then I should print one in my blog. This is beyond my present technical capabilities, but I can provide two links. I usually screw up links, but one of these two might work.
http://www.lcms.org/pages/internal.asp?NavlD=2558
http://www.ourredeemerlcms.org/luthcoat.htm
Please note that it was designed by Luther himself.
If you can't get one of the links to open, then you can always try Google, and put in parentheses "The Luther Rose," and you should get about 365 different links to open, any one of which will show you the fabulous symbol.
http://www.lcms.org/pages/internal.asp?NavlD=2558
http://www.ourredeemerlcms.org/luthcoat.htm
Please note that it was designed by Luther himself.
If you can't get one of the links to open, then you can always try Google, and put in parentheses "The Luther Rose," and you should get about 365 different links to open, any one of which will show you the fabulous symbol.
Sunday, May 02, 2004
About a week ago we discussed the case of three youths who are responsible for taking down the Lutheran sign and symbol at our church, in addition to stealing a stop sign and a gnome.
As it turns out the youthful offenders will pay for a new sign (I'm sure the artist will be happy to be paid twice), and give financial restitution for the stop sign and the gnome.
The symbol of the Lutheran church -- a black cross on a bed of roses -- was drawn up by Luther himself. The meaning of the symbolism is lost somewhat. My pastor did say he had once read of the background for the symbol, but couldn't recall it.
Crime and punishment in Delhi. People work things out, money is exchanged, and the court is left out of the proceedings so that these young people will not have permanent records.
I had hoped for a court trial so as to be able to get all the details, but for the sake of these young aficionados of the symbol, it is just as well that they go on to college and get Ph.D.s in Semiotics.
As it turns out the youthful offenders will pay for a new sign (I'm sure the artist will be happy to be paid twice), and give financial restitution for the stop sign and the gnome.
The symbol of the Lutheran church -- a black cross on a bed of roses -- was drawn up by Luther himself. The meaning of the symbolism is lost somewhat. My pastor did say he had once read of the background for the symbol, but couldn't recall it.
Crime and punishment in Delhi. People work things out, money is exchanged, and the court is left out of the proceedings so that these young people will not have permanent records.
I had hoped for a court trial so as to be able to get all the details, but for the sake of these young aficionados of the symbol, it is just as well that they go on to college and get Ph.D.s in Semiotics.
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